The first freeze of the growing season finally arrived at the end of September. It feels early but it’s not. It just seems that way given how mild and frost-free this season was on the farm.
The hungry ghosts of fall arrived and began to devour the crops as temperatures dipped into the teens. Our growing season is rapidly ending. Fall chores and planting await. It’s been a good year, plenty of challenges, likely more ahead.
At least it feels safer at home. The world off the farm is sure chaotic. So much uncertainty. So expensive. And political statesmen keep behaving so damn mean-spirited. Who voted for that? I pray you reconsider.
The same blabber-mouthing politicians who did such a phenomenal job protecting Montanans from the planet-warming pollutions are the same policymakers who are gonna now protect our privacy and jobs from the insatiable appetite of power-hungry artificial intelligence machinery.
The money-hungry tech elites of the AI world seem intent on making sure robots run the planet.It’s like a bad sci-fi movie. You saw at least one. I seem to recall that Skynet becomes self-aware. It wasn’t pretty.
The AI and robots are the upcoming illegal immigrant, the undocumented worker, stealing your job and making you pay more to keep the power on at home. And it kinda seems like when therobots hack or hurt, nobody is liable for damages.
But, hey. I’m just a farmer. Been working the same farmland with my hands and soul for the past 35 years, since college. What could someone who works the land possibly know about labor, robots, and the weather?
If we think the weather is chaotic today or that power is too expensive, wait until all thoseplanned data centers swarm and gobble up the massive amounts of electricity needed to make living more robotic. Scores of new large-scale power plants need to be built. Wonder who pays?
Somehow the people running the show think that a worker can afford all these ever-increasing and never-ending bills. The last six years in Montana have proven excruciatingly expensive as the cost to living skyrocketed for working families. $7 diesel is just wrongheaded policy.
Add up all those monthly bills, you know, the stuff like food, housing, insurance, childcare, healthcare, fuel, and property taxes. Add up what it costs to live in Montana today versus just six years ago, and it’s an extra $1,000 a month.
That extra grand per month it costs to live in Montana today compared to just six years ago is a shocking hit to the working wallet. And few elected dare mutter a word on how much extra it costs a worker to live in Montana under Republican Greg Gianforte as governor versus just six years prior under Democrat Steve Bullock.
The Flathead is suddenly one of the wealthiest places in the nation, so maybe it’s just hard to see the struggle of the working class. But anyone out there working with their hands will tell you that cost of living got way out-of-control in very short order.
For us dirt farmers, grunts, and clock-punchers, finding an extra grand per month to pay the man remains painful. It’s no wonder why most working Montanans and retirees say that the state is headed in the wrong direction. Most political incumbents’ favorability is underwater.
Hopefully one of the political newcomers running for the U.S. Senate will present somesolutions. Come judge for yourself. The candidates are in town. The event is public, free, and put on by Beer, Buds and the Big Sky Podcast.
Kyle Austin (L), Alani Bankhead (D), and Seth Bodnar (I) are all in Whitefish for a live, public debate at the Performing Arts Center tomorrow, Thursday, Oct. 1 at 7 p.m. No word from the Republican.