December 16, 2025 original broadcast on WQUD 107.7 FM – River Cities’ Reader publisher Todd McGreevy and WQUD GM Aaron Dail indulge in their monthly audio tête-à-tête, this one concerning the December edition of the Reader. Dail gets right into it about his distrust of all things AI. Those who see the artistic benefits of AI — as a relatively new platform for art, is it awaiting its Stanley Kubrick? — might want to ask, Will the political consequence of AI necessarily lead us into the plot of a Stanley Kubrick film?

Kathleen McCarthy’s Impotent civiCUKS essay in the issue #1040 gets into the propagandistic uses of AI and the importance of engaging with social media with a skeptical point of view. Given that Elon Musk, who bought Twitter four years ago, is also one of the biggest, if not the biggest, weapons contractor to the US, perhaps we need something more thorough-going than skepticism. Perhaps we should think about becoming Zététiques. Perhaps the business of examining our world is a never-ending one, and Doubt is forever a provisional skepticism. Perhaps we need to think algorithmically. Perhaps we need to be algorithms. To know the ‘bots, one must become a ‘bot. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

What isn’t up for debate, what cannot be deferred to endless examination, is the detention in isolation of Tina Peters, a Gold Star mother and a former Election Official from Mesa County, Colorado. (In Iowa, we call them Auditors.) Peters should be praised as a heroine for having secured evidence of Colorado’s 2020 election irregularities under the stewardship of Colorado Secretary of State Jenna Griswold. Peters chose not to participate in what Griswold called a “trusted build” protocol ordered by Secretary of State Jena Griswold, which would have entailed the erasure of the 2020 election databases. No examination here necessary: These databases would be purged outright. Sec Griswold wanted to suborn Peters into an unforgivable act. The least charitable reading of Peters is that she wanted to cover her own ass, by making a duplicate of the voting rolls to check against the update. The most charitable reading of Sec Griswold is that she could not abide Peters’s lack of trust in the Trusted Build. That’s where it ends. After that point, charity is completely out of the equation, for, in all cases, Sec Griswold has dug a hole straight to Hell and has sent for the furniture. Meanwhile, Peters sits in Ad-Seg, her conscience clear but her body dying (cancer).

Read McCarthy’s article in its entirety and you’ll find that that sensation you’re feeling is anger, and that it’s a legitimate response to some illegitimate practices we’re asked to countenance on a daily basis. Remember that feeling: It may come in handy later.

We transition, ever so slightly, to a topic that has a special hold on our hearts: A transcript of the speech given by Barbara Stein and Craig DeVrieze to induct Franklin “Whitey” Barnard Inducted into Iowa Golf Hall of Fame, held at the Echo Valley Country Club in Norwalk, Iowa, on 17 October 2025. When you consider the arc of Whitey’s life, you’re also getting a history lesson about golf in the Quad Cities: A Bettendorf kid keen on golf while trying to keep his head above the waterline of the Depression becomes a caddy, then a legit golfer, and finally the founder of the annual John Deere Classic Tournament, a PGA event that’s been going for 55 years and to date has raised hundreds of millions of dollars. Whitey, who died in 2000, is special to us because he was unstoppable in pursuing his heart’s desire, and he never forgot there were others in the world in their own individual pursuits. Against his initial skepticism about the Reader’s viability, all the way back in 1993, he took a chance and bought some adverting to help the Reader become a realized desire.

Whitey was human in the best sense of the word — meaning, he wasn’t an algorithm. Algorithms might help a business, or a fundraiser, reach its goals. What it can’t do is figure out why the need exists for an enterprise in the first place.

So suck it, algorithms.

Rochelle Arnold contributed Don’t Kill the Dandelion Messenger, an analysis of how farmers can improve the quality of their yields, rather than allow the over-application of ammonia nitrate to bleed off a substantial amount of nitrogen (28%) and deprive the soil of the micro-organisms which help keep it healthy. Agriculture companies who claim they want to keep in line with the second iteration of the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) commission’s report would do well to listen to local farmers, like Monte Bottens of Cambridge, Illinois, a sixth-generation farmer who adheres to Grateful Graze’s Five Soil Health Principles. Individual farmers don’t go into the family business expecting to contribute another Dust Bowl in their lifetimes. Big Ag businesses should keep that point in mind as well.

Finally, Dr David Hartsuch contributed What If Housing Were Free?: The Suppressed US So-Called Healthcare System and a Welcome Market-Driven Alternative, hoping to do his part in heading off at the pass societal trends toward socialism and proposing market solutions that don’t encourage physicians to think in terms of quantity of sick people against the quality of service. People don’t want agriculture companies to apply their algorithms to soil health, but they’re willing to accept their use in health care?

That doesn’t sound smart.
(Aired 16 December 2025)
– Summary and analysis by Michael Helke. See Michael’s curation of important Iowa, Illinois and Quad Cities’ local news stories at www.QCAToday.com