Welcome to the first episode of True Thirty 30 | a new weekly conversation where Joey and his Producer Sean X break down the biggest stories, questions, and cultural moments shaping the week.
In this episode, we discuss Iran, rising gas prices, tariffs, farming pressures, and the symbolism behind the “Golden Calf” controversy. We also talk about diesel prices, California regulations, global trade pressures, and the strange state of modern political culture.
TIMESTAMPS
0:00 Welcome to True Thirty 0:42 Iran War Questions 1:03 Gas Prices and Taxes 2:47 California Gas Island 3:41 Farmers Feeling the Squeeze 5:05 Tariffs Fertilizer and Margins 7:10 No End in Sight 8:01 Asymmetric War Explained 12:06 Hormuz and Global Ripple 13:29 Trump China and Ceasefire 14:57 Generational Farms at Risk 16:32 Golden Calf Statue Story 22:50 Wrap Up and Subscribe
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Joey Dumont: Hello, everyone. We are doing something called True Thirty 30, which is basically an idea of our members reaching out to us over the weekend with stories that they thought were either crazy, unfounded, or they wanna know more about. So that’s what we’re doing today. Some of the subjects, we’re gonna cover the Iran war for all the obvious reasons.
Joey Dumont: We’re gonna talk a little bit about some of the deleterious effects of that war specific to farming. And we’re gonna end the conversation with the golden calf discussion. In case you guys don’t know what that is, you will soon find out. So I’m here with my producer, Sean X, and we are gonna go through these topics, um, as best as possible.
Joey Dumont: Hey, buddy.
Sean X: Hey. How you doing?
Joey Dumont: I’m doing well. It’s a happy Monday.
Joey Dumont: So I don’t know, why don’t you share some of the comments we got specific to the... Well, they wanna know more about what’s going on in Iran.
Joey Dumont: For the most part, people have said, “Okay, what’s the nuance with the war going in Iran?”
Joey Dumont: Because we keep on hearing it’s on again, it’s off again. It’s affecting prices. It’s not affecting prices. Yeah.
Joey Dumont: So The New York Times has Iran war long-term energy discussions specific to Iran defended its demands for a peace deal, and President Trump called them garbage.
Joey Dumont: Mr. Trump said he wanted to suspend the federal gasoline tax. So obviously everyone knows that gas has been affected by the Straits of Hormuz being shut down because of this war. We’re now seeing gas prices at what, six- Six, si- six.
Sean X: It’s $6.35
Joey Dumont: For regular?
Sean X: For regular in San Francisco. Yeah. It’s $6.74 for premium, and it’s-
Joey Dumont: And diesel fuel is anywhere between 7 and 8
Sean X: $7.80 for diesel.
Joey Dumont: Um, a lot of it is from California policies, and some of it is from the pipelines or gas can’t reach us. Yeah. We’re a gas island. If a refinery goes down, we’re screwed. So for the most part, we pay the worst gas prices, so we’re feeling the biggest effect here.
Joey Dumont: So we are up over a dollar compared to the rest of you folks out there in the United States of America.
Joey Dumont: And Donald Trump wants to suspend the gasoline tax, which is how much? It’s eight-
Sean X: 18 cents.
Joey Dumont: 18 cents.
Joey Dumont: So- Do, do you know what 18 cents means for those of us in California?
Joey Dumont: With the gas prices I just mentioned, it’s 2 to 3%. Yeah, every little bit helps, but it’s really our California regulations that are the things that are screwing us.
Joey Dumont: I read a meme recently that said, uh, “Donald Trump is so awesome that my truck only used to hold $59 worth of gas and now it holds $130 worth of gas.”
Joey Dumont: Which I thought was brilliant. Um, so whoever wrote that, good for you. Um, but yeah, the, the gas tax is not gonna help us and- for us, . No.
Sean X: It’s, it’s not gonna help us.
Joey Dumont: Like, what we need help with is all the regulations in our state- Yeah ... and let that make us... A lot of people don’t understand.
Sean X: We use different gasoline here.
Joey Dumont: We do. We do. And it’s actually called CARB, um, which stands for California Air Resources Board, in case you guys have never heard of it, ‘cause I sure haven’t. And it basically means that our gas burns cleaner, reduces smog, lowers certain pollutants, and it’s chemically different from gasoline used in the rest of the country.
Joey Dumont: So when they say that we’re a gas island or a, an actual island on its own, that’s what they mean by our taxes. So yeah, I don’t think the, uh, suspending the gasoline tax is gonna work. And by the way, he has to get congressional approval to do so. So there’s another wrinkle.
Joey Dumont: Dude- Uh, we’ll see ... we need, we need, we need more help th- than from the federal government.
Joey Dumont: So those are all problems, I can say that we have an issue with.
Joey Dumont: But As we know, this is affecting everyone, not only the day-to-day people, but farmers specifically because a lot of farmers use diesel fuel as opposed to regular fuel. And, um, so let’s talk a little bit about that, dude. I just moved back to Minnesota to be with my mommy, uh, for her 86th birthday, and, uh, it was cool.
Joey Dumont: And I don’t know, I think most of our listeners understand that I grew up there. I’ve been in California for now 44 years, and I have a lot of buddies both from high school here in California, as well as the people I grew up with in Minnesota who are in the farming business.
Sean X: Yeah. They’re also tend to be more conservative than out, uh, out in California.
Joey Dumont: I mean, it’s- All my friends from Minnesota are Red Hatters. Not all, but most. And then most of my relatives are Red Hatters as well. I’ve been talking to them for the four years that I’ve been reporting on politics. They come to me because they say I don’t judge them, and that, you know, they know I love them.
Joey Dumont: And so they’re just like, “Joey, what’s actually going on?” Yeah. And that’s kind of why we wanted to start this program as well, is that it’s, if I’m reaching out to my Republican friends all the time on a DL basis, which is kind of funny, um, they don’t explain to everyone else, “Hey, I called Joey.
Joey Dumont: I wanted to know what’s going on.” That’s really what I try to do with my friends and relatives the other side of the aisle, if you will.
Joey Dumont: And what we tried to explain to them specific to gas is that I have a buddy of mine who’s a soybean farmer, in the Midwest, and he called me previous to the election and said, you know, “What do I need to know?”
Joey Dumont: And I tried to explain to him, I said, “Hey, buddy, look at where you’re getting your potash,” because I knew he was actually getting potash. Potash, about 80% of our potash comes from Canada. In Project 2025, the Trump administration announced that they actually did want to tariff potash. And I told my buddy, I said, “Hey, just if you can, try to find another source.
Joey Dumont: Look at supply chain issues. Figure out that specific to your EBITDA,” because farms, if you guys don’t know out there, farmers run at a very small margin to begin with. And if there’s increased prices specific to tariffs, which is on the potash, the Mexico-Canadian free trade agreement that Trump actually launched in 2017, which was a good free trade agreement, he blew it up, said it was the worst deal ever, and now we have supplies specific to John Deere, other maintenance issues that are going across the borders of Mexico and Canada, which is also putting up their prices.
Joey Dumont: And some of the things that I talked about specific to the numerous farmers that I’ve talked to over the last month- Is that the Farmer Bureau is actually saying that, and I’ll just repeat it here, “Fertilizer pre-booking rates up 19%. 70% of farmers being interviewed are unable to afford all the fertilizer they need,” so they’re actually planting less, “And farm diesel prices have increased by 46% since the end of February.”
Joey Dumont: So nearly six in 10 farmers report worsening finances, rising fertilizer, fuel cost during plant season, and the immediate economic assistance to keep these open is probably gonna help this year, but they’re worried, they’re very worried about next year. Yeah. So that’s the big-
Sean X: So, well, a lot of them, as you said, they pre-book.
Joey Dumont: So they’ll pre- Well, they’re running out. That’s the problem.
Sean X: They’ll order, and now it’s running out. Yeah. So now the effects are hitting them. Yeah. So what, what were their main concern to you? What, what are they asking you?
Joey Dumont: They’re just asking me what I think based on my reporting, based on the homework we’re doing here at True Thirty to figure out, you know, what do you guys see an end to this war?
Joey Dumont: President Trump has said very publicly that there is so much disarray in Iran that there is actually no leadership to negotiate with. And if you read up on this, the Iranian leadership specifically are a Basarashi-
Sean X: Well, that is a problem when you bomb their leadership.
Joey Dumont: I- Well, he did mention that. He did mention that. He didn’t kill the people they wanted to replace, Khomeini. But, uh, yeah, I, I, I don’t see an end to the war. Obviously, there’s a lot of people talking about that. We’ve had some war correspondents on the show to talk about the externalities of this war and the longevity and the possibly forever war specific to anything in the Middle East based on our history, based on us being the United States.
Joey Dumont: I think what we’re gonna try to explore here at True Thirty, some of the experts we’re bringing on in the next couple months will be talking about what they have referred to as a asymmetric war, and the war is no longer about kinetic destruction.
Sean X: Joey. What do you mean by,, asymmetric war?
Joey Dumont: Great question. So asymmetric war in this sense is that historically kinetic war, we have big battleships, we have destroyers, we have the biggest military in the world.
Joey Dumont: Iran’s known this for as long as it’s existed. So the way they fight us means the asymmetry to what we’re doing. So if we’re launching at $4 million-
Sean X: It’s not, it’s not equal. Yeah. Like, it’s like if we, we can’t- It’s not equal ... we can’t launch $10 million missiles at $10,000 drones all day.
Joey Dumont: There you go.
Joey Dumont: That’s it. Okay. That’s a big piece of it. There’s also something called mosquito boats. So there’s these little tiny boats with engines and people and guns, and they go after the big boats, like our destroyers, and that’s how they’re actually taking Straits of Hormuz under siege, if you will.
Joey Dumont: They only- So basically, they’re not blowing up anything now, but they’re, they’re essentially taking it hostage because of these things.
Joey Dumont: Through strategies that involve less dollars. Yeah. They have mines-
Joey Dumont: A lot less dollars ...
Joey Dumont: they plant a bunch of mines in the Straits of Hormuz because there’s most of the narrow ways, some actual throughput is, like, two miles wide. It’s very narrow, so they can actually take from the ground, from the coasts and defend it.
Joey Dumont: They can defend it with the mosquito boats that I was talking about. They can defend it with drones. And then something that not a lot of people talk about is the topography o- of Iran to begin with. It’s approximately four times the size of Iraq, and I mention that because when we had a surge in Iraq, um, I think we had 170,000 soldiers during the surge, 150,000 now.
Joey Dumont: And one of the big things, and I think this, we learned this in our interview with Tom Shanker, uh, the New York Times war correspondent.
Joey Dumont: Dude, that was a great interview, man.
Sean X: Yeah, he’s so smart.
Joey Dumont: I think you were right about Bibi. I think, like, he convinced Trump- that’s my guess. I have to, I, I think- Yeah.
Joey Dumont: Like, I’m sorry, man. It’s like, dude, someone said, somebody said “If we go into Iran, the people will rise up.” Yes. The problem is the people had just risen up, and they got slaughtered. Wow, that’s- I mean, if you take out 10 to 20,000 protesters, guess what? All the people that are likely to lead the charge are gone.
Joey Dumont: Wow. And yes, and, and people see people being slaughtered, that’s not good for them either. So yeah, I mean, that’s what I mean by asymmetric war, buddy.
Joey Dumont: That’s where we are today.
Joey Dumont: Dude.
Joey Dumont: So I think one of the things that we can admit across the board is that we, America, have proven to be unbelievably powerful in our military might.
Joey Dumont: So what we did in Venezuela, where we swooped in and pulled out Nicolás Maduro in the middle of the night, put him in Rikers Prison, maybe one of the most efficient, wonderfully produced smashes-
Sean X: Efficient leadership changes, yeah.
Joey Dumont: Yeah, I mean, just... Well, I mean, it actually, the regime change didn’t happen
Joey Dumont: I think that was where Donald Trump got very excited about how he can go into other countries. And with Netanyahu coming in specifically to his war room and saying, “Hey, I think we can go-” Iran’s weak. I think we can get them today.
Joey Dumont: Let’s go after them. Obviously, that’s what took place on February 28th. Now we’re seeing, you know what? Eight, seven, eight weeks later, , this very small military excursion, as he called it, has moved into a full-blown war.
Joey Dumont: But back to my Republican friends and farmers, everything they mentioned to me in my one-on-ones with them, their fertilizer, their diesel fuel, their supplies, their maintenance, they’re scared-
Joey Dumont: they’re going under. These are places that operate on, like, a 3 to 5% margin if they’re lucky.
Sean X: Yeah, now it’s going up.
Joey Dumont: And we’re talking about 20... Yeah, and you’re talking about, expenses that are just through the roof. Yeah. We talked about the farmers. There’s also global aspects of this. Yeah.
Joey Dumont: I mean, the Strait of Hormuz closing is most important to Japan, South Korea, China, and India. Yeah.
Sean X: And you mentioned to me, one of, one of our members was literally asking about... Because they are international- Yeah ... they were asking about the international effect that this is having.
Joey Dumont: Well, Prime Minister Modi actually asked all of his 1.4 billion citizens to cut back on gas and anything to do with,, fertilizer or anything to do with the things that we now have a shortage in.
Joey Dumont: LNG, if, for those who don’t know-
Sean X: Liquid natural gas ...
Joey Dumont: it’s liquefied natural gas. Liquified natural gas is something that most people have never really talked about but please understand it’s this: what we use LNG for is fertilizer, intensive food, electronics, textiles, plastics, household utility bills.
Joey Dumont: Again, guys, what we’re gonna try and do is bring some experts on the show to talk to these specifically. We’re gonna bring some economists on, and we’re gonna talk about the longevity of this war. Is it possible with the ceasefire? What does that mean?
Joey Dumont: Well, uh, the, the nature of warfare has changed. I, it- People, and this is where I’ll totally agree with Republicans, like people are growing frustrated with a war that is literally only 60 days old.
Sean X: Yeah. It’s just the fear of the effects long term.
Joey Dumont: So Trump is going to China. What do you think he hopes to accomplish there?
Joey Dumont: I think he hopes to accomplish some type of a trade deal. I don’t know if he’s gonna jump down on the, the tariffs or not, but I do know that this Iran war is not helping his negotiations with Xi
Joey Dumont: because obviously America is the biggest foe of China. I do know that there’s rumor around the campfire that Donald Trump is trying to negotiate numerous deals specific to tariffs and opening up more markets here in America that he’s shut down based on his, 100% or 145% tariff, I think, in the beginning of his first or second administration.
Joey Dumont: The sad part about all this is that there’s, there’s no end in sight with anything to do with what’s going on in Iran. Lebanon obviously is a big issue with that because Donald Trump wants to negotiate with Netanyahu to say, “Hey, we need you to stop bombing in Lebanon because that’s part of our ceasefire agreement, and you’re violating that.
Joey Dumont: And if that’s violation, if that continues to happen, then the ceasefire itself stops, and then we’re right back to a kinetic war.” Bibi isn’t listening. Let’s just say that. Bibi’s not listening. He’s doing what he wants to do because he got us into this war, I think, and I don’t think he wants us to leave anytime soon, and this is more of his issue specific to his place in the Middle East and the surrounding countries that have not been a big fan of him for many years now.
Joey Dumont: So yeah. Yeah.
Joey Dumont: I, I don- I wish I had better news for my friends, specifically in the farming business because it is... It’s been really scary to talk to some of these people. And then, you know, the one-on-one conversations are different than the stuff we’re reading from.
Sean X: Yeah.
Joey Dumont: Sitting down and talking with farmers who have, you know, third, fourth, fifth generation, farms that they’re very proud of.
Joey Dumont: And these are not big farms, by the way. These, you know, 1,000 acres, 2,000 acres. These are not huge farms. The farm my, my grandpa used to work when I was growing up I think was 400 acres. Um, and these are the typical farmers you read about growing up. You know, they jump on their tractors-
Sean X: Yeah, these aren’t, these aren’t the big agribusinesses.
Joey Dumont: No. These are your mom-and-pop farmers- These are mom-and-pop farmers ... just trying to, you know, waking up at 5:00 every morning- Yeah ... working 18-hour days.
Joey Dumont: Yeah. Yeah. All day, every day till the sun drops, and then they go back and eat, and then they re- rinse and repeat. Yeah. And they’re very s- they’re very scared because, again, these are generational, and these farmers that I talk to specifically don’t have any other skills.
Joey Dumont: They’ve been doing this their whole life. They were born and raised on these farms. They watched their father go through exactly what they’re now going through. There is some diversification in s- there’s some big pig farmers that I talk to that are doing well on that, but the guys that are planting soybeans, corn, and wheat, and the typical commodities, they’re very scared for all the aforementioned reasons, right?
Joey Dumont: The fertilizer itself, the price of their supplies, their maintenance, the upkeep on their tractors, their combines, all that stuff, it’s, it’s pricey and it’s, and it’s scaring them.
Joey Dumont: Okay. We’ll get an update, on that issue. Yeah.
Joey Dumont: One of the other big questions that I’ve got right in front of me from one of our members, and many people ask this, what is about this golden calf?
Joey Dumont: It’s probably good to end this on a little bit of a whimsical piece. So in case you guys don’t know, Donald Trump had a golden statue erected in his honor at Doral, which is one of his golf courses here in the United States. It’s 22 feet. It weighs seven tons. And if you guys aren’t aware of the old story specific to the Bible-
Sean X: With Moses
Joey Dumont: Yeah. So- ... Exodus 32, I’m a recovering Catholic, so I know a little bit about this story. Um, it was when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the Bibles, or excuse me, with, with- The Ten Commandments ... Ten Commandments Ten Commandments. And he saw this golden calf that Aaron had a- had built for the staff because they needed an, an idol to worship.
Joey Dumont: Moses was pretty pissed, to paraphrase. And he shattered the tablets, and then he melted down the golden calf, and he made all of the Israelites drink it. So not happy about that. Fast-forward to 2026, Donald Trump has erected a calf. Now,
Sean X: who g- who gave, who gave this to him?
Joey Dumont: Uh, it was a gift, and the Pastor Mark Burns was the one orchestrating this piece at the Trump National Doral in Miami, and he said this, to quote, “Let me be clear. This is not a golden calf,” he said. “This statue is a celebration of life. It is a symbol of resilience, freedom, patriotism, strength, and the willpower to keep fighting for the future of America.” Now, this was the statue from Trump’s attempted assassination in Butler, Pennsylvania, which was obviously awful.
Joey Dumont: Where he said, “Fight, fight, fight.” And they wanted to capture that moment for the remainder of time to prove how brave he was in, in the circumstance. He was pretty brave or foolish, but he was.
Joey Dumont: If the pastor has to say, “This is not a golden calf”- Yeah ... that’s an issue. Yeah. Like, you know, it, it’s r- it reminds me of when Trump did that post a couple weeks ago, and he took it down because there was controversy of it.
Joey Dumont: The Jesus post?
Joey Dumont: The Jesus post. Yeah, yeah. He’s like, this... You know, and then he comes out and he says, “I’m not being Jesus here.” Right. It’s like, you know, don’t tell people to not believe their eyes. So when I look at this 22-foot golden monument to Trump, like, how is that not a golden calf?
Joey Dumont: Well, it is... And I think that’s the funny thing, too, is check this out.
Sean X: So there was a show called The Boys, and- Oh, my God ... have you seen it?
Joey Dumont: Oh, it’s a great show. My mom watches it. Okay. So- She’s 85, by the way- All right ... watching superhero stuff.
Joey Dumont: So Eric Kripke is... I guess he put, “What the fuck? Seriously?” And this idea, this is what he wrote on Instagram- So who, who is he? ... over the weekend.
Sean X: Who is... He’s one of the actors.
Joey Dumont: He’s the showrunner.
Sean X: He’s the showrunner.
Joey Dumont: Okay, got it. And he said, “Seriously, what the fuck?” over a split image of a golden statue of Homelander from episode six of The Boys and the golden statue of Donald Trump. So in the sixth episode of the show features a larger than life golden Homelander statue.
Joey Dumont: The psychotic leader of The Seven proclaims that he is the new Messiah following a visitation by an angel. So the showrunner, this was July of 2025, and he’s saying everything that we put in here as parody about a ridiculous man trying to be the Messiah has now come to fruition. Except-
Sean X: I’ve seen that.
Joey Dumont: The craziest thing about it is- Except it happened here ... if you look at that statue that they had in that episode, I mean, it’s obviously not the same pose as Trump- No ... but- It’s so close ... it is so clo- Dude, it is so close He’s got his arm out like this. He’s got...
Joey Dumont: and maybe because that was the JC being on the cross, all that.
Joey Dumont: So, so they’re like- But it’s the same fucking A ... this is not a golden calf. Trump is not Jesus in this post. No. The, the showrunner for The Boys has basically come out and say... Now, the character on the show, the character on the show is one of the worst characters, right?
Joey Dumont: Well, he’s the Antichrist in this story.
Joey Dumont: He’s the Antichrist.
Joey Dumont: But this is, and this is Pastor Burns again, to continue this quote, “We worship the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone,” he wrote on his social media. “Honor is not worship. Respect is not idolatry, and celebration is not bowing down to a false god.” So again- This is not a golden- It’s right out of Central Casting.
Joey Dumont: If you wanted to write a script- about what not, what isn’t real while you’re actually looking at what is real. This just took place in our life as citizens of the United States of America, and yeah, I don’t think, I don’t think there’s enough, there’s not enough jokes. I mean, the good news is there’s plenty of jokes now.
Joey Dumont: The memes are going everywhere with this. But the idea too, in case you haven’t heard this, was that Donald Trump, who’s never actually opened a Bible much less ridden it-
Sean X: No, he opened a Bible. I saw him open a Bible.
Joey Dumont: All right, true. But he’s never read it.
Joey Dumont: He opened the Bible that he held upside down- Down.
Joey Dumont: True, true, true ... if you don’t remember. He held it upside down when he was front of the church and he opened the Bible that he put, the Declaration of Independence in and the Bill of Rights, ‘cause he sold that once.
Joey Dumont: Well, in his defense, in his defense he’s probably never seen a picture of Jesus, so if he didn’t think- ... he looked like Jesus, it, it actually might have been part of it. But I also heard this, and I have nothing to confirm this is true or not, but they said that either Caroline Leavitt or one of his comms people said, “Hey, Mr. President, say that the f- photo was doctored and that you had nothing to do with that.” I don’t know if that’s true, and then he came out and said, “Oh, I was supposed to be a doctor.” So I don’t know if that’s true or not, but it’s one of those things where I just can’t get over how silly this whole thing is and how...
Joey Dumont: I thought it’d be good just to, uh, yeah- Yeah ... run this story through the ringer to- Yeah ... bring our- So- ... bring our members some fun-
Sean X: That’s the- ... on a Monday morning ...
Sean X: true Thirty this week, and let’s end it on this-
Joey Dumont: Sounds like a good idea, buddy ...
Sean X: pathetic note of the golden calf.
Sean X: Thank- Thank you guys for
Joey Dumont: listening
Joey Dumont: thank you. Thank you, Joey. Cheers.
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