Wes Siler (Journalist, Adventurer, Public Lands Advocate)

Summary

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The Smoking Tire Podcast – Wes Siler: Public Lands, Journalism, and the State of Conservation

Hosts: Matt Farah, Zack Klapman
Guest: Wes Siler (Journalist, Adventurer, Public Lands Advocate)
Date: February 26, 2026

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Episode Overview

Matt Farah and Zack Klapman engage in a wide-ranging conversation with Wes Siler, a renowned journalist known for his outdoor advocacy, in-depth writing, and recent run for Montana state senate. The episode explores the intersection of automotive enthusiasm, outdoor adventure, the evolution of journalism, and the existential threats facing America’s public lands. Wes shares anecdotes from his career, discusses why he got fired from Outside magazine, provides a primer on public land, and answers audience questions on everything from conservation to UTV safety.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Wes Siler’s Journalism Journey & Political Run

• Career Background

  • Wes recaps decades of work as Outside magazine's outdoor columnist, covering cars, trucks, gear, dogs, and, increasingly, conservation issues.
    "I was at Outside as the outdoor lifestyle columnist for a decade. I was by far the most popular writer. I was responsible for something like a quarter to half of all web traffic." – Wes Siler [03:30]

• Why He Was Fired (and The State of Journalism)

  • Explains being let go after declaring candidacy for Montana state senate, citing the changing priorities of media owners.
    "I was fired in September for being a journalist." – Wes Siler [02:34]
    "You can't be a journalist working for most mainstream outlets today… they want unchallenging content." – Wes Siler [04:34]
  • Discusses the shift of good journalism to platforms like Substack and the newsletter renaissance.

• Transition To Politics & Public Service

  • Shares motivations: frustration with the status quo, wanting to make a positive local impact.
    "If I win, I'm just still Wes… I'm just some guy who's fed up with the status quo and wants to help create some change because I think I can." – Wes Siler [08:03]
  • De-mystifies the scale of Montana state senate:
    "Running for state senate here is kind of like running for town council in Santa Monica." – Wes Siler [06:21]
  • Candid about the difficulties and (lack of) perks:
    "It's all downside, I have to say. Don't run for office." – Wes Siler [08:53]

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2. Public Lands: History, Importance, Threats

• Brief History and Definition

  • Public lands aren’t solely national/state parks; they include BLM, National Forests, etc., and are managed for multi-use (resources, recreation, conservation).
    "It's owned by the American people and managed on our behalf by the federal government." – Wes Siler [18:17]

• Global and American Uniqueness

  • Explains why U.S. public lands are exceptional worldwide, support immense biodiversity, and are vital for recreation, tourism, and clean air/water.
    "That healthy wildlife that then tourism thrives on, that establishes our unique identity as Americans of going camping, of being outdoorsy... all that is from public lands." – Wes Siler [19:19]

• Current Policy Threats & Short-term Extraction

  • Warns of unprecedented political attempts to dismantle the multi-use, sustainable management, favoring quick profits over generations-long stewardship. "What we're seeing right now is an unprecedented attack that's trying to undo that balance and tip it entirely in favor of extraction." – Wes Siler [20:47] "We're in the get-it-all-now government." – Matt Farah [21:19]
  • Calls out "backsliding" in conservation over recent years compared with historical bipartisan support. "In terms of public lands, this has been the biggest backslide ever." – Matt Farah [24:04]
    "100% since they were established." – Wes Siler [24:04]

• Role of Politics in Outdoor Enthusiasm

  • Both cars and the outdoors now collide with politics, from EV mandates to land use. "If you care about cars or the outdoors, politics comes for you whether you want it to or not." – Matt Farah [10:47]

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3. Socio-political Commentary

• The Real Agenda Behind ICE and Civil Unrest

  • Siler analyzes how ICE activities and manufactured conflict serve to justify emergency powers, not immigration law.
    "The entire purpose of ICE is to manufacture a violent insurgency against the American government so Trump can be justified in invoking the Insurrection Act..." – Wes Siler [34:41]
  • Discusses the far-right playbook of demonizing vulnerable groups to trigger overreactions and power grabs. "Fascist regimes collect power by villainizing the weakest members of society...and by inspiring violence against them..." – Wes Siler [36:35]

• Media, Convenience, and Societal Responsibility

  • The loss of privacy and autonomy traded for convenience and the importance of ordinary people (not just career politicians) participating in the system.

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4. Automotive Talk, Consumer Advice, and Notable Opinions

• Choosing Tow Vehicles, Trucks, and SUVs

  • Long debate between Matt and Wes about appropriate tow vehicle sizes, hybrid SUVs, and Super Duty trucks.
    "Towing is so sketchy with a car it's not designed to tow... try to double your tow vehicle capacity." – Wes Siler [32:18]
  • Strong opinions about the best and worst modern SUVs. "[Cayennes are] easily the worst car I’ve ever owned... ugly, impossible to maintain, can’t see out of them." – Wes Siler [28:16]

• Policy: Section 179 Tax Loophole

  • Proposes eliminating Section 179 as the simplest way to reduce unnecessary heavy vehicle sales. "The simple answer... is to eliminate Section 179." – Wes Siler [45:48] "If we eliminate that, and it's just fair market, they'll buy something more fuel efficient, something lighter." – Wes Siler [47:03]

• Conservationists and Car People: Can We Get Along?

  • Rejects the notion of inevitable conflict, pointing out most enthusiasts care about conservation out of necessity and love for the outdoors. "We're all in the middle happy ground already… All of us care about this stuff." – Wes Siler [59:48]

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Notable Quotes

• On Journalism:
  • “The problem with being good at journalism is that often being good at journalism is bad for business if it is a business that is oppositional to journalism.” – Wes Siler [04:17]
• On Public Land:
  • “That’s a set aside for all of us. And it gives us a really unique, really democratic access to the outdoors.” – Wes Siler [18:31]
• On Policy Attacks:
  • “What’s happening right now is trying to break that system in favor of just really, really short-term profit.” – Wes Siler [21:19]
• On Section 179:
  • “The reason why every housewife in Dallas drives a G-wagon... section 179. You eliminate that, you eliminate any incentive there is to buy that class.” – Wes Siler [47:09]
• On Conservation and Enthusiasm:
  • “I own two 10 mile per gallon trucks because I like going outdoors… you can’t fully experience the outdoors the way I want... All of us are hopefully good people that want to see other people succeed. What more is there?” – Wes Siler [59:48]

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Listener Q&A Highlights

- Outdoor Destinations in the Northeast [39:26]

Wes recommends Maine for outdoor activities and the ONX Offroad app for mapping public access.

- UTV Safety Advice [47:52]

“UTVs are so capable… they essentially exist to kill bachelor party members. I would just advise you, not to consume alcohol, go slow, wear a helmet, wear eye protection. And recognize your limits.” – Wes Siler

- The Weight Tax & Vehicle Policy [45:06–47:34]

Siler advocates for eliminating Section 179 rather than complicated fuel or weight taxes to reduce gratuitous heavy vehicle use.

- Automotive Nostalgia and Recommendations

• First cars (’69 Morris Minor 1000), best crossovers (1st-gen Lexus RX), and strong support for the use of electronic traction aids in modern vehicles.

- Public Lands and Political Threats [54:02]

“He (Trump) has an express plan that’s seven steps long that has been articulated...we are on step five.” – Wes Siler

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Memorable Moments

• Hilarious Cayenne-bashing and towing debates between Matt and Wes, with practical and impractical advice.
• Eye-opening mini-lecture on historical creation and management of public lands [16:56–19:19].
• Sobering assessment of how policy pivots can devastate conservation achievements within a single administration [54:02–56:37].
• Wes describing the real, discouraging nature of local politics—low pay, no perks, lots of hostility.

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• [02:34] – Getting fired from Outside Magazine by "tech bro" owners
• [06:21] – How Wes was recruited to run for Montana state senate
• [16:56] – Primer on public lands: American uniqueness and function
• [20:47] – Current threats: extraction, exploitation, and breaking the ‘sustained yield’ model
• [24:04] – The largest backslide in public lands protection history
• [34:09] – Analysis of ICE, civil unrest, and political motives
• [39:26] – Northeast outdoor destinations
• [45:06] – Section 179, tax codes, and incentives for heavy vehicles
• [47:52] – UTV/bachelor party safety
• [54:02] – Project 2025/Public lands policy threat overview
• [59:48] – Conservationist vs. car person: middle ground?

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Tone & Takeaway

The tone is candid, irreverent, and world-weary—but ultimately constructive and passionate about both cars and conservation. Both hosts and guest champion critical thought, public engagement, and resisting false binaries between fun, consumption, and stewardship.

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Links:

• Wes Siler’s Substack
• Wes’s Campaign Website
• The Smoking Tire YouTube Channel

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Summary prepared for listeners seeking a comprehensive, content-rich breakdown, including timestamps and directly attributed quotes.

Transcript

[Matt Farah]

What's up, everybody? Welcome to the Smoking Tire Podcast. Today's episode is, as always, brought to you by off the Record. We love off the Record here at the Smoking Tire because they are looking out for us. 24 7, 365. Wherever I drive a car, whatever state, whatever jurisdiction, I know that if I get yoinked, off the Record is right there backing me up. All I got to do is go to offtherecord.com TST send a photo or scan of the ticket, along with a description of what I was doing at the time, my version of events, if you will. And off the Record goes to work. 95% of the time, you just get that text message just long enough later that you've completely forgot about it, saying, dismissed. Other times, you got to take a little extra action. Either way, they are looking out for you. It is affordable and is high quality, and you're supporting your favorite podcast when you use them. It's a 3 Pete winner, folks. Offtherecord.com TST that'll get you 10% off all legal services booked through off the record, once again, offtherecord.com TST Cheers, Habibi. And with that, welcome to my. Welcome to my Airbnb at the foot of a beautiful meadow at the base of a mountain with a man I haven't seen in 10 years.

[Wes Siler]

Something.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Wes Tyler. We did. We did motorcycle things briefly.

[Wes Siler]

We did motor. We did YouTube things briefly.

[Matt Farah]

Car things briefly.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, we were. We were colleagues in the. In the car review world in the 2000s.

[Matt Farah]

And now here you are. Yeah. Wearing a vest over a flannel. We all know what that means. So I actually had to, like, I got. I. You know, when I was coming up here, I'm here for Ice Race, and I knew. I read your newsletter. I just became a paid subscriber, by the way. Thank you. I don't know if they alerted you. Annual annual prepaid westsailerts.substack.com I mean, honestly, the best. Not just on literal substack, but, like, the best writing that I'm reading today is like, pretty much full indies. Yeah. Like yourself. Like garbage day. Hamilton Nolan. I read AR Mox.

[Wes Siler]

Hamilton's great.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Do you read Moxon?

[Wes Siler]

I don't.

[Matt Farah]

I recommend AR Moxon.

[Wes Siler]

Okay.

[Matt Farah]

But, like, they're all just, like. They moved to the newsletter format effectively.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. You can't be a journalist working for most mainstream outlets today. There's a few that still do it right. You know, there's the Atlantic. There's like, Road Track. I know, like road track. Yeah. But, you know, it's just impossible to be a journalist. And so I was fired in September for being a journalist.

[Matt Farah]

I read this and this was crazy because so you. But. So that's a well crafted sentence. So you weren't fired for writing about the wrong thing. You were fired because you decided to run for office here in Montana. And this is according to your newsletter and the outlet said for perhaps the first time ever, that you cannot write for us and run for office.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. So that's a decent summary.

[Matt Farah]

I mean, but you wrote 5,000 words on this. And I just did it.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, you just, you just did a quick.

[Matt Farah]

I just did it in 50, more or less.

[Wes Siler]

The story is, I was at Outside as the outdoor lifestyle columnist for a decade. I was by far the most popular writer. You know, I was responsible for something like any given day, a quarter to a half of all the web traffic.

[Matt Farah]

And you write about cars, you write like dogs, outdoor trucks, dogs, outdoor gear. Yeah. More and more it's land conservation type issues, but for most of your career it's just been general outdoor lifestyle stuff.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, I try to tackle important issues. So what matters? If you're an outside magazine reader, if you care about the outdoors, what matters? And so that changes in a given year. Right now we could talk about climate change because it's almost March. It's almost March and there's no snow in Montana. It's 50 degrees outside.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Wes Siler]

You know, I always took that charge really seriously, and I think I was good at it. And the problem with being good at journalism is that often being good at journalism is bad for business if it is a business that is oppositional to journalism. And so what we've seen recently is a lot of publications have been acquired by, for lack of a better word, tech bros. Yeah. And they're in it not to.

[Matt Farah]

You could also say assholes.

[Wes Siler]

Assholes, that's another word.

[Matt Farah]

People that are actively bad for humanity.

[Wes Siler]

So they're not in it for the cause of journalism or the cause of informing the American public.

[Matt Farah]

No, they're usually in it to the exact opposite thing of that.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, they're using it for their short term buck. And so they get that short term buck out of an app sale or something like that. And so they only look at the journalism as the opening of their engagement funnel. And they want the smoothest path from backwards up that asshole right into the app sale. Right. They don't want good stuff that challenges people. They want unchallenging content.

[Matt Farah]

Well, if you're talking about Bezos and the Post recently. Bezos in the Post recently has said he wants. We're going. We're going full bore pro capitalism all the way.

[Wes Siler]

Yes. So just. Just. Just bullshit, Right?

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And so what happened with Outside was it was acquired in 2021 by Tech Bros. You know, some. Some dude who had made, like, a Strava clone, you know, the height of, like, app acquisition.

[Matt Farah]

We only fuck with the real.

[Wes Siler]

Got hundreds of millions of dollars for, like, a bad Strava clone and thought he was a genius. And I was sitting there doing good journalism, and he was seeing that as a barrier to him selling apps. He wanted to fire me for a while. I had an ironclad contract. He couldn't really fire me. Interviewed Tim Walls during the campaign, interviewed John Kerry. I was supposed to interview Joe Biden. I was doing important work, and he would just. This is not what we're trying to do. Just. Just, you know, go review a fucking tip, bro.

[Matt Farah]

You know? Did he stick to cars? Do he almost. Yes.

[Wes Siler]

Stick to cars. Yes.

[Matt Farah]

I get. I get the occasional stick to cars.

[Wes Siler]

And so I got. I got recruited to run for office here in Montana for state senate, which is 1.1 million people in Montana. I hate to phrase it this way, but running for state senate here is kind of like running for town council in Santa Monica.

[Matt Farah]

Like, my. My. My, like, assembly person, I think, represents, like, the same number.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, exactly.

[Matt Farah]

Like. Yeah. But I do have to pause because I have to actually. Because I want to talk about. Because the way you ended up running is interesting, and I want to talk about that. It circles back to the stuff. But, you know, Mallory McMorrow, of course. Michigan State Senator. Yes. Yes, I support her. I support everything she does.

[Wes Siler]

Yes.

[Matt Farah]

Her team asked if she could come on the podcast.

[Wes Siler]

Okay.

[Matt Farah]

And I said, although I support everything she does, I don't think having politicians on the podcast, even if I support them. Right. Is what I want to do. Yeah. And so, like, I. When I invited you to come on the podcast, I didn't know you were running for office. Like, literally, I did not know.

[Wes Siler]

And then, for the record. For the record, I did not ask to come on the podcast.

[Matt Farah]

Matt asked. No, I did, but I didn't know you were running for office. And then I was like, oh, shit, that's hilarious. And I saw. And I told no to Mallory. And so I was like, all right. The way I'm gonna navigate this is like, me and Wes have, like, a lot of other things to talk about other than, like, what's your website. Plug your campaign website. WestFromOnTana.com WestFromOnTana.com if you're interested in Wes literal campaign positions, go check out west for Montana.

[Wes Siler]

I don't even like talking about that

[Matt Farah]

stuff, but I just feel really bad because I really like and support what Mallory's doing 100%. I said I didn't do politicians. And you're kind of a politician.

[Wes Siler]

Right. Mallory is a much more serious politician than I am. I'm not the serious politician. So. And it's, it's funny because people label you with that. They label you with like, oh, you're a politician now. And you know, if you win and you're saying I'm just. Exactly. If I win, I'm just still Wes, you know, I'm just some guy who's like, is fed up with like the status quo and wants to see. Wants to help create some change because I think I can. It's essentially like the compensation for this position is $5,000 a year. I will lose more money in like the hours I spend on it that I will receive from this.

[Matt Farah]

Is that really the comp a year?

[Wes Siler]

There's some change on top of that. It's very like 5300 or something.

[Matt Farah]

Is it? But like get like, you know, like a bare skin rug or something.

[Wes Siler]

I think I have to revive my own bear skin rug. Yeah. All right.

[Matt Farah]

They don't pay you, but you get to be like first in line for like deer hunting licenses. I don't even think that's no perks.

[Wes Siler]

There's really no perks. It's all, it's all downside, I have to say. Don't, don't run for office.

[Matt Farah]

It's all crazy people yelling.

[Wes Siler]

It's a miserable experience.

[Matt Farah]

Experience.

[Wes Siler]

It's all crazy people yelling at you. Everybody, everybody treats me like I'm on, like embarked on some corrupt endeavor where I spent like my entire life in what's more or less public service as a journalist.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And I'm just sort of doing the same thing. Just like I've written about policy. I know how to do policy now after writing about it for 20 years. Surely I can go, like, apply that directly rather than writing around it. That was my idea. And then all of a sudden I'm a politician now and I'm different and it's. That's strange, right?

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. I mean, because particularly in, particularly in this country, your job title so defines you. Yes. You know, and if you change job titles, you're like a different person now. Yes, in a lot of ways. You know, so. And especially in journalists and politician aren't, like, necessarily opposed, but they kind of are. I mean, you know what I mean?

[Wes Siler]

Traditionally, in some ways. Because journalists cover politicians.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah.

[Wes Siler]

But there's also a lot of, like. There's a lot of, like, shared common grounds. Because both are likely truth.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, Ideally.

[Wes Siler]

Truth. Ideally, you know, like, both are vastly undercompensated, like, service oriented, cause oriented.

[Matt Farah]

Sure.

[Wes Siler]

Career paths.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

I don't even see a politician as a career path. I just see it as like, you know, shit's. Yeah, I'm. I'm fed up with it. I want to do something to help, and that's what we're being told, to do something. Do something positive. And I've run charities in the past. I've helped people out, you know, I've tried to do the right thing always. And it just sounded kind of this time like, you know, hey, maybe the right thing is going to Helena, the state capitol, and helping craft some legislation to make the lightest Montanans a little better.

[Matt Farah]

I. I always sort of found that, like, when people tell me to, like, stick to cars or whatever.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

Like, whatever your kind of area of expertise. If you're looking at something that is out in the world in public, for me, it's more cars than anything else. For you, it's more the outdoors and. And than anything else. But, like, politics comes for you. Like, you don't, like, I didn't, like, go seeking that, but like, like, that shit, like, dude, why is, like, Porsche super fucked, like, literally right now? Like, politics. They said you have to go full electric. And they, like, good fucking smart Germans were like, okay. And they went. And then it was like, handbrake turn. And now they're in. Like, that's politics.

[Wes Siler]

If you can't care about something like cars and not at some point intersect politics and be forced to care about politics because it affects everything. Look at Ford and the pivot they're trying to do right now and what their stock prices have been like. Look at Tesla and the headwinds they're facing. And that's inherently political, right?

[Matt Farah]

Sure. Yeah. Also, they thought the cybertruck was a good idea, which one could argue is not political, but it's incredibly misguided.

[Wes Siler]

It's indicative of a certain political belief, I think.

[Matt Farah]

Right? It does. It does. One who sniffs their own farts too much will inevitably design a car that looks like that.

[Wes Siler]

It's to make trucks great again. Of. Of trucks.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But so that's for me. You know, cars run, run headfirst into politics. Yeah, frequently.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. And the outdoors even more so.

[Matt Farah]

Right. So that's where I was going.

[Wes Siler]

You know, we have 648 million acres of public land in this country.

[Matt Farah]

Can you real quick, just for those who don't like, what is a public land? Like this sounds like a fucking dumb question.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Like what is a public land that's different from national park or state park

[Wes Siler]

or A quick history lesson.

[Matt Farah]

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[Wes Siler]

When we were creating America and trying to ratify the Constitution, we had some problems, right? So we were trying to bring together like 13 very diverse colonies and find a way for them to exist together in the same country under the same governance. And one of the problems was like the real charters that created those countries, you know, they only knew like the 1600s. They're like, I don't know, here's a river on a coast. Hey, Virginia. You have everything from like this river to that river and then like wherever that goes.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And what that looked like on maps after the revolution was just like, you know, vast overlapping Lines, Sure. As they went west of the Appalachians. And, you know, the only way to settle that was to, like, define some sort of common grounds. And that was established as at the time, everything west of the Appalachians basically went to the American people for the furtherance of our country. As we created states, that land was granted to create states. And what we were left over after a few different wars with Spain and Mexico and various other things in the Louisiana Purchase and the establishment of these western states was a whole bunch of land that nobody wanted. We tried to give it away to homesteaders and the Homestead act in various different ways, but a lot of it just was no good. And so it just ended up being owned on behalf. It's owned by the American people and managed on our behalf by the federal government.

[Matt Farah]

And there's BLM for most of the time, Right.

[Wes Siler]

It's not just blm, it's blm. National forests, national parks.

[Matt Farah]

So it's all under the same.

[Wes Siler]

It's all public lands. Right. So, like that right there, if you guys can see that hill, is public land.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And that's national forest. And so that's a set aside for all of us. And it gives us a really unique, like, really democratic access to the outdoors. And if you're just in the cars and you just want Matt to sit in the cars, well, that's where you go off roading. It's where you go car camping. But we all benefit from it because that's our reservoir of biodiversity and clean environment that creates the air we breathe and the water we drink and the animals we like to see. And it's just. I won't dive into too many details, but the way it's managed was created by big thinkers like Teddy Roosevelt, the turn of the 20th century. And it's exceptionally good, and it's exceptional in that it's unique to America. And so you and I have traveled the world. Do you see animals anywhere in the world, including in Africa, like you see here, I mean, outside of a national

[Matt Farah]

park, when I was literally on safari in Africa. Yes, yes.

[Wes Siler]

But, like, driving home tonight, you know, we're in Big sky right now. I'm driving home to Bozeman after dark. And the animals that I might hit, like, on the way home, which maybe

[Matt Farah]

New Zealand, but, like. Yeah, no, not most developed country, natural and.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. And so right here in Montana, the animals that I have a pretty good chance of hitting on the way home are wolves, moose, bighorn sheep, elk, two kinds of deer, you know, black bear, brown bear, you name it. They will all be on the road tonight as I drive home. And that biodiversity and that healthy wildlife that then tourism thrives on, that establishes our unique identity as Americans of going camping, of being outdoorsy and wearing fleece fest over our flannel shirts. You know, all that is from public lands. And it's a really unique system that we all benefit from. It pays hundreds of billions into the treasury every year. It offsets the taxes you and I pay.

[Matt Farah]

In terms of what, national park entry fees?

[Wes Siler]

No, in terms of like, energy extraction.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, energy extraction, yeah.

[Wes Siler]

So it's managed under multiple use. And so basically, like the public lands, I need to consider multiple use and sustained yield. So the idea is that, like, you know, oh, we want to go pull some coal out of that hill. Well, we can. So long as, like, you know, we create a plan that balances that with people that want to hike on that hill, the people that want to extract timber from that hill, people that want wildlife on the hill. Clean air, clean water. Right. And so hundreds of billions.

[Matt Farah]

So public lands aren't necessarily all free from extraction.

[Wes Siler]

No, no, there's vast, there's vast commercial activities on public lands. That's what they're there for. Again, they're there for multiple use. And when managed properly, they balance that industrial use with the other concerns with, with wildlife conservation, with a natural environment, with recreation. Right. And so what we're seeing right now is an unprecedented attack that's trying to undo that balance and tip it entirely in favor of extraction. And extraction is not bad, but it has to be managed correctly.

[Matt Farah]

And so are we surprised? I mean, this is. We're in, we're in the short term money, government.

[Wes Siler]

Yes. We're in the short term.

[Matt Farah]

We're in the get it wall.

[Wes Siler]

So it's so short term. Again, one of the principles in addition to multiple use is sustained yield. The whole idea of public lands is that they will serve the national purse into perpetuity into the future. As long as America is here, we will have a reservoir of minerals and timber and energy to draw on if managed correctly. But what's happening right now is trying to break that system in favor of just really, really short term profit. So, you know, you manage the hill correctly and that'll produce timber for, you know, you know, into the death of the universe, you understand?

[Matt Farah]

They could get more now.

[Wes Siler]

Now, but not tomorrow.

[Matt Farah]

But tomorrow. Yeah. May never come.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

So they're just gonna get it now.

[Wes Siler]

Just gonna get it.

[Matt Farah]

You might as well just get it now.

[Wes Siler]

No, but it's.

[Matt Farah]

Why wait until Tomorrow.

[Wes Siler]

It's crazy. And the ways.

[Matt Farah]

Is this the. Is this the. Because it, like a lot of, like we're the same age, give or take a year.

[Wes Siler]

I'm 45. How old are you?

[Matt Farah]

I'm 44. So we're the same age, basically. And you know, I was shocked into reality, perhaps from a cocooned existence, but really what. You know, when Trump got elected the first time and I went, hang on, what the fuck? And I have been again, perhaps because of my age or I'm sheltered, fucking white guy from Greenwich. I have witnessed across the board backsliding, of course, in human rights and everything and shit. I never thought, you know, you go, these people won rights and now they have them. Like these lands were protected.

[Wes Siler]

Yes.

[Matt Farah]

And now they're protected. Like, I've never seen a backsliding and unprotecting.

[Wes Siler]

It's like nuts, right? So much of it's just so stupid is the problem of it. And you see that stupidity again on public lands where it's just like, like you were identifying short term profit at the expense of long term sustainability. And I'm not talking about like Kumbaya and fucking rainbows, unicorns and shit. I'm talking about logging.

[Matt Farah]

I'm talking about logging.

[Wes Siler]

And if you do it right and it's managed correctly, we can log that forever.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

You know, yeah, there is a way to. Yes, there is a way to do that. And that, that's what we've been doing for 100 years. And right now what they're trying to do is break that and do logging tomorrow really big. And then no logging two days from now, because it'll just be like a pile of mud that'll be like, you know, glow in the dark, radioactive.

[Matt Farah]

Is this from a public lands perspective? I'm not educated enough to say whether from a human rights perspective, I would suspect, I would suspect that maybe the implementation of Jim Crow might have been more of a backslide at that time than what we're seeing now. But that being said, in terms of public lands, has this been the biggest backslide? Yes. Ever.

[Wes Siler]

100% since they were established. Remember that? Like, you know, it wasn't that long ago that we had like Richard Nixon, you know, Republican guy, not the most. Not corrupt politician.

[Matt Farah]

No, he got it. He got a couple of things right, actually.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

So who wasn't Nixon epa?

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, he was. He was epa. He was Clean Water act, he was Endangered Species Act, Clean air, you know, and like Ronald Reagan was pro that stuff.

[Matt Farah]

All he did was be super racist and bug Some people, all he did was crime. Nixon is like real charming crime by comparison. Nixon crime, Nixon crime. Nixon crime is so charming.

[Wes Siler]

A little light breaking and intriguing.

[Matt Farah]

Nixon would be like world Liberty Financial, what's a bitcoin? Like, you know what I mean? Imagine Nixon at bitcoin. Like he's a send a telex or whatever the fuck they were doing.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, I know.

[Matt Farah]

Nixon crime was so charming compared to.

[Wes Siler]

For the naked, the naked grift of these people.

[Matt Farah]

Other than if you factor in Kissinger, I suppose there was probably more war crimes.

[Wes Siler]

We are about to do a bunch of war crime we're gonna do.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, let's circle back on this. Okay. We'll have to. Yeah. You know, hey, Siri, fact check my war crimes. In six months we'll see where we're

[Wes Siler]

doing more crimes in Minneapolis right now. Well, that, that actually crime, crime ridden hell hole Minneapolis.

[Matt Farah]

Dude, the piece that you wrote, you wrote a piece about, I think it was called, or about preparing for tyranny.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

And that essentially kind of got me thinking because you started with the premise that some of these protesters, I mean the ones who weren't being murdered in the street were being followed home by ice.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

And started from the premise of, well, what if home? Typically your safe space and maybe even your like prepper space is no longer available to you. Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

So safe space, being in the outdoors and being arrested in things like hunting and guns and, you know, survival shit.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

You know, manly man shit. It's like at some point you kind of intersect prepping and it starts to make sense.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

You know, I've written articles that like most traditional prepping where you're just stockpiling like 10 years of like cream of tomato soup is kind of stupid and silly because, you know, any fixed location is subject to siege. Yeah, but that's why you put the

[Matt Farah]

tomato soup all over.

[Wes Siler]

All over.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. I've buried

[Wes Siler]

all over the mountain. But finding it for years, you do it. You at some point in all this, become something of a prepper. You look what's going around. You look at the trends, climate change, Right. Weather's getting weird and unpredictable and like we're not really taking care of our roads anymore. And there's a lot of dead trees falling down with the bark beetles. And so that never really leads to like, well, I need to own like a car on 35 inch tires with a winch and an electric chainsaw in the back. And you, you need solar panels to run your battery pack to charger, you know, your chainsaw and Then, well, you probably also need some recovery equipment. And, you know, pretty soon you're literally

[Matt Farah]

driving like a tow truck.

[Wes Siler]

Pretty soon you're me, your car. You know, your ford Ranger gets 10 miles per gallon. And, you know.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I wrote, I did read your article on how to buy a truck, and actually it's incredibly well thought out. And I could easily write a similar article on how to buy a sports car. Right? You think people listen to you? No, I think they just. They're like, oh, that fucking. The Tacoma.

[Wes Siler]

I'll just buy the Tacoma. Tacomas are sick, bro. The Internet says they're reliable. I'll put £7,000 of shit on my Tacoma and go to Alaska. That's gonna work great.

[Matt Farah]

I did actually like that article. I thought it does what I did. It's a funnel of sort of yes no's and limits of what?

[Wes Siler]

You're not trying to tell people what decisions to make. You're trying to help them understand the information they need to make smarter decisions. Decisions.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, because they're always like, dude, would you get like a. You know, they're. They're asking me to compare. Two things have nothing to do with each other. Right. Would you get like a. A Cayenne Turbo GT or like a Bentley Flying Spur? And I'm like, what? What? Like, you know what I mean, why

[Wes Siler]

do people buy Cayennes? Or. It's like easily the worst car I've ever owned. They drive terribly. They're impossible to maintain. They're ugly. You can't see out of them. They're just literally the worst car I've ever owned is a Cayenne.

[Matt Farah]

What year was it?

[Wes Siler]

It was like an old one, 2013. It was a three liter diesel car.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, the diesel one, yeah, everyone loved the diesel for a minute there.

[Wes Siler]

So it was my wife's car and she was really on it and she. This was when we lived in California and she was the first person in California to go get the repair because it was a three liter car. It was a repair, not a buyback. And Porsche of downtown LA lost her paperwork. And we spent like three years trying to get that ironed out.

[Matt Farah]

I won't say anything negative about that dealership.

[Wes Siler]

It was so bad. Like such a fundamentally bad experience at some point. Like, poor squirt her on the phone because she was just calling trying to figure out where her paperwork so you could sell the car. We parked it for three years. We didn't drive it. Then the battery died. And luckily I went on the owner's forum and realized that before I moved the driver's seat, cut a hole in the carpet, and remove the proprietary battery that you can't get anywhere in Montana. I went on the orange forum and it reminded me that I had to connect it to 12 volt power, otherwise the whole car would be bricked and totaled. So I did not total the car and change the battery, but the fact that I ran that risk is just obscene.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, it's not great. Yeah, it's not great.

[Wes Siler]

It's insane. But the car drove bad. It didn't work for three years. Porsche were jerks. And like, for me, vision out of a car is really important because you can't see. You can't drive what you can't see.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And you can't see out of them. I don't understand why anybody buys a Cayenne if you want to.

[Matt Farah]

I don't have the vision issue.

[Wes Siler]

If you want a Range Rover, if you want an suv, a fast one, for whatever reason, just to flaunt your credit score, buy a Range Rover Sport. They drive so much better. They're cool. They look better. You can see out of them.

[Matt Farah]

I don't know if. See again, the visual thing, seeing out of them is not a problem I've had. I may get a hybrid car in with a warranty. Yeah, Yeah. I need to tow something. Yeah, I want to tow.

[Wes Siler]

Why don't you just get a super

[Matt Farah]

duty out of here? I live in Los Angeles, dude. I don't live in Green Acres.

[Wes Siler]

Don't you. Don't you own a car storage facility, dude?

[Matt Farah]

You don't.

[Wes Siler]

Parking for a super duty?

[Matt Farah]

No.

[Wes Siler]

Really? No.

[Matt Farah]

I have very little surface level outside parking.

[Wes Siler]

How. How much weight are you going to tell? Like, what kind of race car are you going to tell?

[Matt Farah]

I'm.

[Wes Siler]

You tell your kash.

[Matt Farah]

I'm. I'm gonna. We've talked about this in the show a lot. We don't need to have this debate on the show. But I'll just give you. I'm. I got a relatively lightweight enclosed trailer for Brian James trailers. It's 2300, 2500 pounds.

[Wes Siler]

Okay.

[Matt Farah]

And it's aerodynamic.

[Wes Siler]

It's 2500 pounds. How much weight are you putting in it?

[Matt Farah]

Almost never more than £3,500.

[Wes Siler]

So you're towing essentially 6,000.

[Matt Farah]

Pretty much max. Maybe 6,500.

[Wes Siler]

What's the towing capacity on a Cayenne Hybrid?

[Matt Farah]

7,070, 800.

[Wes Siler]

That's way too close to the limit. That's gonna be. So that's gonna, like, go over the grapevine. Like doing all that stuff like oil springs. It's gonna be sketchy as hell.

[Matt Farah]

I don't. I disagree.

[Wes Siler]

Get a diesel truck.

[Matt Farah]

I. I do.

[Wes Siler]

Get something that tows 40000 pounds.

[Matt Farah]

Absolutely.

[Wes Siler]

You won't even notice. It's bad.

[Matt Farah]

I don't want that.

[Wes Siler]

Dude.

[Matt Farah]

I do not want that.

[Wes Siler]

I tow.

[Matt Farah]

I would rather have a slightly less optimized tow vehicle.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

That's much better for the 95 of the time it's not tow towing anything.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

I do not want to drive a giant ass pickup truck around LA.

[Wes Siler]

So why don't you just buy like a 10 year old super duty, park it somewhere and only use it for towing. Like towing. So sketchy with a car it's not designed to tow. I tow all the time and here's what I do. Here's a nightmare to car that can't do it.

[Matt Farah]

I don't have to do this. All I have to do is get seven different press cars and try towing with them. Great. From SU the SUV's.

[Wes Siler]

I want just gonna afford super duty press car every time you need to turn a wheel.

[Matt Farah]

I don't today I just got an email with a list of the new super duties. I could borrow one.

[Wes Siler]

Great.

[Matt Farah]

I, I. Look, I understand the argument. It's just I don't necessarily subscribe to

[Wes Siler]

the more is more for but for towing more is. I know, I know.

[Matt Farah]

But it's not that much weight.

[Wes Siler]

I. I think. I think for. For a dear reader the best advice I can possibly give to you is to try to double the the weight of your tow vehicle capacity. You're gonna have such an easier time.

[Matt Farah]

I understand.

[Wes Siler]

Your car's gonna be more stable. You're gonna get better fuel economy.

[Matt Farah]

Dude. I used to tow.

[Wes Siler]

It's gonna be way safer.

[Matt Farah]

20 years ago I towed with a 3500 diesel.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Dodge 3500 diesel.

[Wes Siler]

Smart.

[Matt Farah]

The Cayenne hybrid makes more horsepower and torque.

[Wes Siler]

Great.

[Matt Farah]

Two more years.

[Wes Siler]

Its wheelbase is this long.

[Matt Farah]

It's not a big deal. It's not that big of a trailer.

[Wes Siler]

It's wheelbase.

[Matt Farah]

It's not that big.

[Wes Siler]

Wheelbase creates stability.

[Matt Farah]

It also has a big fucking battery pack weight.

[Wes Siler]

Weight helps more weight over the rear axle.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. The way it's. The weight is in between. It's in front of the rear axle.

[Wes Siler]

Okay. So what's. What's the weight balance in that car?

[Matt Farah]

I mean. I don't know Exactly.

[Wes Siler]

Is it 50, 50 like they're supposed to be or something or close thereof? I do not know because I mean what's your tongue. What's your tongue weight on a cayenne hybrid? Like £750.

[Matt Farah]

I. I don't know. Offhand, I know it can tow this trailer.

[Wes Siler]

Okay.

[Matt Farah]

But like, I don't know, it's gonna be sketchy. I'm gonna try it before I buy it.

[Wes Siler]

It's gonna suck.

[Matt Farah]

I'm not gonna throw 75, 80,000.

[Wes Siler]

This going down the grapevine.

[Matt Farah]

I towed, I towed my Manx to Pebble beach with a Bentayga and it was chill.

[Wes Siler]

Bottegas are sick cars. It was extremely chill.

[Matt Farah]

It was extremely chill. I. I also, man, and I read your. You and a couple of people that I read, particularly Garbage Day, have talked about the sort of the stupidity and malice of the social media government.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Like the fact that ICE is like terrorizing people for content is like real crazy.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. So the purpose of ICE has nothing to do with immigration. That's just like the COVID story. The purpose of ice, like today.

[Matt Farah]

Not originally. No.

[Wes Siler]

No. ICE was created during the George Bush administration to like give money to Dick Cheney and Donald Robinsfeld.

[Matt Farah]

It's a great cause.

[Wes Siler]

No notes there. Dick Cheney's got to eat, man.

[Matt Farah]

Dick Cheney needs a third heart.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. So ICE has never had anything to do with immigration, but today it has even less due to immigration than ever before. The entire purpose of us is to manufacture a violent insurgency against the American government so that Trump can be justified in invoking the Insurrection Acts, which is tried to try martial law. Yeah, he's trying to do so many times. He's trying to invoke the Insurrection act to declare martial law and then use that to shut down the elections and stay in power for a third term.

[Matt Farah]

There's a lot of people who I read that say that basically that that was what January 6th was like supposed to be.

[Wes Siler]

Yes.

[Matt Farah]

Like basically they wanted all those lunatics to fight, quote, antifa.

[Wes Siler]

Exactly. Antifa's not real. And these people are such real morons. So like those guys, all those, you know, our collective memory January 6th is now about, you know, a bunch of fucking morons invading the capital. They were never supposed to have invade the Capitol. They were there to create a street war with the millions of antifa blue haired liberals that were descending upon Washington D.C. and Donald Trump's imagination.

[Matt Farah]

They were real.

[Wes Siler]

And then because of that street violence, he could have again invoked the Insurrection act, declared martial law and prevented the election of being certified.

[Matt Farah]

Right.

[Wes Siler]

And so we saw a test run for it, then it didn't work. He didn't go to prison. Somehow and so he's trying that again now. And. And so the big takeaway here is that as we resist ICE deployments, as we protest, as we do that stuff, we have to resist the urge to do any sort of violence, which, believe me, that urge is there because that will give him the excuse to deploy the military.

[Matt Farah]

The whole point is just poking the bear. Yes. And then creating this. Turning whatever tiny little nothing arrest into some piece of content that can.

[Wes Siler]

Remember that Nazism wasn't about persecuting Jews or sending them in gas chambers. Nazism was about collecting power. And it did that. And fascist regimes collect power by villainizing the weakest members of society that are least able to defend themselves. And so right now, who are the weakest members of society, of society least able to defend themselves? Immigrants and trans people. And so by villainizing those people and by inspiring violence against them, what they're trying to do is have normal people like you and I go, wait a second, that person can't defend themselves. I should stand up for them. And then go out and beat up a cop. And then that video of you beating up a cop to defend some immigrant family on their way to church being

[Matt Farah]

rounded up, it goes on Tucker Carlson.

[Wes Siler]

It goes on Tucker Carlson. And then the 82nd airbor is, you know, stealing your Bentley.

[Matt Farah]

And you know, well, there's multiple shows. I mean, John Oliver just did it and fucking some more news just did it with that Nick Shirley guy who made this bullshit video about the child care centers in Minneapolis and like the chain of events that led directly from that to, like sending in the fucking trucks.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. I mean, it's wild how stupid that is. You take some little, like, incel pervert who can't get laid, and for some reason a childcare doesn't want some little incel pervert in their childcare, and that's suddenly evidence of like, you know, Somali corruption. Like, where does that make sense? Where does that make sense at any level? It's all so stupid and just. It's just Hamilton Nolan writes about this really well, but it's just these people are fucking morons. How are they in charge? Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Cause we're all morons.

[Wes Siler]

Cause we're all too busy to run for. We're all too busy running for office by having great careers.

[Matt Farah]

And we, we sold our, you know, we sold our. Our convenience. You know, we sold our privacy and we sold everything for convenience.

[Wes Siler]

And now they.

[Matt Farah]

And now they've. Now they've got us. Yeah. Let's go to the people. Hang on.

[Wes Siler]

Reader questions.

[Matt Farah]

Patreon.com the Smoking Tire podcast is how you support the show, how you catch the show when it's live. I'm sorry, it's not live right now. How you ask questions for the show, how you get the show early, how you get extra show, and how you get exclusive access to all kinds of cool fun collabs and things that we do. And by the way, shout out to this Montana bourbon, whatever it's called. Montana 1889.

[Wes Siler]

Everything here is called the same thing. It's all trying to play into like the fucking Dutton family bullshit. It's just like, come on, we're a little more dynamic than just like a bad image of a rancher.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

All right.

[Matt Farah]

The swinging tire says, can Wes recommend a place in the northeast good for outdoor activities, hunting and camping?

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, I mean, the Northeast is wonderful. I would head to. I would head to Maine and just get ONX off road, the app and it'll, it'll lead you to everything. Onyx off road, it's just, it's like 19 a year. It's great. And head up to like northern Maine. It's just, it's just tons of logging roads with little patches of public in there. And you can just find your own little slice of heaven really easily. And they're using again on x off air showings exactly where that is.

[Matt Farah]

I. I've done a bunch of the backcountry discovery routes. Yes.

[Wes Siler]

Those are rad. Those are excellent.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, those are good. How do you like your tor Eggs in the morning says, what's the most braking force you've ever felt in a car? Mustang GT3. Le Mans car for me. You ever driven some crazy?

[Wes Siler]

It's been so long since I've done the car.

[Matt Farah]

You don't do sports cars?

[Wes Siler]

I used to. I mean, like, I don't know, like,

[Matt Farah]

what's the last sports car you review

[Wes Siler]

that's been so long? I mean, Corvette ZR1, Lexus LFA GT.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, that was like 2011.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

C6, ZR1. Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

It was a pretty good time to bow out.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Air cooled testicles says Doug Demuro recently made a video about the most important cars of the last 30 years. His top three were Tesla Model S, Toyota Prius. Prius and Mercedes ML320. Agree or disagree?

[Wes Siler]

Interesting choices. I fully agree on Tesla Model S. I agree on Prius. I love the Prius.

[Matt Farah]

The new Prius is dope, dude. It's sick.

[Wes Siler]

But like, honestly, the Prius forever has been up here. There's a lot of income inequality so we talk about stealth wealth a lot. And you don't want to flex here.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

So you want a car that gets you across socioeconomic divides. And if you want that anywhere in the country, it doesn't matter if you're like in Carmel, if you're on Long island, wherever you are, if you show up in a Prius, you're welcome.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

At a dive bar at like, you know, Ralph Lauren's house.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

You know, whatever it is. Like, you're dope. The ML320, the reason he's listing that is it was the first car to use brake based traction aids. Oh, instead of, instead of. Is that why he did use instead of locking differentials? I didn't see Doug's video. Love Doug didn't see that video. I guarantee that's why he's listing it.

[Matt Farah]

I don't know if that was because it maybe was considered the first luxury crossover.

[Wes Siler]

No, it's not really crossover.

[Matt Farah]

It's a luxury suv.

[Wes Siler]

But it was the pioneer of modern electronic traction aids. And modern electronic traction aids are super effective and I'm a huge advocate for them. I think most people don't realize they're on their cars and they don't use them. So if you're in like a, if you're in like a, any sort of truck or anything like that, that's off roady, make sure you use your modes like put it in snowboard, put it in rock mode. Put it like, then you'll get, you know, they'll replicate the function of lockers by slowing down the wheel on the axle.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Then it's spinning the fastest. This to match your wheel speeds and give you traction off road.

[Matt Farah]

The. I, I mean, I, I, I don't really disagree with the list. I, I would, my, in my personal opinion, I would put the Lexus RX300 as number three because it, it literally did that started the crossover.

[Wes Siler]

And those were such unique cars because they were on that unique platform. They were wonderful.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, my mom, you know that? My mom, my mother from the years of 19, well, she amassed them.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

By 2011, my mother owned five RX3 hundreds at the same time.

[Wes Siler]

I bet all five are still running.

[Matt Farah]

I don't have the whereabouts of three of them. Two of them absolutely are.

[Wes Siler]

Yes.

[Matt Farah]

But she had a 97 the first year. A 99, an 03, an 05 and an 09.

[Wes Siler]

Yep.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

If, if you're shopping for just like a relatively affordable car that kind of does everything and it's kind of nice inside early on yeah, they'll never die, actually.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. The best quality, the best year by far of all the RXs we had

[Wes Siler]

was the 05 100.

[Matt Farah]

The 05 had the. The best quality leather, the best quality wood.

[Wes Siler]

It held up well because it was. It was. It was a new thing for them then and they wanted to try something really different and hard, and they put everything they had into it. You know, these days a luxury crossover is just the most, you know, cheapest components you can possibly get in a car. Sold to, like, consumers. They don't know anything. They're all terrible. They're all exactly the same. They're all terrible. But those first generation luxury crossovers, yeah, the first generation RAV4 was super fucking cool. First generation Honda CRV. Super fucking cool. That RX, that first generation RX had the weight of everything Toyota could put into a V vehicle.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And that. That's really. That means something.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Yamahabibi. What is the first car Wes fell in love with and why?

[Wes Siler]

That's a good question. I. So I grew up in England. My dad was a diplomat and we were. He and I were really into English sports cars. My first car was a 1969 Morris Minor 1000. It was the biggest piece of ever, I think it had like 30 horsepower, maybe went 40, 48 miles an hour.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, that's rough, dude.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, it was. It was. I love that car.

[Matt Farah]

I loved that car.

[Wes Siler]

I learned how to work on cars because it broke down like twice going back, you know, every time I went back, you know, back and forth to school, it was just. Great car.

[Matt Farah]

That's awesome. This one you probably can weigh in on. Mustang geek says you've. I have. Just so back. Back. Backstory. People have asked regularly, like, I talked about a weight tax for cars. I felt like that's someone's dog. Yes, it is. You know, because they've talked about increasing registration fees for EVs to offset the fact that they don't use gas, et cetera, et cetera. And I've been of the opinion, and it's not the most educated, but it's somewhat educated, that heavy cars disproportionately damage roads.

[Wes Siler]

Damage roads, yeah, 100%.

[Matt Farah]

And actually, I was. I was actually even further clarified by Ali from Range Energy, who said the transporters that are shipping heavy cars really fuck up roads. Yes. A hauler carrying a bunch of EVs, a bunch of Rivians is really, really fucking up roads. So the question. That's the backstory. The question is you've discussed a Weight tax. But what about higher fuel taxes instead? History shows that when gas prices are high, consumers buy more fuel efficient cars, lighter vehicles, etc. Et cetera, et cetera. It works in Europe. Cafe becomes unnecessary. Could higher fuel taxes be a market driving solution to this environmental and societal problem?

[Wes Siler]

I have a simpler solution.

[Matt Farah]

What's that?

[Wes Siler]

I think most public policy should be simpler, should be written easier to understand. And it can be really broadly effective if we don't make it so complicated. Eliminating tax loopholes, eliminating the complicated tax code that people like you and I benefit from. But that hurts the working man. So the simple answer to getting a lot of heavy cars off the road in America and a lot of unfuel vision cars is to eliminate section 179.

[Matt Farah]

I, I actually am pro that that's the, that's the where you can so

[Wes Siler]

re readers or watchers, if you're, if you're not familiar. Section 179 is a tax incentive from the IRS that encourages you if you have business income to offset it to buy A car weighs more than what, £6,000.

[Matt Farah]

And you can write £6,000 gross vehicle

[Wes Siler]

weight, not curb weight. And how much, how much can you write off?

[Matt Farah]

So, so they've reduced the amount you can write off over the past few years.

[Wes Siler]

It used to be like, it used

[Matt Farah]

to be like all of it.

[Wes Siler]

All of it. 100%. Yeah, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

It's less now.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

I support getting rid of it.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. But the reason why every housewife in Dallas drives a G wag and the reason why every general contractor has afforded super duty on and on and on is section 179. And so if we eliminate that and just, it's just fair market. They need to buy their own car instead of having taxpayers subsidize their car car. They'll buy something more fuel efficient. They'll buy something lighter.

[Matt Farah]

I, I, I, so you could just. I am against incentivizing the purchase of heavier vehicles.

[Wes Siler]

Giant luxury vehicles typically that are where

[Matt Farah]

people are seeking out a heavier vehicle.

[Wes Siler]

Yes. For a purpose. If you've ever like been been in traffic behind like a Ford Super Duty Platinum that costs like $180,000. But like why does this truck exist? Yeah, exists because somebody had whole idea of income to write off and they were forced to buy a really heavy stupid vehicle. So you eliminate section 179. You eliminate any incense if there is to buy that class.

[Matt Farah]

Buying an SUV. Yeah. Okay. Do you with UTVs very often I do UTV. Okay, we got a UTV question. Listen and sometimes watch says, I'm going to rent UTVs for a Bachelor party in Gatlinburg. In a week there'll be nine of us. I know, right? Someone's losing an arm.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, someone's absolutely losing an arm. Sorry.

[Matt Farah]

Well, I'm gonna ask the second and do the second part first. The two parter tips for a bunch of amateurs. And then part two is any particular brand or model we should aim for?

[Wes Siler]

Brand or model won't matter. Yeah. So the problem is like UTVs are essentially like a motocross bike that appears safer because four wheels and a really shitty roll bar. The, the mantra for off road driving that it's just out there universally is as slow as possible, as fast as necessary.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Right. But the problem is the UTVs are so capable and so they have so much performance.

[Matt Farah]

It's flipped. It's flipped. It's flipped as fast as possible, as slow as necessary.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. And so there essentially exists to kill bachelor party members. I would just advise you a, not, not to consume alcohol until afterwards. For sure. Yeah. And then just like, just like realize that you, you're driving off road, an unfamiliar thing. Go really slow, enjoy yourself, don't kill anybody. Don't lose arms. Dude. Andrew, wear a helmet. Wear eye protection.

[Matt Farah]

Why am I such an asshole? Blanking on Andrew's last name, who's a car writer who I call Lefty. Andrew Collins. Yes. I literally call him Lefty. He rolled a UTV on his wedding day. Yeah. Had God read his vows in like an ambulance.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, dude.

[Matt Farah]

It's like, it's funny now because he didn't die, but his hand is permanently up.

[Wes Siler]

No. And he, and he's like, he's not as confident as he used to be before he had that accident. He's, he drives much slower. You know, it really him up and just. Yeah, man. Like, if you guys want to own UTVs, I encourage you to get some training, like a high performance driving school. I want to offer road school, but if you're gonna rent them for a bachelor party, man, that is a worst case scenario. Just like, I don't know, man. Go to a water park and enjoy some water slides.

[Matt Farah]

But yeah, if you must do it, like, just be so careful. Arm restraints are a must. Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Give everybody a safety briefing. You're there to have a good time, not go to the er.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Tickle your pickle for a triple nickel. Says, I'm considering removing my steering wheel on my 1993300 ZX and getting a smaller one to get a quick, better Steering ratio. The idea of removing an airbag from a car that spends 99% of its time on the street feels wrong. But it's a 93, so it's a Gen 1 airbag. In my opinion, you should probably disconnect the airbag at this point. Even if you're keeping that car airbags

[Wes Siler]

as safety devices, if you've never been hit by. In the face by one, it's kind of like recreationally using a hand grenade. Yeah, yeah. It'll burn you, it'll break your nose. There's probably some shrapnel involved. What was that company that got sued for the shrapnel?

[Matt Farah]

Oh, the Takata. Yeah, Takata. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I mean, look, Gen 1 airbag is better than nothing in a high speed crash, but potentially very problematic in a low speed crash.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

In my opinion, I would not feel, I would not be worried about taking one out of another.

[Wes Siler]

What I would do for triple nickel reader guy is I would do racing buck and a proper racing harness. And then in those cases, you don't need an airbag because you're properly restrained.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Although you might break your neck. Excuse me. Not to delicate. Oh, wait, hang on real quick. Dodge January six pack coup attempt. Thoughts on outdoor car covers? Better than nothing.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. I mean, absolutely.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, better than nothing.

[Wes Siler]

I should probably use one. I wish I would have one. Wouldn't sometimes. But I have a camper on my truck and so nothing fits. Yeah, but yeah, like it keeps. We. We have Chinese elms in front of our house and they like rain SAP on our vehicles and it's a nightmare for everything from just clearing your windshield.

[Matt Farah]

Like.

[Wes Siler]

Absolutely. Using outdoor cover. Car cover.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Buy a good one.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, hang on. Well, I don't want to. I. I didn't preview these. I'm sorry. Okay. Duffel Shuffle Retirement club. How much do you think cars being on a TV show or movie or owned by a YouTuber inflates their price compared to the identical car not owned by those people? I mean, so here.

[Wes Siler]

I mean, yes, but like, what's an example?

[Matt Farah]

So if it's a real tv, you know, a real TV car and movie car, then it's like, is the movie or TV show good and well known and well remembered? And well remembered. And if so, maybe like, what was the role of the car?

[Wes Siler]

You know, like, you like Miami Vice, Ferrari. Sure, absolutely.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Knight Rider and like early Trans Ams. Yeah, probably not.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. But like crazy Kramer's car from Seinfeld. Probably minimal.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

But like, yeah, with a YouTuber. I mean, it depends on, like, how

[Wes Siler]

cringe is that YouTuber.

[Matt Farah]

Well, what's their reputation like?

[Wes Siler]

Right?

[Matt Farah]

Like, I Suppose I'm a YouTuber and I sold my car at auction. So, like, the fact that it was mine shouldn't mean anything. But for someone who knows about me, they know that I buy the best examples and I maintain them incredibly fastidiously and I service the shit out of them.

[Wes Siler]

And you have.

[Matt Farah]

Right before I sell it.

[Wes Siler]

And you have really poor taste in interior fabrics.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Yes. Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

And so, I mean, for me, like, you should just buy with confidence, knowing that I don't want somebody out there going, matt Farah sold me a piece of shoe.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

So for someone like me, maybe it's 10 or 15%, but if it's the car Paul drove in the Fast and Furious two or something, then. Right, it's just like it's maybe double or triple. The McQueen Premium was always 300%.

[Wes Siler]

Yep. But readers, good advice. Never buy a car from me.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, you. You use them until they're done. Like the French.

[Wes Siler]

Yes.

[Matt Farah]

Pts Normal says, how much worse? How much more damage could our current administration do to our national parks and public lands before their term is over? A lot.

[Wes Siler]

If you go to my substack westilo substack.com and search TRUMP plan to sell national parks. He has an express plan that's seven steps long that has been articulated by administration and we are on step five.

[Matt Farah]

That's just straight out of Project 2025.

[Wes Siler]

No, it's their own White House plan.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, okay.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. The Project 2025, the sexual glance is written by William Perry Penley, who's like a comic book villain. Like, in addition to trying to sell public lands, he like, writes like anonymous op EDS about like, how homosexuals are icky. He's just a weirdo.

[Matt Farah]

So assuming it's only three years and it's a. That's a scary assumption. But how much more can they up?

[Wes Siler]

So we. We could lose. We could lose some major national parks. They'll try to sort of like slow roll at the beginning and try to sort of like, build some like, enthusiasm around it, still privatize like some. Something nobody cares about. Right. They've identified like, you know, historic buildings, battlefields, stuff like that. Yeah, they'll go in and they'll just like right now, some operations in national parks have always been privatized. If you go stay in the Mammoth Lodge, it's Santerra, Yellowstone. Santera is pretty good. But if you go back to Delaware north, who used to run Yosemite. Some of the lodges at Yosemite are terrible. The guy that used to run Delaware north is now the nominee for the Park Service director. He knows how to work the Park Service, knows how to milk taxpayers. And so what they're going to do is going to just try to like roll out more and more privatization within national parks. And all of that's just gonna prioritize stuff upwards.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And so there'll be great places for Elon Musk to visit and he wants to go pet a bison. Cool. Please do. But it'll be less and less accessible to you and I and normal people. And we could see some really significant sell offs as well.

[Matt Farah]

So like they could create like a, like a South Africa style game preserve.

[Wes Siler]

In fact, that's one of their priorities. With Doug Burgum as doi Right now, all wildlife in America is owned and trust by the public. They're managed by the states. And so they have a stated goal of wanting to privatize that for profits. And so instead of like access to hunting is really democratic right now. It costs nothing and accessible to everybody. And it's how millions of families put protein on their plates to this day. But if that goes to South Africa example, where it's fully privatized and access is just for rich people, then we could lose that. That's really sad.

[Matt Farah]

You didn't use these words yet. So I don't know if you've covered this already, but Lamborghinis on parade says, what are your thoughts on the BLM policy reversal on public lands rule? Yes.

[Wes Siler]

So the public lands rule is really a case of misinformation. I have a lot of frustrations with the liberal side side of the coin here where they sort of like spend a lot of time virtue signaling and not achieving much. It's. The public lands rule was not a rule. It was a sort of memo from the last administration that said, hey, consider conservation on an equal footing to other uses, which is a very formal term of public land uses which are like, like energy extraction. It never actually made because this would have to be an act of Congress, never made conservation a use. Capital U public lands. And it just really upset a bunch of people. So there's really no. There was no material change on the ground when that was eliminated. And it was just sort of again, a liberal side of public lands world not doing itself any favors.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Lockshock Darrell just wants a journal recommendation. I use either moleskins. I've been impressed with this one, which I got as Swag from Monticello Motor Club. This one is Spectre and Company. And I have been very impressed with the durability of this fake leather cover. I've been writing on this since. What's the first date on here? April 28th of 2025. So almost a year. And I mean, look. That looks brand new. Almost brand new. So that's very impressive. From Spectre and Company. Okay. My son Doug's dinero. My son just turned one and loves the sound of engines. A 50cc dirt bike or gas weed whacker will probably make him ecstatic. What car, truck, tractor, etc. Has an amazing exhaust sound and can fit a 99th percentile. Baby.

[Wes Siler]

So I'm gonna. I'm go back up a second there. As somebody who suffers from significant tinnitus today.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Use earmuffs and when it's appropriate, ear plugs for your child throughout their life. I can't go to bed without really loud ringing in my ears.

[Matt Farah]

What do you think did it?

[Wes Siler]

Motorcycles. Motorcycles, absolutely motorcycles.

[Matt Farah]

Everything's engines or wind noise or both.

[Wes Siler]

The wind noise is way more significant than the noise. But like, I grew up attending Formula one races with my dad. You know, like, it's everything. It's all the above.

[Matt Farah]

I do not wear earplugs enough. I wear them like when I shoot guns, I wear them.

[Wes Siler]

I wear them all the time now, but I've done the damage and it only gets worse. There's nothing you can do about it.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. So it sucks.

[Matt Farah]

Panic at my disco. I'm not. I'm not gonna give you my Korean taco recipe on the show. I'll just write it in the comments on the fucking Patreon page. The. Can car people and conservation people and progressives like myself find the middle happy ground.

[Wes Siler]

I think we're all in the middle happy ground already.

[Matt Farah]

You think so?

[Wes Siler]

We are divided by people around us, not by ourselves. You have to remember that the idea of a personal carbon footprint that impacts climate change was created by an ad agency called Ogilvy for the client bp to shift the blame away from the oil companies. Of course it was onto us personally. That's bullshit. All of us care about this stuff. Like, I own two 10 mile per gallon trucks because I like going outdoors. And I feel like I can't fully experience the outdoors the way I want to without them because I can't access the trailheads I want to access. I can't get further into the mountains. All of us like the same stuff. All of us are hopefully good people that Want to see other people succeed? What more is there?

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I mean, I. I don't. I just. Because I don't want a super duty.

[Wes Siler]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

You know, I'm not. If you need a super duty, get a fucking super duty. Right? I. I don't. I do. I don't shame people. I've. I've expressed the feeling of shame from myself when I drive something that's enormous in an inappropriate situation.

[Wes Siler]

You and I look at vehicles for their utility and their function. I think a lot of people who don't come into vehicles from that place look at them through, like, virtue signaling and lifestyle signaling and sort of socioeconomic status.

[Matt Farah]

It could be that. But also, I think Americans versus, like, Europeans buy cars for like a 95th percent use case.

[Wes Siler]

Yes.

[Matt Farah]

Americans do it for like 120% use case.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. Just that, like, one time of the year that you need to tow, you buy.

[Matt Farah]

I might need to move a couch someday. I better get a pickup truck, you

[Wes Siler]

know, But I also, to some degree, I understand that because it's. You're buying one car, right? You want it to fulfill all your needs. And even if it's once a month that you might go to Home Depot for a home project or take your entire kid's soccer team, you know, or go on a camping trip, whatever. It is the hassle of having to take time out of your day to, like, drive to a rental car company and like, you know, all that, you know, bullshit just to get that truck that you maybe don't need for your commute. You just wanna own that vehicle all the time and have it ready to go.

[Matt Farah]

I understand. I try. And maybe I'm not perfect at it. I try to not shame others for their choices. But when I have said how I feel about it, I don't have kids. Whatever. I like a 95% use case vehicle, not 120%. And I've said when I drive ginormous vehicles in the city, I feel like an asshole. And then people have taken that and said that I think you're an asshole if you. No, no. This is how I feel.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Like. Yeah. And if you don't feel that way, like, okay.

[Wes Siler]

And I get that. I mean, like, you know, when I was the first road test editor at JALOPNIK in the 2000s, I was living in Brooklyn, you know, total hipster, long hair, you know, I remember the hair. Yeah. And, you know, I'd bring, like an Audi R8 home.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

And I felt like a fucking asshole hole, you know? And, like, I like Audi R8s. I like sports cars, but, you know, that's, there's a time and a place for one.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Brooklyn isn't usually it, it's not like,

[Wes Siler]

you know, like Bushwick in 2004.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, right.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

No, I, I, well, someone, someone had asked in the, in the, in the Patreon and I didn't, I didn't necessarily. Well, we can, we can answer it if you'd ever been profiled in a car.

[Wes Siler]

Oh, 100%.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

I mean, I get profiled today. I think both my wife and I do because we both drive modified lifted trucks and our lifestyle sort of justifies that. And it's just the reality of living in a place like Montana, being able to fully enjoy it is I'm preparing for extreme weather. I'm preparing for the unknown. So one interesting fact about up here, the only NOAA weather radar is in Great Falls, the air force base. And it's in a valley surrounded by mountains. So it's great if you live in like the valley.

[Matt Farah]

It only does valley.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. But if there's, there's no other, like, accurate weather forecast in like all of

[Matt Farah]

Montana and if they just defunded that one, like.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah, I mean, no, they have it, but it's just there never were accurate weather forecasts. And so, like, you know, we could go somewhere. We could go visit friends. Ennis, which is over that mountain range there in like June. And while we're at dinner, it could snow three inches.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah. And it's like, you know, we want to be able to drive home and there's going to be mule deer on the road and elk on the road road, and we're not gonna be able to see. So I want an airbumper and I want light force lights and I want something with a torsion center diff and good tires.

[Matt Farah]

I mean, living up yourself, recover, It's a different thing. Yeah, it's a, it's a very different thing.

[Wes Siler]

100.

[Matt Farah]

I'm probably not gonna hit a deer or a moose. Yeah, probably. But I will have to park at Trader Joe's like all the time. You know what I mean?

[Wes Siler]

I get it.

[Matt Farah]

And I, you know, so we'll borrow super duty when we need one. That's what we'll do. Yeah. Thanks, Wes. One more time. Westformmontana.com west from montana.com and we live here.

[Wes Siler]

Westsiler.substack.com you know, please subscribe again. I got fired in September for pointless reasons. So I could use your help right now.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, the sub stack is for us. The Patreon is the move.

[Wes Siler]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Thank you to our patrons for supporting us. Us asking such good questions. I don't know if our next show is back in the studio. We maybe have another show from Montana when Zach gets here tomorrow. Because it's fucking Ice Race, baby. It's going to be good. Ice Race will be good. Thank you and thank you and we'll see you later.

[Wes Siler]

Bye.