[00:00:00] Speaker A: State Representative Tacky Janet Quincy is joining us for our first tacky talk of 2026. Tacky. Happy New Year.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Happy New Year, Joe. And all the folks listening to us. I wish everybody a Good start to 2026.
[00:00:13] Speaker A: Happy and healthy is the key mottos for us this year, hopefully. Right?
[00:00:18] Speaker B: It is.
Well, we've been together when both of us were sniffling and challenged and offline. Some of you may not be aware, we do talk about our personal lives a bit and some of the challenges, you know, both of us face in our families and other things going on with our friends or whatnot. So while we don't always share that with you guys in public, you know, be aware that, you know, we, we do have like other lives and we sometimes will cross that into the show every so often. But a lot of what we talk about is before we start is about how we're all doing and what's going on at home and whatnot.
[00:00:54] Speaker A: Yeah, I had a little time off for the past couple of weeks.
So how were your holidays?
[00:01:00] Speaker B: Well, in my case, January 31st is the last day I can grab campaign finance ending. So basically a donation. So we operate on a calendar year, not on a federal cycle. Federal cycles revolves around the primary and the final elections. We're calendar year driven and we do have one of the toughest campaign finance laws in the country.
So if you don't get to the maximum collection per individual, we can't take corporate or the maximum per pack. But even if the pack money is capped, you know, you can not, you know, take last year's number, add to 26 and then do that. You have to make sure you get your maximum out. So for example, excuse me, for example, lobbyists are capped at $200 per individual in Massachusetts.
So obviously lobby legislators try to get that $200 out of them. And it must be personal funds. They can't use business funds, they can't expense it. It is their own money. So I'm always very conscious of the fact that you literally take money out of someone's pocket during the holiday season.
Of course, the cap for individuals that are not lobbyists is $1,000. Good luck trying to find a thousand dollar donor. It can happen, but it's not easy.
And the holiday season, plus inflation plus cost doing business is high. And as you can imagine on Beacon Hill, it's a competition among legislators for campaign dollars from folks that do business with us. It's not like there are infinite pots of money. This ain't Washington D.C.
and even the political action committees are capped of 500 bucks per liberal action committee. And I can only take $7,500 of political action committee money, PAC money. But there is a little nuance regarding people's committees, of which there are basically six, but only five actually have money money in it and then which is outside the cap, but still 500 limit. People committees are special packs that have very low fundraising amount allowed. So they're. I think they're capped at like $76 as opposed to other packs that have much higher limits.
And then there's also unions and associations collecting those monies. Most of those folks don't give more than 500 anyway because they're capping how much they can donate in totality of donations per year.
So this is pretty tough. And you guys should be aware the cost of doing business is not discounted for campaigns, right?
[00:03:25] Speaker A: That's right. You have to pay the same as everybody else.
[00:03:28] Speaker B: Yeah. When the stamp price goes up, you know, if you can't keep your campaign accounts paced with inflation and you run into a campaign situation, it gets expensive. And of course we've talked about this a lot about local charities. I have a stack of letters and emails printed out on my desk right now of which I need to go through and put in my beginning donations to organizations such as, you know, Quintit, Community Action Programs, Cap, File the Bills, Quincy of Hockey. It just goes on.
[00:04:00] Speaker A: Sure. It's a, I mean we should remind folks this is an election year for state officers. So this is November 2026, right?
[00:04:08] Speaker B: Yes, I am running for reelection in 2026. It is also the constitutional officers mean the governor, secretary of state, treasurer, et cetera, also up for reelection as well as very specific county officials, depending where in the rotation of four six year terms.
So district attorneys, one of the county commissioners in Norfolk county, they're up for re election. For example, some of the other county positions on six year terms, interesting enough, was going to be in two years from now. So it'll be in 2028.
We do have a US congressional races, obviously. We also have a US Senate races.
[00:04:46] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:04:47] Speaker B: Ed. Mark is up this year, I believe Liz Warren is up in two years and their six year cycle. So it'll be. Even though it's no presidential year, it's going to be a very active year in Democratic politics.
[00:05:00] Speaker A: No, for sure. Yeah. And it's, it's midterm for a lot of congressmen across the country, so it'll be interesting.
[00:05:05] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. The primaries obviously come first in both political parties and we're watching to see how it plays out in the Democratic primaries. First, I, I think people don't always realize that we look at the primaries beginning of September before we go into the November calculation regarding Republicans or unenrolled or other parties. And we have also a couple special elections going off. Senator Ed Kennedy from Lowell, the state senator there, had passed away last year.
The primary is the first Tuesday in February, followed by a final election four weeks later.
My colleague Ann Margaret Friendu passed away sadly around Thanksgiving.
Her first election is going to also start at the same day, I believe February 1st. Choose in February as well. So we do have some special elections going on, which is kind of tough because once you win the special election, you actually have to get signatures of men again immediately to run for the seat in the normal cycle.
[00:06:04] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:06:05] Speaker B: So just because you win a special election in 2026 doesn't mean that you're not have to go through the same process again to run again this September.
[00:06:14] Speaker A: Right. It's just to fill out that term. Right. Yep.
[00:06:16] Speaker B: Yeah. And the primary day is early this year, September 1st.
[00:06:19] Speaker A: Oh, okay, very good. So that's. Would that be before Labor Day? Yeah, yeah.
[00:06:24] Speaker B: It's because the nature of having the law revolve around the final day, November, it actually walls around that time period. So I believe it's no more than eight weeks.
Okay, maybe. I think eight weeks is the minimum I have to look it up again.
[00:06:40] Speaker A: But okay.
[00:06:41] Speaker B: You know, you have to keep it. It revolves around as primary day revolves around a buffer around a November time period.
And of course by constitution, the re election is the first Tuesday after the first Monday, November.
[00:06:53] Speaker A: Gotcha. Okay. So it's going to be an active year. Definitely on the election front for sure.
[00:06:58] Speaker B: Yeah. You guys know a political junkie. We've talked about this many times about anytime a November election will be municipal, state or federal. I am a junkie. So it'll be interesting how it unfolds. But first things first, I'll get my signatures. Obviously I talk about fundraising, getting ready for a potential campaign or don't know what's going to happen, but you have to get ready no matter what.
[00:07:18] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:19] Speaker B: Obviously observing state, county and federal races, not just here, but also nationally.
[00:07:27] Speaker A: Yep. Speaking of locally, I know you were at the swearing in for almost a brand new city council here in Quincy.
[00:07:35] Speaker B: Oh, seven out of nine is pretty close to a full sweep, I will say. And six of them were brand new. And Mahoney's back for round two, so to speak.
I jokingly Call it being recycled as the show.
I will blame Michael Morrissey for that one.
[00:07:50] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:07:51] Speaker B: But I always joke around about that. Like, why'd you come back? You already left.
But all joking aside, and congratulations to Ann Mahoney on being council president.
If my memory serves, I think she may be the fourth woman to be council president.
[00:08:11] Speaker A: I'm not sure about that, but it'll be interesting to learn about that. Yeah.
[00:08:14] Speaker B: Yeah. Pat Tolan was the first one back in the 80s, and only near Liang was council president. Yeah. Remember, if there's other female council president between, maybe she is the third.
[00:08:26] Speaker A: Don't know. Yeah, I could ask. Well, former clerk Joe Shea would know that answer.
[00:08:31] Speaker B: Yeah, Joe and Nikki would know the answer. I think she may be the third.
[00:08:35] Speaker A: Okay. All right. And, I mean, she was the top vote getter citywide in the November election.
[00:08:41] Speaker B: Yeah. A higher turnout than all of us expected. 29, 22.9%. So almost 23% turnout. I projected closer to 18% and below.
And it's also a full city council with majority women for the first time.
[00:08:59] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:08:59] Speaker B: And you may recall it, they also knocked off essentially five incumbents.
[00:09:04] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:09:06] Speaker B: All the ward councilors that were challenged. Richard Ash was the only one that didn't. Were not. Actually six were knocked off. And they also knocked off one sitting at large, Counselor. And I would remiss if I don't say, you know, thank you for the service for all the folks on both school committee and on the city council.
You know, those of us who are elected know this is not always the easiest gig.
No matter how you exit office. It doesn't matter how you exit. I mean, we cannot overlook that people make the time and sacrifice to run for local office and to do the work and the challenging we have, you know, at all levels of government serving our constituencies.
[00:09:50] Speaker A: Yep, yep. And now two Asian Americans on the city council, too.
[00:09:55] Speaker B: Well, two and a half eons have Noteborough, who's half Thai.
[00:09:59] Speaker A: Ah, very good.
[00:10:00] Speaker B: Okay, so you want to get fractional so we actually have more minorities on the council. And then you ask your first Asian on the school committee, Chinese person Tom Leong.
[00:10:11] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:10:12] Speaker B: So, interestingly, it's actually a school committee came after council on having people of color. It's not actually not unusual in other places for school committee to be the first stop for people of the color to go.
[00:10:24] Speaker A: Right, no, exactly. Yep. So it's starting to be more reflective of. For the city as a whole and.
[00:10:30] Speaker B: A little bit younger.
Some of the folks that have been elected Actually younger than both of us.
[00:10:35] Speaker A: Oh, by far. Younger than me.
[00:10:38] Speaker B: Yeah, some of them. So that's not necessarily a bad thing either.
I've been known to start to lament about politics and my age and young people, but the reality is young people is always going to be the future of politics, regardless of my personal opinions. It doesn't matter what I think. It's just a fact of life. That's right.
It's good to see people who are younger than both of us get more involved.
And I expect the future will continue to have folks that are much younger than both of us.
[00:11:11] Speaker A: Let's hope. If there's any future, we certainly wish them well.
[00:11:17] Speaker B: Well, by age, I'm still the junior member of the delegation.
That's true.
[00:11:21] Speaker A: Tacky. That's right.
You can always hold that ace in the hole by age.
[00:11:29] Speaker B: Me and John Keenan both have by seniority because we got elected in the same year.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: Right, right.
So what's going on at the State House these days?
[00:11:40] Speaker B: Very little, let's be honest about it. We're gonna do our opening ceremony, required by Constitution on Wednesday, tomorrow come into the office for those procedural process. Nothing happens. And in fact, the Constitution requires us to go through these procedures.
There's no schedule for formal sessions yet. Kind of waiting out to see how it goes on the committee level. We have a committee vote, open, done yesterday, Monday, closing on Friday, which will finish off the bills filed on time, which means bills are filed on time at the beginning of the year. And we're trying to schedule bills that are filed after, on time, hopefully before. Well, hopefully in February.
And then meeting schedules beginning, requests for meetings have started as well as trying to keep up with the event schedule. And, you know, just saying, my desk is full of emails and letters from events and donation requests for various organizations around the city. So I'm sifting through that stuff right now, but we'll wait and see. The Governor's State of State address will be coming out some point middle of this month, I believe, like around the 22nd.
And then house Ways and Means, Senate Ways and Means and Secretary of Michigan Finance is actually reducing somewhat late, but they're going to produce their consensus revenue figures to best they can for secure 27 to give us some ideas about, you know, potentially what we're. We're facing on revenues.
I say potentially because in this political environment, especially of an untrustworthy partner in Washington D.C. which you and I, it's not just state politics. You at the local level, municipal governments, county governments, but also you as an individual will see an impact of some form. What it is, I'm still unclear. We've talked about this many times.
[00:13:26] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I mean, beginning the first of the year, there was changes to the Mass Health connector law because of that, right?
[00:13:32] Speaker B: Yeah. Everyone has to reapply. Medicaid. People have to reapply.
When they do this type of stuff, it's going to overwhelm our personnel because there's no way you can ramp up for 200,000 applicants.
[00:13:42] Speaker A: Right.
[00:13:43] Speaker B: Reapplicants. I think that's the number that's been floating around. You guys can imagine on your own the workload and of course the frustration associated with it. People can't get a response, they call us. But the reality is that we have such a high volume of applications and you're not getting an answer. You don't care about the fact that we're overloaded. You just.
[00:14:02] Speaker A: Oh, you just want your answer, right?
[00:14:04] Speaker B: Yes, the answer. And, and what will happen. And you see this in states like Florida, especially on other, you know, social assistance programs, people just give up and reapply. And you're going to likely see that in Massachusetts. So we make it to one risk. And again, people get frustrated because we get overwhelmed and they just give up. Which is incredible because these programs are here to help you out. And then the end of the so called Obamacare tax subsidies ended January 1st and a lot of gig workers and small business owners are going to see a huge cost increase in doing business of which they're going to have to decide if they're going to pass those costs on to you as the consumer.
[00:14:47] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I mean the reality is a lot of folks are going to go without health insurance because they can't afford it, which is going to add to healthcare costs if they end up in, you know, emergency rooms or hospitals.
[00:14:57] Speaker B: Well, we are a mandatory care state, so hospitals have to take you in this state. That is not true in every state, by the way.
[00:15:04] Speaker A: Right.
[00:15:05] Speaker B: So we will. The state is a mandatory care state. So those costs will have to be picked up on a shared basis between the hospitals which have been squeezed since COVID Believe it or not, they still recover from COVID losses, plus manpower shortage and your tax dollars and having, you know, Romneycare now, Obamacare or the American Care act, aca.
The reality is that you're better off on private insurance.
It helps state taxpayers when they are. Even subsidies from the federal government helps reduce those costs, which then keeps them out of arranged rooms, which puts stress on hospital finances and puts stress on the state as well. It's not like the feds go in and fill in the gap. That's us. So, yeah, this has real ramifications. Not just some people that will lose insurance, but it affects our ability to budget, which means it affects your tax dollars, right?
[00:16:05] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. So we'll wait and see how it plays out throughout the year. It's not going to be a quick fix.
[00:16:10] Speaker B: Nothing will be a quick fix. And the ramifications are gradual. People have this kind of idea that I didn't see the sky fall today doesn't mean it's not trickling.
As I like to say, sometimes when bad things happen, it starts with a drizzle.
Yes.
[00:16:27] Speaker A: Before it pours.
[00:16:28] Speaker B: Right, correct. And that was the whole thing about tariffs. People had projected out that everything impacted once, not really thinking through. It's a gradual, gradual infiltration into the price structures which you are seeing this Christmas period, even continue to see into next year. And I'd like to remind folks that those of us in the Asia community, you know, especially us who get imported goods from places like Taiwan and China and, and anywhere in Southeast Asia, we see the price impact first because we're dealing with longest on food.
And for example, we can't find my mom's red rice wine. Oh, red. My mom's red rice vinegar brand is not available in the local stores right now. And it's 100% supply chain driven. And some of you may be aware I have a lot of food allergies and dietary problems and I have very limited number of products I can get overseas I can use. And like I have an oyster sauce, one oyster sauce brand that I can use from Thailand and I can't find it right now, I'm sure here at some point. But it's also gone up like 50%.
[00:17:35] Speaker A: Sure. Yep, yep. Well, I mean, coffee, I guess is a good, is a good example because so many folks use it.
[00:17:41] Speaker B: Yeah. And the Trump administration suspending or trying to reduce those tariffs, it takes time for that to filter through the system. And the reality is also when retailers, or actually manufacturers and wholesalers, not retailers as much get, you get used to you paying these increased prices and they see that sales continue, they're not inclined to go down.
[00:18:04] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:18:05] Speaker B: And that's the problem with tariffs, is that people have this misconception, you reduce the tariffs, you reduce the prices. No, it's a market demand issue. If you continue to pay for those things, they have no incentive to reduce the prices.
[00:18:17] Speaker A: That's right. Yeah. People underestimate the power they have in Manipulating the markets.
[00:18:24] Speaker B: Absolutely. I mean, consumers on the whole, if they decide to, let's say, reduce their coffee consumption outside of the home, it has an adverse effect on everyone from Coffee Break to Dunkin Donuts to Starbucks.
[00:18:36] Speaker A: Right.
[00:18:37] Speaker B: And then if it gets bad enough, they have to do workforce reductions because consumers aren't coming in or they're going to have to change the price structure. While there are other prices, such as we talk about health care for small businesses as well as product and electrical energy costs and insurance, I don't know about you guys, but my car Insurance went up $20 a month and I have a pristine record right now. And I'm just like, are you kidding me?
And I'm sure they're facing all those same challenges too. Mine is very small compared to a business cost. But, you know, on my personal finances, I'm like, wow, this, this is going to debt me for a while.
So then they have to make those hard decisions because consumers aren't spending and we are a debt driven economy because credit card debt is about almost a trillion dollars again after coming down a little bit this past summer where, you know, people are using electronic payment more and things companies like Affirm, you know, buy now, pay later, particularly with certain credit card companies, like I have a Citibank card, you know, is greatly encouraged.
And according to retailer surveys nationally, there are more people who are making quarter million dollars at Walmart than ever.
They are shying away from higher end stores, retailers and moving to much more bargain retailers. And again, a quarter million dollars is a different thing for different people.
But true, you know, it is, it is an indication that people are trading down.
[00:20:06] Speaker A: Yeah. Oh, absolutely.
The new year also brought some new laws to Massachusetts that went into effect or are going into effect this week. Right.
[00:20:17] Speaker B: I remember what they are.
[00:20:21] Speaker A: Well, there's the cannabis consumption cafes that's starting up.
[00:20:24] Speaker B: Well, that's a regulation.
Yes, we'll see how. Again, I'm not going to lament about my satisfaction with the Cannabis Control Commission anymore. We've heard me go like five shows about my dismay about that organization.
But yeah, I mean, we'll see how those regulations roll out and how they crisscross. Not crisscross of local regulatory oversight, because locals do have some regulatory oversight.
[00:20:47] Speaker A: Right.
[00:20:48] Speaker B: It's not 100% supplanted by the state.
[00:20:51] Speaker A: No, it's an opt in, I think is what it was called here.
[00:20:53] Speaker B: Yeah, we'll see how that plays out with the new city council.
[00:20:56] Speaker A: That's right, absolutely. I think the paid family medical leave allotments are going up this year.
[00:21:03] Speaker B: It's all that's tied to the medium household income.
[00:21:07] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:21:08] Speaker B: So the official federal, federal medium household income number doesn't come out to the end of January for the December end year. However, the Department of Labor here in the state can do an estimate based on weekly wages.
So what they do is they collect weekly wages, average of the state and you can kind of calculate the medium house income off of that.
So your unemployment and your paid family leave is all tied to those numbers.
[00:21:36] Speaker A: Gotcha. Okay.
We can't ignore the obvious tacky what's going on in the world, I guess with the president of Venezuela being taken here to the States and talk about Colombia, Greenland, what, what, what do you think about all this?
[00:21:54] Speaker B: Well, unilateral action by the United States, which is, I remind folks, historically not a new thing for us, but in the modern era, meaning post Cold War, that is, it is a much lesser thing that we do.
We, you know, people may recall the CIA did regime change very often in places like Middle east and Latin America and Central America and Southeast. That during the 60s and 70s and into the 80s, regime change was part of the CIA's M.O. that you didn't find out. The stuff was declassified much later on. Right.
So. But this is much more overt than sending the CIA to do something that, you know, unpleasant to somebody. Let's just leave it at that.
And the braziness of it all. I am not feeling bad for Madaro Chavez. Amadaro has both screwed up Venezuela horribly or actually a resource rich nation, not just oil by the way, agriculture, the beaches and tourism.
They're better educated, actually fairly well educated. But they destroyed their economy by just ineptitude.
And I actually was listening to a Planet Money podcast by NPR who did a comparison stories from 2019, 2024 and went through the details, exactly how you blow up an economy by direct government management.
And the dangers, having the government manage directly, how manage economy directly and how you can blow yourself up and you know, how do you maintain power? By basically giving people stuff. Sounds familiar. Let's give you free money.
It's generally how you stay in power. And like I have no sympathy for Madaro as you can imagine.
But the reality is when you do regime change, you have to change the whole regime.
And Venezuela is not like Iraq.
It's not like Assad in Syria or Gaddafi in Libya where literally the regime was one individual with minimal loyalty around them. Like right side for example, had already lost chunks of his military before the complete takeover. The resistance was reduced because Assad was just terrible to everyone.
And of course in Iraq, you know, the US forces with the multinational effort, you know, on round two, George W. Bush took out everybody. It wasn't just exactly, it wasn't just Saddam. He took out the entire military.
[00:24:29] Speaker A: Right, right.
[00:24:30] Speaker B: Here in Venezuela you have a constitution, you have a functional bureaucracy, you have a parliament and you have a military. The regime actually has not changed.
It's still one, basically one political party. It's still the same military. And even though you have a vice president, which they're basically calling an acting president because they want to maintain Madonna's head of state status, you know, is still functioning. And the military is going to have to initiate much more harsher crackdowns in the population to prevent any potential uprising of which many were just unarmed. They don't have guns, they're just running, you know, with homemade glove sticks and whatnot. So the military is most likely going to crack down to make sure that there's no unrest.
But in terms of day to day life, Venezuelans, I don't see a whole lot of change happening.
[00:25:20] Speaker A: Yeah, it's interesting. It's just the individual that they're after, not the government.
[00:25:26] Speaker B: Well, a regime change means changing the government. I mean that's what Putin's tried to do right off the bat in Ukraine war, you may recall, you know, Putin's objective was to end the war within. Within essentially three days.
[00:25:37] Speaker A: I think that's what he said.
[00:25:38] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. By taking Kiev and wiping out the entire Ukrainian government system and install his own puppet system.
Right. And you may be aware that another way that Putin had been trying to install pro Russian prime minister parties to political parties and prime ministers as well as presidents all through Eastern Europe inside EU nations for decades, using things like oil subsidies, whatever it takes for them to get win an election in Eastern Europe, including disinformation. And you actually see the same thing in Taiwan. Chinese government has been buying a lot of the media taking advantage of first amendment rights to spread disinformation to try to create a pro Chinese government which has failed twice now in the parliamentary elections and presidential elections in Taiwan.
So people have this concept that these foreign governments don't just affect countries outside the U.S. they do, but they also affect us as well. And Venezuela is a very close partner of Russia, very close part of China. China is the biggest buyer of oil and Venezuela is less than 1% of all oil production.
You may have already heard this weekend, it's heavy crude only two countries can refine. Heavy crude is The United States and China.
And, you know, low energy prices actually has a negative effect, particularly on shale.
If oil prices go under 50 bucks, actually, actually under 50 bucks, the shale industry would suffer a lot of stress and reduce U.S. capacity, consumption and production overall.
And globally, Consumption's already down in first world countries, but not in developing countries.
So, you know, China's moving towards renewables, Europe's moving towards renewables. They're trying to wean themselves of dependence on situations like Venezuela. Right. But Venezuela is like less than 1% of all oil production. And they're part of OPEC, the part of the original founders of OPEC.
And they talk about all these untapped reserves, but because of the poor governments of Chavez and Madaro, the oil refineries are in disrepair. And the rough estimate from oil industry energy experts say it's about a $10 billion investment to bring back up. And they always point to Iraq, where the US really had control of Iraq. And even with Chinese investment in particular, believe it or not, in Iraq, you know, it took them over a dozen years to go from 2 million to 4 million barrels.
That's. And that's how bad off these refineries are. Some. A lot of these dictator countries don't make infrastructure investments in anything because they basically use the money to buy off people or kill people in the case of Hussein.
[00:28:28] Speaker A: Right.
[00:28:28] Speaker B: And, you know, have to feed the military to stay in power.
And, you know, they ignore the infrastructure, including what makes the money is the oil.
[00:28:37] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Which is why I think you won't see a lot of oil companies rushing into Venezuela because it's a huge investment.
[00:28:43] Speaker B: Yeah, there's a lot of. You got to look into this more, folks.
People have been pounding the president on these statements, which I believe you should have the ability to do.
However, you do have to look at the totality, the circumstances, to decipher whether or not his statements are realistically achievable. And you guys all know I look at a lot of outside the US news these days because the analysis, honestly is a lot better.
If you watch the latest, even a snippet of the last economist podcast or YouTube, they talked about oil industry, how it works, and also talk about regime change, for example, you know, Colombia is the next likely one. It's another like three to eight month or six months or whatever it takes for the US military to plan an operation, because this was not a just, I'm going to get up and do this kind of thing. It takes months and months of planning.
And, you know, Colombia may be next on the list because it is really the drug cartel country.
Cuba is obviously going to always be on this, but it's also Cuba. It's, it's an island, it's fortified, it's. They expect to get invaded.
[00:29:52] Speaker A: Right.
[00:29:52] Speaker B: They've been hostage to the US For a long time. So it's, it's a bit of a different scenario. And then you got countries that have natural resource interests. For example, lithium is being national nationalized countries like Argentina. While Milei and Trump do get along, you know, the naturalization of an essential resource, you know, something that seems is a very serious concern for, for the current administration.
[00:30:18] Speaker A: Yeah. Seeing as we're talking about energy, can we take it back home here in Massachusetts? I know there's a bill pending, I think in the legislature to overhaul the energy policies.
[00:30:28] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm not sure where that's going on. I mean, you do have that bill that came out. Telecom use and energy does a major overhaul that is still in a holding pattern. House Ways and Means, we've got signals what's going to happen next. I've actually heard from all the advocates about why they're upset with this bill already and not going to get into some of the lobbying efforts regarding. Speaking of not great information, but we're not going to touch that right now.
[00:30:56] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:30:57] Speaker B: You all think it's strictly us.
[00:30:58] Speaker A: No.
[00:30:59] Speaker B: I mean even people with the best intentions doesn't always have the best information.
That being said, you know, I suspect something will happen in 2026. I just couldn't tell you what the schedule will be.
And the Senate may go first, even though House released a bill. The Senate may go first on this depending on where they are in the process.
So we shall see. I am aware that people are suffering from sticker shock on the gas bills. I remind folks again last year that they had a 10% defermentary gas bill. Utilities agreed to defer with DPU, but it's a deferment, not a reduction. And I think the communication was very bad. Or by the administration telling folks they had a reduction.
You cannot change a utility company's rates without due process.
[00:31:45] Speaker A: Right.
[00:31:45] Speaker B: And they did not ask for a rate change. So.
[00:31:49] Speaker A: Well, I think the hope was that it would be a milder winter this year, which it has so far not turned out to be.
[00:31:55] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't have to tell you guys that. I mean, I'm shivering the same you all. And my mother needs a warmer house. She already got on me boat the energy efficiency component of my Google nest, which is many folks probably do you know have a cooler evenings but it's too cool for my mother so we're burning more gas just strictly because of our health and we cannot be the only one going through that. I can tolerate a cooler night. I just get more blankets but my mother cannot.
[00:32:25] Speaker A: Right? Yep, yep. No. So it's, it's definitely having an impact on, on people for sure.
[00:32:32] Speaker B: Most, yeah, most definitely. Especially folks that you know are older or health have health conditions where you know if it gets below 70 degrees they, they really start to have visible impacts. And my mother does definitely show physical, very physical apparent impacts if it goes under 70.
[00:32:48] Speaker A: Yeah. So does part of the bill include changing mass save?
[00:32:53] Speaker B: Yeah, that's part of it as well.
Not sure exactly how they're going to do it.
My personal opinion is that when you're spending you know $4 billion of repair money for what in the end is a good question. And anyway everyone gets a free energy audit get encouraged going to people who are mass safe to get free energy audit. But there's also a practical cost. I mean changing heating systems are expensive. And focus on heat pumps. You know when the electric bill goes up and the prioritization the winter again is gas reheating not for electrical generation.
[00:33:27] Speaker A: Right.
[00:33:27] Speaker B: So you know when it gets to a really cold, cold week like we've been seeing you know under 20 degrees the electrical generation companies in Massachusetts do not get natural gas which then forces out to buy a spot market energy for, for my geographic zone which then huge spikes in electric bill.
[00:33:46] Speaker A: Right.
[00:33:46] Speaker B: Those are on heat pumps.
You know we'll see that spike more severe than you know folks that are on oil and natural gas. And we talk about oil too. You told me it was for over 4 bucks a gallon now which is.
[00:33:58] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:33:58] Speaker B: Which is extremely high. Extremely high.
[00:34:01] Speaker A: Yeah. And we both can't figure out why because the cost of a barrel of oil has stayed about 58, 60 bucks a barrel.
[00:34:10] Speaker B: That's exactly it. This part of the energy market we've talked about a lot regarding gas, gasoline, natural gas which is not really oil actually there's a shale component. But put aside the heating oil in particular is a very good question and I don't really have a good answer. I know in Massachusetts that home heating oil is a massive decline of use which could drive up prices because of lesser customers.
[00:34:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:34:35] Speaker B: That being said, you know it's all market driven and gasoline at a BJ's was about $2.70.
Prime down in Hancock street is when I got my gas this weekend. I believe it was $2.78.
[00:34:49] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:34:49] Speaker B: You know, at under $60 a barrel, it should really be lower, right?
[00:34:54] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. And this has been consistent now for the past six months.
[00:34:58] Speaker B: Yeah, it's lower than it was last year.
[00:35:00] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:35:01] Speaker B: You could double check a trip away. Yes, they track those prices too. But no, it should be much lower and especially a lower demand, period. Once you get out of the holiday season, you know, demand goes down, the prices fall.
[00:35:12] Speaker A: Exactly. Yeah.
[00:35:13] Speaker B: Not.
[00:35:14] Speaker A: Not seeing it manifest itself. And in the airline industry either.
[00:35:18] Speaker B: It's the business class problem.
[00:35:20] Speaker A: Ah, okay.
[00:35:21] Speaker B: Business travel is still down for airlines, even though leisure travel is up.
It seems like every year we have record travel and Thanksgiving and Christmas. I know it never seems like it doesn't be a record, but. Yeah, that is the real problem because people in business, particularly big corporate, fly on short notice.
They basically just murdered them on a price. Sure.
[00:35:45] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:35:47] Speaker B: That's not the case right now. And they're still suffering from reduction of business class use in spot, like I need a ticket tomorrow kind of thing. They're not getting that.
People still planning vacations further out. Yep. Trying to get the best price. In case you're wondering, only Tuesday. According to travel bloggers, Tuesday is the best day to start price hunting.
[00:36:06] Speaker A: Oh, interesting. Okay.
[00:36:07] Speaker B: Today's actually Tuesday, so if you're looking for a trip, Today's the day. Stop poking around.
But you know, I always tell folks that when you're getting deals in terms of like, you know, expedia or, or booking.com saying we'll give you, you know, $25 for your next booking by this date, I mean, it's generally not a good sign.
[00:36:28] Speaker A: That's true. Yeah. Because there's obviously not a demand if they're doing that.
[00:36:32] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And I'm a member of like Best Buy Awards. I'm not buying anything from Best Buy in a while. I've not had to have electronics and DVDs have kind of gone out of fashion.
[00:36:40] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:36:41] Speaker B: And I don't need new appliances. But I got an email saying, you know, come buy, you know, Best Buy will give you a $10, basically $10 off on your next purchase you do before January 18th. May have seen that email tour, some variation that email your email box or certain reward programs.
So I mean, yeah, consumer is strong, but certain sectors that they wouldn't offer you any kind of deal if they're.
[00:37:05] Speaker A: Not hurting somehow if they didn't have to. Right, Exactly. Yeah.
[00:37:09] Speaker B: Meanwhile, I mean, my stop and Shop, my Star Market app coupons aren't that wonderful.
Not seeing Great deals on that at the moment. And you know, I highly question if the prices are lower. But we talk about the price of coffee already. But you know, things from Canada like oatmeal continues to be elevated prices and beef is still a challenge between the killing beef because the somehow got past the U. S shield on unscrew flies. But also that importing is. It's challenging. And I don't know you all but local produce ain't that awesome right now.
I mean it's not great looking produce.
[00:37:48] Speaker A: Yeah, no, it's. You're right, it's tough. Yeah. And the prices have knocking down for them either.
[00:37:54] Speaker B: No, it's not. I mean, you know, I'm, you know, I wouldn't get avocados when they're on sale and they're not even then to not great avocados. And you know the price of broccoli is anywhere between A$79 and 199 a pound. And if you get lucky, you might get like a surplus situation. We have to get rid of it now but you better eat it right away if it gets below a certain sale price.
[00:38:12] Speaker A: That's true, that's true. It's on the turn as they used to say.
[00:38:16] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, that's exactly it. You're 100% right. So.
So yeah, as you can tell, I like to bargain hunt, particularly in groceries, especially on groceries. And you know, I lament to my mom's insurer at a time because she needs her insurer. She wants one specific flavor and it must be a max because she needs the protein. So between coupons at the doctor's office and trying to bargain hunt, you know, it's a big thing. And you know, I tell folks again, it's beginning the year, tax season's coming up. Talk to your financial planner. It's a great time to talk to your financial plan to review your. Your plans for your future in terms of not just retirement but you know, maybe about big purchases and things like that. It's also a good time to review your credit card debt.
[00:39:03] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:39:03] Speaker B: Also remind people of scams. I just got a text a friend about somebody who claims to be a state lottery winner.
More like an AI telling you that and.
[00:39:14] Speaker A: Oh, okay.
[00:39:15] Speaker B: They're willing to share their winnings with you.
[00:39:18] Speaker A: Oh, how generous of them.
[00:39:20] Speaker B: Yeah, it's so sophisticated it actually named the location on East Quantum street.
[00:39:24] Speaker A: Is that right?
[00:39:25] Speaker B: Yeah, it could name the little strip mall on East Quantum street.
[00:39:30] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:39:31] Speaker B: So the AI scams are real. They collect more data. I was messing around with one AI Scan one email. Just emailing back and forth until I screwed it up. Because it got its facts wrong and because it just couldn't keep up with.
[00:39:45] Speaker A: With the questioning, you outsmarted them. Very good.
[00:39:50] Speaker B: More like the fact that large language models had nowhere else to turn on the Internet for the next question.
[00:39:54] Speaker A: Gotcha. Okay, so very good. Tacky.
[00:39:57] Speaker B: Again, check those email addresses. If the email address looks funny, funky from where it's from, look at, you know, same your text messages, they're generally trying to, you know, do an AI bot now trying to engage in a conversation. Well, you know, I've not talked to you for a long time.
[00:40:10] Speaker A: Oh, I've been getting those. Yes.
[00:40:12] Speaker B: With no name.
You guys probably get texts even from friends. But because you change your phone and you didn't cloud your contact information and download it back onto your phone, you know, you have these like, you know, who are you? Kind of like.
[00:40:26] Speaker A: Right.
[00:40:26] Speaker B: Text message like who are you? Again, it's because sometimes people don't always remember to input the phone numbers.
[00:40:32] Speaker A: Yep. Yeah. And those, those can be phishing scams too. Those, those questions.
[00:40:37] Speaker B: Oh, 100%.
[00:40:38] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:40:39] Speaker B: Like I said, the launch language models are good, but you know, there's a certain point where the information is not on the Internet and only you would know what the answer is. I mean I had a conversation with a friend about this regarding long language models. He's in the IT industry and he's thoroughly convinced that they can mimic human behavior regarding rash creating arguments and rationales. And I don't disagree with that. The problem is that not everything's on the Internet. As remind folks, it's digital knowledge is something you don't write and put on the Internet.
[00:41:05] Speaker A: That, that's true.
[00:41:07] Speaker B: You guys all know I've been around and I have lies to knowledge about politics locally as well as politics and state government and Beacon Hill. And you know, I know how certain laws came to be and some I have no idea obviously. But you know, certain ones I do know, I promise you no language, no large language model will know the answer.
[00:41:26] Speaker A: Right? Yeah, it's, it was never written down.
[00:41:29] Speaker B: Yeah, that is right. Or never written down and published on the Internet.
[00:41:32] Speaker A: Right, exactly.
[00:41:34] Speaker B: So I mean there are limitations and the human capacity to how they get from point A to point B is something no language model can replicate.
[00:41:45] Speaker A: Thankfully not yet anyway. Maybe not in our lifetime.
[00:41:48] Speaker B: Not in our lifetime, but maybe someday. Maybe. It's one thing to try to take Charles Dickens and have AI write you a Charles Dickens book based on the diversity of styles he wrote In Versus, how did he come up with the idea for the story?
[00:42:04] Speaker A: Yeah, it won't know that. Yeah.
[00:42:06] Speaker B: Oh, the creative process, how many drafts there were.
[00:42:09] Speaker A: Right.
[00:42:10] Speaker B: What changed in the story. Right. And you see this in movie making, you know, based on screeners and testers. They'll change storylines or they'll change the cgi. They change something or historical events change. Fever Pitch is the example. Fever Pitch actually ended with the Red Sox losing World Series.
Yeah. And it was the year they broke the curse, so.
[00:42:30] Speaker A: Oh, interesting.
[00:42:32] Speaker B: Restoot. The whole last scene.
[00:42:35] Speaker A: Was that 2004, I think.
[00:42:38] Speaker B: Yeah. They had to come back and. Yeah, a lot actually. That was before the film tax credit became permanent. They did these shoots in Fenway, but they shot most of that in Toronto.
[00:42:46] Speaker A: Oh, interesting. Okay.
[00:42:47] Speaker B: Yeah. People don't realize that a film about your. One of your favorite sports teams because of the lack of a film tax credit was not really. Was not shot in Massachusetts.
[00:42:59] Speaker A: Well, thankfully, that's changed.
[00:43:02] Speaker B: Yeah. Film industry is very challenged still post Covid.
Obviously. You guys know I'm the architect of the permanency of the film passway. I didn't write the first one. I was around for the first one. I worked in the Senate. But I mean, you know, removing that sunset was very important.
But it's very challenged right now. The industry is still very challenged. Production costs are high.
You know, you have these, all these new contracts we have challenging against AI. You have content issue where if you make stuff and makes no money, you take a loss.
And you guys see Warner Brothers Discovery out there still trying to facilitate sale, whether Netflix or Paramount and you know, intellectual property, stills value, you know, you know, streaming wars in my mind is Netflix still.
They have the been best of managing their money on subscriptions and services, so.
But it's still very hard. And you saw Avatar, the new Avatar movie finally cracked a billion.
But Wicked 2 did not accelerate as quickly as they did when Wicked 1 Part 1 essentially on box office sales. And it's expensive to go to the movies. I mean, it's like 19 bucks in the evening.
[00:44:15] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Yep. Easily.
[00:44:17] Speaker B: Yeah. And they make. They make movie theaters. Makes the majority of money in concessions.
[00:44:22] Speaker A: Great.
[00:44:23] Speaker B: So obviously I don't, you know, people, they don't like when you sneak food in, but people will eat a bigger dinner before they.
[00:44:30] Speaker A: That's right. And just get a soda or something.
[00:44:31] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, that's kind of the solution. I mean, you know, just eat before you go to the theater.
[00:44:37] Speaker A: Well, techie, once again, we've kicked off an hour.
[00:44:41] Speaker B: Yeah. Somehow some way we find something to chat about. So just want to again, remind folks, scam season's hot and heavy because of the immigration situation.
You know, that's been a fun one. Again, people demanding money, so don't get deported.
You got the tech scam about your easy pass not being paid, not text you about that sort of thing.
Obviously IRS and department revenue scams, you know, give me money or we're going to foreclosure a home kind of stuff.
And you know, and if it's good, too good be true, it most likely is. And definitely encourage folks to reach out to the attorney general's office, the ftc, us, any legislator.
And we can try to help you verify a scam or not. But in terms of identification, check that email address carefully and check that phone number carefully.
[00:45:35] Speaker A: Yep. And if somebody's telling you to go to a bitcoin ATM and take out money, don't do it.
[00:45:39] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, absolutely. And don't give a personal face, especially Social Security numbers.
And your credit cards, again, have 100% fraud protection.
So, you know, God forbid someone steals your credit card numbers, whatnot. Credit card companies have priced in their version of shrinkage, which is fraud. They pick up the cost for the fraud, which is not bad. You and it's bad for them.
[00:46:03] Speaker A: Yep, yep. Report it right away for sure.
[00:46:05] Speaker B: Yep, yep. You also get your free credit report. So you want to go to Experian or one of the other credit reporting companies. You know, you can check your credit report and you can, you know, let them know there's any discrepancy, like you have the address is wrong or something like that.
You should do that again. It's a beginning year. It's a good chance to get ready for tax season and, you know, revive finances. But again, I want to emphasize before we go, the number of scams are going to crank up and they're going to rely on the current political environment's fears to take advantage of unspectable folks to hand on money to fraudsters. That's all.
[00:46:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
Here's where we ask you to give out your contact information.
[00:46:45] Speaker B: Sure. We're in room 42 at the state House. My room does not change.
Even though it's a New year's. Numbers is still 617 7223-706177-22370.
You know, do give us a call. The office is staffed. Tacky Chanmyhealth. U of E T A C K E Y C H A N at Emmyhouse. U of E is the email we do screen as we were talking before the call. I did screen my emails over the weekend to make sure the emails went to the right staffer.
They will try to help you out.
In case you're wondering, unemployment emails are still the single biggest call right now to be offered.
Obviously we have State Representative Tacky Chan Facebook with an Instagram that goes along with it. We're a little behind on social media just to let you all know, so I'm going to see some older postings.
We do have State Representative Tacky Chan. Well I'm sorry, it's Tacky Chain Org, our resource page contact page. People do use that actually I do get people unemployment problems. Contact me via the website MA Legislature Gov me Legislature is the state legislators website very much encourage everyone to go to the website to find your bills, watch public hearings, watch our sessions and get more information about things important to you in the legislature. And of course you know
[email protected] you guys have a burning question for Joe, please definitely email in but also check Joe in the morning for his 10 minutes of Quincy News and say those things.
[00:48:18] Speaker A: Thanks so much Techie. Happy New Year once again.
[00:48:21] Speaker B: Happy New Year and look forward to talk to you soon.
