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Tommy Grisafi is the main host and content creator for Ag Bull Media.
The Ag Bull Podcast showcases agriculture's top talents in a long-form video format. The Ag Bull Trading Podcast is a deeper discussion of trading with analysts and key players in agriculture nationwide.
AG Bull
Wiesemeyer's Perspectives | Beef, Tariffs, And A Wrecking Ball Walk Into Washington
We walk through a volatile week where shutdown politics, CPI relief, and global trade headlines moved cattle limit down while grains firmed. From Argentina beef optics to a possible Trump–Xi meeting, we connect DC decisions to cash flow, price risk, and the week ahead.
• shutdown timing linked to ACA premium hikes and party leverage
• partial FSA reopening and roughly 3bn dollars in payments to producers
• CPI at 3 percent yoy, equities rally, odds of another Fed cut rise
• beef inflation stubborn, cattle limit-down driven by optics and fear
• Argentina imports small in scale versus US consumption
• screwworm controls, Mexico cattle border reopening scenarios
• trade cards: 301 probe on China, soy and sorghum deliverables
• Canada talks pause, Japan signals added US commodity buys
• Brazil tariffs, coffee prices, and hamburger flows
• API withdraws support for year-round E15 and seeks reforms
• Senate hearing on seed and fertilizer market power and history
• market highs, debt surge, and risks from congressional dysfunction
Trading futures and options involves the risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors.
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Thank you, Tommy G
Happy Friday, everyone. Tom Gristaffi with the EggBow Podcast, EggBow Media and Eggbow Trading. Well, to say it's been a week, that'd be an understatement. Lucky for you, we have just the guy to break it all down. Now, we've got to give him a formal introduction. I think the only way to do that is just to tell you a little bit about Jim Weismeyer and give him a nice open. Everyone, enjoy the show.
unknown:Mr.
SPEAKER_00:Jim Weissmeyer. Live from DC. How are you doing, my friend?
SPEAKER_01:I'm good, except tired because we had Trump on steroids plus two.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my God. Absolutely, absolutely. Let's get right in the show. Where would you like to start? How about with U.S. government shutdown?
SPEAKER_01:Yes. When and how? I think we're approaching the time. November 1. I think it could go until uh November 1 or a little later. Why do I say that? That's when the Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act major increases will take place, and the Democrats lose their argument that they want them extended because the Republicans are not giving in on that. They want major reforms to that program, and they don't want to do it unless and until the government comes back to work. So after November 1, the increases are already in place. And the Democrats, I think, will have their political issue that I really think they wanted all along. They'll never say this publicly. They want to blame Trump and the Republicans for the dramatic increase in the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare Act payments to use that in the 2026 elections because they want to win at least one chamber of the House of Congress, probably the House, so they can help neuter President Trump for the last two years of his second administration. That's at least my perspective on that one. So it could it will be into November. I know it's going to take until early next week because the House has already said they're not coming back, and the Senate isn't back until next week, too. So government shutdown continues. It's now the second longest, uh, and it's going to continue.
SPEAKER_00:FSA partially open, sir.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, there's a few kinks, but early in the week they should be not fully backed. There's two people in each FSA office. They were manning the phones trying to get those two uh individuals for each county office, and they're getting close to that. And they had to make sure that the money, the funding was moved into the accounts before they started hitting the send uh button on some of the around$3 billion in payments, but they're coming. And that's for the ARC PLC payments for the uh 2024 crop, that's for the ag disaster wands, marketing ag loans, things like that. So at least they're back, and at least about$3 billion of cash flow is getting out there.
SPEAKER_00:Unbelievable. All right. I want to see you. Good to see you. This is my world, my old days from the border trade bond pits and stuff. CPI came out today, and uh, I believe you have some color on this, sir.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, on the CPI, it actually came in a little bit below the market expectations. Uh, look at that, 0.3 percent. The overall inflation rate annually was at 3%. But the the market impact of this was twofold. One, it gave the equity market the bravado to make new highs, I think across the board here. And two, it it uh increases the odds that uh late this month, next week, we're gonna have another 25 basis points cut in the Fed funds rate. So that was an important report. It showed that uh food inflation was a little lower than August. This was a September report, but it clearly showed those beef prices are high and they're probably going to uh uh uh stay high. Uh, they also said at the White House that uh remember this was the September CPI report. They've already said to the White House they don't expect to release the October report because of the government shutdown.
SPEAKER_00:I did see that. Yeah, a lot of news coming out. Now, to note, I think today we're supposed to have cattle on feed. I don't think that's coming out, just to note. But uh yeah, a lot of a lot of interesting stuff. Hey, let's just real quick while we're chatting here, I want to tell people I'm super excited about this. If they like your content, as fast as you're putting out content, of course, they can subscribe to it right there at the bottom, folks, weismeyer at gmail.com, or they can go to the Ag Bull website, www.agbull.com. Just go to AgBull Intel. Jim Weissmeyer has his own column called Weissmeyer's Perspectives, where we are pumping out. Now, normally Jim would put out a story or two a day, but uh, did you set a new record yesterday? Six, seven publications.
SPEAKER_01:It was too much, but let me see your fingers.
SPEAKER_00:Are there any it was one of these days?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I've got cramps. Uh it was one of these days, but important, uh, important stuff this week. Yes.
SPEAKER_00:Back to lightning round here. Now, this Argentina beef imports. Oh boy, are you sitting down?
SPEAKER_01:Yes, yes. The uh Argentine beef imports, they quadrupled them from all this is what uh Trump said. Yeah, he seeks quadrupling beef uh purchases from Argentina, but they're going from 20,000 tons to 80,000 tons. Well, yeah, I hate to say it, but it's peanuts.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, well, I got a chart to represent that, and uh this was from a friend on uh well, explain why it's peanuts, and I'll get the chart up.
SPEAKER_01:Well, we we consume 13 million metric tons of beef a year. 13 million metric tons, and this is 80,000 metric tons.
SPEAKER_00:Now explain to folks, and for our people listening on Spotify and stuff who can't see the chart. Sorry to talk over you.
SPEAKER_01:That Argentina, if this is a pie chart and the Argentina is in maroon and it's squeezy little at 2% of uh 2025 US beef imports by country. Now it's gonna go up what three percent, you know.
SPEAKER_00:That's yeah, I mean it's still it it it's really nothing.
SPEAKER_01:No, but it's it's the optics. You know, listeners will want to know well, why did the market what what feeder cattle went down over$23 a head?
SPEAKER_00:Are you suggesting I post a picture of feeder chart?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I would if we have it there. We ooh boy, that's a ski slope. You don't want to go down. Yeah, that shows you right there. It's it it was, and you you you're a trader, Tommy, you know that it's the optics of it and it's the fear angle. Like, well, what else can happen here?
SPEAKER_00:You know, yeah, and and something happened here, and uh, we'll get to this chart in a little bit. That one I jumped the gun when you lock limit up or down. Now, two weeks ago or three weeks ago, where like feeder cattle had one of its biggest moves in history, it was up twenty dollars. It's okay, and I'm gonna maybe people were gonna catch some slack for this, and I'm okay with it. Why is it okay to go up twenty dollars, but it's not okay to go down twenty dollars because the tone, the rhetoric, they didn't like his rhetoric. It was a very I didn't like his rhetoric.
SPEAKER_01:Did you emotional rhetoric, emotional rhetoric uh rhetoric? And he I know the cattle you know producers in the US are thinking, hey, America first here, Mr. President. But remember what I said last week in this term of the Trump administration, America first is consumers first, it's not producers first. That's what a lot of people are misreading his second term. And also, he doesn't understand the cattle market, he's as what we call all hat, you know what I mean? And you can imagine the constraints this has put on USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins. She can only go so far, and when he says he's going to increase the uh imports, well, she can give him some arguments, maybe per or con, and I think she did, but he's the decider. Now, there's geopolitics involved here too, Tommy, okay, because he this is this is a China complex thing, because he's trying to get uh Argentina, Brazil more in the US flank versus uh China and the BRICS countries. And so this is tied into far more geopolitical things than I think the ag industry uh realizes. So we're into heady, heady ground here.
SPEAKER_00:But is it like a us against them?
SPEAKER_01:Let's it's almost, yeah. We're we're de-risking ourselves from China and vice versa. China's doing the same thing.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, they're picking teams, yeah. We're all right. Oh, picking teams, yeah. Russia fight, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, Russia, Iran, ex uh North Korea, etc.
SPEAKER_00:That's really scary, Jim, because they're playing with people's livelihood, my friend.
SPEAKER_01:They are, they are.
SPEAKER_00:Did I tell you this one, or is this no?
SPEAKER_01:This is one. We've got the picture of the plant. They announced again a 13 13-page plan. I mean, that included a lot of things. Actually, there were there were some things in there that the cattle industry, uh, some in the cattle industry have wanted for years. Uh, it wasn't mandatory country of origin labeling, but it was voluntary. There's uh souped up uh funding and uh attention on helping uh get some more smaller meat processing plants. That's easier said than done, by the way, in my judgment, and some other aspects, but that tells you the focus. When was the last time you saw out of any White House a 13-page plan for the cattle industry? Now, normally cattle producers, very independent, and I don't blame them. They don't want, they don't want too much involvement here by the government. And the farm state lawmakers are saying the same thing. Senator Chuck Grassley said uh this week that when it came to Argentina and Trump and cattle, that the president should just shut up, you know, and that echoed what I think a lot of livestock producers are are thinking privately. Yeah, but Trump is looking at the consumer, he's irritated that beef prices are uh so high and they're staying high. But look at the price of coffee, Tommy.
SPEAKER_00:I saw coffee hit a record high yesterday. Correct, Jim?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely, and look at that versus a hamburger. Yeah, it's expensive, but uh versus coffee, plus you get good protein from beef. So uh yet and I'm not seeing demand going down. And this is what I wish that our president would understand. Let the market work, you know. When the when the government gets involved in market handling, you know, you usually get unintended consequences, and we're seeing them right now. The market isn't perfect, as we both know, no, but it's far better than the weak hand of a government coming in and trying to basically manipulate things, and then people lose trust of the market.
SPEAKER_00:You can't go take a big position home over the weekend, not knowing that you can't get out on Monday. That's the problem, Jim. We don't mind having a loser, but can I get out of my loser? That's the trader in me. I want to go back a little bit. Absolutely. Yeah, Secretary Rollins tweeted this, or her people tweeted this, and there's some very interesting people here skimming over this. The first person here, Doug Bergum's involved in this. Protect and improve business of ranching. Doug Bergam, why is he involved?
SPEAKER_01:Well, that's on the grazing. They're gonna they're gonna increase some grazing on federal lands. That's to get some more cattle, you know, you know, grazing. So he had to get involved in the permitting. He's very good on the permitting process. He's he he's a very knowledgeable guy. Thank goodness he's in the he's in the cabinet. So he'll direct if they want to increase grazing on federal lands, he's the guy to uh execute uh you know uh that that plan. So that's why he's involved primarily.
SPEAKER_00:We got a familiar face, and we got a new face that maybe you and I know this young lady, but let's go with uh number two here. This is the new face. Now I bring her up. She's uh she's a very smart gal. Talk about this young lady a little bit.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. From the small business administration, Kelly Loffler. She was actually in the final running running to be USDA secretary, but then he chose Brooke Rollins. She's in it primarily as a result of uh increasing uh the loans to establish more small, smaller beef processing plants. So that's why SBA is involved. And uh for for perspective here, Tommy, you had some of these programs already in place under the farmer Biden administration, the uh USD former USDA secretary Tom Vilsack. So this is just a continuation and an enhanced version of some of the programs that were frankly already in place.
SPEAKER_00:And we got to bring in my father's least favorite person. He doesn't like secretary candy. I might just, as a joke, put a picture of Kennedy on his nightstand and just see how long it takes for him to see it. What's Kennedy?
SPEAKER_01:Robert F. Kennedy. Well, this goes into the food programs, this goes into the dietary guidelines, etc. But the good part of this is he's he's saying him to himself, meat is a good protein. And within reason, that should be part of the plan. So that's a plus side. We finally got some good news out of him on the ag sector.
SPEAKER_00:All right, let's go to this little bugger. New world screwworm. Just can't seem to lose this subject. And then we're not going to, are we?
SPEAKER_01:Well, well, no, but that the the new world screw worm Mexico situation got into the market today. I think that's why you were tanking earlier, because late yesterday Reuters put out a report that Mexico's ag secretary is coming to the U.S. to talk with Brooke Rollins and hopefully to reestablish to open the border for Mexican cattle. Now, people don't think that's going to happen, but let me tell you some background stories here. Please do. This was part of the discussion. Some, not all, some people tried to encourage Brooke Rollins to do that, but she chose not to. So but I think it's coming. I don't know when. The reason I say that, I did a history and it's on your site probably. It's in today's report. My updates today. I looked at the history of since the 80s and even before that, when Mexico had screwworm. We never closed the border in past years. It was only last year when we had an incident or two in Mexico that we closed the border. Remember, and then it reopened, and then they got more cases, and then it's been closed ever since. There was long years established on both sides of the of the border, and I looked at those years and it was a fairly effective you know deterrence. But I think Brooke Rollins wants to see that sterile fly plant well on its way and increasing the number of sterile flies before we see an actual uh opening of the border, and then only from certain states, probably, and and going into Arizona and certain Mexico states, the western you know, states where it's relatively free. But that got into the market to today. So we're gonna have some some information next week. We'll see. Now, Rollins has been rather negative on Mexico's involvement in this you know, keeping this uh screwworm out, but they've been doing some things uh that much to to to USDA's uh applaud privately. So I just think it's a matter of time before the border opens. Now, if you want more cattle and beef, this is the way to do it, not imports, you import the cattle. But I know there's listeners out there in the cattle industry say, wait a minute, you know, be very careful if you're gonna do that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and just in reference, this is a live cattle daily chart. We're coming back to prices that this sounds insulting to people. We haven't been this low since the beginning of the month, right? Yeah, but if you're involved in this, this is very painful because anyone who's bought cattle recently now is already upside down, correct? Now, this is feeder cattle, Jim. This is November feeder cattle. What people probably can't see here is the January, March, April, May, August, all the back month feeder cattles all the way across, and all the live cattles were limit down in that and we're bigger limits than we used to be. It's not like the old days where we're down a couple dollars, we're down big dollars a month. Yeah, yeah. Then we'll have expanded limits on Monday. So, folks, if you're out there or if you're worried, I did put my number at the bottom. It's easy to get a hold of us. And uh, of course, you can go to the website, there's a contact us page. Real quick, we're about halfway through the lightning round. If you're enjoying this content, Mr. Weissmeyer allows us to have the show for free. It's it's the best show out there. But if you're enjoying this content, we have premium content. If you notice, I didn't put out a lot of content this week. I actually put it out, but it was pay for content. www.agbull.com. Right there, you can click monthly or yearly. Mr. Wiesmeyer is so generous and loves the egg community so much, he decided the Weissmeier show is going to be free. Now, with that, here's where we get into the real serious stuff. We had to take a little commercial break because now we get real serious. And I'm really interested what you have to say about this.
SPEAKER_01:Well, Trump says he's going to meet with Xi Jinping, China's leader, next Thursday in South Korea. China has still not officially confirmed that the meeting is going to take place. I think it will, but I I, you know, I want to hear China say they're going to meet. Now, when the two, if if and when the two meet, they both are coming at this meeting with far different expectations. Trump loves deliverables. And so the Wall Street Journal had a story that I commented on today in my updates, in which I headlined it uh G thinks he's got Trump's number. They have read the art of the deal, they know Trump's emotionality, they know that to get concessions, they gotta pat him on the back, say he's good, the relationship is good, and give him some things that he wants. And those things are, include some purchases, Chinese purchases of U.S. soybeans and sorghum. They added sorghum this week, which I think is a good, thank goodness, because the Milo people really need it. So we're gonna see if they meet. I think you're gonna see some of these deliverables, and then we'll have to see if they issue a statement. That's another thing that I've learned to look out for. If they issue a statement, both countries issue a statement after they meet, that's a good sign. But if they don't, then well, it they just agreed to meet and maybe a few things. But what does China want? China's gonna want something because frankly, Xi Jinping thinks that China's above the United States now. They think that their economy is gonna be better over the long haul. He thinks 10, 20, 30 years ahead. That's uh Gi on the right side. Yeah, yeah. And so he's coming in this meeting with a little more bravado. He's got the uh precious minerals, things that he thinks he's got the US caught, but I don't think that's true because we import almost 300 billion dollars more from China. We have a deficit, they need us.
SPEAKER_02:They need us.
SPEAKER_01:So if Trump really were to pull out big time, China's economy was tilt south, just like that fear cattle chart that you showed, by the way.
SPEAKER_00:And and full disclosure, we've had a nice little healthy, healthy rally in soybeans while the government's closed, and while we don't have allegedly China buying, but we wouldn't know if they were buying, Jim.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, because the daily export sales report is not being announced because USDA is closed. Yeah, uh yeah, we've had a pretty good rally here. In fact, you're you're above on soybean prices where you were a year ago. I checked on that the other day.
SPEAKER_00:Very much so, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so and corn too, same thing.
SPEAKER_00:Technically, we're breaking out too. I do a video with uh Kerry Artec, and he had a level in soybeans. We broke out. I I'm gonna post a picture. Tell me what you think of this.
SPEAKER_01:I hold the cards, the cards are made in China. That's the there's more truth to that, you'd think. Now back to the cards. Oh, thank goodness. Yeah, now I gotta look at all the decks of cards I have to see where they're listening this is fancy stuff.
SPEAKER_00:I don't even know what this next headline means. I just put it in there.
SPEAKER_01:Well, this is interesting because of the timing. The U.S. Trade Representative's office today, maybe about an hour or so ago, announced a Section 301 investigation of China's uh fulfillment or lack of fulfillment of the phase one agreement. Remember that one under the first Trump administration? The timing of that was not a mistake. That's to give that's to give another card, if you will. There's your card angle there. That's to give another card to Trump, to Xi Jinping saying, hey, where's accountability? At least the U.S. follows through on commitments. You didn't. And just because you think Biden was weak didn't doesn't mean that you shouldn't have fulfilled the terms that you signed. And I've got pictures of your people signing it.
SPEAKER_00:And we're talking about these right here, soybeans.
SPEAKER_01:This is big time soybeans and other primarily soybeans, yeah. They were uh short of the of their commitment, they just dropped it. Now they can say that it was COVID and other things, but no, they didn't fulfill the terms. That's why you have a 301 investigation. And this is a little more leverage that Trump can have. So I think it was a smart move on the part of the you know, you know, Trump administration to give him another quiver in his arsenal. Trump trade talks with Canada off, but the their prime minister said today he wants to uh resume those negotiations. This is internal Canadian politics because the Premier of Ontario a few weeks ago edited, and it was, I think, a bad edit, prior Reagan comments on tariffs, saying that they really don't work, etc. Even though in Japan Reagan selectively used tariffs. But you have to know Trump. He doesn't like that. But what people also don't know is Trump gets a little jealous of former president Ronald Reagan because of the love Reagan has within the Republican Party. So he thinks that Reagan was too moderate. And when when he saw what Canada was doing, he thought, stop all talks. I don't think that's gonna last. I think we they we he will resume talks after probably getting a call from Canada's prime minister. We won't hear it, but uh he would say, Mr. President, it's uh our Ontario premier. He got out of sorts, he shouldn't have done it. Let's talk, and I think that they will. So I think this is mainly a couple day story and that they'll go back to talks.
SPEAKER_00:Trump deal with Japan.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you know, Trump's gonna meet. He's not only gonna want to meet with Xi Jinping, if Xi Jinping will say yes, he's gonna be meeting with Japan, in which Japan, who has a new prime minister, they're gonna fulfill the terms of that U.S. Japanese agreement. And I think they're gonna announce even additional imports of U.S. commodities above their traditional purchases, and I'm not talking just rice, so this could be a good thing in the in in the next few days, Tommy, on Japan. That's a good thing. We got positive news.
SPEAKER_00:We don't bring up Japan a lot.
SPEAKER_01:No, no, but they're they're a good ally and they're a really good customer of U.S. commodities. So that's a good thing. That's a good thing.
SPEAKER_00:All right, let's see what we have after Japan here. So much coming out.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, Brazil, Lula is the leader of Brazil, and he wants to meet maybe I think this weekend. Now, Trump's leaving at 10:40 p.m. tonight, Eastern time. Now, Trump runs late like Clinton did all the time, so I don't know whether he'll actually leave at that time. But when he goes over internationally, Lula is already there and he wants to talk a trade agreement. Yes. Now that could be important because if you recall, we added 10% tariffs on Brazil before Trump increased it by 40% to 50% tariffs. Well, that decimated their hamburger shipments to the United States. And they can ship far more hamburger to the United States than Argentina can, and it's better quality, by the way. So I'm not I'm not predicting that, but I'm telling you that this Brazil-Argentina mix, I'm not going to rule out a trade agreement between the two countries that could include uh lower coffee tariffs uh to lower the price of coffee and that uh beef, especially hamburger.
SPEAKER_00:And he references this, Jim, in this in this truce social. He says the only reason cattle people are doing well is because my 50% tariff in Brazil, it's right there in the middle of the meat of that. Now, it's complete BS because the cattle market's been rallying since COVID of 20, but that's for a different day.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Under Trump 101 rules, you know, it's just what it just didn't make sense. Didn't make sense. And and it puts Brooke Rollins in a spot, as I said before. It's just incorrect, but that's Trump. He just doesn't understand the cattle market, he doesn't understand that it takes two to three years. It's called the cattle cycle. He doesn't understand just to let the market work. He thinks it could be like the egg situation, in which they they they did reach the top of the egg market when they announced their five-point plan.
SPEAKER_00:There's there, there it's there's Trump eating beef. He had his own beef company for a while, his own Trump stakes, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And I said before, he usually puts ketchup on steak, by the way. A lot of people don't know that.
SPEAKER_00:Oh boy, that's two strikes against him. All right, we got we got this. This one's interesting. API pull support for year-round E15 needs reform. That's gotta hurt.
SPEAKER_01:That just just at the time where you think there was momentum again for year-round E-15 in Congress or the White House, American Petroleum Institute comes out the middle of the week saying, Well, we've withdrawn our support at this time because we want to see reforms in the ethanol and in the biofuels uh arena. They didn't detail, but I've been told they want some changes on the small refinery exemptions. In other words, a little give corn growers won't like. They want a little give on the uh the what do I want to say?
SPEAKER_00:You'll think of it.
SPEAKER_01:45Z, 45Z program. They want uh lower rin prices, etc. So uh I always was suspect when API initially came out in support of year-round D-15. Now I know they didn't have follow-through. So that's just it's another hurdle ahead for the year-round D-15 to be determined later. Oh, and this is coming next week, I think Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee is gonna have a hearing on seed and fertilizer. You'll recall that the Rollins announced that in a memorandum, the Department of Justice and USDA was investing will investigate fertilizer and seed companies. And so now Congress is gonna pick up on that. They're gonna hold a hearing. Now, I think you put it on your site, Tommy, but I did a major fertilizer report this week. A look at the past, a future current and the history of the U.S. fertilizer and world fertilizer markets. So I would I would encourage uh listeners and and and viewers to look at that report because I spent some time on that to show how the US regulations in the 70s and 80s almost drove the U.S. fertilizer production out of this great country. And that's why. And we have 90% of the potash comes from Canada. And and look how we're treating Canada. So there are reasons why fertilizer prices are are high. And that that report shows absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:If you'd like to reference that, Jim's talking about that, it's on the EGBO website now. And that that report was called specifically Jim so they could search for it.
SPEAKER_01:I don't know now anymore.
SPEAKER_00:Well you put out seven yesterday. Hey, read them all.
SPEAKER_01:They were all fertilizer in the headline. Fertilizer is in the headline. But it tells you also how China went from an importer to a major exporter of fertilizer. So that's called a mega change, by the way.
SPEAKER_00:A mega change.
SPEAKER_01:A mega change, yeah. And so it's it's it's a good report. I want to do another one on seed, but I'm gonna do have to work this weekend to get it done. So we'll see.
SPEAKER_00:All right. This sounds like a song, wrecking ball.
SPEAKER_01:It was just like Miley Cyrus wrecking ball, because it's down the east wing of the White House. Not the actual, it's the attachment to the White House. He didn't, he didn't put the ball to the White House, although it's got Democrats all just aflutter. I mean, they just, oh my goodness. But history clearly shows, I mean, that the White House has changed over the decades. Your Truman balcony on the on the on the back end of the White House. That was done in the Truman administration. Yeah, there's the when they were starting to put the wrecking ball. That's on the Treasury Department side of the White House for those people who know Washington. And it was really where they had the White House theater and things like that. But Trump wants a 90,000 square foot, looks like 300 million or 350 million dollar ballroom, not paid by taxpayers. He'll help pay and some independent some private private people are gonna pay. But speaking of that, the Democrats are already saying that's pay-to-play, you know, things like that.
SPEAKER_00:Sure, sure, sure, sure. Who's paying the U.S. military?
SPEAKER_01:Nobody right now. And they the Democrats rejected several attempts to do that. So that's not a good sign. And these the the pressure points on having the government uh stay out are are increasing. You're seeing it with more cancellations of airline flights or delays in flights, and I'm going to be traveling pretty soon, so they'll get my ire. And you've got the food stamp, uh, the snap uh program. A number of states have whittled down their reserves. And so now we're hitting the pressure points, which again, I think we probably got a week to 10 days before both sides say, hey, let's get together and do something. Will it be time, by the way, Tommy, to do the November crop report? That's a big question. I don't know. But if you go into the first few days of November, I think that they won't have a November crop production report, but we're gonna see. And I think it could be very close.
SPEAKER_00:Okay. What I was referencing, Jim, was I thought Trump said some anonymous donor gave 150 million dollars to get they could.
SPEAKER_01:I didn't know that, but I didn't doubt it.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, there's kept coming out. Oh, well, we got the troops paid because this anonymous donor talk about pay to play or being in the good.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, the troops, you mean the troops? Yeah, oh well, I think he'll he'll bend over backwards, they'll find the money. There are so many billions. Yeah, there's so many billions of dollars floating around. The government, the government. I mean, look how they came up with three billion dollars to to bring back the farm service agency. I mean, it's it's there.
SPEAKER_00:Let's skip over billions. That's boring. Let's talk about trillions. Stock market hit all-time highs just a little bit ago.
SPEAKER_01:My 401k is 501k, Tommy. I'm happy. I'm happy papy on that one now. Let's just hope it continues. But we're getting in into frothy areas, but this thing could uh run for a while because of uh less than expected inflation. Your US economy is pretty good shape. You you could have a three and a half to four percent gross domestic product in the next quarter or two. You've got next year those one big beautiful bill, tax pluses, uh, investment, equipment depreciation, et cetera, coming into play. And if we ever could get this trade policy stabilized, then uh companies could plan. Right now, they don't want to get too aggressive in hiring new people, putting out new products, et cetera. But all that could change if we had any stability in some of the things that we're talking about right now, Tommy. So I'm still upbeat on the U.S. economy. I think I the the labor, you know, situation is a little bad. The unemployment keeps going higher, but that's why you're gonna have lower interest rates. Even our Fed chairman realizes that now.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. And I think I forgot to reference this chart, so now it'd be a good time. Uh the stock market believes in what Trump's doing, but maybe not what Congress is doing. Is that correct?
SPEAKER_01:Look at the look at the yeah, look at the the the historical low for Congress. Look at look at that number. That's even low for Congress. And you know, if you took out the the husbands and wives of lawmakers, their parents, their grandparents, and others, it would be single digits. It would be single digits, but that shouldn't surprise people because what Congress is dysfunctional. And and I'll say it again, we should never have a shutdown of the government if the lawmakers from both political parties would just do their job. And that's just not the appropriators, it's the leaders of both the Republican and Democratic parties who won't give the appropriators. The appropriators are the ones who sp who actually determine where the spending goes, but they have to get a top-level number first from the congressional leadership, and they take forever to get that number, and that's why you back up, it's like backing up cattle. It just it you just you you you just it it takes so long in the fiscal year to get that number. So I point the finger for this shutdown at both political parties, but Congress, both the appropriators and the congressional leadership at the highest level. And when I ask them why do you do that? Both sides tell me, leverage. This gives them leverage to get what they want. Is that any way to run a government? It's not, it's not. We gotta we gotta get through this.
SPEAKER_00:One last picture, and then we'll just talk a little bit. What's the deal with this?
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah, that 38 trillion dollars. Look at how fast we've gone over the last two trillion dollars, fastest in ever. That tells you this thing's gotta stop. I mean, it's gotta temper because the bond market, if they think Washington has lost control, you'll have real interest rates go higher faster than anyone realizes. And some people say, oh, the debt doesn't matter. Well, it does matter.$38 trillion when when you don't have a way to deal with it. So watch that for the future in the bond market.
SPEAKER_00:All right, we're getting to the last one, U.S. sanctions. President Columbia. This just came out a few minutes ago. Thoughts on this?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, the president and his top people are getting serious about the drug cartels in Venezuela and Colombia. You've seen the killings on the ships and things like that. And now we just sent some pretty big military hardware over to Latin America. This doesn't look good for the thing, and he's flexing the American muscle on that. And that's the president of Colombia who Trump had more than a few negative words uh about. He he's getting serious about the drug issue because he says Trump says every time that uh that a boat is hit, that saves 25,000 American lives.
SPEAKER_00:And I told Gina I was gonna lay down and she said, Why aren't you laying down? I said, Gina, he, this guy's not gonna be president forever. And the energy and his ability to answer a question. I know people, I hey, if you're out there and you want to comment on this video, drop a comment. But if you didn't watch this, go back and watch it. Yeah, each one of his important staff that was involved in this, he gave him time to talk, he didn't talk over them, and then he answered questions. I don't know if there's a person in the room who didn't get to ask questions. Did you see that lady from France try to answer a question, but he couldn't understand her?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, he he is the most energetic president I've ever covered, and he does. He is quick with the facts. He they tell me that he reads vociferously. And here's a little nugget for for the listeners and viewers. I've changed the way I have to cover both USDA and the White House. Now I I look at first XX, the old Twitter, I look at Truth Social, that's that's Trump's uh uh you know social media, then Fox News, Fox Business News, and CNBC. Why is that? Because Trump likes to be on those programs, and his cabinet knows that. So uh in the case of Brooke Rollins, she doesn't give many ag related pressers anymore. She goes right on Fox News or Fox Business or CNBC because they know President Trump is watching. So that's a way for them to see uh for Trump to see what they are doing. So that's why I've got to manned all those programs now where I really didn't have to all that much before. Now it's must must view TV.
SPEAKER_00:Well, Mr. Weismeyer, we've come to the end of the show. I hate to say goodbye, but uh I'm sure you'll be putting out a release real quick, folks. Thank you for watching. If you'd like to get a hold of Jim, his email's right there, weismeyer at gmail. If you'd like to see Jim's stuff come out, he'll email it directly to you. Or you can go to the Agble website. We have it posted up there now. If you really, really enjoy what we're putting out. Of course, we have our premium content, and uh, we'd love to see you move over to the premium side. Mr. Weissmeyer is gonna take us home. He's gonna leave us. You're not done yet. You're gonna leave us with something optimistic and why he loves America. Mr. Jim Weissmeyer, Wiesmeyer's perspectives.
SPEAKER_01:Watch some of the weekend developments and next week. I think we'll get some positive news on the ag front, both from the trade policy and economic uh arena. And that's good news.
