The Food System Is Breaking — Ranchers Are Taking It Back | 2/17/26

Americans are paying more than ever for increasingly unhealthy food — yet ranchers are going out of business. In this interview, I sit down with Texas rancher Texas Slim, owner of Beef.com and co-founder of the Beef Initiative, to discuss the growing movement to decentralize beef production and reconnect communities directly to the people raising their food. He explains how regulations, consolidation, and globalized supply chains have separated consumers from local farmers — and why rebuilding local food networks may be critical to the country’s future. From meatpacking monopolies and the threat of AI data centers draining our aquifers to the disappearing family farms, this conversation reveals how the modern food system works — and what a “cow-to-fork” model could change. If communities control their food, they control their future. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices