Smart Tech is Taking Over    (Hour 1)

Transcript

Smart Tech is Taking Over (Hour 1)

John & Gordy · Thu Jul 17, 2025

Kathryn Lake

You're listening to Civic Media.

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When the chips are down and democracy's back is up against the wall, two radio veterans step up to the microphone to right the wrongs, standing for truth, justice, and just because.

To say what needs to be said.

It's John and Gordy on 92.7

WMDX.

Trump disavows stupid supporters over Epstein bull, you know bull BS see

again He can say it.

We can't say it.

It's the s word right that I keep saying we have to start saying I don't understand I know I'm a little ahead of the curve here, but not that that ahead I mean seriously when are when are we gonna start saying the word?

Because it means nothing.

What

is it?

I

don't know

What, a horrible word?

No.

What the hell?

It's not that bad.

It's really...

I've been

saying

it since we've been kids, little kids in the field, uh, running around, oh man,

hey

man.

You're

gonna talk to FCC about that.

You know, I just... I'm just

so done with this, you know.

I mean,

let's just say the word.

I saw, um, a simple interview with, I think it was Adam Schiff or somebody last night

who was

watching it, and he just came out with the word.

Yeah, I know.

Yeah, politicians are people Buddha judges saying it yes, yes You know smart guy like him to speak seven languages he figured it out The word in

the one language that I want to say

Yeah, it's all Epstein all the time now it is 24-7 well,

you know, I think this is his downfall

I mean if

it's ever going to happen it has to be

this

When Charlie, what's his name comes out against?

What is it?

Charlie Kirk?

Charlie Kirk's all over this.

We've got that.

We've got it.

We've got Charlie Kirk coming

up.

And it's so funny, though, the whole approach that Charlie Kirk has come up with is just so extreme and stupid.

My head explodes every time I even think a bit of

it.

We

had it yesterday.

We did not get to that story, but we'll get to it today.

We'll get to

it.

Uh, cloudy skies this morning.

We had a little bit of, uh, sprinkles, I think overnight, some, some light rain.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You

know, I, I

have, uh, I have, uh, my windshield wipers on my car.

You know, everybody's got to check their windshield wipers and whether they're like this.

You know, we always say that.

Take your umbrella along, check your windshield.

Does anybody really ever check their windshield wipers ever?

No one does.

And then they

find out

when it

starts ripping apart and using them.

Yikes, right?

So you have the new car and the new windshield wipers, and they sense rain.

Really?

Really?

It

senses how much rain is coming down and how fast the windshield wipers need to go.

I'm not kidding you.

And do you agree with the way it's sensing it?

Yes, it's just unbelievable.

Seriously.

You don't have to push a button or do anything.

No, no, you know how sometimes you come

down hard and sometimes it lightens up and

the

windshield wipers know when that happens and they...

You got smart windshield wipers.

I can't believe it.

Yes.

Pretty soon smarter than me behind that wheel.

Oh, man.

I'll tell you, I took a look at it yesterday.

We went to the parking lot after the show.

I couldn't believe it, man.

It is straight out of the Jetsons.

And

it looks like, I mean, it's a cool-looking car.

Yeah.

It's very, very cool.

It's pretty hip.

Now, you can take a ride today, if you want, right after we're done here.

Really?

Yeah.

Ride right out of the ramp here.

Can

I join, too, or?

No,

Tom, you

can't.

John doesn't allow anybody else

in the car in

the back

seat, except the kids.

Of course you can take

a ride with it.

Awesome.

Awesome.

If you have a driver's license, he might even let you drive it.

Yeah, I think so.

I don't know what I can do.

That's going too far.

You can ride in the back seat.

Have you

checked your insurance?

This is Gen Z here.

You never know what they're going to do next.

OK.

Look, we got an early morning call already.

We do.

Yeah.

Shall we go to it?

Yeah.

We've got a lot of stuff on the list here.

Let's check it with Matt and Middleton.

Yeah, Matt's been leaving us voice notes.

But now, here he is live.

Good morning, Matt.

Morning,

guys.

I wanted to bring attention to this geo group, this private prison corporation that is being given tons of money to build these concentration camps.

And apparently Baldwin, Wisconsin is one of their targets to build one of these to move people from Chicago and this little area around us.

I see this MAGA as a civil war, technically, because it's the rise of the Confederacy against, you know, the rest of us.

Sure.

And I'm wondering what you think about, we know people in prisons are put to work, we know the Confederacy loves slavery, right?

Right, yeah.

So it seems like this is a return to a kind of slavery.

And the more people they get in these concentration camps, and the longer they're stuck in there, they're going to be put to work as well.

They're probably going to be picking the crops.

What do you think about that?

Is this just a return to the Confederacy, and that's kind of what we're up against?

Well, that's what a

lot of people are thinking, actually.

I know the one prison where they get a dollar a day, and they use

the dollar a day to make a phone call, one phone call a week because the phone call costs $5.

So you get $5 a day and you make one phone call for the entire week and you get labor besides, which is a big plus for them and that's why it's private and that's why I think these things are going in all over the country, just as Matt has mentioned.

These corporate prisons.

What's the name of the company Matt?

GEO group

GEO group and I looked at their website.

Yeah, and they try to make it look all nice like they're all about rehabilitation and reentry and you know programs to help people and it's all BS, you know Yeah, it is of

course.

Yeah.

Oh boy.

Yeah.

Well, that's where we're at out there

today.

Yeah.

All right.

Well, thank you for bringing that to our attention.

Yeah, you know, we'll look into that.

Yeah

Keep our eye open.

Build one up in Baldwin, huh?

Yeah.

Interesting, yeah.

OK.

Weather today, well, it's 61 degrees.

And you'll notice as soon as you step outside, much cooler out there today in a high of just 70 and maybe a couple of spots of rain along the way.

It's going to stay pretty cloudy.

A little bit later on, we'll talk to attorney Jim Santel.

and get the latest from him.

No Tim Slecker today.

He's busy, probably trying to figure out what he's gonna do about 1400 people being let go of the Department of Education.

Maybe he's affected somehow by that, I don't know.

Who

knows?

Trying to keep track of it all.

Yeah, the quick.

disassembly of the government now because of the Supreme Court allowing Trump to do whatever he wants, which is an amazing thing.

I don't know if Congress, do they think that they can take that power back when there's a Democratic president?

I assume they think so, but the Supreme

Court

is making it very easy for a Democratic president to come in and do whatever the hell he wants over the wishes of Congress.

They're letting this happen.

And I'm hoping that that happens.

I hope we have the walls to actually do something when we have the damn power.

Look at what they're doing.

The Republicans and the Maggots are doing here.

The Project 2025 Russell vote doing

of this dismantling just I mean in in five six months

they

have managed to do something like this this is well this is fantastic this is truly more done than any

other president in history well if the president can do anything he can call off the voting

He could just say, well, we have an emergency here.

We're just going to skip loading this time around, and everybody stay in place.

Because so many things are going on, and we have to have troops in the streets, and everything else.

It's just well, I've got I think you can do anything.

I've got a story on that Yeah, I've got yeah, they're they're starting to meddle in the elections here I've got this the president recently called for Texas to gerrymanders voting districts right to To net republicans an additional five friendly districts

Just five what gives him the power to do this.

I why would it be up to the president?

He decided to do it

Why haven't we done stuff like this?

Trump has launched a multi-pronged effort to gather data on voters and inspect voting equipment sparking concerns about local and state election

officials.

Here we

go.

think that the federal government will eventually then interfere in the election in 2026, the midterms.

Of course he's going to do this kind of stuff.

And then the Washington Post also reports that the Justice Department has asked at least nine states for copies of their voter rolls, a move that could grant the department access to non-public information about the voters.

And federal law gives the Justice Department the ability, but it does not expressly give the agency the authority to review voter rolls themselves.

So,

yeah.

I mean, this whole thing is unwinding.

And I don't know, somewhere along the way, either we just throw up our hands.

and just

see what happens.

And I think Trump is hell bent on getting rid of Jerome Powell.

He's going to fire him, whether he's supposed to or not.

He's just going to just let him go.

Because they're revamping the building where the Fed is.

Yeah, and he didn't do it right.

He's just making stuff up now.

He spent too

much money, right?

Yeah.

They didn't spend too much money putting gold-plated statuettes.

on

the

fireplace.

Did you see the picture of the fireplace?

No.

Compared to Epstein's fireplace at Epstein's mansion?

No.

They're almost identical.

Oh, wow.

With the gold scrolling and stuff.

Yes.

Oh my god.

I saw the comparison picture.

Wow, it's just

bizarre.

Okay, but you know, that's the whole thing

here.

I

mean, you know, we're, we're looking at him complaining about the new building for the Fed and they've have, they have huge problems.

You're gonna flooding the basement, the wiring is old.

This is

like, yeah, really an old building.

It has to be, you know, really, really renovated.

And they're complaining about how much money it costs to renovate it.

What?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anything anything to have an excuse to let Jerome Powell go who he hired and forgot about he's the one we got We have that coming up.

We'll get that.

We got that good.

Do

we have time with for what you would you rather do you have

time?

We're gonna we're gonna switch it down.

We're gonna only two instead of three only two questions.

Let's go two questions.

Yeah, this

is much better

Okay

Okay.

All right.

First question.

Okay.

Would you rather have a fridge that restocks itself with your favorite foods or a closet that always has a fresh, perfectly fitting outfit for the day?

Oh, the refrigerator.

I think I would do the refrigerator.

Yeah, you know, I would do the refrigerator.

That was a quick and easy one.

And then the second question I have is you're being dropped from a helicopter into the center of a lake.

Would you rather the lake contain a hundred great white sharks or 10,000 piranhas?

I

think

Trump came up with a solution to all of this, right?

I think he wanted to take the sharks or I'll fight the sharks too with with Trump

I think I'll do sharks to a hundred great whites.

Maybe they'll miss me or something 10,000 piranhas

Hard to

avoid.

Ten thousand Peronite.

Yeah, I guess I'd go with the Sharks too.

Yeah, you know, we're missing National Tattoo Day here.

I don't know why we don't look at the National Calendar every once in a while.

And

not only that, but it's World Emoji Day.

World Emoji Day.

How could we miss World Emoji Day?

Well, one I think we're really missing is National Wrong Way Corrigan Day.

Oh,

I hardly remember

that.

Well, nobody wants to know about it.

We dropped the National Day calendar.

Nobody cares anymore.

You know, you don't want to hear about Douglas Corrigan's fascination.

Never mind.

Never mind.

All right,

well,

I guess

no one wants to

hear that anymore.

Didn't we have a request to

bring back the National Calendar from your neighbors?

My neighbors wanted to hear it again.

It's 19 minutes past the hour.

We're just getting going on a Thursday morning here in beautiful downtown Madison.

We'll be back with more of John and Gordy for Thursday after this.

Kathryn Lake

You're listening to Civic Media.

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Visit civicmedia.us slash email to get started.

Alright, there it

is, WMDX92.7.

It's John and Gordy in the morning, the little smothers, brothers there.

They were a lot of fun.

Yeah.

Big on topics back then.

Groundbreaking.

Howard Hughes.

We're following his fingernails, you know.

They grew so long.

I remember that was a big issue.

Boy, you know, I'd like to have those issues back again.

I'm probably never heard of Howard Hughes.

I've never known.

I've never, I've never even heard of the Smothers Brothers.

Oh, really?

Okay.

Yeah.

Wow.

And Gen Z here.

I'm not

quite sure what to say about that.

Howard Hughes, he was a...

He was reckless.

He was reckless.

He had a billionaire reckless.

He was into airplanes and built up Spruce Goose, which was

a horrible

project

that

never really got it.

It got off the ground once.

Yeah, it was a wooden airplane.

But it was a massive airplane.

It was huge.

Huge body on it.

Yeah.

And he built that all himself.

Well, no.

He had help.

He designed it.

He was kind of an engineer.

He was crazy, but not that crazy.

He was back in the, I don't know, 30s and 40s, I guess, was his heyday and he dated Hollywood stars and yeah, it was a big deal.

Yeah.

And then he was very, very rich, became a recluse, lived in Las Vegas, and then grew his hair long and his fingernails long, and nobody ever saw the guy.

He was just...

or recluse.

He does seem kind of crazy.

Now I'm listening to this, yeah.

So what you have to do then is check out a few repeats of the Smothers Brothers and check that show out.

It was a groundbreaking show.

They were taking off the network because they were too political.

CBS fired them.

Wow.

During the Nixon era.

Yeah.

Kind of reminds us of what's going on today.

Right.

Nixon was just a warm up for a boy Donald

Trump.

Well, this is crazy.

This is crazy stuff.

What?

No, I'm just I thought you were leaving.

I was absolutely stunned.

We're looking into the the geo group here.

They're checking out the latest news on it.

What kind of prisons they're building.

Well, we know that, you know, they're using slave labor at this point, a dollar a day.

But what is the.

Labor about what

are they making what are they doing?

I don't know.

I don't know.

I

don't know That's what I want to know what they're

doing.

Are they doing farm labor maybe?

Yeah, yeah.

This portion of the show brought to you by Madison Hearing Aid Center.

If you're not sure what other people are saying because of loud background noise or if you're, you know, you're out on a windy day, you can't hear what's happening the way you used to, call Madison Hearing Aid Center.

Their number is 608-249-4077 or go to their excellent website, MadisonHearingAidCenter.com.

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And give them a call again, 608-249-4077, MadisonHearingAidCenter.com.

The other little piece of

information is Gen X. Yeah.

Those born between 1965 and 1980, they have become big fans of the mega movement.

Trump's popularity has increased 23 points since April, with those voters 50 to 64 years old.

I find that hard to believe.

I know.

Well,

that's a recent poll, CNN SSRS survey.

Now, what do you do?

I don't know.

And the Democrats aren't exactly polling very well.

I mean, it's kind of lukewarm.

And they can't improve their polling because the Democrats can't do anything at this point, except whine and complain.

But I think that

The plan now is to hold up another continuing resolution or whatever it is in the future.

If they do certain things now, then they will hold up and stop the government from operating in the next debate.

So we'll see what

happens.

I mean, this is their threat.

We don't hear much about it, but we have to protect public radio.

throughout the entire country.

That's one of the big things that we have to protect.

The Senate

did pass that bill to cut the funding last night.

Well,

did they?

To hold off on the funding.

I thought it was just the preliminary.

Now they're going to have a full.

Well, it goes to the House now.

Oh, really?

That's what I read this morning.

Oh, OK.

All right.

It's going.

And for a while, Mitch McConnell was saying, oh, no, we need public funding for PBS.

We need to do it.

And then he changed his

vote.

Did he really?

Yes.

He went along with it, the Senate passed it to cut the funding, and some of the other things in there for USAID, whatever else was in that bill.

The rescission vote.

Yes, the rescission vote.

We'll double check on that, but I saw they passed it last night.

Well, they're

certainly going for everything on the list that they have put together over the last 50 years.

Everything is on there.

Everything, and they're passing it all.

Boy, it would be great.

Remember when the Democrats were working on the Affordable Care Act, Obamacare?

Right.

And they wanted to put a public option in.

And in no way.

Boy, talk about overreach.

Man, that was just way too much.

Oh, we can't have a public option.

You know, you guys want it all, don't you?

Well, your wish list, you can stuff it.

Yeah.

Unbelievable now look at what's happening here.

Here's the headline Senate vote Senate votes to cut $9 billion from public broadcasting and and foreign aid.

Yep.

So there you go.

All right.

Oh, that's another sweet.

What a what a great way to start the day Sorry all you people that work at PBS, you know

They haven't cut the funding completely, just $9 billion dollars for everybody.

Okay.

629, Cloudy Skies, and it's gonna reach a high of just 70 today.

We'll talk to Brittney Merlot a little bit later on, and also Jim Santel in our next hour, coming back with more of John and Gordy in the

morning.

As the 21st century began, human evolution was at a turning point, a dumbing down.

with no natural predators to thin the herd.

It began to simply reward those who reproduced the most and left the intelligent to become an endangered species.

What an idiot!

Oh, what a loser!

Now listen, Grapehead.

I'll explain it so even you can understand

it.

Idiocracy!

For the smartest

guy in the world, you're pretty dumb sometimes.

So much stuff to get to this morning.

Unbelievable.

WMDX, John and Gordy in the morning.

And you can check us out on your Civic Media app as well.

If you're traveling the globe this summer, you can always listen to the program as well and then text us or give us a voice note.

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And we are also live on YouTube,

our YouTube, John and Gordy, this morning, as well as Facebook.

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And you can call us at 608-879-8255.

It is 636 cloudy this morning, 61 cool degrees, a high of just 74 today.

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You think so?

We'll have to talk to the Verlo

people about that.

Yeah, it'll be made by Verlo, of course.

Uh,

put our, put our faces on it somewhere.

It's not the technology we have sitting around at home.

We could just assemble a kit, but, uh, you know what, maybe that's a good idea.

Just thought of it.

All

right.

Let's spitball that for a while.

Okay.

Workshop.

Running around the table.

That's right.

You used to have those.

All the phrases?

Yeah.

You have all the phrases because you used to have.

I used to have to be in those meetings.

Yes, I know.

Oh my god.

When you were at 47.

Oh my god.

Promotion director.

That was fantastic.

Robert from McFarland said, my VPN says I'm listening from Gotham City.

Really?

Okay.

Well,

that's good.

That VPN is quite secret at this point.

We got a text from Mark from Prairie to Sax says, I wouldn't think that Jerome Powell was personally supervising the retrofitting of the Feds building.

Right.

Right.

You know, that's a good boy.

And Trump paves over the Rose Garden.

Yeah.

Just the

second one.

God.

Spending all this money.

Yeah.

It's no big deal with Jerome Powell, who, you know, really isn't.

in the redecorating or refurbishing business.

Why would

it be him?

Yeah,

why is it his fault all of a sudden?

But they will try to make it that.

I appreciate that, Mark.

And we're also looking at...

You

all right?

Would you like a throat lozenge?

Yeah, we're also looking at another story, the big edit.

You know, the thing is this was bound to come out, right?

Yeah.

You know, Fox News has edited those interviews ad nausea completely

all the time.

Yeah.

And

to make

him look good.

Exactly.

And, you know, Trump goes after 60 minutes, wins kind of wins that case because they had to fold in order to make a merger take place with Paramount.

But the whole thing here is now it's coming out and it should be coming out.

Yeah.

This has been doing this for thousands

of

years.

Thousands

of

years.

All

right, well, here, let's get to the first story here on idiocracy.

By the way, I want to just mention, I'm hearing idiocracy a lot.

Me too.

In newscasts now.

I heard somebody brought it up last night.

Yes.

On what show was that?

MSNBC.

Was it MSNBC with Chris Hayes?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Will it be trendsetters or trendsetters now?

This is just like idiocracy.

Of course we are.

Wow.

Okay.

Yeah, it's normal.

It's an actual term.

I bet it's going to be added to the dictionary if it isn't already, right?

All right.

So anyway, um, Marjorie Taylor Green was called out for her calls about terrorism.

This was just a, this is just a fun thing.

I don't know who the representative is that called her out on it, but let's just say mic drop time.

Okay.

Let's listen to cut 77 here.

Listen,

let's talk about border patrol apprehensions.

between porch of an entry at the southwest border of terrorist terrorist

and I have to say it is pretty rich hearing the gentleman from Georgia

expressed concern about terrorism.

And she literally was selling defund the FBI t-shirts and hats on her website for $30 apiece, $30 for the shirts and another $30 for the hats.

You don't get both for just the $30.

The leading law enforcement agency tasked with combating terrorism in this country and keeping people safe.

And she wants to defund it.

So I'm not going to take any lectures from her on.

securing this homeland from terror.

With that I yield back.

Isn't that just fantastic?

I'm not gonna yield to the gentlemen.

She's quite manly.

But anyway, that is something else.

Selling t-shirts, do you fund the FBI?

Yeah, wow and baseball caps do

You don't get you don't get them together.

I pointed out

Watch

out.

Yeah, they're trying to take yeah, so can you all right now?

We've talked about this before and I sounded somewhat like a conspiracy theorist But you know, I'm kind of wondering why we never hear about the Trump shooter right in Butler

What

happened there?

No

one ever brings it up.

It was an investigation but we didn't hear much about

it.

So I guess a reporter brought it up to Trump the other day and that would be cut 68.

Let's listen to cut 68 and all about the Trump shooter.

What happened?

Will you repeat that question?

On this one year anniversary of Butler, I was going through your mind this morning when you woke up.

I know that you're praising God, you're alive, but a lot of people want to know how you've taken this day on this one year anniversary.

God was protecting me.

Maybe because God wanted to see our country do better or do really well, make America great again.

But God was protecting me, Brian.

I'll tell you, the more you think about it, the more you see it.

But now I just...

I don't like to think about it much.

You know, I have a job to do, so I don't like to think about it much.

You don't

think about anything.

It's a little bit of a dangerous profession being president.

What, thinking?

But I really don't like to think about it too much.

No, yes.

I think you better off not thinking

about it.

Yeah, don't think about it.

Don't think about it.

No, I

wouldn't think about it.

No, I think he made that point, right?

And so let's listen to this next cut.

This is from the Hill.

This is a part of their report in regards to what happened to the shooter.

Let's listen.

protecting him, how he doesn't feel more attached to this issue.

He feels like he's very quiet.

It's

weird, right?

I felt the same way about Trump's response.

The Daily Caller's White House correspondent on a trip to Iowa last weekend asked the president if he was satisfied with the investigation into the assassination attempt, and he said that he was.

But meanwhile, the public doesn't know much of anything about the attempted assassin.

They don't know what his motivations were, what his background was, how he got to this point.

We haven't heard much about what the Secret Service is doing to make sure that something like this doesn't happen again.

So to hear Trump himself say it's basically case closed as far as I'm concerned is really bizarre.

It is.

It is quite bizarre.

The reason I think that they're holding off on this and they don't talk about it much is because the shooter was conservative.

Here's a Trump supporter.

Yes.

He

was Republican.

And that's why they don't want to bring it up, because this is homegrown terrorism.

And they don't want to talk about homegrown terrorism in this country and the shooter.

So that's my point of view on it.

I don't know why the news people don't bring that up every so often, but I

think

it has a lot to do with portraying the right wing, the Megas, as people who are dangerous to this country.

And I think that is the meme.

Jotted down a few of the responses to this story Isabella DeLuca.

It's been one whole year and we still know nothing about this guy and here's another response We know he was a registered Republican and everyone who knew him described him as a conservative So that's where the epiphany for me came in you know when I read those two I thought yes that has to be it They just don't want to point a finger

at conservatives in any of

this.

But they did, didn't they reprimand or fire some secret services agents after that report came out about the investigation?

Yeah, they suspended a few.

That's about all they did.

That's all we heard

about.

The report came out and it looks like inflation is starting to bubble up and take place here.

So I want to hear cut 88.

This is from CBS News.

Let's listen.

New inflation numbers show the prices you pay in stores going up faster last month.

The annual inflation rate of 2.7% was the highest since February.

Economists think prices will go up even more if President Trump's new tariffs take effect on August 1st as scheduled.

Money Watch correspondent Kelly O'Grady is here with what this means for your bottom dollar.

Kelly, good morning.

Good morning to you all.

All right.

So the inflation rate, it kicked up for the second month in a row with June revealing the first meaningful evidence of tariffs pushing prices higher.

So, for example, apparel rose by 0.4%.

That was slightly above the monthly average.

Home furnishing prices increased by 1% and appliances nearly 2%.

These are products that we source primarily from overseas and therefore subject to those import taxes.

While the inflation rate, it's nowhere near the 9% level we reached three years ago.

Economists warned

the upward

pressure on

prices will only grow this year, especially with those higher tariffs set to kick in August 1st.

Now,

businesses, they're worried as well.

The Port of Los Angeles saw the busiest June on record as companies race to import those goods ahead of the higher tariffs and the holiday season as well.

So this uptick really gives the Fed license to continue that wait-and-see approach and hold them steady despite the pressure from the White House.

What do you think the markets are so steady when everything is so tumultuous?

Because everything is August 1st, right?

Let's wait and see.

What are we going to hear from Powell?

Keep putting it off.

That's what

it's

all

about, really.

That's all they want to do.

Yeah.

So everything is going up and the ports are pretty silent after, you know, a very busy time when everybody ordered early and all of that stuff will be cleared out.

Now, you know, they didn't take place while they didn't actually participate much in that big sale.

What was it?

The Amazons?

prime day.

Oh, the prime sale.

Yeah.

Prime

days.

People didn't

get involved in that simply because they didn't want to blow out all this stuff they bought early so they could keep the prices stable.

They didn't want to give those sale prices on items that they just purchased.

Right.

But anyway, all of that is starting to clear out and the prices will start to increase.

Oh, boy.

But you know, I've always said that we have this kind of stable economy.

When they predict inflation, it doesn't happen and then suddenly it

happen and the only reason it did happen they always gloss over this but we had a supply chain problem okay right I mean that was the whole reason for it and then of course businesses decided to jump on that and take advantage of it and then increases the prices after that

so they

use the supply chain problems which they actually had and

they increase the prices anyway and then downsize the products.

So it was not a good time, not a good

image by big business.

Right.

Well, it seems like the grocery prices have gone up a little bit and then they backed off a little bit.

You're like you're saying that, you know, they're getting ready for the inflation to hit and then they're like, okay, really isn't that bad yet.

Let's hold on to these prices.

Same thing with gas prices.

They really have.

not jumped up too much lately.

They start inching up a little bit and then they back off.

I've seen it kind of just steady.

Yeah.

That's what I've seen at the pump.

It's just

steady.

Nothing's really

happened

yet.

No big jump.

But now they're predicting low petroleum prices.

Really?

They're just saying that.

Okay, we got to take a break here.

We got more coming up from Idiocracy.

So hang in there.

Stay with us.

We'll continue with more of John and Gordy after this.

You're

Kathryn Lake

listening to Civic Media.

Find the latest news, information, and archives of all your favorite shows on the Civic Media website,

civicmedia.us.

WMDX

92.7.

It's John and Gordy in the morning with a lot of positive information.

Flashing back

there.

Good news.

Yeah.

That's an oldie.

Yeah.

Cloudy skies to start your Thursday and high is just 70 degrees today.

It's right.

Right now it's nice and cool.

61.

Yeah.

And feeling less humid.

All the storms.

well out of here.

Boy, they had five tornadoes scattered across and was watching some of the weather coverage last night.

We had some civic media coverage as well.

And yeah, some damage by rock's berry.

Oh, the final cloud.

Yes, lots of lots of video and dodge, dodgeville also with a tornado and then a few others, you know, fill us in.

Yeah.

We'll get to more of that in about a half hour.

All right.

He got some more news here.

Okay.

This is effectively dead for Kansas farmers.

And they're reeling from this.

Trump has slashed their wheat program.

The program food per piece delivers surplus wheat worldwide.

These cuts Kansas Republicans frantically tried to discourage Trump from making is bad news, not just for the recipients of this wheat, but the Kansas farmers who relied on it to sell large amounts of

their product.

It was the latest blow to farmers, particularly in Kansas, where about 80% of those on the high plains voted for Mr. Trump.

So why don't we get to this interesting report from Ali Valshi about Medicaid and farm workers.

Let's listen to what he has to say.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rowland saw in a gleaming vision, killed two birds with one stone.

Her problem is that the Trump administration's immigration crackdown is affecting farms across the country.

Food production is at risk of slowing down as migrant farm workers hesitate to show up to work.

They fear being detained or deported because ICE agents are descending on America's farms.

Authorities say they arrested more than 300 farm workers in a recent operation targeting

two California cannabis farms, they say they were not pursuing another worker when he suffered a fatal fall during one of those raids.

And the problem is US agriculture relies on migrant farm workers and the industry is lobbying the administration not to deport them.

But President Trump's MAGA supporters accuse the industry of selling out.

They want ICE raids on farms to expand.

Meanwhile, President Trump's signature policy bill that he recently signed into law has its own problem.

It includes some of the biggest cuts

to Medicaid in decades, which could leave millions of people without health coverage, something that Trump promised not to do.

But Republicans insist that the work requirements they inserted into the legislation only affect able-bodied adult recipients who choose to be unemployed.

And that's where the agriculture secretary, Brooke Rollins, comes in.

We must

be strategic in how we are implementing the mass deportation, so as not to compromise our food supply.

Ultimately,

the answer on this is automation, also some reform within the current governing structure.

And what else?

And

then also, when you think about, there are 34 million able-bodied adults in our Medicaid program.

There are plenty of workers in America.

It's so simple.

will deport migrant farm workers and then their jobs will free up for Medicaid recipients who need to work to continue receiving health care.

They'll qualify for

health coverage and America's food supply will be secured.

Two birds, one stone.

It goes without mentioning the number that Secretary Rowland's uses 34 million able-bodied adults.

First of all, the number is much, much lower than that.

It's between 20 and 30, 25 and 30 million.

And according to Kaiser Family Foundation's research, a majority of them

are working full or part time.

Well, there's one myth that you missed, which is that people are not living off of their Medicaid checks.

This is not welfare.

Medicaid is paid to health care providers when people get health care services.

I'm going to

stop you there because this is a huge point.

You can't get rich off of Medicaid benefits.

That's right.

Right.

You not only can't get rich, you can't live off of Medicaid benefits.

So all of these people are doing something else to support themselves.

And as you pointed out in that slide, most of them already work, they go to school, they take care of somebody, or many people can't work, but they also can't qualify for disabilities.

So there are a lot of people with disabilities who get Medicaid who aren't technically disabled according to the government rule.

And one

of the big

things that I found this out when I was doing the survey, you

know, the census

survey, farmers.

utilize Medicaid when they don't have very good years, when

they

lose a lot of money

or just

even any kind of money.

They don't make a profit for that year.

Suddenly they're not making anything.

They need to go on Medicaid in order to sustain themselves, at least for healthcare coverage and food stamps.

So

it's one of those things that is very

important.

So what are you gonna do?

Ask the farmers to go out and get a job so they can work 80 hours a month

in order to

still get food stamps or at least Medicaid.

Okay,

now come on what what what that is a huge huge area that they have to think about and no one ever brings it up But it's out there.

We

got

two minutes

left.

Yeah a couple minutes Well, I don't have enough time for the next cut here then

what are we

gonna

do?

Okay, let's go to a bankruptcy of farms

You know this, Americans rely on the country's farms to put food on the table.

But according to new research from the University of Arkansas, farmers are filing for bankruptcy at record rates.

News Nation's Brooke Schaefer joins us now.

Brooke, why is this the case?

What's making it so difficult for them to grow and operate?

Well, Marky, we spoke to a company that does farmland transactions and they told us that essentially it's getting a lot more expensive for family farmers to make their products and that is forcing a growing number of these farmers to now

the University of Arkansas released data this month, which claims that from April of last year to this March, more than 250 farms have filed for Chapter 12 farm bankruptcy.

University economists say bankruptcy filings in the first quarter of this year alone have already exceeded.

last year's.

Those same economists argue that farmers are right now facing what they described as a financial pressure cooker with prices for things like seed and fertilizer staying relatively high.

Other analysts suggest high interest rates are also playing into farmers' difficulties right now.

All right.

Yeah, so they're

having

farmers.

And we've seen, of course, a lot

of bankruptcies

here in Wisconsin, or year after year after year, 500 or so farms go bankrupt each

and every year

on average.

So it is incredible and it's happening again, especially because of what Trump's policies are doing to them.

Coming up, we'll talk to Attorney Jim Santel in our next hour.

Find out the latest from him.

Back with more of John and Gordy after this.

Kathryn Lake

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