July 8, 2025 • 50 mins
Welcome to The Weekly Top 3 — our look at the top 3 things on our mind here at Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets — for the week of July 7, 2025.
This week, our top 3 issues are these: 1) we discuss whether Elon Musk is the new Ross Perot and what that might mean for national politics (2:09); 2) we explore how the One Big Beautiful A will affect the list of issues facing the Alaska legislature (13:13); and 3) we discuss Gov Dunleavy’s call for a special session and how, while it may be a tactical gain in some areas, it is yet another lost opportunity to resolve state fiscal policy (31:25).
The Weekly Top 3 is a regular weekly segment on The Michael Dukes Show. The Show broadcasts on Facebook and YouTubeLive as well as via streaming audio from the Show’s website weekdays from 6–8am. We join Michael weekly in the first hour of Tuesday’s show, from 6:25–7am, for a discussion between the two of us about our three issues.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hi, this is Brad Kiefle, managing Director of
Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets.
Welcome to the weekly top threethe top three things on our
mind here at Alaskans forSustainable Budgets for the week
of July 7th 2025.
The weekly top three is aregular segment on the Michael
Duke Show.
The show broadcasts on bothFacebook Live and YouTube Live
(00:33):
as well as via streaming audiofrom the show's website.
Weekdays from 6 to 8 am.
I join Michael weekly in thefirst hour of Tuesday's show
from 6 10 to 7 am for adiscussion between the two of us
about our three issues.
We post the podcast of ourdiscussion following the show on
the Alaskans for SustainableBudgets Facebook, youtube,
(00:55):
soundcloud, spotify and Substackpages.
Also on the Alaskans forSustainable Budgets website, as
well as the projects page onnational blog site mediumcom.
You can find past episodes ofthe weekly top three also at the
same locations.
Keep in mind that, in additionto these podcasts during the
(01:17):
week, you can also follow andparticipate in the discussion
with us of these and otherissues affecting Alaska's fiscal
and economic condition byfollowing us on the Alaskans for
Sustainable Budgets Facebookpage and through our posts on
Twitter.
This week, our top three issuesare these First, we discuss
whether Elon Musk is the newRoss Perot and what that might
(01:41):
mean for national politics.
Second, we explore how the OneBig Beautiful Act will affect
the list of issues facing theAlaska legislature.
And third, we discuss GovernorDunleavy's call for a special
session and how, while it mightbe a tactical gain in some areas
(02:02):
, it is yet another lostopportunity to resolve state
fiscal policy.
And now let's join Michael.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Well, let's, let's get ready to, let's get ready to
jump in, jump on board here andget things ready to rock and
roll.
First things first.
I thought this was a reallyinteresting question because
normally we don't dive too farinto all the national stuff, but
you start off on the deep endhere and you ask the question is
(02:31):
Elon Musk the new Ross Perot?
Which is?
That's an interesting question.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Well, I've actually had discussions with people who
don't know who Ross Perot are.
I mean, I've talked to someyounger people and asked that
question or raised that issueand people go who's Ross Perot?
So, to begin, ross Perot was abusinessman, a very wealthy
businessman, not unlike the ElonMusk of his day.
(03:01):
Perot had started some ITcompanies and was very
successful in those.
And in 1992 or 1991 began aseries of conversations on the
Larry King show, which was thena very famous, a very popular
talk show on TV, on TV and andPerot started outlining his
(03:23):
concerns about where thenational debt was and where the
country was going and about theeconomics of the kind of the
economic situation of thecountry.
Over the course of thosediscussions with Larry King,
perot sort of talked himselfinto running for president and
announced halfway on the LarryKing show that he was running
for president, formed a newpolitical party called the
(03:45):
Reform Party and ran forpresident in 1992.
And even though he didn't carrya state, he carried some
counties.
But even though he didn't carrya state, even though he got no
electoral votes, he had a hugeimpact on national policy.
During that campaign he ransome infomercials which I
(04:06):
remember clearly from that timethat were just sort of you know
chart talks talking about thenational debt and they were
successful in terms of framingthat issue the national debt and
the direction of the countryfrom a deficit standpoint.
Successful in framing thatissue as a as a as an important
issue of the country from adeficit standpoint.
Successful in framing thatissue as an important issue of
(04:27):
the 1992 campaign.
Both then President George Bush,I and soon to become President
Bill Clinton, the othercandidates in 1992 had to
address that issue that Perotcreated.
And I can say with a certainty,because I knew a lot of people
in the Clinton administrationduring that time I can say with
(04:50):
a certainty that Perot'scampaign in raising that issue
and the positions that Clintonhad to take in response to that
issue in 1992 had a big impacton the Clinton administration,
both the first term and thesecond term.
And, if you will recall,clinton was the last president
during which the nation had abalanced budget.
(05:11):
Every president since then,from George Bush II on through
to the present day, have runsignificant deficits.
Clinton was the last one thatactually balanced the budget and
actually was reducing thenational debt.
There was a debate at the timeabout whether the Treasury was
going to have to stop issuingTreasury notes or Treasury bills
(05:33):
, which was going to bedisruptive to the debt market,
but that was a real issue at thetime.
So Perot had this hugeinfluence a businessman coming
out of the business side raisingthese issues, having a
tremendous amount of money andputting that money behind his
campaign.
Raising these issues had atremendous amount of impact on
(05:53):
the national debt.
For the last couple of yearswell, the last several years
I've talked about the need for anew Ross Perot, because when
you look at what's going on withthe deficits and the debt in
the nation, particularly withthe new one big beautiful bill
or one big beautiful act,particularly with the additional
(06:16):
deficits and national debt thatare being created by that, we
need somebody to come in sort ofoff the sidelines, come in, get
in the middle of the debate andstart focusing on national debt
.
And when you look at what Muskhas said, what Musk has done and
his discussion of forming a newparty Perot had the Reform
(06:39):
Party.
Musk is talking about formingthe America Party when you look
at what Musk has said and whathe's done and the issues that
he's raising, which are thenational debt and the deficits
and spending out of control.
When you look at the issuesthat Musk is raising, he looks a
lot like the new Ross Perot,with a lot of money backing him,
(07:01):
being able to come in and makewaves, make an issue out of this
sort of thing.
Now a couple of big differences.
One Elon Musk is widelyperceived as a jerk and Perot
was a jerk, but he wasn't widelyperceived that way At the time
(07:23):
he came into the race.
He was perceived as somethingnew and fresh and off the
sidelines.
Musk, with his tenure in theTrump administration, is not
going to be perceived assomething new and fresh.
It's going to be perceived as,you know, sort of somebody whose
stakeout position is not wildlysuccessful and now raising.
(07:44):
Second, is Perot was able topersonalize the issue by running
for president himself.
Musk can't do that because he'snot a US-born citizen.
Right Wasn't born in the US.
So Musk can't personalize it inthe same way Perot did.
And frankly, and I think Perotgained a lot from being able to
personalize it in the same wayPerot did and frankly, and I
(08:05):
think Perot gained a lot frombeing able to personalize it in
that way he was able to say Iwant to be your president, and
I'm going to do this.
If I'm your president and hewas able to run for president
and run from that base.
Musk isn't going to be able todo that.
But I will say this we need aRoss Perot, and if Elon Musk is
(08:28):
the because we need to changethe direction of the deficits of
the national debt badly, needto do that, and if Musk is what
we get to do that, then fineit's.
If Musk is as close to Perot aswe can get somebody with a lot
(08:49):
of money behind them, theability to to articulate the
message or the ability to pushthe message.
If Musk is what we get, thenthat's fine, and and and
hopefully he is successful inthe same way as Perot.
He's going to do it a differentway.
Perot personalized it.
Musk is saying he's going tocome into some key races to be
(09:09):
able to create this third forcethat sits between the Democrats
and the Republicans and can tiltone way or the other to make
them successful, depending uponhow they are reacting to the
national debt and deficit issues.
So it would be a different waythan Perot did it, but Perot had
(09:31):
a big impact coming off thesidelines and doing it, and and
and Musk has the potential to bePerot like, if not, if not
completely, the equivalent ofwhat Perot did, perot like in
his impact.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
One of the major concerns about Ross Perot and
Brad was saying we need a newPerot.
And is Musk the new Perot?
You know the complaint is well,he got us Bill Clinton right.
He split the conservative voteand that's always been the fear
of Republicans who are like theparty is not doing enough.
We need a new party.
You know, a third party, but athird party always seems to
(10:09):
split out the conservatives.
So what's your reaction to that?
Speaker 1 (10:13):
in that regard, Well, I guess a couple of things.
The Republicans aren't doing sogreat, michael.
If you look at the analysis ofwhat the one big, better,
beautiful bill does, it producesdeficits that are double the
(10:33):
size of the American Rescue Plan, double the size of the CARES
Act, more than double the sizeof the impact on the deficit on
the debt from the original TaxCuts and Jobs Act Trump's Act in
2017.
So the Republicans aren't doingtoo great and I don't think
(10:56):
it's something to hope for forthe Republicans to stay in
control, because they'reproducing bigger deficits than
the Democrats did.
And the second thing is Clintonwas a Democrat, yes, but
affected by Perot, particularlyaffected by Perot.
Clinton pursued veryconservative, relatively
(11:17):
conservative, fiscal policies.
He cut back on food stamps.
He cut back on TNAF, which isTemporary Assistance to Needy
Families.
He made deep cuts in the socialnetwork, got the budget back in
balance.
Now he had a lucky run at theend because of the dot-com
(11:38):
bubble.
Incomes went up and so incometax revenues went up and it
helped balance the budget.
But nonetheless, he had tobring down the spending side or
stall the spending side, stallthe increase in the spending
side, in order to achieve thatbalanced budget.
So, yeah, it'd be great ifRepublicans were up to the task
and were able to do it, but theyare demonstrating again that
(12:02):
they're not and are running bigdeficits again.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Well, I mean, that's always my commentary is how
great a job are they actuallydoing, and would it be better to
have a third party?
I mean, at this point I'm justlooking at the debt and thinking
, you know this, this, thiscan't last, this can't, this
will not end well, is what Ilook at it and see in my mind
for sure, all right, well,that's so.
(12:29):
So I guess the final questionis so is Elon Musk the new Perot
, or do you see it as just kindof what do you?
What do you?
What do you see it as?
Speaker 1 (12:38):
He's.
He's potentially Perot, likehe's not the new Perot because
he can't run for president, hecan't personalize the issue in
the same way that Perot did.
So he's potentially Perot-likein the sense that he can move
the needle, the national needle,by forcing the issue to become
a very big issue nationally andforcing the parties to respond
(13:01):
to it.
Personally he won't be a Perot,but he can be Perot-like and
you know, in the absence ofanything else, Perot-like is
better than no Perot at all.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
Yeah, well, let's move over to what we have been
kind of dancing around, which is, of course, the OBBB, the One
Big Beautiful Bill, or one bigbad bill, depending on which
side of the aisle you're on, Iguess.
So what?
What is Alaska's response?
What should Alaska's responsebe to the BBB?
(13:33):
What?
What?
You know as you look at thisand see all the things, what?
What's your thoughts on this?
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Well, I've been spending most of the time around
the, the OBBA and aroundthinking about what is the, what
should be the state levelimpact, what should be the
legislature's response, whatshould be the governor's
response, how are we going todeal with this at the, at the
(13:58):
state level?
And the two big?
Well, there's several impacts.
The two, the two that have hadthe most publicity, are the
impact on Medicaid and theimpact on SNAP, or what's
formally called food stamps.
The impact on MedicaidMurkowski tried to get an Alaska
(14:18):
exception to it and failed,failed.
And what they did, what thecongress did generally, was
create this big fund, 50 billiondollar fund for rural hospitals
.
Uh, in response to the medicaidcuts that are going to be made
and that's sort of a backhandedway of doing it.
I mean what?
(14:38):
The medicaid cuts are stillthere.
The medicaid cuts that are inthe bill, that are affecting
everybody else, are going toaffect alaska the same.
So we're going to havereductions in Medicaid.
What the fund does is ruralhospitals in particular, because
of the demographics of theirpopulations that they serve.
(14:59):
Rural hospitals in particularare dependent on Medicaid, on
being reimbursed by Medicaid forthe services that they're
providing their constituents.
With the Medicaid cutbacks,their constituents won't have as
much Medicaid when they walkinto the hospital.
They won't be able to slap downas much of the Medicaid card
(15:21):
and have their bill paid byMedicaid.
So hospitals are concerned thatwithout that revenue source
their economics are going to bestrained.
If not requiring that they foldthe hospital bailout bill or
the rural hospital bailout.
Portion of this is to sort ofbackstop the hospitals and say
(15:42):
okay, even though you're notgoing to be getting Medicaid
from all of your constituents,there's going to be cutbacks in
what they will pay you.
We will give you money tobackstop you and keep you whole.
So it's sort of a backhandedway of doing it, because what
will happen now is hospitalconstituents that don't have
Medicaid will still walk intothe hospital and the hospital
(16:03):
will still serve them and thehospital will know they're going
to get back in.
They're going to get support atthe back end from the hospital
fund, but it's not going to be aone-for-one offset.
So one of the impacts at thestate level is going to be those
Medicaid cutbacks and whethersome in the legislature are
going to push for state increaseto Medicaid or state subsidies,
(16:27):
separate state subsidies, tooffset the Medicaid cuts.
That's going to be one issuewe're going to hear about.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Which they said is somewhere in the neighborhood
when they discussed this earlierin the year about $80 million a
year, right?
I mean, this is a prettysignificant chunk of money,
Right.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
The second one is SNAP.
And SNAP, the legislature andthe governor are actually going
to have to do something.
It's not going to be.
Do you want to?
It's going to be.
They're going to have to dosomething.
Snap the way.
The problem that Alaska's inwith SNAP is we are wildly
non-compliant with theregulations of SNAP.
(17:05):
We have people getting SNAPbenefits that don't qualify.
We have people that qualify forSNAP benefits that aren't
getting them because of the waythe state's been administering
the SNAP program.
And so the way that theCongress put in some of the SNAP
reductions was for states thatare noncompliant, there will be
(17:28):
a reduction in the federalpayments.
I mean, basically, congresssays if you aren't going to play
the game right, then we aren'tgoing to give you all this money
, which makes sense and so, andso the state is is out of, is
out of compliance, wildly out ofcompliance, and that would
result in significant reductions.
The protection that Murkowskigot, or the special provision
(17:49):
that Murkowski got, was like atwo-year window within which the
state can come into complianceand not suffer that penalty.
If it doesn't come intocompliance, it suffers the
penalty.
So there's going to be a lot ofeffort, a lot of discussion,
you can already see it but a lotof focus on getting the state
into compliance and, frankly,that's going to require money,
(18:11):
because one of the reasons thatthe state's out of compliance is
we have understaffed thedepartment that's responsible
for administering the program.
The state administers SNAP andwe've understaffed the program
that's responsible foradministering the program, and
so that's going to be a focus,you know, getting putting the
resources back into thatdepartment to get that
(18:34):
department back up and runningagain to meet the allegations.
The other claim that some makeout of OBBA is well, the state's
going to be rolling in moneybecause we're going to have all
this additional development upat NPRA, we're going to have all
this additional development ofANWR oil development, and so the
(18:54):
state's going to get all thebenefits out of that, and so
we're going to have a lot ofmoney.
Don't worry about it.
The answer to that is no.
Npra has a provision.
I mean the NPRA.
There's two aspects of what theCongress has done with NPRA.
One is they've increased thenumber of leases that are going
to be available and the Trumpadministration generally is
(19:15):
reducing regulations ondevelopment, so that the claim
is that's going to result inadditional development up at
NPRA claim is that's going toresult in additional development
up at MPRA and with that theyalso the Congress also increased
the share of MPRA revenuesroyalty revenues that go to the
state.
Problem with that is that MPRAcontains a provision the MPRA
(19:37):
Act contains a provision thatthe royalty share that goes to
the state from NPRA be used inthe local communities, be
directed to the localcommunities.
So even though the royaltyshare is going to increase from
NPRA, it's going to go to thebenefit of the North Slope
(19:58):
Borough and other localcommunities up on the slope.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
It's sort of it will pass through the state's fingers
but there won't be a lot of itdoesn't go straight into the
general coffers, it goes rightback and round trips right back
up to where it came from.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Right.
Anwr is different.
Anwr doesn't have thatprovision.
So if there are lease revenuesin ANWR, then they would go to
the state.
But, as we've previously talkedon the show, we're unlikely to
see a lot of development in ANWRuntil it's clear what's going
to happen in four years or threeyears from now.
(20:34):
Oil companies aren't going toput a lot of money into ANWR
until they see that they'regoing to be able to develop ANWR
.
They're going to be able to seethat four years from now or
three years from now there'sgoing to be a continuation of
the Trump approach.
They'll be concerned that we'regoing to have a snapback to the
Biden approach and all of asudden, all that money they will
have invested in poordevelopment of ANWR will be
(20:56):
wasted, and so they're going tobe very, very skeptical about
investing a lot of money in ANWR.
So even though the ANWRprovisions, even though ANWR
lease revenues would come backto the state, would flow back to
the state, there's not going tobe a lot of those.
I don't think that are going tobe developed.
The final issue about that alsois even on the MPRA side.
(21:18):
On the MPRA side we would stillget production tax.
But the way our production taxsystem works.
You know, that shows up in the2050s or 2060s or something,
because we defer a bunch ofrevenue from developments, from
new developments, and so thatrevenue wouldn't come through on
production tax until way downthe road if it's not offset them
(21:41):
.
So there's not those who think,oh, we're going to be rolling
in money because we're going tohave a whole lot of money from a
whole lot of additional moneyfrom this development that that
that the one big bill promoteson the slope.
It's that's not going to happen.
So so so the big issues thestate's going to have to
confront is Medicaid.
What are we going to do aboutthe reduced Medicaid payments
(22:04):
that are going to come throughSNAP?
What are we going to do aboutthe potential of a big penalty
hitting in two years?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Well, it's going to be interesting to watch.
And, of course, on top of this,all $38 trillion dollars in
deficit at the national level ontop of that, not to mention
what the state has to deal within and of itself and um and and
that to me is the is thechallenge on this whole thing,
like where you know we get, weget all this stuff and yet the,
(22:38):
the, the cost of it is stillgoing.
We're still staggering underthe cost.
I guess is what I'm saying, andI'm just a little concerned
about the fact that nobody seems.
You know, and if you talk, ifyou even raise the question
about it, I've been seeingpeople on X and other places get
dogpiled by asking the questionabout what about the cost of it
?
And then they're immediatelydogpiled about well, about what
(22:59):
about the cost of it?
And then they're immediatelydogpiled about well, why do you?
Why do you love Kamala?
Why do you love, you know, whydo you hate Trump?
I mean, it's just, like youknow, I'm just asking a question
about the cost of the bill, notabout, and it's just, it's kind
of demoralizing to watch this.
You know, this litmus test.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
Yeah, see, I mean go back to 1992 again.
The complaint was Ross Perotled to Bill Clinton.
Well, I mean, we weren't goingdown the right track with George
Bush first and we hadn't beengoing down the right track with
Reagan's second term in terms ofimpact on debt, in terms of
what was going on with nationaldebt.
(23:38):
So, yeah, I mean you got tofocus on the cost, and if that
means the Republicans can't gettheir act together, then you
know, maybe we need, we need adifferent system, maybe we need
the, the third party that Musktalks about, that would have the
balance of be able to tip thebalance of power one way or
another and use that to toreduce cost and reduce, reduce
(23:58):
deficits and ultimately reduce,reduce the national debt.
But yeah, I mean the one bigbill is going to be a challenge
for Alaska.
Yes, it does open up new areasby expanding the leases, which
is what the one big bill does.
(24:18):
By expanding the leases, itopens up the potential for new
development, but it's notanywhere near a certainty that
that new development A is eithergoing to occur, particularly
over in ANWR, in the near futureand B, if it does, it's going
to result in additional revenuesto the state anytime in the
near future.
So we've got the cost pressurethat's going to hit us from
(24:40):
Medicaid and from SNAP and we'vegot we've got the sort of murky
revenue potential that's.
That's way down the road, ifit's any place.
And to your point about thenational debt, I mean somebody's
going to have to come in anddecrease federal spending, and
Alaska is highly dependent onfederal spending.
In addition to Medicaid, on topof Medicaid and on top of SNAP,
(25:00):
alaska is highly dependent onfederal spending In addition to
Medicaid, on top of Medicaid andon top of SNAP.
Alaska is highly dependent onfederal spending.
So as these deficits pile upand as somebody finally comes in
and gets them under control byreducing federal spending,
that's going to boomerang backon Alaska as well.
Not an immediate issue, but onethat's lurking out there, a big
one that's lurking out theredown the road.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
Again, because somebody has to do it, brad.
I mean, that's the thing I mean.
Arithmetic says you can't keepspending what you don't have in
ad finitum right, indefinitely.
You can't.
You just you know, we can'tkeep doing what we're doing and
expect that it's going to workout.
Essentially is what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Another way of saying that, with friends like these,
who needs enemies?
Right, yeah, exactly, exactly,selling our children down the
road?
Uh, to make it work, spread theblame, brad says kim, there's
plenty of blame to go around.
I mean, this is a republicanand a democratic problem.
There is no two ways about this.
This is there is plenty ofblame.
This is not a, in fact, this isnot just solely a Democrat or a
Republican problem.
This is just a politicianproblem.
(26:09):
That's what we have right nowis essentially a politician
problem.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Yeah, the I wrote a.
I wrote a piece the other day,a short piece that essentially.
I wrote a piece the other day,a short piece that essentially
said you know, both parties areto blame, that they're both
going down this road of spendingwithout having revenues to
offset it or spending at levelsabove revenues, however you want
(26:36):
to put it.
And you know it doesn't reallymake a difference.
It doesn't make a differencebetween whether you got
Democrats or you got Republicansbecause, again, the deficits
that are being created by the,by the one big beautiful bill,
are bigger than the deficitscreated during the Biden
administration.
So you know, with friends likethese, who needs who needs, who
(26:57):
needs enemies.
And yeah, okay, I'll spread theblame on both sides.
That's why Musk is intriguing,like Perot was intriguing in 92.
It's intriguing because whatMusk essentially says is he's
going to target a few races.
At least, what he says now ishe's going to target a few races
, a few congressional races,house races and Senate races to
(27:19):
try to get a middle group sothat neither the Republicans nor
the Democrats are in control,and then use that middle group
to negotiate for the majority byextracting concessions out of
the majority party, out ofwhoever wants to be in the
majority, concessions in termsof spending levels or offsetting
(27:43):
revenues to reduce the deficit,and that I mean, that was sort
of it's not what Perot reallyhad in mind.
Perot had in mind him becomingpresident and then running the
thing in a way that reducedspending levels and closed the
deficit, but it's sort of thesame effect and that's non-party
(28:08):
aligned.
It essentially says that bothparties are at fault.
We're going to get in themiddle, we're going to control
who gets in the majority andwe're going to negotiate these
spending cuts as a result of it.
The Freedom Caucus, the HouseFreedom Caucus, says they've
tried to do that, chip Roy andothers say they've tried to do
(28:28):
that, but they fold like a cheapsuit when push comes to shove.
So presumably Musk's party, theAmerican party, would be less
likely to fold and more likelyto extract real concessions in
the Congress.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Well, you could only hope.
Because again, the thing is,brad, I've said this, I think I
said this yesterday.
You know, we're running out ofroad to kick the can down.
That's the problem, is it?
Eventually, I mean, they'lljust there, won't be any more,
you're going to have to face themusic.
And when that happens, I mean,you know, we saw the Weimar
(29:07):
Republic, we saw what happenedto some of these things, and on
top of that, the fact that we'rethe world reserve currency, um,
you know it could get.
You know, if we, we may lose,we may, we may create, we've
created our own monster here.
We just can't seem toacknowledge that.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
That's the problem.
Not only are we running out ofroad, we're speeding up, we're
speeding the car up the deficitsone more time.
The deficits coming out of theOBBA are bigger than the
deficits during the Bidenadministration.
Bigger we're speeding, biggerwe're speeding the car up.
We're speeding the car towardthe cliff.
The only difference between theDemocrats and Republicans right
(29:48):
now is who they're spending thedeficit on.
The Democrats want to spend itone way, on social programs.
The Republicans are spending itanother way in terms of tax
cuts for the wealthy, but itdoesn't make any difference.
They're both spending itanother way in terms of tax cuts
for the wealthy, but it doesn'tmake any difference.
They're both spending it.
And Trump, the OBBA speeds thecar up.
(30:08):
So we're running out of road,yes, but we're speeding the car
down the road, down theremaining road, as we go.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Yeah, well, like I said, what if I told you that
the left wing and the right wingwere both part of the same bird
, right?
I mean, that's kind of wherewe're at right now.
We have a politician problem.
Nobody wants to be the bad guyto tell them that the gravy
train is over and that we can'tbe all things to all people, and
nobody wants to be that.
(30:36):
And you know, musk is an asssometimes.
There's no doubt about it to bethat.
And you know Musk is an asssometimes, there's no doubt
about it.
The guy you know and and he'skind of a conundrum because he
was, you know, his company hashad a bunch of subsidies and
done all these things, but he'salso hugely innovative and he
also is hugely successful inmany, many ways, and so when you
start hearing him talk aboutsome of these things, it makes
(30:57):
people listen.
So maybe that is the good thing.
But I mean, I thought it wascool when he said the other day
you know, this thing is full ofpork and everything.
And Trump said, well, maybe weshould cut your subsidies.
And he said cut it all.
I mean that, you know, I wouldlove to, I would love to see
that, but again, and then hisstock tank, and then his stock
tank.
But I mean, you know he's therichest guy in the world, so
(31:20):
he's like I'm OK.
I mean, what are you going todo?
You know, sometimes you got totake a stand.
Welcome back to the program.
The weekly top three continues.
We just finished talking about,you know, elon Musk, and now
the response to the OBB, and nowwe have this new maneuver by
the governor to.
This new maneuver by thegovernor to.
(31:46):
I mean, I'm starting to wonderif he got some new advisors
somewhere in there or whatever,because all of a sudden he's
doing some interesting stuff.
The governor has called aspecial session for August the
2nd and he's delineated thatthat special session should
cover education, reform and thedevelopment or the building of
the Department of Agriculture.
And so, brad, this was kind ofa surprise, because everybody's
(32:10):
like nobody's going to do this.
Forrest Gump is, I'm sorry,forrest Dunbar, sorry, forrest,
forrest Dunbar is going to beoverseas, and this person's out,
and that person's out.
Nobody wants to do the specialsession.
And the governor's like nope,we're going to do it.
So give me your thoughts onthis.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
Well, tactically it's brilliant.
I mean, I had not even thoughtof the idea of calling a special
session to force the vote onthe veto overrides.
I mean, basically what theConstitution provides is that,
following a veto, a veto afterthe end of a session, that the
(32:52):
legislature, if it's going tovote on veto overrides I guess
it must vote on veto overridesthe way some people read the
Constitution that it must votewithin five days of the next
session, be it a regular sessionor a special session,
particularly of hisappropriations cut for education
, forcing the votes on the vetooverride in this special session
.
And also there's some otherbills, including the audit bill
(33:36):
for the oil and gas taxes thatthe legislature passed and the
governor vetoed.
There's some also other vetobills out there that would be
subject to the same rule thatyou vote within the first five
days of the special session,governor.
The reason it's tacticallybrilliant is because you've got
legislators spread all over helland back for the summer.
(33:57):
You've got Forrest Dunbar inPoland on National Guard duty
and you've got legislators whowere scheduled to go to the
National Conference of StateLegislatures annual meeting in
Boston.
I think it is that same weekendhead out, that same weekend as
the governor's called thespecial session for.
(34:18):
So the governor has.
I mean, tactically it'sbrilliant because it reduces the
chances that you still with me,brad?
Speaker 2 (34:34):
are we here?
Yeah, we're here.
You, all of a sudden, you werelike you froze for a second,
like they were, so you weresaying sorry all right so.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
So it's tactically brilliant in the sense that the
governor's forcing this earlyvote on the veto overrides does
it really do anything?
I mean, we'll recall back in2019 that the legislature passed
appropriations.
The governor vetoed a bunch ofthose appropriations.
The legislature then came backin the next session and passed a
(35:05):
supplemental bill that werethose same appropriations and in
the meantime the governor hadgotten squeezed by the recall
effort and when the legislaturepassed the supplemental
appropriations that essentiallyreappropriated the stuff the
governor had vetoed, thegovernor didn't veto it a second
time.
So you know what would happen.
(35:27):
What the equivalent here is.
The governor's vetoed education, called the special session.
Because of the tactics aroundthe special session limitations
around the special session thelegislature doesn't override his
his cut of the appropriations,but then when they come back in
next, next spring or next earlynext year, they pass a
supplemental that includes thesame appropriations, puts it
(35:47):
back to the governor.
They pass a supplemental thatincludes the same appropriations
, puts it back to the governor,and if the governor vetoes it a
second time, then they're allsitting there, everybody's
sitting there, ready to veto.
So it's a tactic, sort of maybea delaying tactic rather than a
kill shot, but it's aninteresting tactic.
Speaker 2 (36:14):
Yeah, no, and I think really it does a couple of
things.
And first of all, I think theywere counting on the fact that
he was going to veto it and thenthey'd be able to tackle that
and make that a core issue atthe very beginning of the
session, going into thiselection year, and be able to
tie these legislators to thegovernor's vote or the
governor's veto early on.
Now that they're doing, youknow, he's going to try and
force the issue another sixmonths early.
Well, people have got a shortmemory, so maybe by that time
(36:37):
they'll have forgotten some ofthat.
I think he wins either way.
I think the governor, this is awin for the governor either way
, whether he gets uh, whether hegets overridden, or whether
he's able to hold off theoverride, I think it's a win for
him either way.
Um and uh, and and I, like yousaid, brilliant, I thought was
tactically brilliant was a, wasa, was a good piece.
(36:58):
Now we see that he has alsocalled on the minority members
not to attend for the first fivedays.
Um, and, which I thought wasthat was kind of bold, uh, but
what do you?
What do you say?
What do you, what do you say tothat?
Speaker 1 (37:16):
well, sort of cute.
I mean he's trying and in a wayhe may be trying to give them
cover, uh, for not voting for,for for the minority members
being put in a in a positionwhere they have to vote one way
or the other on the vetooverride.
Well, the governor didn't toldme, told me not to show up, and
you know all support thegovernor right.
And so they don't get put in aposition where they have to vote
(37:37):
one way or another on the vetooverride.
It's still, I mean, that'sstill maybe a short-term thing,
because if he does veto, theveto's upheld.
They come in at the beginningof the next session, they pass
the supplementals, immediatelypass the supplementals or very
shortly pass the supplementals.
Governor vetoes it again.
Then those minority members areput in the same position and
(38:00):
this is all before the nextelection cycle.
So it may be a short-term gain,but to me it sort of looks like
trying to give the minoritymembers cover.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Yeah, exactly, I mean .
Speaker 1 (38:12):
to me it sort of looks like trying to give the
minority members cover that theydidn't make the decision not to
show up.
It was the governor who told menot to make the decision.
Speaker 2 (38:17):
Right?
Well, because I mean, notshowing up is a no vote, and the
governor was just trying toobviously issue them a little
bit of a little hedging of theirbets there.
What do you do you have aprediction for the, for the, for
the special session?
I mean, are they going to gavelin, gavel out?
Are they going to, you know,are they going to attempt it?
What?
Speaker 1 (38:36):
do you?
What do you think is going tohappen here?
Well, stephen said.
Gary Stevens, the president ofthe Senate, said he's going to
gavel in and gavel out, gavel in, take the veto, override votes
regardless of what comes fromthem, because his position is
it's.
There's both the two issuesthat the governor's nominated
(38:57):
for the special session.
One is education policy and thesecond is the division of
agriculture, department ofAgriculture.
Both of those got dealt with inthe last session and both of
those the legislature said no onthose issues.
And Stephen said you know wehaven't changed our mind.
We're not.
Why are we going to go back andrevisit this?
Why are we going to waste thetime going back and revisit this
(39:19):
?
So, yeah, we'll come intosession because the constitution
says we have to.
We'll hold the veto votesbecause the constitution says we
have to, but there's nothingelse to do because we've already
been down these roads, we'vealready made the decisions we've
made.
There's no incentive.
The governor hasn't created anyadditional reason to go down
these roads again.
(39:39):
So there's no reason to stickaround.
And if the Senate is going todo that, I doubt if Stevens
would have said that withoutchecking with his membership.
So if the Senate is going to dothat, there's no reason for the
House to stick around becausethey can't act alone on any of
this stuff.
So I'm sure they follow suit,maybe a day after, maybe the
same time, but they follow suit.
(40:01):
The disappointing thing, I willsay this the disappointing thing
about this are the issues thatDunleavy called the special
session on education policy andagriculture policy Already been
decided.
There's not going to be achange on those.
At the same time, we have hugefiscal issues and the governor
has said.
The governor said at the end oflast session that he wants to
(40:24):
work on fiscal issues, that he'sready to work on fiscal issues.
They said.
The governor's spokesman hassaid they'll have a package
ready to go at the beginning ofthe next session on fiscal
issues.
Well, if you're going to have apackage ready to go at the
beginning of the next regularsession, you can have a package
ready to go now.
I mean, it's not like thesefiscal issues are new, where is
it?
It's not like we haven'tthought about it, yeah, and so
(40:47):
the disappointing thing is thathe didn't use I mean tactically,
yes, tactically, this was all atactic to get the feeder
overrides up.
But if you're going to do this.
I mean, let's do it for somepurpose, something that actually
we need, which is fiscal policy.
And I'm disappointed that if thegovernor was going to do this,
(41:09):
unless it was just solely forthe tactical reason, and maybe
that's the explanation of it butif the governor was going to do
this unless it was just solelyfor the tactical reason, and
maybe that's the explanation ofit but if the governor was going
to do this, that he didn't callit on fiscal issues and didn't
have a package ready to go onfiscal issues, because, I mean,
we are never going to be able todo education policy until we
(41:29):
get fiscal policy set.
We're always going to debatewhether we're spending too much,
too less, too little oneducation policy until we
understand who's paying and howmuch we have.
And until we resolve that,we're not going to get education
policy resolved.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
I guess my question is but what is the answer there,
brad?
Because we saw the fiscalpolicy working.
Does the governor call his ownpolicy?
They wouldn't even.
I mean, they had a uniform,unified front.
They had all decided.
All these separate people anddifferent political philosophies
had all agreed and thenabsolutely nothing happened.
(42:06):
So I mean, do we just get moreof that or do we actually get
something that fixes it?
Speaker 1 (42:11):
I mean, yeah, so there's a, so there's a
difference.
I mean, what we had was the wasthe legislative working group,
and they came up with a proposedfiscal policy, but the governor
never said anything about it.
The governor didn't try toimplement it through bills of
his own.
He sort of let legislators youknow, let let Ben Carpenter, in
other words others wander outthere and die on the road trying
(42:31):
to fight for it as individuallegislators.
I think it would be different,significantly different, if the
governor brought that samepackage as his package and said
OK, you guys have talked aboutthis, this is what, this is what
you settled on.
I thought about it.
These are the bills to implementit.
Here's a legislative sessionfocused solely on that.
Let's go, and I think, and hefights for it, and I think
(42:54):
that's a different dog thanwhere we ended up last time
after the fiscal policy work.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
Well, we talked about how a strong governor could do
that could drive the boat, couldspearhead, could put the plan
in place, could change how theyfactor the budget, could do all
those things.
And that's what we need.
We need a strong governor to beable to do that.
And well, so far we've been alittle disappointed.
We're just let's put it thatway, I mean, you're right.
(43:22):
And this is again where we'vetalked about this strength and
this power of the Alaskaexecutive, the administration.
Right, I mean, it's a stronggovernor, and yet we haven't had
a strong.
We had, the position is strong,but we need somebody who's
strong to be able to take thatposition and say, okay, I'm
(43:45):
going to steer the bus andhere's, here's my new, here's my
new road, uh, and we thought hewas going to do that early on,
but of course, again he got.
He got his hand slapped overthe whole you know the cuts and
the Don Ardwin bill and therecall and everything else.
But he's just never reallyrecovered from that and it seems
like everything is just kind ofgo along to get along, although
(44:07):
this last couple of weeks hasbeen interesting to watch this
posturing and I'm not sureexactly what to make of it.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
Well, it's, yeah, it's stuff he can do
unilaterally, though, Michael.
I mean a fiscal policy,determining a fiscal policy,
would require legislativeinvolvement, because you have to
change the statutes.
But you know this, this tacticof calling everybody back and
forcing early votes on the, onthe vetoes, is something he can
do unilaterally and he's, youknow he can do that, but he's
(44:34):
not, he's not been able to be aleader in the sense of getting
the troops together.
Somebody the other day saidwell, Bill Walker, going back to
Bill Walker, Bill Walker triedthis all in package.
He tried to put, you know, somespending cuts and some revenues
, and, and, and that neverworked.
So why should Dunleavy try thething that even Walker couldn't
get across?
(44:54):
And the difference to me is thefiscal policy working group.
Walker never had a legislativeoutline of things that at least
some legislators had signed offon as going together in a
package, and Walker didn't havea legislative package that he
could say.
Look, the legislature said thisI'm going to agree with it with
(45:18):
these couple of changes, andhere's your own package,
legislature, here's your ownpackage back in front of you.
Now pass it and get behind it.
Dunleavy has that.
Dunleavy with the fiscal policyworking group, although he's let
time run on it, certainly.
But Dunleavy has that.
Dunleavy with the fiscal policyworking group, although he's
let time run on it certainly.
But Dunleavy has with thefiscal policy working group.
He has that package.
(45:38):
He's got to fill in some of thedetails, but he can say
legislature, you put together aworking group, this is what you
decided.
That working group decided theywere willing to do Some
revenues, some cuts, some oiltax reform, some other things in
there.
This is some cuts to the PFD,coming down to 50-50, POMV,
(46:00):
50-50, PFD.
This is what you decided.
This is what you recommended.
I endorse that, with thesecouple of changes or not.
I endorse that.
And here's your package backwith my endorsement.
Pass it and we can get thisbehind it.
Dunleavy has that and he's hadthat for since what?
(46:20):
2021?
Is that when the fiscal policyworking group was?
So he has that ability, he hasthat package he can endorse and
I don't know what he's going todo.
To be honest, I have somedoubts that when we get to the
regular session, he's going tohave a fiscal policy package.
I'm expecting it's going to belike Trump's tariffs right Two
(46:42):
more weeks, two more weeks, twomore weeks.
But I mean, he has that and hecould have come to this special
session and said hey, I got atactic and I'm going to screw
you guys on the vetoes you did,but at the same time I'm also
endorsing your fiscal policyworking group package and we're
going to go forward from there.
(47:04):
Didn't do it.
Speaker 2 (47:11):
And I think it's a wasted opportunity for him not
to have done it.
You're saying that he couldhave called the special session
knowing that they were going todo the veto override, but the
whole purpose of the specialsession could be a financial
plan based on the fiscal policyworking group plan.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
Yep, yep, yep and actually make some progress.
Because then you put thelegislature in the position you
know there were some liberallegislators who were on that
fiscal policy working group Thenyou put the legislature in the
position you know there weresome liberal legislators who
were on that fiscal policyworking group Then you put the
legislature in the position ofsaying, put up.
You know you guys put this up,I'm endorsing it.
Now are you willing to?
Are you willing to live up towhat you said in the fiscal
(47:44):
policy working group and sort ofsort of get the advantage back
over on on on that side, anddoing it in a special session
keeps the focus on that, keepsthe bright light right on that.
I think it would have been agreat maneuver, but it's not
what he's doing.
Speaker 2 (48:00):
Well, there's nothing stopping him doing that.
Coming into the next budgetcycle though, right, I mean he
could, and you're right, itwould have been great to do it
on the special session.
But if he comes into the nextbudget cycle with the budget and
then this fiscal policy workinggroup plan and basically tied
them all together and putlegislation in you know, I mean
(48:20):
he could still do that thenRight, he's got one more bite at
this apple, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
He could, and I hope he does now that he's passing up
the opportunity to do it on thespecial session.
I hope he does at the beginningof the session, but the problem
with doing it during theregular session is there's
15,000 other issues going on andthere's a whole bunch.
Speaker 2 (48:41):
He can make it the focus of the special session he
calls the special session.
You can only talk about what hesays you want to talk about.
Speaker 1 (48:49):
and he could do it Right, right, exactly, and that
I mean he's had that tool since2021 and I really hoped that he
was going to use it.
And when I saw the initialindicator on the special session
, the initial headline was justsaid Dunleavy calls special
session.
Given what he said at the endof the last of the regular
(49:10):
session, which was we need tofocus on fiscal policy a little
late, but we need to focus onfiscal policy I thought, all
right, now we're going tofinally put two and two together
and we're going to get thisdone.
And then you know well, I'mgoing to call it on things that
the legislature has alreadyrejected.
But there's this neat tactic inhere that I get to do along
with it.
I just it's a wastedopportunity that I get to do
(49:32):
along with it.
I just it's a wastedopportunity.
Another wasted opportunity, Ithink, as we go down this road
of the state falling deeper anddeeper and deeper into this
deficit cycle.
Speaker 2 (49:40):
All right, brad.
Well, now you get to go enjoyanother week of relaxation and
enjoyment out there.
Kate Bratton, thank you so muchfor coming on board.
We look forward to seeing youback here.
Appreciate you coming in today,thank you.
Speaker 1 (49:52):
Michael, as always, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (49:54):
All right, we'll see you next week.
Speaker 1 (49:56):
Well, that's a wrap for another week's edition of
the weekly top three fromAlaskans for Sustainable Budgets
.
Thank you again for joining us.
Remember that you can find pastepisodes on our YouTube,
soundcloud, spotify and Substackpages, and keep track of us
during the week on Facebook andTwitter.
This has been Brad Keithley,managing Director of Alaskans
(50:17):
for Sustainable Budgets.
We look forward to you joiningus again next week on the Weekly
Top Three.
Thank you.
Hi, this is Brad Kiefle, managing Director of
Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets.
Welcome to the weekly top threethe top three things on our
mind here at Alaskans forSustainable Budgets for the week
of July 7th 2025.
The weekly top three is aregular segment on the Michael
Duke Show.
The show broadcasts on bothFacebook Live and YouTube Live
(00:33):
as well as via streaming audiofrom the show's website.
Weekdays from 6 to 8 am.
I join Michael weekly in thefirst hour of Tuesday's show
from 6 10 to 7 am for adiscussion between the two of us
about our three issues.
We post the podcast of ourdiscussion following the show on
the Alaskans for SustainableBudgets Facebook, youtube,
(00:55):
soundcloud, spotify and Substackpages.
Also on the Alaskans forSustainable Budgets website, as
well as the projects page onnational blog site mediumcom.
You can find past episodes ofthe weekly top three also at the
same locations.
Keep in mind that, in additionto these podcasts during the
(01:17):
week, you can also follow andparticipate in the discussion
with us of these and otherissues affecting Alaska's fiscal
and economic condition byfollowing us on the Alaskans for
Sustainable Budgets Facebookpage and through our posts on
Twitter.
This week, our top three issuesare these First, we discuss
whether Elon Musk is the newRoss Perot and what that might
(01:41):
mean for national politics.
Second, we explore how the OneBig Beautiful Act will affect
the list of issues facing theAlaska legislature.
And third, we discuss GovernorDunleavy's call for a special
session and how, while it mightbe a tactical gain in some areas
(02:02):
, it is yet another lostopportunity to resolve state
fiscal policy.
And now let's join Michael.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Well, let's, let's get ready to, let's get ready to
jump in, jump on board here andget things ready to rock and
roll.
First things first.
I thought this was a reallyinteresting question because
normally we don't dive too farinto all the national stuff, but
you start off on the deep endhere and you ask the question is
(02:31):
Elon Musk the new Ross Perot?
Which is?
That's an interesting question.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Well, I've actually had discussions with people who
don't know who Ross Perot are.
I mean, I've talked to someyounger people and asked that
question or raised that issueand people go who's Ross Perot?
So, to begin, ross Perot was abusinessman, a very wealthy
businessman, not unlike the ElonMusk of his day.
(03:01):
Perot had started some ITcompanies and was very
successful in those.
And in 1992 or 1991 began aseries of conversations on the
Larry King show, which was thena very famous, a very popular
talk show on TV, on TV and andPerot started outlining his
(03:23):
concerns about where thenational debt was and where the
country was going and about theeconomics of the kind of the
economic situation of thecountry.
Over the course of thosediscussions with Larry King,
perot sort of talked himselfinto running for president and
announced halfway on the LarryKing show that he was running
for president, formed a newpolitical party called the
(03:45):
Reform Party and ran forpresident in 1992.
And even though he didn't carrya state, he carried some
counties.
But even though he didn't carrya state, even though he got no
electoral votes, he had a hugeimpact on national policy.
During that campaign he ransome infomercials which I
(04:06):
remember clearly from that timethat were just sort of you know
chart talks talking about thenational debt and they were
successful in terms of framingthat issue the national debt and
the direction of the countryfrom a deficit standpoint.
Successful in framing thatissue as a as a as an important
issue of the country from adeficit standpoint.
Successful in framing thatissue as an important issue of
(04:27):
the 1992 campaign.
Both then President George Bush,I and soon to become President
Bill Clinton, the othercandidates in 1992 had to
address that issue that Perotcreated.
And I can say with a certainty,because I knew a lot of people
in the Clinton administrationduring that time I can say with
(04:50):
a certainty that Perot'scampaign in raising that issue
and the positions that Clintonhad to take in response to that
issue in 1992 had a big impacton the Clinton administration,
both the first term and thesecond term.
And, if you will recall,clinton was the last president
during which the nation had abalanced budget.
(05:11):
Every president since then,from George Bush II on through
to the present day, have runsignificant deficits.
Clinton was the last one thatactually balanced the budget and
actually was reducing thenational debt.
There was a debate at the timeabout whether the Treasury was
going to have to stop issuingTreasury notes or Treasury bills
(05:33):
, which was going to bedisruptive to the debt market,
but that was a real issue at thetime.
So Perot had this hugeinfluence a businessman coming
out of the business side raisingthese issues, having a
tremendous amount of money andputting that money behind his
campaign.
Raising these issues had atremendous amount of impact on
(05:53):
the national debt.
For the last couple of yearswell, the last several years
I've talked about the need for anew Ross Perot, because when
you look at what's going on withthe deficits and the debt in
the nation, particularly withthe new one big beautiful bill
or one big beautiful act,particularly with the additional
(06:16):
deficits and national debt thatare being created by that, we
need somebody to come in sort ofoff the sidelines, come in, get
in the middle of the debate andstart focusing on national debt
.
And when you look at what Muskhas said, what Musk has done and
his discussion of forming a newparty Perot had the Reform
(06:39):
Party.
Musk is talking about formingthe America Party when you look
at what Musk has said and whathe's done and the issues that
he's raising, which are thenational debt and the deficits
and spending out of control.
When you look at the issuesthat Musk is raising, he looks a
lot like the new Ross Perot,with a lot of money backing him,
(07:01):
being able to come in and makewaves, make an issue out of this
sort of thing.
Now a couple of big differences.
One Elon Musk is widelyperceived as a jerk and Perot
was a jerk, but he wasn't widelyperceived that way At the time
(07:23):
he came into the race.
He was perceived as somethingnew and fresh and off the
sidelines.
Musk, with his tenure in theTrump administration, is not
going to be perceived assomething new and fresh.
It's going to be perceived as,you know, sort of somebody whose
stakeout position is not wildlysuccessful and now raising.
(07:44):
Second, is Perot was able topersonalize the issue by running
for president himself.
Musk can't do that because he'snot a US-born citizen.
Right Wasn't born in the US.
So Musk can't personalize it inthe same way Perot did.
And frankly, and I think Perotgained a lot from being able to
personalize it in the same wayPerot did and frankly, and I
(08:05):
think Perot gained a lot frombeing able to personalize it in
that way he was able to say Iwant to be your president, and
I'm going to do this.
If I'm your president and hewas able to run for president
and run from that base.
Musk isn't going to be able todo that.
But I will say this we need aRoss Perot, and if Elon Musk is
(08:28):
the because we need to changethe direction of the deficits of
the national debt badly, needto do that, and if Musk is what
we get to do that, then fineit's.
If Musk is as close to Perot aswe can get somebody with a lot
(08:49):
of money behind them, theability to to articulate the
message or the ability to pushthe message.
If Musk is what we get, thenthat's fine, and and and
hopefully he is successful inthe same way as Perot.
He's going to do it a differentway.
Perot personalized it.
Musk is saying he's going tocome into some key races to be
(09:09):
able to create this third forcethat sits between the Democrats
and the Republicans and can tiltone way or the other to make
them successful, depending uponhow they are reacting to the
national debt and deficit issues.
So it would be a different waythan Perot did it, but Perot had
(09:31):
a big impact coming off thesidelines and doing it, and and
and Musk has the potential to bePerot like, if not, if not
completely, the equivalent ofwhat Perot did, perot like in
his impact.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
One of the major concerns about Ross Perot and
Brad was saying we need a newPerot.
And is Musk the new Perot?
You know the complaint is well,he got us Bill Clinton right.
He split the conservative voteand that's always been the fear
of Republicans who are like theparty is not doing enough.
We need a new party.
You know, a third party, but athird party always seems to
(10:09):
split out the conservatives.
So what's your reaction to that?
Speaker 1 (10:13):
in that regard, Well, I guess a couple of things.
The Republicans aren't doing sogreat, michael.
If you look at the analysis ofwhat the one big, better,
beautiful bill does, it producesdeficits that are double the
(10:33):
size of the American Rescue Plan, double the size of the CARES
Act, more than double the sizeof the impact on the deficit on
the debt from the original TaxCuts and Jobs Act Trump's Act in
2017.
So the Republicans aren't doingtoo great and I don't think
(10:56):
it's something to hope for forthe Republicans to stay in
control, because they'reproducing bigger deficits than
the Democrats did.
And the second thing is Clintonwas a Democrat, yes, but
affected by Perot, particularlyaffected by Perot.
Clinton pursued veryconservative, relatively
(11:17):
conservative, fiscal policies.
He cut back on food stamps.
He cut back on TNAF, which isTemporary Assistance to Needy
Families.
He made deep cuts in the socialnetwork, got the budget back in
balance.
Now he had a lucky run at theend because of the dot-com
(11:38):
bubble.
Incomes went up and so incometax revenues went up and it
helped balance the budget.
But nonetheless, he had tobring down the spending side or
stall the spending side, stallthe increase in the spending
side, in order to achieve thatbalanced budget.
So, yeah, it'd be great ifRepublicans were up to the task
and were able to do it, but theyare demonstrating again that
(12:02):
they're not and are running bigdeficits again.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Well, I mean, that's always my commentary is how
great a job are they actuallydoing, and would it be better to
have a third party?
I mean, at this point I'm justlooking at the debt and thinking
, you know this, this, thiscan't last, this can't, this
will not end well, is what Ilook at it and see in my mind
for sure, all right, well,that's so.
(12:29):
So I guess the final questionis so is Elon Musk the new Perot
, or do you see it as just kindof what do you?
What do you?
What do you see it as?
Speaker 1 (12:38):
He's.
He's potentially Perot, likehe's not the new Perot because
he can't run for president, hecan't personalize the issue in
the same way that Perot did.
So he's potentially Perot-likein the sense that he can move
the needle, the national needle,by forcing the issue to become
a very big issue nationally andforcing the parties to respond
(13:01):
to it.
Personally he won't be a Perot,but he can be Perot-like and
you know, in the absence ofanything else, Perot-like is
better than no Perot at all.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
Yeah, well, let's move over to what we have been
kind of dancing around, which is, of course, the OBBB, the One
Big Beautiful Bill, or one bigbad bill, depending on which
side of the aisle you're on, Iguess.
So what?
What is Alaska's response?
What should Alaska's responsebe to the BBB?
(13:33):
What?
What?
You know as you look at thisand see all the things, what?
What's your thoughts on this?
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Well, I've been spending most of the time around
the, the OBBA and aroundthinking about what is the, what
should be the state levelimpact, what should be the
legislature's response, whatshould be the governor's
response, how are we going todeal with this at the, at the
(13:58):
state level?
And the two big?
Well, there's several impacts.
The two, the two that have hadthe most publicity, are the
impact on Medicaid and theimpact on SNAP, or what's
formally called food stamps.
The impact on MedicaidMurkowski tried to get an Alaska
(14:18):
exception to it and failed,failed.
And what they did, what thecongress did generally, was
create this big fund, 50 billiondollar fund for rural hospitals
.
Uh, in response to the medicaidcuts that are going to be made
and that's sort of a backhandedway of doing it.
I mean what?
(14:38):
The medicaid cuts are stillthere.
The medicaid cuts that are inthe bill, that are affecting
everybody else, are going toaffect alaska the same.
So we're going to havereductions in Medicaid.
What the fund does is ruralhospitals in particular, because
of the demographics of theirpopulations that they serve.
(14:59):
Rural hospitals in particularare dependent on Medicaid, on
being reimbursed by Medicaid forthe services that they're
providing their constituents.
With the Medicaid cutbacks,their constituents won't have as
much Medicaid when they walkinto the hospital.
They won't be able to slap downas much of the Medicaid card
(15:21):
and have their bill paid byMedicaid.
So hospitals are concerned thatwithout that revenue source
their economics are going to bestrained.
If not requiring that they foldthe hospital bailout bill or
the rural hospital bailout.
Portion of this is to sort ofbackstop the hospitals and say
(15:42):
okay, even though you're notgoing to be getting Medicaid
from all of your constituents,there's going to be cutbacks in
what they will pay you.
We will give you money tobackstop you and keep you whole.
So it's sort of a backhandedway of doing it, because what
will happen now is hospitalconstituents that don't have
Medicaid will still walk intothe hospital and the hospital
(16:03):
will still serve them and thehospital will know they're going
to get back in.
They're going to get support atthe back end from the hospital
fund, but it's not going to be aone-for-one offset.
So one of the impacts at thestate level is going to be those
Medicaid cutbacks and whethersome in the legislature are
going to push for state increaseto Medicaid or state subsidies,
(16:27):
separate state subsidies, tooffset the Medicaid cuts.
That's going to be one issuewe're going to hear about.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Which they said is somewhere in the neighborhood
when they discussed this earlierin the year about $80 million a
year, right?
I mean, this is a prettysignificant chunk of money,
Right.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
The second one is SNAP.
And SNAP, the legislature andthe governor are actually going
to have to do something.
It's not going to be.
Do you want to?
It's going to be.
They're going to have to dosomething.
Snap the way.
The problem that Alaska's inwith SNAP is we are wildly
non-compliant with theregulations of SNAP.
(17:05):
We have people getting SNAPbenefits that don't qualify.
We have people that qualify forSNAP benefits that aren't
getting them because of the waythe state's been administering
the SNAP program.
And so the way that theCongress put in some of the SNAP
reductions was for states thatare noncompliant, there will be
(17:28):
a reduction in the federalpayments.
I mean, basically, congresssays if you aren't going to play
the game right, then we aren'tgoing to give you all this money
, which makes sense and so, andso the state is is out of, is
out of compliance, wildly out ofcompliance, and that would
result in significant reductions.
The protection that Murkowskigot, or the special provision
(17:49):
that Murkowski got, was like atwo-year window within which the
state can come into complianceand not suffer that penalty.
If it doesn't come intocompliance, it suffers the
penalty.
So there's going to be a lot ofeffort, a lot of discussion,
you can already see it but a lotof focus on getting the state
into compliance and, frankly,that's going to require money,
(18:11):
because one of the reasons thatthe state's out of compliance is
we have understaffed thedepartment that's responsible
for administering the program.
The state administers SNAP andwe've understaffed the program
that's responsible foradministering the program, and
so that's going to be a focus,you know, getting putting the
resources back into thatdepartment to get that
(18:34):
department back up and runningagain to meet the allegations.
The other claim that some makeout of OBBA is well, the state's
going to be rolling in moneybecause we're going to have all
this additional development upat NPRA, we're going to have all
this additional development ofANWR oil development, and so the
(18:54):
state's going to get all thebenefits out of that, and so
we're going to have a lot ofmoney.
Don't worry about it.
The answer to that is no.
Npra has a provision.
I mean the NPRA.
There's two aspects of what theCongress has done with NPRA.
One is they've increased thenumber of leases that are going
to be available and the Trumpadministration generally is
(19:15):
reducing regulations ondevelopment, so that the claim
is that's going to result inadditional development up at
NPRA claim is that's going toresult in additional development
up at MPRA and with that theyalso the Congress also increased
the share of MPRA revenuesroyalty revenues that go to the
state.
Problem with that is that MPRAcontains a provision the MPRA
(19:37):
Act contains a provision thatthe royalty share that goes to
the state from NPRA be used inthe local communities, be
directed to the localcommunities.
So even though the royaltyshare is going to increase from
NPRA, it's going to go to thebenefit of the North Slope
(19:58):
Borough and other localcommunities up on the slope.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
It's sort of it will pass through the state's fingers
but there won't be a lot of itdoesn't go straight into the
general coffers, it goes rightback and round trips right back
up to where it came from.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Right.
Anwr is different.
Anwr doesn't have thatprovision.
So if there are lease revenuesin ANWR, then they would go to
the state.
But, as we've previously talkedon the show, we're unlikely to
see a lot of development in ANWRuntil it's clear what's going
to happen in four years or threeyears from now.
(20:34):
Oil companies aren't going toput a lot of money into ANWR
until they see that they'regoing to be able to develop ANWR
.
They're going to be able to seethat four years from now or
three years from now there'sgoing to be a continuation of
the Trump approach.
They'll be concerned that we'regoing to have a snapback to the
Biden approach and all of asudden, all that money they will
have invested in poordevelopment of ANWR will be
(20:56):
wasted, and so they're going tobe very, very skeptical about
investing a lot of money in ANWR.
So even though the ANWRprovisions, even though ANWR
lease revenues would come backto the state, would flow back to
the state, there's not going tobe a lot of those.
I don't think that are going tobe developed.
The final issue about that alsois even on the MPRA side.
(21:18):
On the MPRA side we would stillget production tax.
But the way our production taxsystem works.
You know, that shows up in the2050s or 2060s or something,
because we defer a bunch ofrevenue from developments, from
new developments, and so thatrevenue wouldn't come through on
production tax until way downthe road if it's not offset them
(21:41):
.
So there's not those who think,oh, we're going to be rolling
in money because we're going tohave a whole lot of money from a
whole lot of additional moneyfrom this development that that
that the one big bill promoteson the slope.
It's that's not going to happen.
So so so the big issues thestate's going to have to
confront is Medicaid.
What are we going to do aboutthe reduced Medicaid payments
(22:04):
that are going to come throughSNAP?
What are we going to do aboutthe potential of a big penalty
hitting in two years?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Well, it's going to be interesting to watch.
And, of course, on top of this,all $38 trillion dollars in
deficit at the national level ontop of that, not to mention
what the state has to deal within and of itself and um and and
that to me is the is thechallenge on this whole thing,
like where you know we get, weget all this stuff and yet the,
(22:38):
the, the cost of it is stillgoing.
We're still staggering underthe cost.
I guess is what I'm saying, andI'm just a little concerned
about the fact that nobody seems.
You know, and if you talk, ifyou even raise the question
about it, I've been seeingpeople on X and other places get
dogpiled by asking the questionabout what about the cost of it
?
And then they're immediatelydogpiled about well, about what
(22:59):
about the cost of it?
And then they're immediatelydogpiled about well, why do you?
Why do you love Kamala?
Why do you love, you know, whydo you hate Trump?
I mean, it's just, like youknow, I'm just asking a question
about the cost of the bill, notabout, and it's just, it's kind
of demoralizing to watch this.
You know, this litmus test.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
Yeah, see, I mean go back to 1992 again.
The complaint was Ross Perotled to Bill Clinton.
Well, I mean, we weren't goingdown the right track with George
Bush first and we hadn't beengoing down the right track with
Reagan's second term in terms ofimpact on debt, in terms of
what was going on with nationaldebt.
(23:38):
So, yeah, I mean you got tofocus on the cost, and if that
means the Republicans can't gettheir act together, then you
know, maybe we need, we need adifferent system, maybe we need
the, the third party that Musktalks about, that would have the
balance of be able to tip thebalance of power one way or
another and use that to toreduce cost and reduce, reduce
(23:58):
deficits and ultimately reduce,reduce the national debt.
But yeah, I mean the one bigbill is going to be a challenge
for Alaska.
Yes, it does open up new areasby expanding the leases, which
is what the one big bill does.
(24:18):
By expanding the leases, itopens up the potential for new
development, but it's notanywhere near a certainty that
that new development A is eithergoing to occur, particularly
over in ANWR, in the near futureand B, if it does, it's going
to result in additional revenuesto the state anytime in the
near future.
So we've got the cost pressurethat's going to hit us from
(24:40):
Medicaid and from SNAP and we'vegot we've got the sort of murky
revenue potential that's.
That's way down the road, ifit's any place.
And to your point about thenational debt, I mean somebody's
going to have to come in anddecrease federal spending, and
Alaska is highly dependent onfederal spending.
In addition to Medicaid, on topof Medicaid and on top of SNAP,
(25:00):
alaska is highly dependent onfederal spending In addition to
Medicaid, on top of Medicaid andon top of SNAP.
Alaska is highly dependent onfederal spending.
So as these deficits pile upand as somebody finally comes in
and gets them under control byreducing federal spending,
that's going to boomerang backon Alaska as well.
Not an immediate issue, but onethat's lurking out there, a big
one that's lurking out theredown the road.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
Again, because somebody has to do it, brad.
I mean, that's the thing I mean.
Arithmetic says you can't keepspending what you don't have in
ad finitum right, indefinitely.
You can't.
You just you know, we can'tkeep doing what we're doing and
expect that it's going to workout.
Essentially is what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Another way of saying that, with friends like these,
who needs enemies?
Right, yeah, exactly, exactly,selling our children down the
road?
Uh, to make it work, spread theblame, brad says kim, there's
plenty of blame to go around.
I mean, this is a republicanand a democratic problem.
There is no two ways about this.
This is there is plenty ofblame.
This is not a, in fact, this isnot just solely a Democrat or a
Republican problem.
This is just a politicianproblem.
(26:09):
That's what we have right nowis essentially a politician
problem.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Yeah, the I wrote a.
I wrote a piece the other day,a short piece that essentially.
I wrote a piece the other day,a short piece that essentially
said you know, both parties areto blame, that they're both
going down this road of spendingwithout having revenues to
offset it or spending at levelsabove revenues, however you want
(26:36):
to put it.
And you know it doesn't reallymake a difference.
It doesn't make a differencebetween whether you got
Democrats or you got Republicansbecause, again, the deficits
that are being created by the,by the one big beautiful bill,
are bigger than the deficitscreated during the Biden
administration.
So you know, with friends likethese, who needs who needs, who
(26:57):
needs enemies.
And yeah, okay, I'll spread theblame on both sides.
That's why Musk is intriguing,like Perot was intriguing in 92.
It's intriguing because whatMusk essentially says is he's
going to target a few races.
At least, what he says now ishe's going to target a few races
, a few congressional races,house races and Senate races to
(27:19):
try to get a middle group sothat neither the Republicans nor
the Democrats are in control,and then use that middle group
to negotiate for the majority byextracting concessions out of
the majority party, out ofwhoever wants to be in the
majority, concessions in termsof spending levels or offsetting
(27:43):
revenues to reduce the deficit,and that I mean, that was sort
of it's not what Perot reallyhad in mind.
Perot had in mind him becomingpresident and then running the
thing in a way that reducedspending levels and closed the
deficit, but it's sort of thesame effect and that's non-party
(28:08):
aligned.
It essentially says that bothparties are at fault.
We're going to get in themiddle, we're going to control
who gets in the majority andwe're going to negotiate these
spending cuts as a result of it.
The Freedom Caucus, the HouseFreedom Caucus, says they've
tried to do that, chip Roy andothers say they've tried to do
(28:28):
that, but they fold like a cheapsuit when push comes to shove.
So presumably Musk's party, theAmerican party, would be less
likely to fold and more likelyto extract real concessions in
the Congress.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Well, you could only hope.
Because again, the thing is,brad, I've said this, I think I
said this yesterday.
You know, we're running out ofroad to kick the can down.
That's the problem, is it?
Eventually, I mean, they'lljust there, won't be any more,
you're going to have to face themusic.
And when that happens, I mean,you know, we saw the Weimar
(29:07):
Republic, we saw what happenedto some of these things, and on
top of that, the fact that we'rethe world reserve currency, um,
you know it could get.
You know, if we, we may lose,we may, we may create, we've
created our own monster here.
We just can't seem toacknowledge that.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
That's the problem.
Not only are we running out ofroad, we're speeding up, we're
speeding the car up the deficitsone more time.
The deficits coming out of theOBBA are bigger than the
deficits during the Bidenadministration.
Bigger we're speeding, biggerwe're speeding the car up.
We're speeding the car towardthe cliff.
The only difference between theDemocrats and Republicans right
(29:48):
now is who they're spending thedeficit on.
The Democrats want to spend itone way, on social programs.
The Republicans are spending itanother way in terms of tax
cuts for the wealthy, but itdoesn't make any difference.
They're both spending itanother way in terms of tax cuts
for the wealthy, but it doesn'tmake any difference.
They're both spending it.
And Trump, the OBBA speeds thecar up.
(30:08):
So we're running out of road,yes, but we're speeding the car
down the road, down theremaining road, as we go.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Yeah, well, like I said, what if I told you that
the left wing and the right wingwere both part of the same bird
, right?
I mean, that's kind of wherewe're at right now.
We have a politician problem.
Nobody wants to be the bad guyto tell them that the gravy
train is over and that we can'tbe all things to all people, and
nobody wants to be that.
(30:36):
And you know, musk is an asssometimes.
There's no doubt about it to bethat.
And you know Musk is an asssometimes, there's no doubt
about it.
The guy you know and and he'skind of a conundrum because he
was, you know, his company hashad a bunch of subsidies and
done all these things, but he'salso hugely innovative and he
also is hugely successful inmany, many ways, and so when you
start hearing him talk aboutsome of these things, it makes
(30:57):
people listen.
So maybe that is the good thing.
But I mean, I thought it wascool when he said the other day
you know, this thing is full ofpork and everything.
And Trump said, well, maybe weshould cut your subsidies.
And he said cut it all.
I mean that, you know, I wouldlove to, I would love to see
that, but again, and then hisstock tank, and then his stock
tank.
But I mean, you know he's therichest guy in the world, so
(31:20):
he's like I'm OK.
I mean, what are you going todo?
You know, sometimes you got totake a stand.
Welcome back to the program.
The weekly top three continues.
We just finished talking about,you know, elon Musk, and now
the response to the OBB, and nowwe have this new maneuver by
the governor to.
This new maneuver by thegovernor to.
(31:46):
I mean, I'm starting to wonderif he got some new advisors
somewhere in there or whatever,because all of a sudden he's
doing some interesting stuff.
The governor has called aspecial session for August the
2nd and he's delineated thatthat special session should
cover education, reform and thedevelopment or the building of
the Department of Agriculture.
And so, brad, this was kind ofa surprise, because everybody's
(32:10):
like nobody's going to do this.
Forrest Gump is, I'm sorry,forrest Dunbar, sorry, forrest,
forrest Dunbar is going to beoverseas, and this person's out,
and that person's out.
Nobody wants to do the specialsession.
And the governor's like nope,we're going to do it.
So give me your thoughts onthis.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
Well, tactically it's brilliant.
I mean, I had not even thoughtof the idea of calling a special
session to force the vote onthe veto overrides.
I mean, basically what theConstitution provides is that,
following a veto, a veto afterthe end of a session, that the
(32:52):
legislature, if it's going tovote on veto overrides I guess
it must vote on veto overridesthe way some people read the
Constitution that it must votewithin five days of the next
session, be it a regular sessionor a special session,
particularly of hisappropriations cut for education
, forcing the votes on the vetooverride in this special session
.
And also there's some otherbills, including the audit bill
(33:36):
for the oil and gas taxes thatthe legislature passed and the
governor vetoed.
There's some also other vetobills out there that would be
subject to the same rule thatyou vote within the first five
days of the special session,governor.
The reason it's tacticallybrilliant is because you've got
legislators spread all over helland back for the summer.
(33:57):
You've got Forrest Dunbar inPoland on National Guard duty
and you've got legislators whowere scheduled to go to the
National Conference of StateLegislatures annual meeting in
Boston.
I think it is that same weekendhead out, that same weekend as
the governor's called thespecial session for.
(34:18):
So the governor has.
I mean, tactically it'sbrilliant because it reduces the
chances that you still with me,brad?
Speaker 2 (34:34):
are we here?
Yeah, we're here.
You, all of a sudden, you werelike you froze for a second,
like they were, so you weresaying sorry all right so.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
So it's tactically brilliant in the sense that the
governor's forcing this earlyvote on the veto overrides does
it really do anything?
I mean, we'll recall back in2019 that the legislature passed
appropriations.
The governor vetoed a bunch ofthose appropriations.
The legislature then came backin the next session and passed a
(35:05):
supplemental bill that werethose same appropriations and in
the meantime the governor hadgotten squeezed by the recall
effort and when the legislaturepassed the supplemental
appropriations that essentiallyreappropriated the stuff the
governor had vetoed, thegovernor didn't veto it a second
time.
So you know what would happen.
(35:27):
What the equivalent here is.
The governor's vetoed education, called the special session.
Because of the tactics aroundthe special session limitations
around the special session thelegislature doesn't override his
his cut of the appropriations,but then when they come back in
next, next spring or next earlynext year, they pass a
supplemental that includes thesame appropriations, puts it
(35:47):
back to the governor.
They pass a supplemental thatincludes the same appropriations
, puts it back to the governor,and if the governor vetoes it a
second time, then they're allsitting there, everybody's
sitting there, ready to veto.
So it's a tactic, sort of maybea delaying tactic rather than a
kill shot, but it's aninteresting tactic.
Speaker 2 (36:14):
Yeah, no, and I think really it does a couple of
things.
And first of all, I think theywere counting on the fact that
he was going to veto it and thenthey'd be able to tackle that
and make that a core issue atthe very beginning of the
session, going into thiselection year, and be able to
tie these legislators to thegovernor's vote or the
governor's veto early on.
Now that they're doing, youknow, he's going to try and
force the issue another sixmonths early.
Well, people have got a shortmemory, so maybe by that time
(36:37):
they'll have forgotten some ofthat.
I think he wins either way.
I think the governor, this is awin for the governor either way
, whether he gets uh, whether hegets overridden, or whether
he's able to hold off theoverride, I think it's a win for
him either way.
Um and uh, and and I, like yousaid, brilliant, I thought was
tactically brilliant was a, wasa, was a good piece.
(36:58):
Now we see that he has alsocalled on the minority members
not to attend for the first fivedays.
Um, and, which I thought wasthat was kind of bold, uh, but
what do you?
What do you say?
What do you, what do you say tothat?
Speaker 1 (37:16):
well, sort of cute.
I mean he's trying and in a wayhe may be trying to give them
cover, uh, for not voting for,for for the minority members
being put in a in a positionwhere they have to vote one way
or the other on the vetooverride.
Well, the governor didn't toldme, told me not to show up, and
you know all support thegovernor right.
And so they don't get put in aposition where they have to vote
(37:37):
one way or another on the vetooverride.
It's still, I mean, that'sstill maybe a short-term thing,
because if he does veto, theveto's upheld.
They come in at the beginningof the next session, they pass
the supplementals, immediatelypass the supplementals or very
shortly pass the supplementals.
Governor vetoes it again.
Then those minority members areput in the same position and
(38:00):
this is all before the nextelection cycle.
So it may be a short-term gain,but to me it sort of looks like
trying to give the minoritymembers cover.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Yeah, exactly, I mean .
Speaker 1 (38:12):
to me it sort of looks like trying to give the
minority members cover that theydidn't make the decision not to
show up.
It was the governor who told menot to make the decision.
Speaker 2 (38:17):
Right?
Well, because I mean, notshowing up is a no vote, and the
governor was just trying toobviously issue them a little
bit of a little hedging of theirbets there.
What do you do you have aprediction for the, for the, for
the special session?
I mean, are they going to gavelin, gavel out?
Are they going to, you know,are they going to attempt it?
What?
Speaker 1 (38:36):
do you?
What do you think is going tohappen here?
Well, stephen said.
Gary Stevens, the president ofthe Senate, said he's going to
gavel in and gavel out, gavel in, take the veto, override votes
regardless of what comes fromthem, because his position is
it's.
There's both the two issuesthat the governor's nominated
(38:57):
for the special session.
One is education policy and thesecond is the division of
agriculture, department ofAgriculture.
Both of those got dealt with inthe last session and both of
those the legislature said no onthose issues.
And Stephen said you know wehaven't changed our mind.
We're not.
Why are we going to go back andrevisit this?
Why are we going to waste thetime going back and revisit this
(39:19):
?
So, yeah, we'll come intosession because the constitution
says we have to.
We'll hold the veto votesbecause the constitution says we
have to, but there's nothingelse to do because we've already
been down these roads, we'vealready made the decisions we've
made.
There's no incentive.
The governor hasn't created anyadditional reason to go down
these roads again.
(39:39):
So there's no reason to stickaround.
And if the Senate is going todo that, I doubt if Stevens
would have said that withoutchecking with his membership.
So if the Senate is going to dothat, there's no reason for the
House to stick around becausethey can't act alone on any of
this stuff.
So I'm sure they follow suit,maybe a day after, maybe the
same time, but they follow suit.
(40:01):
The disappointing thing, I willsay this the disappointing thing
about this are the issues thatDunleavy called the special
session on education policy andagriculture policy Already been
decided.
There's not going to be achange on those.
At the same time, we have hugefiscal issues and the governor
has said.
The governor said at the end oflast session that he wants to
(40:24):
work on fiscal issues, that he'sready to work on fiscal issues.
They said.
The governor's spokesman hassaid they'll have a package
ready to go at the beginning ofthe next session on fiscal
issues.
Well, if you're going to have apackage ready to go at the
beginning of the next regularsession, you can have a package
ready to go now.
I mean, it's not like thesefiscal issues are new, where is
it?
It's not like we haven'tthought about it, yeah, and so
(40:47):
the disappointing thing is thathe didn't use I mean tactically,
yes, tactically, this was all atactic to get the feeder
overrides up.
But if you're going to do this.
I mean, let's do it for somepurpose, something that actually
we need, which is fiscal policy.
And I'm disappointed that if thegovernor was going to do this,
(41:09):
unless it was just solely forthe tactical reason, and maybe
that's the explanation of it butif the governor was going to do
this unless it was just solelyfor the tactical reason, and
maybe that's the explanation ofit but if the governor was going
to do this, that he didn't callit on fiscal issues and didn't
have a package ready to go onfiscal issues, because, I mean,
we are never going to be able todo education policy until we
(41:29):
get fiscal policy set.
We're always going to debatewhether we're spending too much,
too less, too little oneducation policy until we
understand who's paying and howmuch we have.
And until we resolve that,we're not going to get education
policy resolved.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
I guess my question is but what is the answer there,
brad?
Because we saw the fiscalpolicy working.
Does the governor call his ownpolicy?
They wouldn't even.
I mean, they had a uniform,unified front.
They had all decided.
All these separate people anddifferent political philosophies
had all agreed and thenabsolutely nothing happened.
(42:06):
So I mean, do we just get moreof that or do we actually get
something that fixes it?
Speaker 1 (42:11):
I mean, yeah, so there's a, so there's a
difference.
I mean, what we had was the wasthe legislative working group,
and they came up with a proposedfiscal policy, but the governor
never said anything about it.
The governor didn't try toimplement it through bills of
his own.
He sort of let legislators youknow, let let Ben Carpenter, in
other words others wander outthere and die on the road trying
(42:31):
to fight for it as individuallegislators.
I think it would be different,significantly different, if the
governor brought that samepackage as his package and said
OK, you guys have talked aboutthis, this is what, this is what
you settled on.
I thought about it.
These are the bills to implementit.
Here's a legislative sessionfocused solely on that.
Let's go, and I think, and hefights for it, and I think
(42:54):
that's a different dog thanwhere we ended up last time
after the fiscal policy work.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
Well, we talked about how a strong governor could do
that could drive the boat, couldspearhead, could put the plan
in place, could change how theyfactor the budget, could do all
those things.
And that's what we need.
We need a strong governor to beable to do that.
And well, so far we've been alittle disappointed.
We're just let's put it thatway, I mean, you're right.
(43:22):
And this is again where we'vetalked about this strength and
this power of the Alaskaexecutive, the administration.
Right, I mean, it's a stronggovernor, and yet we haven't had
a strong.
We had, the position is strong,but we need somebody who's
strong to be able to take thatposition and say, okay, I'm
(43:45):
going to steer the bus andhere's, here's my new, here's my
new road, uh, and we thought hewas going to do that early on,
but of course, again he got.
He got his hand slapped overthe whole you know the cuts and
the Don Ardwin bill and therecall and everything else.
But he's just never reallyrecovered from that and it seems
like everything is just kind ofgo along to get along, although
(44:07):
this last couple of weeks hasbeen interesting to watch this
posturing and I'm not sureexactly what to make of it.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
Well, it's, yeah, it's stuff he can do
unilaterally, though, Michael.
I mean a fiscal policy,determining a fiscal policy,
would require legislativeinvolvement, because you have to
change the statutes.
But you know this, this tacticof calling everybody back and
forcing early votes on the, onthe vetoes, is something he can
do unilaterally and he's, youknow he can do that, but he's
(44:34):
not, he's not been able to be aleader in the sense of getting
the troops together.
Somebody the other day saidwell, Bill Walker, going back to
Bill Walker, Bill Walker triedthis all in package.
He tried to put, you know, somespending cuts and some revenues
, and, and, and that neverworked.
So why should Dunleavy try thething that even Walker couldn't
get across?
(44:54):
And the difference to me is thefiscal policy working group.
Walker never had a legislativeoutline of things that at least
some legislators had signed offon as going together in a
package, and Walker didn't havea legislative package that he
could say.
Look, the legislature said thisI'm going to agree with it with
(45:18):
these couple of changes, andhere's your own package,
legislature, here's your ownpackage back in front of you.
Now pass it and get behind it.
Dunleavy has that.
Dunleavy with the fiscal policyworking group, although he's let
time run on it, certainly.
But Dunleavy has that.
Dunleavy with the fiscal policyworking group, although he's
let time run on it certainly.
But Dunleavy has with thefiscal policy working group.
He has that package.
(45:38):
He's got to fill in some of thedetails, but he can say
legislature, you put together aworking group, this is what you
decided.
That working group decided theywere willing to do Some
revenues, some cuts, some oiltax reform, some other things in
there.
This is some cuts to the PFD,coming down to 50-50, POMV,
(46:00):
50-50, PFD.
This is what you decided.
This is what you recommended.
I endorse that, with thesecouple of changes or not.
I endorse that.
And here's your package backwith my endorsement.
Pass it and we can get thisbehind it.
Dunleavy has that and he's hadthat for since what?
(46:20):
2021?
Is that when the fiscal policyworking group was?
So he has that ability, he hasthat package he can endorse and
I don't know what he's going todo.
To be honest, I have somedoubts that when we get to the
regular session, he's going tohave a fiscal policy package.
I'm expecting it's going to belike Trump's tariffs right Two
(46:42):
more weeks, two more weeks, twomore weeks.
But I mean, he has that and hecould have come to this special
session and said hey, I got atactic and I'm going to screw
you guys on the vetoes you did,but at the same time I'm also
endorsing your fiscal policyworking group package and we're
going to go forward from there.
(47:04):
Didn't do it.
Speaker 2 (47:11):
And I think it's a wasted opportunity for him not
to have done it.
You're saying that he couldhave called the special session
knowing that they were going todo the veto override, but the
whole purpose of the specialsession could be a financial
plan based on the fiscal policyworking group plan.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
Yep, yep, yep and actually make some progress.
Because then you put thelegislature in the position you
know there were some liberallegislators who were on that
fiscal policy working group Thenyou put the legislature in the
position you know there weresome liberal legislators who
were on that fiscal policyworking group Then you put the
legislature in the position ofsaying, put up.
You know you guys put this up,I'm endorsing it.
Now are you willing to?
Are you willing to live up towhat you said in the fiscal
(47:44):
policy working group and sort ofsort of get the advantage back
over on on on that side, anddoing it in a special session
keeps the focus on that, keepsthe bright light right on that.
I think it would have been agreat maneuver, but it's not
what he's doing.
Speaker 2 (48:00):
Well, there's nothing stopping him doing that.
Coming into the next budgetcycle though, right, I mean he
could, and you're right, itwould have been great to do it
on the special session.
But if he comes into the nextbudget cycle with the budget and
then this fiscal policy workinggroup plan and basically tied
them all together and putlegislation in you know, I mean
(48:20):
he could still do that thenRight, he's got one more bite at
this apple, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
He could, and I hope he does now that he's passing up
the opportunity to do it on thespecial session.
I hope he does at the beginningof the session, but the problem
with doing it during theregular session is there's
15,000 other issues going on andthere's a whole bunch.
Speaker 2 (48:41):
He can make it the focus of the special session he
calls the special session.
You can only talk about what hesays you want to talk about.
Speaker 1 (48:49):
and he could do it Right, right, exactly, and that
I mean he's had that tool since2021 and I really hoped that he
was going to use it.
And when I saw the initialindicator on the special session
, the initial headline was justsaid Dunleavy calls special
session.
Given what he said at the endof the last of the regular
(49:10):
session, which was we need tofocus on fiscal policy a little
late, but we need to focus onfiscal policy I thought, all
right, now we're going tofinally put two and two together
and we're going to get thisdone.
And then you know well, I'mgoing to call it on things that
the legislature has alreadyrejected.
But there's this neat tactic inhere that I get to do along
with it.
I just it's a wastedopportunity that I get to do
(49:32):
along with it.
I just it's a wastedopportunity.
Another wasted opportunity, Ithink, as we go down this road
of the state falling deeper anddeeper and deeper into this
deficit cycle.
Speaker 2 (49:40):
All right, brad.
Well, now you get to go enjoyanother week of relaxation and
enjoyment out there.
Kate Bratton, thank you so muchfor coming on board.
We look forward to seeing youback here.
Appreciate you coming in today,thank you.
Speaker 1 (49:52):
Michael, as always, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (49:54):
All right, we'll see you next week.
Speaker 1 (49:56):
Well, that's a wrap for another week's edition of
the weekly top three fromAlaskans for Sustainable Budgets
.
Thank you again for joining us.
Remember that you can find pastepisodes on our YouTube,
soundcloud, spotify and Substackpages, and keep track of us
during the week on Facebook andTwitter.
This has been Brad Keithley,managing Director of Alaskans
(50:17):
for Sustainable Budgets.
We look forward to you joiningus again next week on the Weekly
Top Three.
Thank you.
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