Introduction

Hi everyone and welcome back to the Homestead Education Podcast. So I am joining you today from a hotel somewhere in Kentucky because we’ve been on the road for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, I don’t know, eight, nine days, I don’t know, I’m done. I do appreciate you guys just kind of being okay with the podcast coming out a couple days late this week.
I was actually in D.C. on Monday and Tuesday and traveling before that so it was kind of hard to go ahead and get the podcast out but I wanted to wait and have the topic be about what we did in D.C. So here I am. We actually, we started out our week, Savannah and I and my daughter flying from Idaho to South Carolina, no to Cincinnati and then driving to South Carolina for the Great Homeschool Convention where I was a speaker there and then we had a booth for a few days which was super fun, got to see some awesome people and we actually completely sold out of all of our products. So I mean that’s always, always a positive besides the money, it’s less I have to take back on the plane with me.

The Long Drive to D.C.

So then we got done with the conference and we literally threw everything in the car, hit the road and started driving to D.C. which between the weather and wrecks on the highway, we were going to try to split it up, drive a few hours on Saturday night and then get into D.C. midday the next day so that we could join some people for dinner. And what should have been about a six or seven hour drive total ended up being closer to like 10 or 11 hours, like I turned and like asked my daughter because she’s sitting across the room, that was, I mean it was a disaster. And we got into D.C. super late on Sunday and we still had to meet with some people because we were there on a business thing.

Why We Went: National Ag Day

So what was going, I talked about it a little bit last week, but what was going on is Tuesday was National Ag Day which is, there’s a lot that goes on with that but what we were invited for is they put on some events for youth leaders in agriculture and we were invited to come in for that. It was, we weren’t there, we were sort of there on official capacity, we were invited by the National Branch which a lot of people don’t really know what the Grange is and it’s super disappointing because it’s a historical society. It’s been around, it was founded in 1867, it’s a fraternal brothership that was designed to help rural communities and at the time you actually had to be a farmer to be a part of the National Grange because what they did is they would meet at the local level like town, county and have an individual Grange there and then they would, they had a state Grange and then they had the National Grange.

What the Grange Was Designed to Do

And besides having brothership and a place to learn and have education and they also would submit and talk about the legislation that was important to agriculturalists, farmers and the rural population. And it was just a really great way for rural voices to be heard. Something that I don’t feel like we currently have, I think there’s a lot of rural populations that are constantly screaming taxation without representation and that is 100% what’s happening.
I do feel like with some of the things with the new administration a lot of control is being brought back to the states which then means these decisions are going to be made by state senates and state representatives. And these state representatives instead of representing hundreds, thousands or millions of people, they’re representing sometimes only in like the 10 or 15,000. And so they’re actually hearing what the people want to be heard on and then able to present that at the state level.
And so I think it just gives us a lot more voice that we haven’t had in a really long time. So another thing, but with that the Grange, I mean so many of the agricultural laws that were put into place over the last, let’s see it was 159 years, were directly influenced by the National Grange. In fact, in the I think it’s the 20s and 30s, many of the laws were referred to as Granger laws when it comes to agriculture because they were so integrally, it’s been a really long couple of weeks, they were very involved.

Historical Influence of the Grange

And now at this point, well and then there was like the Country Life Initiative that came about in like the 10s and 20s that was about empowering and educating rural communities. I do have some thoughts and views on those, but the Grange was really integral in making sure that the rural voices were still heard as much as possible. Now, well then in during the Depression and World War II, the Grange was huge.
I mean like a million members and that’s just like paying members, that doesn’t include like the kids and like the extended families that were a part of that. Then somewhere around that time, they also made it where you don’t have to be a farmer to be a member of the Grange, but the Grange has so many programs. They have the Grange Youth, the Junior Grange, some states you can show at your state or your county fairs through the Grange, kind of like 4-H or FFA.
And they have the Youth Ambassador Program, which is who we were with when we went to visit. What has been happening lately between less than 1% of Americans being farmers and so many people moving out of rural, well, previously moving out of rural locations. At this point, we’ve seen an increase in rural demographics, like especially in, I always hate to say it this way, but the millennial age, you know, the 25 to 44, the parents, the working age family, there’s been a 6% increase in that demographic in rural communities.
And that doesn’t even include like what they consider the suburban communities that a lot of times I feel like could be considered rural as well. So, because I mean, so many people, you know, they connect digitally, they’re working from home. And so they’ve lost that sense of community.

The Decline in Membership and Community Need

But what happened is range numbers have decreased. And I mean, we see that across the board in so many organizations, just on so many things in general, with just kind of how society has been moving towards. But as humans, we have this eccentric need to be a part of a community.
And I think that that’s where a lot of our anxiety and other things like that are coming from, as just these separated people, where we’re not working together as a community. And, you know, I talk about our sustainable skills all the time, and, you know, generational sustainability, that we don’t have those extended families, we’re not learning skills, we’re not connected with anybody. And we’ve seen some really crazy things happen over the last several years, where we realized that we need all of those things.
And people don’t know where to find them. And I mean, I go to Homestead, Homeschool, Prepper, all sorts of conferences all the time. And people ask me, how can I, you know, find programs to teach my kids like what you’re teaching? Where can I find a class to do this? Are there community groups that offer this stuff? And a lot of the times, I have to say either no, or I don’t know.
And that’s because so many communities just don’t offer that stuff anymore. But then I turn around, and I see like on the internet, people talking about how back in the 30s and 40s, they used to have community centers where you could take all your stuff, or all your produce, and not only learn to can, but they would help you preserve for the whole year. And people are like, why don’t we have these anymore? And I’m like, we have programs and organizations that do this, but they just aren’t out there in our faces anymore, or they aren’t the standard like they used to be.

Why the National Grange Reached Out

And so the national grant actually reached out to me because of my educational efforts and some things that I’m doing with, you know, the homesteading and regenerative farming and that type of stuff to see if there was something we could do to partner. So it seems how my daughter and I were going to be on the East Coast for National Ag Day. We were invited to join them and just kind of see what they’re all about, which was an amazing experience.
And I am going to talk about what happened on National Ag Day. But we were invited to do everything that these youth ambassadors were doing, which during this time, the youth ambassadors were with National 4-H, the National FFA, the AFA, which is America’s Future of Agriculture. And that was it.
And we did some amazing things. We sat in on roundtables with the chief of staffs from the House and Senate Agriculture Committee, and representatives, like their chiefs of staff. We did roundtables with them.
And I say we, like all of us were sitting there chatting and talking and going over like the really important legislation that has to do with agriculture. So we went, we had a private meeting as Grangers. And then we did it again the next day, both at, my camera is like moving.
So any of you who are watching this, if you’re seasick, I’m sorry. I don’t know if it’s my fan or something with the hotel. But so then we also went to the USDA for the National Ag Day events, where we listened to the Deputy Secretary of Agriculture speak.
We listened to the head of the Farm Bureau. Then they did a Q&A panel with some of the top ambassadors of each group on how they got involved in agriculture and what their missions are. And then we went in and we sat with some people from the USDA and had like a press conference, basically, where the kids were able to introduce some of these big names and have an interview session with them, which I mean, was amazing.
And that’s probably the most about what I’m going to cover when I circle back to some of this. Oh, we had lunch at the USDA. We went to the Congress offices with the representatives staff from the Department of Agriculture Committee.
We did the same thing over in the Senate. Then we kind of broke up and we went and all each talked to the staffs for our senators for our individual states. Unfortunately, most of the legislators were out of D.C. this week because they’re having some time off.
Then we did the Friends of Agriculture reception in the Kennedy Caucus Room. We learned how to drive, ride the Metro. That was fun.

Small Group, Big Access

But when I say that we were with these groups, like a lot of people think, okay, you’re there on like a field trip and there’s, you know, 100 kids, you know, being shuffled from one room to the next. There were about 12 kids. I say kids, they ranged from, they were teenagers and like early college.
There was about 12 of them and they had a few chaperones and a couple people from the range and then my daughter and I. So, I mean, these were groups of maybe 20 getting to see, going into these offices. So, that was super awesome. Savannah, do you want to come answer a couple questions real quick? She’s trying to eat food, but I think that she needs to come join us for just a minute.

Savannah Joins the Conversation

So, you can just kind of come here. So, what was it like going into these congressional buildings as a 16-year-old? I don’t know. It’s just me and you, hon.
We’re just videoing it. I mean, it’s a great opportunity. Not everybody gets to do that and it was really cool getting to see some of the things.
Yeah. I mean, I think it was really great how each of you kids like had opportunities to ask some really insightful questions. Because you weren’t part of the actual ambassadors, you kind of didn’t get your chance as much.
Had you gotten a chance, was there any questions that you would have liked to ask? Were there any issues that you feel really strongly about that you wish you could have had a chance to bring to their attention? Yeah. There’s a lot of food waste that happens in just the whole process of everything getting done. Vegetables, like maybe not looking exactly perfect, they don’t sell them.
Lots of meat just gets wasted every year. Male chicks that are hatched out in hatcheries every year that aren’t used for meat, they just get killed on day one because they’ve got no use is what people say. Yeah.
This is across the board on both ends, like on the farming side, the production side, the retail side, and the consumer side. I’ve talked about this a lot in the podcast, but to have the kids really just see this, it’s… And then talking to these chief of staffs who we actually tried to have this conversation with them a little bit, and one of the things they said is their hands are tied. There’s nothing they can do to make these changes.
They can’t encourage people to eat better or waste less because not everybody has that opportunity, which is frustrating because… Stay here. It’s frustrating because as an educator, I feel like everybody can be in that opportunity. I don’t feel like I’m necessarily in a privileged… Well, maybe at this point we might be in a little bit of a privileged place because we’ve worked really hard for where we’re at, but we haven’t always been privileged.
I’ve shared this a little bit before previously, but I was a single mom, a domestic abuse survivor. When I was in college, my daughter here and her twin brother were just toddlers, and I was absolutely on food stamps and WIC and got assistance in going to school and assistance in them going to daycare, but that didn’t mean that we literally lived on packaged foods and cereals and things like that, which is what we see happening across the board right now. I get the excuse of, well, people live in food deserts, and so they have to buy everything from Dollar General and stuff like that, and that’s just not 100% the truth because I think everybody has opportunities.
If you had a chance, Savannah, to teach people some of the ways that we don’t waste in our home, what would you really focus on? I know it’s hard when you don’t do this all the time, but I’ve definitely heard you be able to have this conversation. I mean, in the average household, there’s lots of food that goes to waste. Stuff you buy just goes bad in the fridge because you may not have a use for it or eat it in time, but there’s still lots of things you can do with the wealthy vegetables that you don’t want to eat.
Your animal, like dogs, chickens, can have them. If you don’t have dogs or chickens, you probably know someone who does have them and would love this. Absolutely.
I mean, chickens are the consumer’s garbage cans. They can eat it. You’re saving yourself money by feeding your chickens.
They turn it into compost. I mean, it’s all just part of that cycle that I think that we have really disconnected ourselves from over the last 100 years. We hear a lot about how there’s technology and there’s new ways of doing things, and I don’t think that’s an excuse to totally separate yourself from just the basics of how life works and how the human land connection has always been.
What was your favorite part about DC? Probably just hanging out with everybody, getting to talk to all these other kids, young adults who are around my age who have the same thoughts as I do of what’s going on with all of our agriculture, things that are going wrong and things that are going great in the world. Were there any facts or anything you learned sitting in with anybody that really surprised you? Almost everybody we talked to, going, like, talking to all these people in the, what room was it? The Kennedy caucus room? Yeah, like the Kennedy caucus room or the, just like all the places we went and talked to all the people who worked, all of them started out as interns from college. Yeah, that was really interesting.
Like, most of the staff had started as interns. I thought that was pretty cool. What I was surprised to learn is that a lot of the youth ambassadors actually didn’t come from highly rural communities, and I’m going to definitely say in my travels and we spend a lot of time in very rural communities, and to find out that they aren’t, there aren’t a lot of opportunities for the youth in that way was really surprising because I always thought that there was a little bit more with the 4-H and FFA, but to encourage these kids to move up the ranks in, you know, national organizations, it was amazing to see the kids that were there, but I wished I would have seen more kids that came from highly rural places.
Yeah. So, all right, well, thank you, sis. I’ll have to get you back on later when you’ve had a minute to think about everything I asked.
Okay, I’m gonna go make a cake. All right, hotel living. So, I’m going to go over some of the things that we learned.
Oh, my thing got a little, and I don’t have a way to, like, reprint out my notes here or anything, so I’m just going to give you some notes. A little bit of a summary straight off of my iPad. Let’s see here.

The Farm Bill Situation

So, something I didn’t realize, which I guess I should follow this a little closer, but I totally, like, somehow I didn’t know. The farm bill, it’s an every five year legislation. The last time it was passed was in 2018, which, so that means it should have been redone in 23, and as of right now, they still have not passed a new farm bill.
Most of the funding for anything that goes through the farm bill, like, nothing has stopped. Like, nobody’s not getting their food stamps, or farmers are still getting their aids, they’re still, you know, if a three year grant was written, like, that’s still happening, but something else that, you know, is just kind of a huge thing to look at with this is there has been no updates to the farm bill since COVID. Now, I don’t know about you, but I think COVID has really changed the way everybody thinks about agriculture, regenerative agriculture, supply chains.
I mean, just down the board, there’s, you know, new things with, a lot of people don’t know this, but about two thirds or more of the farm bill goes directly to the nutrition programs, which is, you know, the Food Stamp, like, SNAP program, WIC, and there’s a whole bunch of others. Like, I couldn’t even list all of them, you know, some of them are, like, getting money to food pantries. And so, I think that a lot of that has really, really changed in the last five years.
Well, I think, I mean, I know it has. And so, for our whole farming funding, you know, keeping us all going, and everybody fed, and all those things, nothing has changed since the biggest, like, turmoil in modern history of our lives. And a huge piece of it directly relates back to farming and agriculture, and the way people are trying to live directly relates back to that.
So, I mean, I’m talking the regenerative farming movement, the homesteading movement, you know, I joke, the crunchy moms, but, like, this grassroots movement of people that want nutritious food, who want to learn sustainable skills, who are just really, really feeling this disconnect that we have as humans right now from the land and our food, and, I mean, just on down the line. The trade that is happening, that has been really kind of, there’s been a lot of stuff like that. But one thing that I didn’t realize is one out of every three rows of corn goes out of the country.
I mean, that’s a third of our corn going out of country. I mean, that’s huge that Americans supply that much food, and, I mean, that’s just the corn out of country, but we don’t have our own farm funding and stabilization happening here. So, I learned a little bit more about, like, national food security.
It kind of bounces around a little bit because I was taking notes in a bunch of different places, but, you know, the empty shelves that we saw, I mean, that is a direct visualization of our national food security and the issues that we have there and the issues we’ve seen over the last five years. I mean, just realizing how fragile that system is, and I think that a lot of people, you know, especially from the homestead movement, you know, they’re talking about it all the time, and we kind of get a little bit of backlash that, like, okay, we’re stable, like, chill out. But I literally heard this out of the mouths of staff from the agriculture committee from the House of Representatives.
So, I mean, this is not something that is just this tiny little grassroots movement of, you know, people that want to melt cow. This is legitimately what’s happening, and to just kind of, like, have that reassurance and validation of everything that, like, we’ve known and have been, like, screaming from the rooftops and kind of been told that we are, you know, crazy peppers or whatever, that, no, this is actually what is happening, and it’s being acknowledged at the federal level. You know, they say that, you know, technically we are always three meals away from social unrest.
But then we also hear, like, don’t worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow has its own problems. But when you’re only three meals away, that is tomorrow.
I mean, it just, it happens so fast. It’s really, it’s a concerning thing that that’s what we’re, I mean, we’re not saying that we are three meals away from not having food. What we’re saying is that as a nation, we’re three meals away from, like, complete social unrest, but yet, like, that’s not, I mean, it is a priority, but it’s just not happening in some of the ways that I think it really could be, and, you know, they say that, like, it’s not a solution to have people growing their own food, but it is.
It absolutely is. It’s not, we aren’t going to be able to get everybody to grow enough food to not need farming or anything like that. That’s not even possible with the people who live in cities.
But I do feel like that, you know, this window could be, you know, changed. Like, for those of you watching on YouTube, and even though those that aren’t, like, I’m making, like, you know, there’s all the agriculture in the world. Like, I have my hands, you know, kind of a foot apart or something.
And then I’m making, like, you know, a two-inch thing on each side. And if that two-inch thing on each side included people growing more of their food and wasting less, and a two-inch thing on the other side that was less waste at the, like, farming and production level. And honestly, like, a whole layer, like, taken off the middle of where a huge amount of our food goes to, like, low-nutrient-density items that are then, you know, sold to families that, you know, are causing more nutrition issues, malnutrition, all that type of stuff.
And then you’re down to, like, the core of just, like, highly nutritious foods with a little bit of gap on each side. And I think that if, I know that it’s like, they can’t just be like, oh, everybody, just so you know, you’re growing your own food now. Like, it just doesn’t work like that.
But I feel like if there was more programs out there and more funding to, you know, rural education and that type of stuff that, you know, and not just rural education, but rural education towards regenerative farming, small-scale farming, like, how to actually do this. You know, having state or county extension offices out there working with the small farms, not just, oh, yeah, if you come in and see us, we’ll help you. No, like, they need to be, like, have a list of the local farmers or the people that are interested in local farming.
And they need to be following up with them and making sure that they are able to grow their foods. If they’re having issues, that they’re there to help. I mean, because personally, like, if I have my tomatoes being a little weird, I’m going to try to Google it.
But, like, having somebody who does this all the time and they see the issues, and they might be able to see that, hey, everybody in this region of the county is having tomato issues. Maybe we need to look at the soils here or something. But no, we’re not doing that.
They’re just waiting and hoping that people call in. And then maybe in a few years, they might notice a trend. But if they were out there on the farms in their counties, they would be seeing so much more.
And then helping people market their foods. You know, the food and ag marketing is a huge industry. And they talk about how important that is all the time.
But I tell you, there is no one from, like, the Idaho Department of Agriculture helping me sell my products to my local community. Or how to do that legally. I’m sure if I went down there and sat at their desk and said, like, you really need to help me, they would.
But they aren’t reaching out to the local farmers and seeing what kind of support that they need. And honestly, our local office shut down. I would have to drive 100 miles to get to the closest one.
So I just, I mean, that’s, like, my huge soapbox. Maybe I’ll get done off of it. Maybe I won’t.
Let’s keep moving down the list.

Voices from USDA and Agriculture Leaders

You know, something that somebody, one of the people said that we got to sit in with. And her name is Jennifer Tiller.
She’s the Chief of Staff to the Deputy Secretary. She had came over from Senate and then was working for the USDA. She’s only been in this office for about six weeks.
But this woman is a powerhouse. And her really big platform is nutrition. And one of them is, like, getting whole milk back in school.
So, I mean, I don’t know her entire platform. I would really like to look into her more. I just haven’t had that opportunity yet.
But her really big thing is food security. A country that can’t feed itself is a country in decline. And what she stated is the UK is close to not being able to feed themselves in all of human history.
I mean, that’s, like, bam, right there. They are an industrialized country that if they were cut off from any part of the world or if there was any issues, they literally would not be able to feed themselves. It’s scary.
Like, really, really scary. And, you know, we’re not in the UK. But, I mean, they’re probably, they have historically been, like, our closest allies.
And that’s the position they’re in. Where does that put us in relation to them? And even though, I mean, as Americans, we have the space to farm way more than probably any other country. Maybe not.
But, I mean, we’re up there. But if we’re not actually getting that food to people, it doesn’t do any good. So, or long term, if it’s not nutritious and things like that, it’s just, it’s a waste of time and money.

The Panel of USDA Officials

So, one of the, like, in one of the places we sat in on, it was basically a press conference for the kids. But, I mean, there was actually people in there videoing it, taking pictures, interviewing the kids. It was a really cool experience.
But the people that were on this, like, panel to ask questions of, one of them was Joseph Parsons. He’s the administrator of NASS, which is the National Agriculture Statistics Service. The other one was Jennifer Tiller, the one that I just told you about, chief of staff to the deputy secretary.
So, Seth Meyers, he’s a chief economist for the USDA. And he actually works a lot overseas. He’s part of, like, international agriculture stuff.
And then Dr. Mike Williams, and he’s part of the educational institutes for the USDA. There may have been one or two others that were doctors or that have their doctorate. I snapped the picture and started writing their names and then realized that one of them had that title.
So, if you are familiar with these people and I messed that up, I apologize. It was a very crazy couple of days. Also, the two gentlemen, Dr. Mike Williams and Seth Meyer, I had them backwards in my notes.
I looked at a picture later. I tried to sort it out. But if I specifically say something that one of them says, or that I thought one of them said, I apologize.
But really, I want to just give you the gist of what the entire conversation was about there versus who actually said what. So, Joseph Parsons, he’s kind of a hoot to listen to. He’s another one that I think I might look up a little bit more.
So, the National Ag Statistics Service, I mean, it’s kind of just exactly what it sounds like. They gather data and statistics all over every single agriculture thing. If you go online and, you know, anything you Google that has to do with food and agriculture, it comes up through the USDA.
And that is where that information comes from. One of the things that I actually thought was really cool is they partner with the gentleman who does the overseas stuff. And they actually have statistics on what commodities are doing in other countries from satellite imaging.
They can zoom down and see not only what they’re growing, but the quality of those crops down to an area about like four by four feet. I mean, holy jeepers. And then what they do is if they go, okay, this country is not going to have great tomato crops this year.
We’re going to send one of our people in from this agency. And they hire like half Americans to work in these embassies. And then the other half is locals.
And they’ll send those locals in to negotiate deals and stuff to make sure that we are selling American agriculture overseas. And they had like an expo in India with like 10,000 vendors from American agriculture companies to make sure that we are, you know, keeping our farmers in cash flow, selling their products through their overseas markets. Like I was just blown away that this was even something that happens.
Kind of like on both ends. Like, wow, I didn’t realize we can do that. It’s so cool like how, you know, agriculture has advanced so, you know, technologically and marketing coming from, you know, like the ag girl in me.
But then the other side of it was like, if they can tell if, you know, Mexican tomatoes are not doing that well this year, what do they know about my garden? What do they know about me? Okay. So a little scary. But, you know, I was definitely like living all my little girl dreams in the USDA because that was where I had always wanted to work until I got in.
Even when I was in college, that was the plan. I was going to work for USDA and I had gotten an internship working in the private sector, getting them ready for a USDA style inspection and fell in love with being the creative, ingenuitive position, getting food plants ready for USDA third party type inspections. So I never ended up working for the USDA.
And honestly, over the last few years with my husband’s health and seeing what’s happened nationally with COVID and stuff like that, there’s definitely some things that I’m not in agreeance with everything they’re doing either. Even still, when I always dreamed for, you know, 30 years of my life to work for the USDA, getting to walk into that building was kind of one of those dream come true moments. So I was definitely taking a lot of pictures.
I have some that I’ll share with you guys later, like on my social media and stuff. Taking a few selfies, like I was being that girl and I don’t even care because that was pretty exciting.

Advice to Youth from USDA Leaders

So back to Mr. Parsons here.
You know, one of the things that the kids asked him is, you know, what does it take to be like an agricultural student and then go into working in agriculture or specifically like ag politics like these guys or, you know, at the government level. So, you know, he was just really big on the opportunities that there are, that it isn’t just, you know, kind of, you know, one track, like there’s so many different things you can do, you know, especially when we look at how the production industry that is associated with food is almost bigger or with farming is almost bigger than the farming industry or maybe it is. But he was really, you know, he wanted kids to look at what technology, you know, can do for them and the importance of understanding technology going into agriculture, which sounds completely counterintuitive.
But even as someone in that homestead realm, I still use a lot of technology in my farming, even if it’s just from the business aspect of it and not the actual, like, you know, science and tech part. Although we do have a few, like I use a Doppler to check and see if my pigs are pregnant. I test soil, all sorts of things.
And of course, you know, I just run my business, like social media marketing and my spreadsheets and all that stuff is all technology based. Definitely, like, make sure that you’re a lifelong learner and that you learn critical thinking and that you have a strong sense of farm values. So that was, you know, really exciting to hear that coming from somebody in such a high government position to say that you still just need to have those farm values.
And then, you know, as you’re deciding on your major, embrace ambiguity. Don’t just stick to one path. And like, it’s kind of, I don’t know how to do it, but I can figure it out.
And I think, you know, that’s something that I do all the time. My family thinks I’m a little crazy, because I have that gene that just says that there’s something I can’t do. I think my biggest challenge is that I don’t acknowledge that I can’t do it all in the time period that I believe I can.
That might be ADHD, though.

Jennifer Tiller’s Message on Food Security

So, next, Jennifer Tiller, and what she talked about with the food security, and a country in decline, says we are spending seven times what we did 50 years ago on food. Both, like, as a country and individually.
And the poor just can’t reach these monetary needs, and honestly, more money for them is only a Band-Aid. So I really love her stance on that, and some of the things I talked about earlier in this episode that the Grange and I are hoping to partner on would definitely be something that I think that she would be really excited about, because, yeah, more money is just a Band-Aid. Of course, we’re, you know, we’re in a pandemic, hoping that there’s money to teach people at this level, but it’s, you know, if you give a man a fish, he eats for a day.
If you teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime. And that’s kind of, she’s saying we need to stop feeding people and teach them to feed themselves. Or at least I hope that that’s what her point was with that.
Her big thing is the whole milk for healthy kids, that there’s a lot of politics in the nutrition program, but she really feels like that you should have whole milk as an option because dairy is good for you, which, I mean, we absolutely know this. Of course, I wish there was more options for, you know, I’m a big supporter of raw milk. I think that there’s a whole conversation to be had there, but I’m just glad that they’re acknowledging that kids need a more nutrient-dense option.
It’s not saying they’re going to take skim milk out. They’re just saying that they want that to be an option for children. And where this kind of comes from is that, you know, Maha and Make America Healthy Again really produces a voice for the people that we haven’t had in a long time.
And I talked about that a little bit more of like, you know, the taxation without representation. She did talk a little bit about being a woman in this world. She says basically just push your way through the doors, work hard, learn your job, and have, you know, work on hard work and tenacity.
Don’t allow yourself to get removed from the conversation. Surround yourself with good people, and you don’t have to be the smartest person in the room. I always say, like, if you’re, if you are the smartest person in the room, find a new room because you need to always be learning.
But they also, you know, she just kind of points out that you don’t need to point out that you’re the smartest person in the room. So any of you who are listening to this, if you have young daughters that are looking to go into any field really, but especially a lot of those male-dominated fields like agriculture and politics, maybe have them listen to this part or, you know, look into some of these powerful women. So we just kind of need to make sure that agriculture is always front and center in our world because, and the American people, consume everything.
So if, I mean, food fiber and a lot of our energy comes directly from agriculture. A lot of our medications come from agriculture. I mean, just on down the line.
If we don’t continue to make that a priority in our lives, we are going to be in for a world of hurt. Make sure that you’re learning the soft skills. So soft skills are instead of I know how to type, it’s I know how to listen, you know, or they’re kind of a lot of things that can’t be quantitative.
So, you know, typing skills, knowing a certain computer program, those are all hard skills. Those are things you learned, you have a certificate for there or whatever, and they’re quantitative. Soft skills are qualitative.
So, you know, I’m an excellent leader. I know how to implement procedure, those types of things. Those are the skills that are going to get you through the door a lot faster than if you type five words per minute slower than another applicant.
And then something she said right at the end, one is never curtail your curiosity. So kind of that same lifelong learner concept. And to remember that the internet is forever.
Stay off of it, because you can be vetted for what you put on the internet. Currently, there are people in DC and other federal organizations who are losing their jobs over highly inappropriate things that they put on the internet. Like I want to like point it out that they’re highly inappropriate.
Like I mean, we’re talking I don’t want to say the words on here. But I think some of them you might know what I’m saying. And so something just consider long term.
Those were really bad things. But you might even put semi things that especially if you’re going into politics, you might be absolutely perfect for a job. But you may not get it because the administration at the time is leaning one side or another.
And at this point in your life, you may not even care or have that be a big part of your concerns. Because you’re just good at your job, but that wouldn’t make you it wouldn’t, you know, change your ability. So.

Insights from Seth Meyer

So Seth Meyer, he’s that chief economist, like I said, I may have had these two guys mixed up. But with the tech coming in so fast, people can’t be disruptors. You know, you can’t be getting in the way of some of that.
You need to be able to communicate. It says we’re in DC, we answer the questions we want, not the questions that are asked of us. So that was somebody had a very specific question.
And he says, we’re in DC. So I’m going to answer the question that I want to answer and not the one you just asked me. So I kind of got a kick out of that one.
Basically, literally, the question that was asked, he did not answer it at all. He just said what he wanted to say. So I thought it was kind of entertaining.
Frustrating from some aspects, but that was a pretty blatantly on purpose.
And it says, hang out with interesting people. So find people, someone that, someone you find interesting and hang out with them, learn from them, absorb what they’re doing.

Guidance from Dr. Mike Williams

Let’s see here. Dr. Mike Williams, you know, he talked about sometimes agriculture can be a difficult sector to work in, you know, especially when we’re not talking about farming, we’re talking about like the politics level of it. It’s extreme.
There’s a lot of uncertainty. We have to accept change. And you need to be able to speak right and convey your thoughts.
I mean, that, that was his advice to the kids. You need to have accomplishment and a driving force. You need to love what you’re doing.
A lot of these, they were, they believe in the mission of their organization. They believe that working in public service was an honor. They, they find agriculture very fascinating and that they just believe in their own American products.
So, I mean, it was just, like I said, it was just a lot of notes that I kind of jotted down real quick and wanted to make sure I shared with you. It was an amazing experience for both myself and the kids involved. And I hope to just see, I hope that a lot of these people in Washington are paying attention to what we are doing in rural America.
That we’re, we’re trying to be sustainable. We’re trying to grow our own food. We’re trying to take that edge off, the larger agriculture, whether that’s for our own personal reasons or that we believe in the, betterment of all.
I think that we need to think more about what, Jennifer Tiller said in that, I don’t remember her exact words, because I really liked it. Oh, you know, money is only a band-aid. So, that if you teach a man to fish or, you know, if you give a man a fish, he eats for a day.
If you teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime. And that’s really what we need to be focusing on in our country right now. And I’m not even saying growing all your own food, but just cooking like whole foods, cooking nutritious, not just buying things that are ready to eat.
Understanding where that comes from and being, being an active part, in politics in your community and feeding your neighbors and learning to grow your own food. So, you know, with that, I would just like to say that there’s a lot you can do. There’s a lot your kids can do.
Help out in your communities, find ways to do that. I’m going to have some more information over the coming weeks and months that hopefully will help a lot. I’m just kind of waiting on some answers right now as to what I’m going to do.
I need to get home and work some things out, but my continued mission is always going to be helping you and your kids grow your own food and grow as a person. So everybody, I hope you keep growing and I will see you next week.