Bill Meyer Show Podcast - Sponsored by Clouser Drilling www.ClouserDrilling.com - 10-17-25_FRIDAY_7AM

Episode Date: October 17, 2025

10-17-25_FRIDAY_7AM

The Bill Myers Show podcast is sponsored by Klausur drilling. They've been leading the way in southern Oregon well drilling for over 50 years. Find out more about them at Klausordrilling.com. Mr. Outdoors is here, Greg Roberts at Roveweather.com. Outdoor report is sponsored by Oregon Truck and Auto Authority, Airway Drive in Medford. And, of course, we're honoring the passing of Ace Freeland. That's the one you wanted to start with, Greg.

I know you are like the biggest KISS fan that I have ever known next to Ron Boutwell who ended up passing away a couple of years ago went to his funeral great guy, interesting fellow without any question and I was going to mention your former wingman

here at some point and I see that you went with the first for Ace that was his first lead vocal within KISS. He was the lead guitarist. He contributed backing vocals but shocked me was the first time on an album, we got to hear Ace do a lead. And, of course,

for the rest of his time in Kiss, you definitely heard more and more of that. And then, of course, they released their four solo albums simultaneously underneath the Kiss banner. And, you know, for as much as Ace meant to me as every member of that band did, the Catman, Peter Chris, was absolutely my personal favorite. He's the guy who got me behind a drum kit, you know, and so when the solo albums were released, I went after Peters first, and I listened to it and went, oh, wow, what? I didn't think any of the solo albums were particularly good, though, do you? Yeah, and Gene's was kind of all over the map.

He ended the album singing When You Wish Upon a Star, and I'm like, okay, what is he doing? Pulse wasn't bad. Well, the thing is, of all the members... Paises was amazing. And, of course, back in the New York group became a monster hit, but there wasn't a bad song on that album. It blew my mind how good it was, and it immediately elevated him into my second favorite member of the band

behind the Catman, because you never replaced the Catman. And, you know, he went on to have a pretty good solo career. The biggest thing he did in terms of his solo career outside of Kiss was a song called Rock Soldiers. And it's a big anthemic kind of, you know, rock and roll all night kind of big rock anthem. And Ace, you know, admittedly, he kind of was his own worst enemy. You know, he and Peter both, their addictions, worked them out of the band because Kiss was really funny. On the one hand, you'd have two guys who were going to live that rock and roll life as hard as they possibly could. And then you had two other guys who were total teetotolers and all about business.

Yeah, that would be Gene and Paul, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, no, and it's funny because, you know, you listen to their live albums or you'd go see them live, and Paul's talking and acting like he's living the rock and roll party lifestyle and jeans up there singing cold gin, and neither one of them ever did, quote, unquote, the rock and roll lifestyle, except obviously, well, you know, sex drugs and rock and roll, well, they definitely did the first part of it. Yeah, they definitely have legendary, yeah, legendary.

My favorite of the four actually was Paul Stanley. I just thought that as a rock, that he was actually an underrated. and a great rock singer. I thought he did a great job singing, wonderful singing. I don't know about being underrated because I hear a lot of people talk about him as a singer and a frontman, where I do think he was savagely underrated, was as a guitar player, as a rhythm guitarist, because you're listening to what they're doing, and whether it was Ace or whether it was Bruce Kulik or Tommy, you know, some great guitar players.

they've had in that band, you start listening to what the rhythm guitar is doing, and Paul, I don't think Paul's ever gotten his due as a player of guitar. He was way better than people thought. Yeah, but the point being that the takeaway from Ace's, from Ace Freely's death, though, is that falling is no joke. And I know you laugh about it, you know, the old commercials, I've fallen and I can't get up, you know, all that kind of stuff. When you fall as a little kid, it's usually not that big of a deal, you're closer to the ground,

you tend to fall forward like you had just mentioned in other things. Falling as an adult is a big deal, and especially as an older adult with balance issues possibly coming in, and he died of a brain bleed from that. That's what it was, ultimately, right? And that's exactly what it was. And the sad part is when those things become severe, I don't care who you are, I don't care how much money you have or how great the doctors are attending to you, when they reach a severity level like Ace had, who you are doesn't matter.

Reality and biology takes over at that point, and we're pretty fragile things as humans in reality, regardless of shape or whatever. there are just certain things that is no respecter of your status of who you might be and you're going to die from it. And Ace sadly is an example of that. I brought up Jeff Schifrin, Michaela Schifrin's father. Same exact thing. You know, it's sad and it happens. And this is why Falls are the leading cause of injury-related death for people 65 and over. They just, they are. All right, but anyway, hats off to Ace for a great time while it lasted, as always, okay? Why don't we, before we run out of daylight here, what are we looking at here in the outdoor report,

getting out there, maybe getting your buck or whatever it is if you're thinking about doing that over the next few days? How do you see it there, Greg? I tell you what, you know, we've got, you know, sun and clear skies right now, which doesn't always lead to great hunting. We're going to have some showers moving in tomorrow. night and into Sunday morning, then we get a little bit of a break, and then the storm door really opens up, and it stays open for the rest of the deer season, and then going in to the elk season. We're looking at a lot of rain, a lot of high-elevation snow above

5,000 feet, and we're also going to be seeing really windy conditions. Those kind of things get the deer active during the day, get them moving around, and these kind of conditions, especially if you're up there closer to the 5,000 foot level, say 4,000 to 5,000 feet, anyway, right up there around the snow line, where the snow's happening, deer are definitely also going to go into both pre-rut and then rut activity the way it looks before the end of the season. So here's what happens. It's well noted.

The bucks drop their guard, if you will, about exposing themselves to humans because they're on the search for dose. And they start doing things you wouldn't typically otherwise see them do. So, yeah, it's going to be really wet. It's going to be really snowy. But if you dress and you're prepared for the conditions, being out there, you may see more dear than you've ever seen. and definitely have much better chances to take a buck with those type of conditions happening. I'm going to ask you a totally personal question here about my situation. A couple of weeks from now, Linda and I were going to be going over to the Hot Springs in Cedarville.

And I don't know. Should I cancel that trip and maybe plan differently? I would share people look at things. If I remember, you guys were going to be heading over there in about another couple weeks around Halloween. Yeah, Halloween Day we were going to head out there, and I don't know. Well, yeah, your issue is you have to go above 5,000 feet to get there regardless, whether you drop clear down to the south, go through Redding, then take 299 out. You still got to go over Cedar Pass, and that's over 5,000 feet.

So likely to be very snowy. You can't approach it from the north without getting over 5,000 feet, like coming out of Klamath or Lakeview. So honestly, I think it's definitely one of those that either you wait and watch and cancel at the last minute or you just decide, well, unfortunately, there's very good agreement regardless of the source that we're going to see really big-time heavy snows hitting. So maybe we'll go do something else, like go to the coast and watch the big waves. That's kind of what I was thinking.

I was going to take it. This was going to be our anniversary trip, even though the anniversary was a little earlier this month there. But I know there was one time that I was a little concerned, though. The room that we like going there is very difficult, the book, and it was only available late October. And I'm thinking, boy, you know, that's kind of right on that knife's edge when it starts getting sporty over there. Yeah, and then it's like, you know, you decide, okay, we're going to do this. And, gee, Murphy's Law. You know, here it comes, naturally.

Just when we're finally going to be able to do this, maybe a real adventure getting there. And I forget, once you're there, pardon, once you're there, I forget what the elevation is there. Oh, elevation, I think even down there is like about three or four thousand feet, even down there in the valley, right? Well, if it's that, then maybe not. But definitely the mountains trying to get in there for sure.

Yeah, yeah, okay. Well, I'll talk with Linda about it. We might change you. It might turn into a coastal trip instead. We'll see. Okay. All right. Because I don't think there's ever going to be a problem getting to the coast like that, like going over to Cedarville. It shouldn't be. Again, we're talking expected snow levels around 5,000 feet, and you get into burst to heavier precipitation, may get it as low as 4,000. But we haven't got any of the coastal routes anywhere close to that elevation. So, yeah, the coast would probably be the best option, but a lot of rain, a lot of wind. But on the other hand, you get over there and you're probably going to have a very good show from the big storm-generated waves come rolling in. All right. Good stuff there. Hey, anything else as far as, you know, outdoor activity here over the next few days,

is rain going to be, or I'm sorry, fish going to be, you know, biting or not, do you think, over the next few days? I would say probably pretty good chance they're going to be biting through the weekend, but when that storm activity hits, yeah, the fish will probably shut it down and turn dormant and just go down, get below whatever wind action is stirring up the surface of the lake or whatever and rested out. If we're talking about creeks and rivers and, you know, that type of fishing, definitely expecting those to get blown out and get really colored up. So, yeah, take advantage of this weekend if you're an angler, because once we get beyond this, I can't promise you any kind of good

fishing opportunity, whether we're talking about the lakes or the rivers or creeks. All right, very good. Mr. Outdoors, Greg, rogweather.com. Rogueweather.com. Greg, I always appreciate you coming on here for the Outdoor Report. And if anything really big breaks, and gosh, we'll see you next Friday, okay? Yeah, for sure. And once again, Rip Ace, just happy for all the memories, thrilled now, but I got the chance to see them at the height of their power on the Destroyer tour at the Oakland, California stop.

You know, this is funny, I bought a T-shirt at that thing. One of those baseball, you know, the colored sleeves, the white center, and the Big Destroyer logo in it, and it had black. arms on it, wore that thing until it was tattered. Of course. I found out about your former wingman and what he used to do for Kiss and knew he had the silk, he had the silk screens to make that exact shirt. And I begged him, and I begged him.

And what I learned about Ron Matthews, in reality, Ron Boutwell, he was a man of his word. He promised Gene and Paul he would never, under any circumstance, do an unauthorized run of that. Of that shirt, yeah. Even for me. Yeah, the stories he would tell me about the interactions with the kiss crew just used to crack me up. And he and I were doing mornings on KBOY. Gosh, that must be, man, that's like 34 years ago now. I'm feeling really, really, uh, KB-O-Y and then KZ-Z-E.

Yeah, I know. It's like I'm feeling, and of course, I'm still on KZ-Z-E, now it's K-G-E. MD. But yeah, exactly. You're on that signal. Yeah, that being said, I remember he was telling me about the deal in which, uh, in which Gene was asking for. Okay, what other business ideas do you have? Well, it's this crazy idea about putting your blood, putting all of you guys' blood into the printers ink and printing Kiss comic strips. But I, I said no. You know, I thought that was just too crazy. And then Gene set him aside and said, listen, you know, you don't, ever not bring an idea. In other words, yelling at him to say, you make sure and bring

all the money-making ideas there because they didn't think it was going to last for a long time. They really didn't think, so you're going to make money while the sunshine, so to speak. Okay. Here's the difference. The circumstance is kind of right where Gene told him, don't you ever turn down an opportunity, but I didn't remember it was the blood in the comic, which they did. This is the one I remember. Oh, is it the condom? said we get to the end of the merch meeting, and Gene goes, is there anything else? And Ron says, well, there's this one thing. Gene goes, what was it? And he goes, this company approached us about making a kiss condom. And I'm like, are you freaking kidding me? And he said, Gene got right up out of his chair roast a full height. And Gene's a really tall dude. And he said, he got right in my face. And he said, you, a hole, you call them back right now and tell them we'll take every one of those things. they can make.

Yeah, I think you're right. I think I conflated. A lecture about, don't ever, you know, not tell us about an opportunity. Yeah, I think you're right. I think you're right, and I was wrong on that. I conflated the blood in the red ink to the condom story. But I remember Gene was like, whatever you're making money, we want to know about it, right? Give us all the ideas, right?

And then Ron said, and of course, naturally the biggest selling thing for merchandise on that tour was the kiss condom. Amazing time. What can we say? Thanks, Greg. Take care. Have a great weekend. All right. We'll see you next time. You too, Bill. Greg Roberts, rogueweather.com. 729. Stephen Westfall roofing is growing.

Now proud... News Talk 1063. KM.E.D. You're waking up with the Bill Myers Show. 732. We'll have news coming up. Scott's an Eagle Point. Scott, you are a professional driver. So you kind of wanted to add on to what Greg was talking. about when it comes to the past weather conditions here coming up. And what say you today, huh?

Yeah, well, correct. The challenge is that when you're up there, you're dealing with elements and people die from exposure. Definitely bring lots of water in your car. Keep warm. Bring washerflow. The best washer flu that I have found over the years has been Rainex. RainX is an incredible product year-round.

and a must, and keep up on all your fluid. Now, do you like the Rain X? Because I know the Rain X spray actually has a little bit of acetone in it. Does the actual washer fluid have acetone in it, or is it only just the spray stuff that you put on the windshield? Yeah, I'm not familiar with that, but web-on stuff is good, too. I used it when I rode race stuff in Portland on the anti-car track up there. back in the 90s. That's a good product, too.

Yeah, you're absolutely right, though, that the carrying of water and the ability to stay warm, maybe alternative communications, and, you know, getting stuck up in a past-level area in the middle of the winter around here is not a, it's not something to joke about. You would know that. Right. Right. I mean, this, it changes so rapidly. You know, whether in southern Oregon, we have these microcells, which Greg has gotten into, and I'm sure the people have experienced, especially hunting this time of the year. So, you know, be able to, you can have fires again right now. So be extra careful with your fire pit, bring a bucket, a shovel.

And, boy, just keeping warm up there. Think about big jacket. Yep, you got it. Scott, appreciate the suggestion from a professional driver, all right, be well. And let me grab one here. Brian Weldon, you want to talk about No Kings this weekend. By the way, it is No Kings, too, and it's totally, totally grassroots. You know that.

Yeah. Yeah. No dark money web of interest that is trying to do anything. It's just completely natural, just sprung out of the, well, the ooze again. Anyway, but what are you thinking, huh? Yeah, right. I just wanted, most people aren't aware of this, but if folks would just go on Facebook or any other media, and look up Rogue Indivisible Group or Rogue Revolt, you'll see that these

people are very organized in this No King's Rally. Matt Spurlock is the District 2 leader in Grants Pass. There's 16 districts across Oregon. They're funded by George Soros. They're holding open every single day of the week. these no signature, or these commissioners recall booths all over town here, these people are extremely corrupt, funded by George Soros, over a million dollars in the state of Oregon. If you really want to help out Graspaster, Josephine County, join Jeremy Ford and go up to Devil Slide and help

clean up the trash from all the homeless, and don't attend the No King's Rally at the courthouse. All right. By the way, I would avoid engaging. Okay? Yeah. All right. And the only reason I bring this up is that there are a lot of people there, I think,

that are sporting for a fight and would love to be able to say, see, see, you know, that kind of thing, just saying. So I would just. Yeah, and then the news will record it all and we'll look bad. Yeah, exactly. It's kind of the way to look at it, too. I appreciate the call, Brian. Thanks for making it.

736. We'll catch up on the rest of the news here in just a moment. And we have Brad Hicks, who's in town. And you're in studio, I should say, of course, he's in town. We always know about that. But running for state senate, I think it is one of the most positive political developments that I've heard for a long, long time. It's kind of like, yeah, the Obi-Wan of politics, helping Obi-Wan, you're our only hope. I'm just kidding, but we'll have a little fun with you. We're in trouble. But still, in all seriousness, We'll talk about the announcement and where the race is going next. An intelligent solution is influenced by timing.

This is Randall at Advanced Air. It is rebate. Fast grills at besthot grill.com. Hi, I'm Steven with Stephen Westwell Riffin'ink. And I'm on KMED. Brad Hicks is running for State Senate District 3, currently occupied by Senator Golden. And he is, well, he made his big announcement yesterday. He had, what is that, 100, 150 people, I would say?

About 100,000, I think. 100,000. Oh, so you're a Democrat that is counting the crowd. Okay, got it. I texted a couple of friends last time. I said, you know, usually 12, 15 people show up to these things. I said it was really great to have about 100,000 people there. No, but still, it was great seeing everybody, you know, everyone from state senator, Bruce Stark was there.

We had, you know, Rick, Rick Dyer, Commissioner Rick Dyer there. And we had all sorts of... Perry Atkinson ended up doing the introductions in the invocation here, Kim Wallen, and who else am I forgetting here? I know I'm forgetting some other people, but a lot of former state senator Alan DeBoer. Yeah, he was right behind you. Oh, was he? Yeah.

I guess a lot of stuff was going on behind me, and I didn't know about it. Yeah. Well, see, he's funny because he has a particular, if you remember him when he was mayor of Ashland. Yeah. You would always have some of the more colorful issues come up before. before Alan DeBoer, Mayor DeBoer at that time. I think they saved him for him. Yeah, and I was always amazed at how poker-faced.

He was able to stay with some of the most crazy things being brought before the city council. I always admired him. He's one of the most calm, and I've known Alan for a long, long time. He's one of the most calm, level-headed, practical guys I know. Yeah, I always enjoy you. And he calls in the show every day on that, too. we always appreciate his input. I wanted to get with you, though, and talk about this race. It kind of was a little mention out there, and some people jumped on your filing for running for

State Senate. And now I made it official, and you bring out that everyone's waving the pom-poms and the Hicks for State Senate, that kind of thing. And why are, where you going here? Because your name has been tossed around for, I would say, 20 years at least, as a suggestion for, there I would say, someone that could really be a, I have to call it a kind of a common sense, moderate voice, you know, out there that could actually work really well in the third district. Yeah. Well, I appreciate that, and it's true.

I, you know, I joked a little bit yesterday that it was probably 30-ish years ago when Congressman Bob Smith walked into the chamber. I'd just start working there. you're like a 28 year old right i was i was i was exactly 28 and i had just turned 28 and uh just got my job at the chamber i was thrilled i was you know i was excited to be home in southern oregon and work at the chamber and bob walked in who was kind of a surrogate dad to me and his you know two boys or two of my best friends and and he said bradley you're going to run for elton johnson's seat he didn't ask you to do anything he told you to do things that's you know

I was like, okay. But I thought, oh, gosh, I haven't done anything. I haven't accomplished anything, right? Like, I should be a husband and a dad and own a business or run a company. And I hadn't done any of those things at that point. So I always felt like I wouldn't have voted for me then or somebody like me. So I got to do some stuff. So over the last, you know, 30 years, I've been doing some stuff.

And I guess it's. And you're tired from doing that stuff. you know, at least semi-retired. Now, you're still on the board of the chamber, right? No. No? Never have been on the board of the chamber. I thought you were.

No, no. Okay. I don't know if I could get elected to that, so that's why I thought, no, I'm kidding. No, even as the CEO of the chamber, I was not a voting member of the board. Okay. And that's the way it ought to be, right? My job is to go out and make sure that the member's goals and objectives get accomplished. sometimes even if I don't personally like that or if I wouldn't have voted that way as a board member

at the end of the day you have a choice as the president and CEO the member said it's what I want is where I want to go you go make it happen so why do you want to do it now why do I want to do it now that's probably still a very good question there's no getting around the fact I've always cared about this place the state the process right i still uh i still want to believe in our system you know here in the state and nationally so all those things are intact um but i don't like where it's headed i haven't liked where it's headed for a long time and you bang your head against that wall and keeps getting bloodied and all that stuff and you know there was a time like when i retired thinking, I don't know, maybe, maybe I should be looking at Florida and Arizona and Texas

where I might be less frustrated, but the other thing is that you're hearing from, from people who have lived in Oregon for a long, long time, especially business people. I could think of the Travis Borsmans of the world that have kind of, that have looked at the state of Oregon and just said, hey, I'm out of here. And they're not only taking money out, but they're taking business opportunity out with them and everything else. And it's, it's, it's, uh, existential situation we have going on. So you think about the tentacles of what you just said because I commented about Travis. I grew up with Travis and Grant's Pass and I read.

Did you play football together or something like that? No, he was kind of a skateboard dude. Yeah, I kind of think of it. That makes sense. Exactly. Dutch pros. Yeah. Yeah.

I played football, but I don't remember Trav playing football. But I was working in the legislature. I think I was the year or session I was an intern. Came home for Christmas and I drove through downtown on my way to my grandparents and there was a pile of teenagers in the old Mayflower grocery store parking lot, which I think they own now. But I saw like this thing. It looked like a shack. It was like two by four and plywood and plastic and all these teenagers hanging out there in the dark. So I got home and were in my grandparents' house and I said, what's going on at the grocery store in the parking lot?

And my dad said, oh, Travis and Dane got this coffee thing going on. And I don't know. Boy, if you only knew. Oh, you have no idea because Travis at one point kept saying, you should, you know, franchise or open up the store in Colorado. And I didn't want to go to Colorado. And the worst part is I remember what I said to him and others that were involved. I said, you know, only truck drivers and old people drink coffee.

Like, why would I want to do that? Like, this is going to fizzle out. Yeah. I was wrong. Okay. So, you know, you don't want me to be your stock analyst, but maybe your state senator. By Microsoft on the first day that it's opening up there? Why initial public offering? Why would you do a stupid thing like that? This computer thing. It's a passing phase. But still, you look at the brain drain, I guess, or the leaking of Oregon's, you know, economy. I mean, that's really what it is. It's like a slow leak, isn't it? We have been sort of like the frogs in the pot of water, right, over a long period of time.

So it's not like we woke up one day and suddenly realized Oregon was a bad place in which to do business or a whole lot of other things. Have your child go to public schools, right? It's been happening for a long time. And I guess when I retired, I'd kind of gotten to that point where I was frustrated. I felt like a henny penny. I'd been running around for 30 years saying the sky. guy is falling. This is what's coming. It's going to be bad for business. It's going to be bad for kids. It's going to be. And not really making a lot of progress. And maybe now with, you know,

four years of semi-retirement under my belt, I'm refreshed and recharged and ready to jump back in and fight those fights from a different angle. Yeah. Yeah. The political angle where a lot of the problems sprung from, really. There's no way of putting it. That is the wellspring. And you take, you know, Now, we don't know if Senator Golden is going to run for re-election at this point, do we? No. The only information that I have heard seen in print was in the Grants Pass Daily Courier article in which the reporter who interviewed me asked him. He said he was going to decide January 1st. That's the only thing I know to be true.

I've heard people say, oh, I'm certain he's going to do it. I've heard people say, there's no way he's going to do it. I don't know. And like I said to one of the other newspaper reporters, I can't control any of that. All I know is I'm doing it. And I'm doing it. I intend to win. I'm excited about it.

I think you saw yesterday the enthusiasm around it. And I have to say, because I got cut off. I don't know if you knew this. But at the end, we were told that you saw my wife come up. And abruptly interrupt me. Yeah, RCC told you to shut her down. Shut her down. Okay.

Yeah. Huh. And I think it was because we might have been blocking some stairs. Yeah, but weren't you also one of the people that ended up helping get that RCC building built at some point, if I recall. It's probably better for you to say that than for me to say that because it sounds like I'm saying, don't you know, I built this building. Don't you know who I am. Yeah, I didn't. I don't say that.

And, of course, I don't have. because a lot of people, a lot of people got that building built and raised the money and all that stuff. But, yeah, I was pretty involved in it and feel like I've done a lot over the years for my alma mater. In fact, my very first session in the legislature as a staff person and intern, 1987, I worked inside the building to start the process to change the name from Southern Oregon State College. which is what it was called when I was there to Southern Oregon University and my buddies joked that that was just because I wanted SOU, Southern Oregon University on my diploma

when I finally graduated instead of Southern Oregon State College but I thought it was the right thing they had the right classes and programs to you know and it has worked out relatively well so this battle this election coming up one way or the other third district is an interesting district Senate district And last time we checked here, I'm thinking of there is maybe a 7,000 Democrat versus Republican advantage. But you have a big bunch of non-affiliatings and independents in the middle there too. But 7,000, I don't think is, I think that's workable.

I think that's something, especially right now because this is about, I mean, really, you're talking about not lefty or righty. You're talking about quality of life, really, from what I could tell yesterday. Yeah. And so I look at that and I say, that's kind of good news, right? You've got, I hope I have these numbers right. I think it's about 59,000 NAVs or non-affiliated voters. Yeah. So you got, you know, about 42,000 Ds and 48 or 9,000 R's. And again, I could be off. So if somebody knows those exact numbers, share them. But something like that. What that tells me is you got this huge block of people out there. who are a little bit upset with both sides, right? Kind of tired of this, kind of tired of that. And honestly, Senator Goldham set himself on fire with the, no pun intended, with the wildfire map. It was kind of like here, I'm just going to sit up here and, you know, throw darts at me.

Well, that was maybe my favorite thing about the announcement yesterday. And I did say this, but as I was looking out at the people in the crowd and, you know, Of course, I know almost everybody that was there, not everybody, which was also good. But it looked like our district. And that made me feel probably the best, you know, liberal Democrat friends from Jacksonville and Ashland. I find it interesting that it's Ashland News. Dot News that showed up to cover it. I loved it. And nobody else did.

Yeah. Well, I was there. You were there. But the guy was great. And we had a great, I felt badly because the interview. was probably a 10-minute interview and it took 30 minutes because people didn't realize it was an interview and they kept interrupting us.

So I felt badly for the reporter. But anyway, it looked like the district. And I think I commented, this is what taking back our state looks like. So I've got liberal Democrats from Ashland running up and hugging me and saying, I can't wait to vote for you. The thing that I find about looking at your back

ground within the chamber. You are one of those guys that has an uncanny ability to do what I never could. And that's be friends with everybody. And, you know, that's great to be in a, you know, in a political world. But that is, uh, is very necessary because this is not just a partisan thing, but the point of the matter is is that single party control of the state has not benefited the state. No. And there has been a lot of, um, and that's not good for either party. It's not. And it's, there's just been a lot of nonsense, frankly, promoted. And you get to the point where Democrats, I hate to put it this way, but just know that, well, we don't have to talk to the Republicans.

There's nothing there. We don't need them. We don't need them. Only to raise taxes, do we need them? And then after that. And not even then every time. Exactly. Exactly.

And so it is time to break that supermajority. So that way it brings back some balance. and getting everybody talking to another again, I think would be helpful because when you don't have to talk to them, we don't need them, it's like, you know, so what? And can anybody say that Oregon

is in really great shape right now? Well, I said the exact same thing to a friend the other day. He was, you know, jamming me with questions. I said, I'm going to ask you a question. Are you, so my opponent's had this seat for seven years now, is, right? Are you better off today?

kind of the Ronald Reagan question, right? Are you better off today than you were seven years ago? And I got a whole laundry list of statistics from a variety of, I think, credible sources that would tell you, even if you don't know the answer to that question intuitively, the answer is no. Like we're in the top 10 of all the things you don't want to be in the top 10 and in the bottom 10 of all the things you don't want to be in the bottom 10 of. Well, yeah, even with education, which you mentioned briefly yesterday,

It's like you can look at what is going on with education right now with the rankings and the performance. And you're saying, okay, yeah, you want to get on the school board. But if you want to save your kids, you can't leave your kid in there right now. And I have thought this for a long time. You know, my son is a junior in college now. So I don't have a currently have a child in public education in the state anymore. But I used to think when I would, I'd look at rooms full of people that I knew to be parents. And I think, why aren't they running out of here with their hair on fire about the state of public education?

If my child was in this school right now, and I knew that, you know, we had the fourth, worst, fourth grade reading rates in the United States of America, I'd be furious, right? Now, we did things at home with our child to make sure that we, you know, propped him up for success. And I know other parents do too. But let's say you've got, you know, two parents at work or you've got a single parent home and they don't have time to do that. You're entrusting your children to a system which has failed and not just failed, it failed miserably. Miserably. And continues to. And I don't know this because I wasn't a lie, but people tell me my grandparents would talk about times decades ago.

And I think it was because we had ONC dollars, but families would move. families would move to Oregon so that their kids could be educated in Oregon public schools. They were that good. Why isn't that the aspiration? Why isn't that the goal? Why can't it be like that today? And I think part of that is, you know, single party control of the state. Yeah.

Because it just, you know, I would say the same thing. The problems in Texas with single party Republican control probably have. I hear you. You know, everybody, you got to be able to, you know, your opponents aren't always wrong about everything i guess is what i'm well and even if even if they're wrong in your mind uh it doesn't mean the system was designed to force the conversation right um uh another one of the things i feel like i'm i'm on repeat mode a lot of said this the other day as well um we know our federal constitution has these structural limitations on power right most state constitution i haven't read

all the state constitutions because that would be geeky But I'm interested to know this, but they all have these structural limitations on power checks and balances and all that stuff. That's a good thing. Our framers knew that to continue this experiment, we were going to have to talk to each other, right? I have to listen to you. You have to listen to me. And then somewhere in the middle is where we come up with. Today, compromise is viewed as evil.

And if I don't agree with you, I'm going to rip your bark. off and you know um whereas and this is not all that long ago i you know bruce star and i he was great to come down yesterday now our republican senate leader drove down we're buddies right we worked in the legislature in the late 80s and early 90s together and i think Bruce could tell you we worked there probably at the tail end of it but in a time when we'd go kind of tip o'neal ronald Reagan style, duke it out all day long over issues and disagreements and that sort of thing, and then go have a beer at Magooz together and play shuffleboard. Has it been that for a while, right?

I think, and as much at the time as I thought I was in favor of term limits, I'm not saying I'm not, I got to think about it a little harder, but I kind of think term limits flushed in Oregon, kind of flushed that out a little bit. So you had people that were tenured, they'd been around a while, and they knew, got to know each other's kids and play golf together and cards and stuff like that. Well, you knew one another as humans. Yes. And so, like, you, you know, joked to have ability to get along with people.

I think I kind of learned that there to some degree. I mean, also my grandparents and parents instilled that in me, but. Yeah, and as long as you can, as you can bring that friendliness, but not complete, you know, and not sell your soul either. That's the, and that's the challenge in these situations. principles and your integrity but and and you don't have to do that um in order to get along with people and listen but my friendships and relationships have never been predicated on agreement um people wouldn't get married if that were the if that were the acid test don't i know all right

linda he didn't he's not talking about you yeah exactly brad hicks by the way is with me and he's running for state senate district three so i'm running out of daylight here so i'm going to have to Cut you loose. We'll have you back another time. But this was just a quick end, hey, why are you doing it and where are you going to go? And what happens now then? Do you have the website? Do you have all the niceties put in place? What? That's all coming. We've secured the domain name and all those sorts of things. So it will be soon. It's under construction, as they say, if you go there, that's what it'll tell you. Probably going to be a great name. Like, don't be stupid, vote Brad. Well, I'm just kidding. I'll share a couple of working slogans with you that my friends are telling me, don't do that, don't say that. But it's going to be Hicksfor Senate.com. I want to make it as simple as possible. That's pretty easy.

Yeah, yeah. You know, treasurer's in place, kitchen cabinets coming together. We still, you know, we're talking, looking at consultants and campaign managers and all the other things you have to have to do these things. But that's all coming together. I may maybe it's crazy but I I'm thrilled to be doing it and I'm humbled by the the turnout at these things and and the support phone calls, emails, texts that I'm getting again from all sorts of folks like they they look like this district and I I think that's encouraging very good Brad thank you great getting a chance to see you again you're welcome anytime all right

be well appreciate it Brad Hicks running for Senate it's KMED KMED HD HD 1 Eagle Point Metro KBXG Grants Pass. Do a quick.