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.
Pretty much a Superman guy.
You know, this afternoon we're gonna talk to Pete Schwabba and I understand, you know, he saw the movie Superman.
Finally saw a superhero movie.
Mark that
on the calendar.
We'll have to talk to him about that.
This is John Peterson, Gordy Young in the morning and...
WMTX 92.7 on your radio dial.
If you're driving in and I got to complain, you know, it's
almost as
though, uh, it's, you know, it's a rainy morning.
It's really coming down, down there and downtown and it's just crazy.
My son came up, uh, from the lower levels of her house, never, never see him.
And he says, John, do you have to look a look outside?
It's orange.
It was just.
Orange.
It was really, really cool and scary.
And I'm thinking it's the smoke from Canada that's down here mixing in with this storm.
You
think that's why it was orange?
No.
There's the real reason why it's orange.
Why?
We have every stoplight in this damn city is off time.
So we're all sitting there.
Everybody, all of Madison is sitting there at the red lights.
Waiting to get to the next red light.
I'm telling you we are gonna have a small problem in this town And we've got to end it now.
I am in mr. Environmentalist right here.
Yeah, I am done with this I had it
You know, we have mentioned this a dozen times on this show.
They have not changed the city lights.
Please change this.
What is wrong with you people?
You know, we're sitting in a light waiting for you on University Avenue.
It's
just a crosswalk for students.
They're not here and we're waiting in a light at the railroad tracks and nothing's happening.
I don't really mind that.
I can take a little nap, a little cat nap.
Two, three minutes.
Well, I'm
glad to know
that you're really tired behind
the wheel of the car.
And then you go down a little bit further, and there's this one-way street that's still under construction between the student buildings.
Right.
And, you know, they're never going to open the damn thing.
But it's a light, and it's a red light.
Every time it's a red light, we're waiting for nothing to cross.
I have had it with the city.
Please.
Yeah, I'm speaking for everybody in Madison has to endure this
every morning going to work.
There's nobody on the roads though.
That's the issue.
I mean, they're they really don't need that.
They just should go with the flashing yellows.
What's wrong with that?
Yes, whatever
happened to those
days, right?
Oh my god, flashing yellows going to at least six thirty six thirty seven even.
Why yeah, all right, that would solve it right away.
Why can't they not time the lights out like that?
I'm at least thinking six, you know the flashing
yellow
lights.
He used to do it in the old days And and John I know for you there's like 20 lights on your way to work.
It's not just like three or four Yeah, it's so outrageous.
It's
so ridiculous.
I'm just done with this Okay, you know if they only had
flying cars.
We were supposed to have flying cars by now.
The
Jetsons said that we should have had flying cars by now, and here we are.
Just battery-operated cars.
We're making slow progress.
yeah and so we have showers and thunderstorms this morning quite a lot of lightning at the moment and thunder and lightning yeah that was crazy some heavy downpours so watch out for those on the way in I mean it's darker now than it was a half hour ago yeah no kidding wow these are supposed to pass through and then it's going to get brighter by midday and we'll be back to sunshine excellent this afternoon and it's going to heat up to a high around 90
for today.
There's
heat alerts.
It's gonna feel more like a hundred by late in the day.
Where we're going out to our pizza lunch today.
That's right.
We've got the Sugar River Pizza Party happening at Sand Hill Pet Clinic this, well, around noon time.
And congratulations to Sue Berg and the crew there.
And we'll be showing up with the pizzas right about lunchtime there, noon
time.
So
that'll be good.
And hopefully all the rain and thunderstorms will be out of here by then.
and it should be a good afternoon, but hot, hot and humid, 90 for a high, it'll feel more like 100.
You know, it's nice
to know that Catherine's back again, but
this
time she's reminding us that Dominic is sitting in the other room.
Good morning Dominic.
Oh yeah, good
morning guys, good morning.
We forget to, you know, you can chime
in any time, you
know.
Well, I'm not
having
a good, I'm having a bad morning.
Why?
Look at the thunderstorm outside, you know.
That's what I got to do.
He chimed in a few times here.
So, uh, you know, I'm not totally shy, you know guys scare me sometimes though,
you
know
I wonder what I am afraid of though.
I'm afraid our guests today are not going to be able to make you because it's raining so hard like they're not going to see where we're at and you know we're
right in the
downtown area so I'm
hoping
they do but.
They've got GPS I'm sure they'll be fine.
I don't
know I don't know maybe not.
Maybe with the thick smog that hangs over the city because
people are waiting at the lights.
They've written this book called Historic Wisconsin Roadsides and we should be talking to them about 645 or so.
Looks really good.
We've had a whole bunch of Wisconsin Roadside books and we'll see what they've come up with.
This is the latest one.
This looks really good.
So we hope to be talking to them.
Where you can
find free ice cream.
Free ice cream.
We'll have to ask them about that.
They've got
all these different like pathways that you could take.
Yeah.
To explore Wisconsin.
And I want to know where Elvis' favorite roller coaster is.
That's one of the things that they've got.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And shipwrecks and all kinds of cool things.
How about the radio station broadcasting only music?
created on site so it's
yes only music created on site I've not heard of that and I wonder where that is no answer to that's
not
beaming from your your house my house you have
your dream is to just create a radio station with your music only
my my original music no music only no no I'm not Tom Hartman no
Nice shot.
Let's see, it's 6.13.
Oh, let's get to what do you know or what thing
is it that
you don't like out of these three things?
We're getting this right here, you know.
I can't get the name of this in my head.
Check out the
question.
The question on our website, WMTX.com.
We've got it right there.
Would you rather
would you rather yes, that would be great grand intro for this as well?
All right first first question
Okay, all right
first question.
Would you rather know how to scuba dive or know how to fly a plane?
Which
one would you rather do?
Oh man, that's a good one.
Hate
water, hate water.
You do hate water?
I
hate flying.
So you're running
a lost loss here.
I know I can't pick.
Oh, you can't pick really?
No,
you really can.
I hate both those things.
I think I'd rather play, uh, do the plane.
Yeah.
I think I would rather know how to fly a plane, too.
Yeah,
especially
at EAA.
That would be a crazy experience.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
It's
your life.
Okay.
Is there an age limit for pilots?
I don't think there is.
I don't know.
To get your first license?
I don't know.
But it's expensive.
It is pretty expensive.
Yeah.
The scuba diving, I think, is probably not quite as expensive as getting a pilot's license.
Have you guys ever scuba dove?
I don't know if that's the right word.
No, I did a little snorkeling.
a
long time ago.
It
was
fun.
You know, I've seen a lot of James Bond movies where
the
snorkelers are down there, and then here comes the sharks.
They get the spirit, the spirit by the, uh, yeah.
What
would you rather do, Tommy?
I would rather fly, I would rather know how to fly
in life.
You know, and I could, yeah, my parents and everything would be great.
Alright, second question, and second and last question, would
you
rather be someone who compulsively laughs during sad moments?
Or someone who cries whenever someone makes a joke
well, we're laughing
The
first one's
an automatic so yeah, I think I would I think I would go with that one I wouldn't want to cry when someone makes a joke.
That would be the worst thing ever
Yeah,
well, I agree.
Yeah
Um, that's it for would you rather, huh?
Yeah, that's fantastic.
Why did you go from three questions to two questions?
You just couldn't come up with enough stuff?
You know what?
We were thinking about doing national day calendar.
You know that
we got the poll going.
There was
a lot of a lot of turnaround, a lot of turmoil.
So we still have that poll question.
A lot
of people are asking about the national day calendar.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
So,
you know, I
don't think anybody's asked about.
No, no one is asked.
Why don't we
just go to the
phones?
You know, we've got Troy out in Monhorib.
Okay.
Wait in on the line.
Maybe he's
got it.
It is a national vanilla ice cream day, but okay.
Oh, that's it.
Right.
That's the only one.
All right.
Talking about.
Okay.
Good morning, Troy.
What's on your mind?
Hey guys, how's it going?
Good.
Good.
Do
you
guys get
knocked off the radio?
Oh,
no.
Oh, no.
You're not, sir,
you're not doing
this right now.
Well,
I'm hearing you on the app.
I switched over to the app on the radio.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
We're getting a few more messages here.
Yeah, thanks for letting us know.
Sometimes those radio tower sticks out there get struck by lightning.
I saw the lightning.
That might have
actually struck the tower.
Yeah, we're starting to get a bunch of messages in here.
So, yeah, I guess that's what's... We'll get our engineering crew on it.
I'm sure they're already jumped on her.
All right.
Thanks, Troy.
Thanks
for
letting us know, Troy.
All right.
All right.
Dominic, make some phone calls.
I'm going to make some phone calls here, but I'm guessing it's the thunderstorm.
If you want to leave, just climb the tower.
I
had to do that one time out in Sun Prairie.
Did you?
I was working a Sunday evening.
You had to go out for the shack?
Oh my God.
Yeah, John Duncan called me.
He said,
you got
to go out to the... I mean, there was continuous lightning
and
thunder.
It was horrible.
And you know, that was only maybe 50 yards away from where the studios were.
But I had to run out there and start pushing buttons and flipping switches.
Yeah, it was frightening.
The old days when we used to take care of the transmitter and take...
Meter readings right things like that.
Ah, yes.
Ah, those were
the days.
Yeah meter readings You used to have to have a license for what we do.
Yeah.
Yeah, third class and
I had to go down
to Chicago to take the test same here
Yeah, that's where you had to go back in the mid-70s.
I still have that
license somewhere.
Stuffed away someplace.
I lost mine somewhere on the way.
It's my
pride and joy, boy.
That's a big accomplishment for me.
I
went through at least 80 pots of coffee studying for that test.
Yes,
I know.
It wasn't an easy test.
No, it really was not.
It was mainly how to read meters.
Yes, and then, of course, they had impossible math quizzes.
Right.
You had to do the meter readings, and then you had to figure it out.
You had to go through some percentages.
It's crazy.
But now you don't need to do that.
Exactly.
You don't have to have any kind of license to be on the air at all.
A little update.
Oh, yeah.
What's happening?
Drew, our engineer, is on it right now.
So we're
just hoping for a fix right now.
Yeah.
All right.
Now here we are.
We're warning everybody about driving into work, and no one can hear us on the car radio.
Yikes,
but they can still get us on the app.
Civic media app, right?
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Okay.
Good.
All
right.
Well, that's the way everybody watches, right?
You
know, even through their Bluetooth in their car stereo.
That's it.
So again, we have we have our friends with the historical roadside Wisconsin book coming in a little while.
And then Mike McCabe will join us in our seven o'clock hour.
Doug asked the question
from St.
Francis.
What is radio?
It's all digital now, Doug.
It's all gone digital, mostly.
Yeah.
But a good question, nevertheless.
You know, maybe Catherine can add that to our website, too.
The poll question?
The question for the week, what is radio?
Yeah.
Yeah, that's actually a pretty good question.
Actually, I gave...
Her two questions with great answers.
All she has to do is just post one of them, one of these
days.
It's 19 minutes past the hour.
No changes.
Just get going on a Wednesday morning back with more after this.
All right.
WMDX 92.7, it's John and Gordy in the morning and it is a difficult morning.
drive into town because the lights are all off.
And now our station tower has been taken out by the lightning storm that we have and the dark skies and continued rain.
That's right.
Showers and
thunderstorms this morning, but it'll clear out around midday highs today around 90 degrees.
It's going to feel even hotter than that.
There's a heat advisory out.
It's going to feel like 100 degrees by late this afternoon.
So
Be
ready for
that.
This portion of the show brought to you by Madison Hearing Aid Center, 4706 Cottage Grove Road.
Madison, they have fast and flexible appointments.
They're family owned, community focused.
Talk to Jim or Sarah, you can give them a call, 608-249-4077 or check out their website, MadisonHearingAidCenter.com.
Start out with a basic hearing test there and then make an appointment.
Again, it's Madison Hearing Aid Center, 4706 Cottage Grove Road in Madison.
All
right, okay.
Oh, that's fantastic.
Yeah, I heard the promo that you made there about the adjustable bed frames.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, it was good a
couple weeks ago.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I forgot all about
that.
And I'm so glad that Gordy had to straighten out that mess.
What are you talking about?
That I left.
What?
Oh, with the adjustable bed frames?
Yes.
Yes.
I have to do is put together those.
to single beds, extra long single beds.
So I heard that promo too.
Each person could adjust it to the way they like it.
Well, yes.
You made it sound like we had them here in the studio or something.
It was weird.
Very odd.
Well, you know what?
That's not a bad idea either.
We should have them right here in the studio.
We should have them, yeah.
Just in case, you know, somebody has to stay overnight.
Pete Schwabba, we were thinking of him constantly here on the
show.
Well, he's here in Madison
all this
week.
He is.
Of course, he hasn't invited us to come over.
No, we've
invited him to be a part of it.
We're going to be filling it for Maggie Dawn this afternoon.
Right.
We thought of him from four to six.
So
we've invited him to be a part of the show
during
the last half hour.
So we'll see if he shows up.
Yeah.
He's
got
to be in the building to get ready for his show.
I thought it was fascinating deal for him.
The question he had yesterday, you know, the question he had yesterday was, you know, what kind of, what poster did you have up when you were young on the wall of your bedroom?
What poster did he have up there on the wall?
Yeah.
So, yeah, we'll ask him about that.
Yeah.
Did you have a poster up in your room?
A few of them.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I don't recall having any posters.
Typical teenage posters of the time.
What, Farrah Fawcett?
No, the Farrah Fawcett.
And not like Farrah Fawcett very much.
The hair freaked me out.
I didn't like that.
I had a poster.
I did have one poster of Steve McQueen on the motorcycle.
And remember,
great
escape.
Yeah, sure.
Yeah.
And he's jumping over
the barbed wire.
I had that poster.
Oh.
Yeah, it was really cool.
I have no poster in my room.
My room is just barren.
It's just a straight white wall.
That's all it is.
Is it still that way?
It is still that way.
Nothing on your walls.
Nothing on my walls.
That's
sad.
It's very sad.
I'll tell you what I had.
I had the Dylan poster.
Really?
Yeah.
Which one?
The Dylan
poster.
It was the colorful one with his
hair.
Oh, OK.
That was on one of his album covers.
It was.
I think it was an insert in one of the albums.
Oh, OK.
And you put it up on the wall, and it was up there.
Then I painted an actual picture of Mick Jagger.
You painted
a picture.
You
know, they had the opaque projectors in school.
Oh, right.
And that's what I did.
I put that picture on the opaque projector, put it up on the wall, etched it, and then I painted it in kind of a modern.
Art form that's interesting and I have that up on the wall kind of like cheating
isn't it for artists?
No, no, it's really great stuff.
I mean, I would think I would
assume frowned upon by the artistic community.
Yeah with Projector to do your half of the painting for you.
Yeah.
Yeah seems like how
about those Campbell's soup cans did you think?
You think you just ad lib them or use an opaque projector.
That's
what I don't
know what
Warhol would have done.
That's a good question.
I don't know.
I did have one Playboy pin-up.
Oh, did you?
Up on the wall.
Your parents allowed you to do that?
Yes, they did.
They did just one and I just never changed it.
It was always up there.
Do you remember the month and the year?
No.
No, I don't.
No.
Remember going into Spencer's?
Remember Spencer's was
the thing in all the malls and they had
in back in the back, they'd have all the posters on
a thing and you could
just look through them all on a.
Did they have something like that at West Town yet?
I think they do.
I think they do.
I don't know.
I haven't been there in a while.
But yeah, that's a great place to go in.
A lot of weird
stuff.
All right, we've got Idiocracy coming up in just a few minutes.
Phone lines are open, 608-879-8255.
A little bit later on, Mike McCabe will join us and talk about his latest sub-stack offering.
I
also had, you know,
on my wall, I had a few posters.
What else was on your wall?
I also made a picture of my superhero, The Dark Danger.
This was one that you created?
Yes, Dark Danger.
Yeah, I used to draw comics in my bedroom all night long and looked out at the street light.
Very moody.
I loved it when it rained and I did my comic books and I'd slide into the comic book world of Dark Danger.
Do you still have some of those comic
books?
Yeah, I do.
I never threw them out.
Drew them for hours and hours and hours.
Okay.
Yeah, it was fun.
It's fun.
Bring some of those
in we'll put them on the website.
Oh
sure.
Yeah
Thanks, Gordy
I'm here for you pal.
You know what I may do that
just just to spite
you you
may do
that I want to
see it too,
you know,
right?
You may do it, but you probably won't okay We'll
be
back with idiocracy
as
if
you hadn't gotten enough of it so far.
It's all coming up on Johnny Gordy in the morning.
Yeah.
Human evolution does not necessarily reward intelligence with no natural predators to thin the earth.
There is a place without boundaries, a place without limits.
Welcome to Costco.
I love you.
A place that is about to be violated.
Welcome back to John and Gordy in the morning.
92.7 WMDX.
A rainy start today, thunder and lightning moving through the city.
Right through State Street, we still have some heavy rain downtown here.
90 degrees, the predicted high for this afternoon.
There's a heat advisory.
It'll feel close to 100 hot and humid today.
This
portion of the show brought to you by Virlo Mattress.
You can wake up and sleep better on a Virlo Mattress.
They've extended that 4th of July sale through the end of the month.
You can check out their adjustable bases on sale at 30 to 50% off.
That's right.
And they also have plenty of accessories too on a buy one, get one free accessory sale.
So check them out.
east side and west side in Madison or just go to Verlo.com.
All right.
Idiocracy.
We got
plenty of it.
Well, I guess we do.
Let's start off with John and Middleton, his text to us.
John, slow down.
The new car and the lights work fine.
You're speeding.
Well, that's true, but
you've always speeded though.
You've always been
actually not so much in the new car.
No, I think it looks like a speedster and I don't want anybody to
think that
I'm a it's a hot.
I'm a hot rider.
Yeah, but it does
have amazing amazing.
It's very slick.
Yeah,
it's
got a lot of get up and go.
It
does.
I tried it out the other
day.
Man, it was it was really pretty smooth.
You know, it's
very smooth.
All right.
So thank you, John, for the
tip on that.
But
no,
you can call us 608-879-8255 or Texas on the free Civic Media app.
Just go to WMDX on the app.
And you can also send us a voice note.
Check that out.
WMDX civic media app.
All right, your neighbors, by the way, are texting in here.
This should be on Idiocracy, I suppose.
Trump's saying these think tanks, they build buildings for people that think, and it's really not thinking.
It's a little bit of a combination of thinking, but it's something you sort of have or you don't have.
That's a quote from Donald Trump.
I'm glad that, you know, yeah, I was thinking of that same quote on the way to work.
Something you sort of have or you don't have working that that into my life.
You know, what a what a thought.
It's a thought for the day.
Yeah.
All right.
Think tanks.
One of the weird stories that come out now is Elon Musk is hinting that the Trump administration could possibly be breaking the law.
Well,
What do you think?
After reports emerged that the government was counting on trying to get Amazon to take over the Golden Dome missile defense system
instead
of Elon's SpaceX.
Amazon.
Yes, Amazon.
When were they in defense systems?
Now they are.
This is what happens when you put the billionaires in charge.
Suddenly they think they can do everything.
And they are now, apparently.
According to Musk, federal acquisition regulations require using the best provider at the best price.
So he thinks he's the lowest bidder.
I don't think so.
Now there's a name to Amazon's project.
It's quipper kipper K U I P E R have no idea what that means.
But anyway, that is their golden dome proposal for the Trump administration.
Why would you know Amazon have anything to okay?
You
know, a lot of people have said this is crazy stuff.
It is crazy.
Israel is a little smaller than the United States.
They have a golden dome, but it's not going to be as big, of course, as the United States, and it's almost impossible to do.
And we do have a missile defense system.
Right.
I'm not quite sure the point.
Yeah, I'm not sure either.
I don't know.
And then we'll have this golden
glow over the United
States
because of the dome.
I don't know how that works, but it doesn't sound like we should turn it over to Amazon.
No.
I think our guests have arrived
now,
so you know.
Okay.
Have a
seat out there.
Okay.
Didn't you want to talk?
Oh, yeah.
I want to mention the, you know, the Capital Times idea fest is coming up September 8th through September 12th.
And listen to the lineup they have.
You know, they always get some terrific guests.
They really
do.
This year.
They've
outdone themselves this
time.
They have.
They're gonna have JB Pritzker, governor of Illinois.
Great guy, great speaker.
Tim Walls from Minnesota.
I mean,
Pritzker is a billionaire.
Yeah.
This
guy, you know, he knows how to talk to the average American of hard work in America.
Yeah, he'll be excellent
So all
these speakers of course again from September 8th through September 12th.
They have a number of different venues The Cap Times idea fest tickets.
I believe are already on sale They're gonna have Eugene Robinson And let's see Jennifer Rubin of course award-winning Washington Post columnist Norm Eisen, I mean the great lineup Maureen Dowd
We'll be there, and a few others.
And we're gonna be talking with Paul Fanland, the publisher of the Cap Times.
I think we're trying to line up an interview with him sometime next week, if not next week, the week after.
It's coming up September 8th through September 12th, and I believe Civic Media is also one of the co-sponsors, or we're involved with the IdeaFest as well.
So we'll tell you more about that as we get a little closer.
Well, Maggie had Paul Fandle and I'm yesterday
afternoon.
Okay.
Yeah.
So we're hoping to get them on hopefully next week.
We'll see.
But we've got tougher questions to ask.
Oh, you think so?
Oh, definitely.
What?
Well, look, we're having this big discussion about, you know, ideas, right?
Ideas for Democrats.
Ideas for progressives.
Ideas for pro-democracy individuals running for office.
Sure.
But what are those ideas?
Well, that's what
I do at
a time when we're all panicking just a little bit watching our country disintegrate into a Unitary executive mm-hmm the power of this king that we have in
in the White House right now.
It's just outrageous.
So we'll see what happens, but I'd love to talk to Paul about all of this stuff because it's a tough time.
It's not the normal every day.
Here we are.
We have another one of these events.
We really have to come up with something.
This has to be something where we shoot the idea around the table a little.
Well, right now, we're
still
in Epstein files.
We're in that.
Right now.
Yeah.
And that's not going away anytime soon.
It seems like that's, even though they've, the Congress has put off till September trying to deal
with
it.
They've kicked the can down the road already.
It's
Mike Johnson.
Right.
Well, I mean, Mike Johnson, what an ass kisser.
Unbelievable.
He's willing to put everybody on vacation until September because they didn't want to vote on releasing the Epstein.
No,
they
don't
want to deal with
it.
I just don't get that.
Well, they've got the, you know, they're going to come out with the
grand jury.
This isn't going away.
But that's just the tip of the iceberg.
The grand jury stuff is just ridiculous.
Yeah.
And then, of course, they put out, well, they're going after Obama, right?
Oh, yeah.
Right.
And then Martin Luther King.
Crazy.
Papers yes, so I'm really reaching I really just kind of you know throwing stuff out there now if you were Wondering is there really a fire hose of BS?
Yeah, and you're you're seeing it out there right now just to distract us away from the Epstein List of papers.
It's again not going away.
What about all the videos that they found?
They were talking about that
Yeah, some of these witnesses are starting to come forward.
So and some of the billing that they have that, you know, it certainly does track down exactly who participated and who didn't.
And then, of course, they're going out and well, anyway, it's just it's it.
Well, we have a comment here.
Yeah.
I have Nick Fuentes.
All right.
He's a white nationalist, anti-Semitic.
guy and we always take it, but no, but you know, every once in a while, somebody says something correct.
And I found a longer cut of something we played a few days back,
but
I just wanted to play it here.
All right.
This
is Nick Fentus.
Fentus.
Yes.
Ten years into this, we get, oh, Epstein, that's all fake.
Here's the MLK files that you wanted.
And you go, really?
You bury the Epstein files as if that's not bad enough.
You're going to lie to our faces.
Tell us it's a Democrat hoax.
If you're not gonna go with a lie, you're not a real supporter, you're not a real one.
Oh, and now, well, here's some MLK files that are a load of shit.
Isn't this what you wanted?
We're the most transparent administration in history.
You're lying.
You know you're lying.
You're lying to our face.
You know we know you're lying.
You don't even care.
You're just giving us the finger and rubbing it in our faces.
I don't want their support anymore.
Well, fine.
You don't get anymore.
Nobody should vote for Trump.
Nobody should vote for Republicans.
Trump must f***ing pay for this statement to say, I don't want your support anymore.
Every single Trump supporter, every single Republican needs to say, okay, bet.
You don't want our support?
Forget about the midterms.
Forget it.
Okay.
The 2026 midterms.
It just needs to be a Democrat avalanche at this point.
And that's not because I'm a Democrat.
I'm not.
I don't like the Democrats.
I hate the Republicans more
because the
Republicans are traders because I have voted for Republicans.
I have supported Republicans and they it on our face.
And now he says, if you're not on board with the Epstein cover up, oh, I don't want your support.
You're a weakling.
You are fat.
You are a joke.
You are stupid.
You are not funny.
You are not as smart as you think you are.
And if you watch my show, you know, I've been very critical.
I've never been this far.
No,
this
just goes to show this entire thing has been a scam.
When we look back on the history of populism in America, we are going to look back on the MAGA movement as the biggest scam in American history.
And the Liberals were right.
The MAGA supporters were had.
They were.
See, he wanted to say Johnny
Cortez.
But
the Liberals were right.
OK.
Well, Nick Fuentes is about as far right as he gets.
Yeah, you can't get any further.
But
he's turned.
He's turned.
He has had it.
Oh,
that's
amazing.
Yeah.
All right, coming up right around the corner, we're going to be talking with Tom and Christy Manus.
They've written this great book.
It's called The Historic Wisconsin Roadside.
And, you know, when you think about traveling around Wisconsin, you've been all over the states.
I have.
I've
had,
you
know,
in-state.
Yeah.
What do they call it?
Were you taking a vacation?
in your state.
A staycation?
A staycation, that's it.
I've taken a few of those.
I love
them.
But they've really traveled the roads around Wisconsin, picked out some of the great sights to see and we'll be talking to them.
And then a little bit later on, we've got Mike McCain.
It's Wednesday, he's always here on Wednesday in the second hour, so he'll be joining us as well.
And we want to remind our Madison listeners and anybody out there, we're going to be filling in for Maggie Dawn this afternoon.
from four until six.
She's off for a day.
She'll be back tomorrow.
That's right.
Yeah.
So plenty to plenty on our plate for today.
We've got the Sugar River pizza party
happening a lot on
our plate today.
Yes.
Pizza is busy all day.
I know what happened.
I
don't know.
How am I going to get
my nap
in?
I don't
know.
I'm trying to figure that out myself.
OK.
All right.
This portion of the show brought to you by our friends at the Madison Hearing Aid Center.
Hang on a second.
There are 4706 Cottage Grove Road in Madison.
Give them a call.
608-249-4077.
They are there helping people change their lives.
Their goal isn't just selling hearing aids.
It's improving the quality of life through better hearing.
Madison Hearing Aid Center.
Go to their excellent website, MadisonHearingAidCenter.com.
Back with Tom and Christy Manis with the historic Wisconsin road sites.
Next on John and Gordy.
You're gonna see Wisconsin.
Oh, yeah.
So much to
see.
Historic Wisconsin roadside.
Welcome back to John and Gordy in the morning.
That's John Peterson.
I'm Gordy Young, Dominic Lee, our producer.
We've got showers and thunderstorms to start your Wednesday.
Highs today, about 90 this afternoon.
A heat advisory.
It's gonna feel like 100 degrees later on and rain and storms should clear out this morning.
Time for us to welcome our guests.
Tom and Christy Manus.
Good morning to you.
Good morning.
Thanks for coming in.
You have authored a book.
In fact, you've got a number of projects going on, but your most recent book is called Historic Wisconsin Roadsides.
And
towns off the beaten path in the banter state.
And that's what it's all about, really, for staycations.
A lot of people have been able to get out of the state because, you know, money, COVID, the whole thing, and everybody stayed in the state and just had to see the sights and adventure into all of these different towns and cities and the countryside.
And you did it.
And you put it in book form.
And this sounds like a really fun event.
bad actually.
Now you've been travel writers for how long?
30 years.
Wow.
Okay.
All
right.
And who have you, who have you written for?
Newsweek, Food, Wine, Travel, just a lot of
places.
Yeah.
Okay.
Now tell us about this book, Putting This Together.
How long did this, you're from Eau Claire, right?
That's where you.
We live in Eau Claire.
Now Christy's from Madison.
We live in Eau Claire.
People know her from before is Christie flick before we got married.
So it's
okay.
Yeah, so How many roadside attractions are in
this book?
Well, this has over 1200 that we hand-picked and but but it's not you know, it's it's fun We're like pop culture.
So it's not just about you know,
it's not dates and old buildings or
It's pop culture stuff.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's the best kind of stuff.
A lot of quirky things, too, because our first book, Secret Wisconsin, is all about quirky and unusual and weird and wonderful things that people didn't necessarily know about.
And it is Wisconsin.
What else are you going to find?
But unusual and unique things.
So tell us about this.
There's so many things in this book.
But there's a radio station that does only original music.
Is that right?
It's crazy.
Where is this?
You would never imagine you'd come across this.
So in Sturgeon Bay, the Holiday Music Motel, originally it was a Holiday Motel in the 50s.
It was the very first motel in Door County.
Okay.
So musicians, they got together after creating an event and then they bought a motel because they have workshops and they have a festival.
and this is their meeting place.
So the Baltum Hotel totally restored it back to the 50s.
It's just like walking back in time.
Neon, I mean, old, you know, counters and phones and Simmons furniture.
And so they, it's every year they do the festival and then when they restored it, they
put in a recording studio.
They
also have a radio station that records only music that's created by their artists within the walls of the Holiday Music Motel.
That's amazing.
Do they have announcers that you know to do some music and tell a little history about each and every song that they create
there?
Well, one of the investors is from Timbuk 3.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
And he's like the hands-on guy
that does the website and he's the hands-on guy.
And then another person you might know that also performs every year.
Well, almost every year at the festivals Jackson Brown.
Oh, no kidding.
Yes.
I mean, it's so cool.
This story really grabbed onto me and there's so much info there.
It's just the coolest.
I'm a big
Jackson Brown fan.
Have
you been up there and seen the hotel?
No, I've not
seen
it.
We're definitely going to go
there.
You would think it would be really expensive.
Yeah, it's not.
I
went through the whole
the year and I tried to find the most expensive dates and the most I found was like 160 bucks a night.
Wow.
What's the name of the hotel again?
Holiday Music Motel.
Okay.
It's right on the canal, right at the Old Still Bridge.
Oh, okay.
And they're also dog friendly.
Oh, no kidding.
That's
nice too, because a lot of people take their dogs and pets on those vacations, at least in Dork County.
Right.
I know.
Well, everywhere dog friendly is a big thing now.
I always travel with
us almost 100% of the time.
Now tell us about the Elvis' favorite roller coaster.
That's in Wisconsin?
It is.
Where is this?
This is up in Green Bay at Bay Beach.
It was in Memphis and he used to take all his friends to ride the roller coaster when it was shut down.
Okay.
And it got moved to Green Bay.
Wow.
And
he's a roller coaster fanatic
and
he would rent a park at night just so he and his friends were the only ones that could
that would be in the parking that could ride it.
And they would just ride over and over and over.
And it's supposed to be one of the best ones in the country.
It's one of the top 10 wooden roller coasters.
And
we didn't know about that.
Wow, OK.
Had no idea.
It doesn't go by itself like ghostly.
Night trips.
We could create that anyway.
And here again, that's another thing that's really reasonable.
I think it's $1.50 to ride it.
They
raised the price this year to $1.50, which is six
tickets.
Now, you know, my dad used to work for the gas company.
And he worked, and he traveled Wisconsin, and he went to a few motels that were haunted.
Did you talk about any of those kind of places that are known to be haunted in Wisconsin?
We really didn't.
OK.
Because he's scared.
Oh.
It scares me.
Yeah.
It scares
me.
We
only have
about free ice cream.
You
know,
I wanted to know about the ice cream.
Yeah, yeah,
yeah,
yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, when the temperature drops below 20 degrees, you have to go to Mullins Dairy Bar in Watertown because they give away a free group of ice cream.
Wow.
And it's such a cool place.
It's like a throwback on time, too.
You need to check it out.
So it
sounds like a day to do that.
So we just have a minute or so left here, but I want to know what your favorite one.
Do you have any, each of you have a favorite place?
I do.
I do.
I'll go really quick.
Mine is Friday Morning Fish Fry in Kenosha at Oliver's Bakery.
OK.
All right.
Seriously, people line up at 7.30 in the morning to get their fish on Friday.
They're pre-order.
And it's been going on for years and years.
Over 40 years.
All's been long?
Yes.
At a bakery, you can get a donut and fish and shrimp.
Time, you got a favorite before you go?
Oh, absolutely.
Mine is the Kozi Inn in Janesville.
It's downtown Janesville.
It's the nation's second oldest Chinese restaurant, second location.
They're known for the egg rolls.
People order them.
It's
Janesville.
Yeah, people order them for tons of them at a time.
to take home with the McCoolers, and also the owner, his dad, was one of the six Chinese survivors of the Titanic.
Very
good.
Oh my god.
Tom
and Christie, thanks for coming in.
Tom and Christie Manus, the book is historic Wisconsin roadside, so you can get it on Amazon everywhere else.
You can get it
everywhere.
Everywhere.
OK.
Thanks
for coming in.
Little luxuries down right by us.
Happy travels.
Thank you.
Appreciate
it.
Thank you.
Be back with more after this on Johnny Gordy in the Morning.
Ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies
and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies
and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen.
Ladies and gentlemen.
Ladies and gentlemen.
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Ladies and gentlemen.
Probably.
Yeah.
Downpours.
But this should all clear out.
We'll see a high near 90 this afternoon with a lot of sunshine expected later.
Right now it's in the mid-70s.
And we've asked Tom and Christie Manis to stick around for a few more minutes.
We were talking with them just before the break about this book, the historic Wisconsin roadside.
There's just so much in this book.
Yeah.
And so much that you've traveled all over the state.
You know, you
seem like we've seen some of the better things.
We couldn't just let you go.
I mean, all the things that you could still tell us.
You know, you know, Historic Wisconsin, you're telling people, you know, hey, try this out, try that out.
But you've also got another book and that is Secret Wisconsin.
Yeah, right.
This is a different.
Look at Wisconsin,
right?
What's the biggest secret that we have
in Wisconsin?
The biggest secret?
Well, we have so many secrets in Wisconsin.
I know.
We'll have
to choose from.
There's so many more that we have to read about.
But they're secret.
So we
can't really tell anybody
about
it.
Right.
So
maybe we should just sit quietly.
No.
Let's not get into that.
We'll tell us some of the things
in
secret Wisconsin.
Yeah.
So in Durand, which is where we live now, near us in Eau Claire.
It's about 20 minutes away in downtown.
There's hundreds, maybe thousands of people go past downtown, have no idea what's there.
In the Corral Bar, the owners bought the building next door and to create an event space.
And so they started turning into it and they found this big colorful buffalo behind the, you know, the boards and stuff that are turned out.
And they're like, okay, what's going on?
So he carefully tore it away.
And what happened was there is a 55 foot long by nine foot tall temporary circus poster from the 1880s.
It was only supposed to last about two to two and a half months.
Okay.
And one of the curators at Circus World said that it's the biggest and most preserved circus poster of his kind he's ever seen.
Wow.
And so circus performers, they would travel ahead.
and do the advertisements and they use lithograph paper and they would stamp them as you know advertising obviously.
And so they wouldn't have to come back and take them down.
Wow.
Now I lived in Baraboo for eight or nine years and I've been to Circus World a number of times and they have such a huge collection of that kind of memorabilia these old
Gorgeous posters and of course the circus wagons in there any other historic finds like that in your in your secrets of Wisconsin book
a little different But one thing that I think is really cool is down in cut a hay.
I think I'm saying that
yeah Yeah, there's
an old department store.
It's called dread skis
Wow, and
it is you it's still is still open mm-hmm, and you walk in and it's like walking back in time They're still selling old stock
Stuff you can buy if you need a leisure suit
from 70s, you can go buy one.
And the original owner still works behind the counter.
At least she did as of like six months ago.
Okay.
And they don't buy any new stock.
It is literally a department store filled with old, old stuff.
Where do they get it?
I apparently they've
had stock
and no, no, this
is like
original stuff.
They still have.
Yeah.
That's amazing.
It is.
And it's big.
It's a big store.
But one of the things with that that fascinates me is they still have the old cash pay system where the
you know, a person at the counter, they take their money and put it in a cup and they send it to the people upstairs in this old metal railway.
No.
And then they make change.
The accounting department makes change and they send it back.
You're
kidding.
You have to drive down there and just go in this department.
This
is
in
Cudahy?
Yeah,
and it's
right on, like, the main street.
Yeah, this is where I buy my Patrick Cudahy bacon.
Is that right?
That's where you got that leisure suit that I bought.
Yeah, I get a leisure suit.
That's an amazing thing.
I mean, that's something you notice when you're in there, right?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Well, we had heard about this and thought we had to check it out.
That's one thing we do.
We
don't look it up online or,
you know, right at
that way.
We actually go to everything.
Wow.
I mean, to the point where we heard about the Marfa lights not too long ago, a couple of years ago and decided Marfa lights down in Texas,
South Texas.
Oh, yeah.
So we had to drive all the way down there and check it out.
And was it worth it?
It was.
Oh, definitely.
It was.
Yes.
Yeah.
What is it?
Yeah, nobody knows that's what really I mean sit in the sky It
is and I walked away thinking that it's got to be extraterrestrial
or
something I mean, it's been disputed.
We did a story on it and we researched it and researched it and even
PhDs say there's no explanation for it.
People have tried to disprove it, but different color lights they hover in the air right above the horizon and sometimes they'll split and they kind of slowly dance and then they'll disappear and then they'll reappear again and at one point we counted 11 at the most and you know we're skeptics so we're like we kept going back we went back early in the morning like four o'clock in the morning we went back you know the next night and they were still there and we found out we were so lucky because most people don't see them.
This
is the kind of stuff we do though.
We love to get out and see what we can find and find out the answers and figure out the why.
Is there like a secret here in Madison or around Madison that we should know about?
Or at least you know an adventure that people could take in Wisconsin in Madison or
or nearby.
What do you guys
know about Gravity Hill?
Well, is this in the
Dells?
No.
This is the old Wonderspot.
No,
no,
come on.
The thing was nuts.
No
Wonderspot, they have like six places in the country.
Aren't all Hills and Gravity Hills where you fall and you're rolling down the hill?
Okay, out in Schultzburg, not too far from Madison.
Okay,
yeah,
yeah.
On a country road, you park your car on the country road, and Gravity pulls it uphill.
Oh,
no.
Like there's
little elves pushing
you.
No,
seriously.
Yeah.
And so there's a blue sign that gives you instructions, and it's right outside the city limits.
It's right there.
And so you put a neutral, and we're not talking about just slowly rolling.
I mean, we were up to like five miles an hour rolling.
I mean.
In
skeptics that we are, we went back like.
two or three times and spent time there doing all different angles.
It's an optical illusion.
I mean, you could be actually uphill or downhill.
That's
so cool.
You have to do it.
I mean, what a
great thing to take a carload
of kids
to, you know,
and freak them out.
Yeah.
Yes.
Not explain it.
I know.
One time we were there and we had to wait in line because people were over on the side of the road waiting.
Right.
Right.
It's like a cornfield.
OK.
We got time
for a couple more there.
There's one here that I want to find out.
You say somebody, the original Butterburger is not where we think it is.
Okay, where do we think?
Is this Culver's?
Okay, so this is a place you really have to check it out.
You have to see this in person.
Okay, so 1936, isn't 30s of blue 36?
Solly's Grill in Glendale.
So they say they have the original Butterburger.
So obviously skeptics, you know, we have to check out.
So they have the butter is actually cooking on the grill.
They put the burgers on and then they steam it with onions and then they take the bun.
Now, before they take the bun, they take, they have just, you know, stacks and stacks of one pound blocks of butter.
Of course, this Wisconsin, you know, thank goodness.
Okay.
Not hard to find butter.
Yeah.
And so what they do is they put it room temperature, then they put an old fashioned milkshake machine with the metal cup and they whip it really good, you know.
Oh, beautiful.
Okay.
And then.
Then they take it when the, right before the burger is done, they take it and it's just like icing.
They have a like an icing spreader.
They dip it in and they put it in.
It must be like three inches thick on the top.
They spread it on the top of the bun.
And so then they put the burger on, they put the top on, and then the butter melts on top.
And it's just like the burger, and they have these special plates that fit it just right.
So, but the butter melts and it's like the burger is sitting in a moat of butter.
It's like
this deep.
I was gonna say, it seems like a wet burger that's healthy.
They cut it in half to help you though.
Well, that's helpful, yeah.
Wow.
All
right.
That seems like a unhealthy thing to eat on a regular basis.
Slightly.
Yeah.
It's amazing the amount of people that are there for it.
Oh,
yeah.
Everybody there ordered it.
Yeah.
I mean, it was crazy.
Now, that's just north of Milwaukee, right?
Right.
Here's another cool thing.
Okay.
Up in the northwest corner in a town called Luck, they used to make the Dunkin' Yoyos.
Oh, sure.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
And there's a museum there.
I mean, there's nothing else, really, but there's
a museum.
They have a yo-yo
museum?
Yeah, the world's largest yo-yo is
there.
Oh, I love it.
I have so many dunking yo-yos at home.
The world's largest.
It's just unbelievable.
Do you have a
pink one?
I have a pink one.
I have a speckled black speckled one and one that actually lights up.
And one is kind of a butterfly shape.
Yeah.
Yeah, I
love
those.
Those are easy to equip.
Well, how big is the largest yo-yo?
Oh.
Chest high, waist high.
OK.
OK.
Wow.
Well, we were talking about your swatch off the air, and you have a collection of swatch watches as well.
I do.
I collected watches for a
like.
You collect a lot of things along the way?
Yeah.
You must be big souvenirs, right?
A lot of stuff around the
house.
No.
We used to, we do a lot of international trips, so we pick up a little thing here or there.
We
just
picked up something new on an international trip, actually.
We did.
We were in... Is a total
surprise.
Yeah, total surprise.
We got a bill in the mail last week.
We drove where we shouldn't have in Italy.
Oh,
what happens?
What do you
mean?
We had rented a car and we went to a town called Luca and...
We didn't know that you weren't supposed to drive cars in the central square, which a lot of towns over there do that.
Without a permit.
They had a little parking area with about 10 cars, and we were looking for a place to park.
So we
got a ticket in the mail.
We've
been
telling everyone to be careful,
because
it was $58 euro.
We thought it was a scam at first, because on our WhatsApp, we don't use WhatsApp, but when you're in Europe, you do.
And so we got this notification, this charge on your credit card.
I'm like, whatever.
A scam.
The next morning, she said, hey, our credit card was charged.
I'm like, what?
So I started looking into it.
And it's all in Italian, you know.
And so I had to copy it, put it in translator, and then it said the location.
And I said, were we ever at this place?
So we're all looking at Google Maps.
Skeptics that we are.
Our son pulls it up on Street View, and we're like.
Oh yeah, we were there and there's the big X. Huge sign.
Huge sign with X's and we thought, well maybe it means don't park.
We don't speak
any Italian, not a word.
But you said there were parked cars there.
Yeah,
you can buy
a permit.
Live and learn, right?
Yeah,
I guess so.
You never go back there.
So we got time for one or two more.
favorites of yours.
As
far
as historic stuff, what have you gone back to see because you didn't get enough the first time?
Anything that you want to see again?
Oh, there's so much.
Oh,
yeah.
The state is so full.
I mean, we have a list of over 500 things for a second edition of a secret.
We have 1,400 in this first one.
Yeah.
And it's always, I mean, I keep lists all the time.
And we find something, I'll add it.
Yeah.
So it's...
You know, right here, right in your backyard, the Capitol.
Okay.
I think it's fun to go there and look for the fossils.
The fossils.
A lot of people don't know about that, but there's fossils in the marble, in the granite,
in the can.
Oh, I have heard,
yeah.
There's something about this.
Yeah, and if you go in on the main floor, you can talk to the desk, and they'll give you a list of where they're at and
what they look
like, and then go around the Capitol and find them.
Great thing for kids, free.
They actually have a map?
Yeah.
Wow, okay, that's something
for
the kids to do.
And they're
kinda,
I
mean, we enjoyed looking for them.
It was something different.
And she mentioned free.
Our secret Wisconsin you can experience everything in the book for sixty four dollars and eighty cents.
We like free stuff Yeah,
everything in the book for that
you can experience everything in the book sixty four dollars and eighty cents
Okay, name of that book a secret Wisconsin, right a guide to weird wonderful and obscure and then yeah
this this
good go ahead
on the cover
Yeah,
this little boy with the boot.
Yeah
is in Steven's point and there's kind of a neat story about that.
It's been there since 1800s
and it's in front of a fire department, the main fire department, and people drive by all the time and never ever see it.
Because they put it away in the summer, or they put it away in the winter when the students are there.
Yeah, okay.
Because they'll steal it.
They'll steal it.
It gets vandalized.
Yeah.
Interesting.
This is just unbelievable.
It really is.
Tom and Kristi Manus, thank you for joining us.
You're planning my next vacation in Wisconsin.
Sounds good.
Give me a call.
Very good.
Great to have you in.
Again, your book is available everywhere.
Books are sold, right?
It is.
Amazon.
Little luxuries.
Thanks
for
having
us.
It's great having
you.
Again,
safe travels to you, and we'll talk to you again sometime.
Yeah.
Definitely happy to have you
back.
Yeah, love to have you back.
19 Pass the Hour, coming back with more on John and Gordon.
Oh, Mary Jan.
Take me
away from all this.
Mary Jan.
Take me away from all this.
It's almost as if we were on Mary Jan.
Wisconsin has some secrets.
I love it.
WMDX.
John and Gordy in the morning.
92.7 back on the air.
A little stick out in the middle of the country.
Yeah.
Is lit up once again.
Yeah.
Got zapped by a lightning bolt or two.
Yeah.
And but it's back and running just fine now.
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All right.
OK, weather today, showers and storms this morning, sunshine this afternoon, highs near 90.
It's going to feel very hot and humid.
There's a heat advisory.
Mike McCabe is coming up in just a few moments from Substack.
And we'll talk about some interesting things with Mike.
And that is what you're afraid of.
Yes.
What are
you afraid of?
Yeah, what are you afraid of?
But right now, let's get to, you know, Trump is going out after his opponents.
Past and future.
Oh, do we have what?
We have Brini.
We have Brini.
Oh, we do have
Brini.
We'll get to that.
Oh, man.
Oh, my.
We'll get to that.
Sorry about that.
Well, you know, she's out there at the air show.
Yes.
And, uh,
gosh,
I didn't think she survived the, uh, wing blocking that you, uh, was attempting yesterday.
Well, it looks, uh, looks pretty good there in Oshkosh this morning for
more to see from the camera
there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
got that shelf cloud rolling in that's the views this morning we got that text saying hey heads up showers and storms for the next three hours so people were up trying to pull in their tents you know get the awnings down and stuff like that and the older you know there's a yodeler here no there's a yodeler
at 7 a.m.
every morning to wake all the campers up and EAA volunteers.
It is hysterical.
That is hysterical.
But he was yodeling.
Yeah.
Everybody was crawling out of their tents trying to get ready for the rain, but you guys got hit pretty hard.
Yes.
What, advisory?
Well.
What came straight to this?
What?
I don't know.
It
was outrageous
this morning.
We had a
real downpour.
Heavy downpours and
a lot of thunder and lightning.
Now, can you do me a big favor?
Could you record the yodeler so
we can
play it back?
Yes.
Yeah,
I'd love to.
Oh, I'd love to hear that.
Yes, I'll have him tomorrow morning.
All right.
OK, great.
Yeah, we want to hear what he has to, what he's got.
His chops.
He's
good.
OK, chops.
Well, you have to build up to yodel.
You know, something you
can't
just roll out of bed and
yodel.
That's true.
OK.
Weather today.
OK, so once we get through the showers and storms, it's going to really heat up today and for the next
few
days, right?
Yes, so the rain is pretty much done for you and that's gonna be gone for the rest of the day So that's heat screening creep in 92 degrees for highs.
It's gonna feel like 103 or so nasty humidity a little bit of a south breeze Maybe about 15 miles per hour might help things.
Yeah, but stay in the AC the shade drink a lot of water
We are looking at some storms though tomorrow.
Maybe tomorrow morning around 4 a.m.
Another round possible around noon or so, and then it really cranks up from about three to six.
Some of those could be on the stronger side, maybe some high winds possible, but nothing too, too crazy.
Like up north later today, they're going to have the chances for tornadoes.
Yeah.
Wow.
Okay.
Really?
Yeah.
And then Ryan Lander Eau Claire.
Oh
boy.
Okay.
And what about the weekend?
What's the extended forecast looking like for Saturday and Sunday?
We have the big Atwood Fest happening here in Madison.
Oh, nice.
OK, so you're still going to be into those warm temperatures, unfortunately.
Highs on Saturday about 85 degrees.
Sunday, we're going to go back into the 90s.
OK.
And Saturday morning, it looks like the best chance for showers and storms.
Sunday looks beautiful.
Lots of sunshine, but hot.
Excellent.
All right.
Yeah.
All right.
Well, enjoy the EAA there.
Thank you.
All right.
Keep us posted on the Yodeler.
I can't wait for the Yodeler.
All
right.
Is
that on the microphone?
He just beams that throughout the entire camp?
Oh, yeah.
The whole EAA grounds, the whole camp, the whole nine-year-olds.
Never heard about that.
All
right.
Very good.
Look forward to it.
Thank you, Brittany.
Cool.
You have a good day.
You're welcome,
guys.
Talk to you tomorrow morning.
Yep.
That's our meteorologist, Brittany Merleau.
Okay.
It is.
It
is.
Gosh.
Lots of things.
I can't wait to hear the yodeling.
That's always been a big fan of yodeling.
For me, yeah, me too.
I've got a bunch of vinyl of it.
I've collected over the years.
It's different.
You don't have an
outlet for that.
I know my turntable broke about 10 years ago, but I still got the vinyl.
Okay.
Oh, where are we?
Well, we've had to reshuffle
the
deck here a couple of times.
Let's get to something really short here.
Okay.
All right.
It's wealthy.
It's wealthy.
Tucker Carlson talking about kids not being able to buy houses.
Look, I'm just trying to find a shortcut here because we don't have that much time and all the news, you know, I mean,
Trump going after his opponents and everything.
We didn't have time for that.
But I tell you what, finding out about Wisconsin and all the secrets here and the great places to go, I am just chomping at the bit now to go on vacation.
I'm sorry.
I
know.
I want to go.
Yes.
Right.
We need to
do that.
Yeah.
I
know.
There's so many
things to check out.
All right.
Let's just, should we play this?
Okay.
Tucker Carlson.
One 13.
Let's play it.
And it's especially bad the young people can't afford homes.
Let me just put a very precise point on this.
Well, I've got a bunch of kids.
Can they afford houses with full-time jobs at like 27, 28?
And the answer is no way.
And the answer is that 35-year-olds with really good jobs can't afford a house unless they stretch and go deep into debt.
It's really hard to have a family without a house.
It is.
It's like super fun to live in an apartment if, you know, there's like a bar downstairs, you're in a cool neighborhood.
I'm in East Village, it's so cool.
Try to have three kids.
You're not going to have three kids there.
You can't.
Nobody wants to raise their kids in that neighborhood.
Nobody wants to raise their kids in an apartment.
People do it because they have to.
Nobody wants to.
People want a little house, not some McMansion, just a little normal house.
That is the actual American dream.
Yeah.
Well, you know what?
It seems like the Megas and the Republicans have been trying to kill that American dream for years and years and years.
And now you're complaining that your kids can't buy a house because it's something you created that you promoted capitalism.
Yeah.
Sorry.
It's not working for you, huh?
Okay.
That's Tucker Carlson.
Yeah, well, that's my point of view.
Okay.
It was a quick one.
I get
you.
I got it.
No, it's
good.
29 past the hour when we return Mike McCabe.
We'll join us here on John and Gordy in the morning.
It's
so good that
it just
works.
Johnny Gordy in the morning, WMDX 92.7.
It
is seven.
35, still got some showers out there, but it looks like they're moving on out.
And then we'll see sunshine and hot temperatures today, high close to 90, heat index in the 100 degree range.
And that's why we have a heat advisory.
So be careful out there later.
It's going to stay pretty humid and hot for the next few days.
Really, really hot.
I'm afraid of this kind of weather.
Don't be scared.
It'll be OK.
OK.
This portion of the show brought to you by Madison Hearing Aid Center.
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We've got Mike
McCabe in the studio from Substack and Mike Gordy just said the word, a-scared.
Now, when we were kids... Is that a word?
We all said that, didn't we?
We all said that.
Where did that come from?
A-scared.
See, that means it's a word because...
Kids everywhere were
saying
it.
They were
saying
it.
Yeah.
That's why we say it now.
It just doesn't make any sense, but it works.
And you're really not afraid of the weather, John.
You were just setting up our
segment.
Exactly.
Are you afraid?
I saw right through that.
What are you afraid of?
That's sort of the theme of your latest Substack blog.
That's
right.
You know, I was fascinated by the fact that you were asked, are you afraid of what's going to happen now after you left the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign?
Oh, gosh, I've gotten that question so many times.
But
yes, when I left the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, I just thought it was time to pass the baton and bring in some new blood.
I don't think it's healthy for an organization to be led by the same person forever.
You know, that kind of churn and turnover is really healthy.
you know I made the decision to
to step aside and I had a whole bunch of people.
First of all, worried whether the organization would even survive and it has and it's thrived.
You helped to start it, right?
Yeah, I was involved at the very beginning and then ended up becoming executive director and served in that role for 15 years.
You were getting big CEO pay.
But I could have easily done that work for another 15 years and loved it.
I enjoyed the work.
and was passionate about the cause.
But I really felt that it was time.
It just felt like the organization could become stale if it just kept going along the same direction.
So I decided to step aside and I had all kinds of people say, aren't you afraid you're gonna lose your purpose in life or you're gonna be bored or all these kinds of things.
And you know, now more than ever, today more than then,
It just seems like there are more Americans who are more afraid of more things Then at any time in my lifetime any time that I can recall and I think that has a whole lot to do with what's gone so haywire with our politics There's just so people are being fed fear all the time
And that fear is stoked and it becomes anger and it becomes rage and it becomes a really warped kind of politics.
And the reason I wrote this article this week for Substack was that a clip of Edward R. Murrow on the air talking about Joe McCarthy and the fear of that era.
And he spoke so powerfully on television, looking directly into the camera, speaking to Americans about the fearmongers who had seized our government.
And it just seems so appropriate to the current moment.
And
so that's what got me thinking about this in the first place.
And then
as I was writing,
I couldn't help but think of that movie, Bridgespies, and I understand you've got
a clip from it.
I brought the clip that you mentioned in your article, so let's play it.
Listen to this.
How did we do in there?
Not too good.
Apparently you're not an American citizen.
That's true.
And according to your boss, you're not a Soviet citizen either.
Well, the boss isn't always right.
Thought he's always the boss.
I love that.
Do you never worry?
Would it help?
That's it right there.
That of
course
was Tom
Hanks playing the lawyer of Rudolph Abel who was the accused Soviet spy in that movie Bridge of Spies and and and Hanks character asks asks Rudolph Abel
numerous times over the course of the movie.
Aren't you worried?
And every time you would say, would it help?
And that's kind of what I was thinking.
You know, we're so angst-ridden and so afraid of so many things, scared.
Yeah, scared.
And I'm thinking, does it help?
No.
Is it getting us anywhere good?
Yeah.
It could be therapeutic in some ways, but it doesn't matter because we're all deep into this hot water.
We're frogs in this water
waiting for it to boil.
So yeah, the thing is with this fear that we all feel now, it's on both sides, by the way.
We fear what...
you know, Trump is gonna do and what the Magus are going to do and what they've already done to the country.
They fear us.
And in our ideology, they fear socialism.
They fear this.
Or at least
they say it's socialism
that they fear.
Yeah, so it's all these odd things, you know, we've all come together with this particular, our own fears.
And we're playing that up.
There's no, we're not comfortable.
in our own skin, in our own country anymore, which is very frightening.
And I think that is at the very bottom of why our politics has grown so dysfunctional.
It really boils down to, we're afraid of each other.
We're afraid of talking with each other.
We're afraid to speak up.
I think about all the family gatherings.
Right.
And you know, people are afraid to talk about what's going on in the country.
They're afraid to talk about politics because they're afraid of where that might lead and the relationships that might be...
damaged irreparably.
And so even at that basic level, there's all kinds of fear at a Thanksgiving dinner, which is really tragic.
It's
crazy.
That's what happened in our Christmas get-together.
My brother said, well, wait and see, wait and see.
And I thought maybe they both voted for Trump.
I know one did.
But the other one only said this just to placate everyone at the table.
He knew his brother was getting very upset and this brother across the table.
He didn't care about But he he just said wait and see wait and see just calm down everybody down except for me I was panicking But yeah, I think you know for us to be afraid of our own family in and the great relationships We have between family members and have something like this to crop up and divide the entire family.
Yeah, it's it's
Boy, this is really unhealthy.
Yep.
And I was just up in my old stomping grounds over the weekend.
On Saturday, I went to the heart of Trump country, which is where I grew up.
And I was doing a book event at the public library in Owen.
And a whole bunch of my former high school classmates came.
Oh, cool.
And
they weren't objecting to your
position?
And you know, we had a wonderful time together and we talked for hours.
Even after the event, we talked for hours.
But you could tell people were also walking on eggshells about the condition of our country and about politics and all of that.
And I actually yesterday had a follow-up phone call with one of my former classmates who was really quiet.
at the event and the conversation afterwards.
And I didn't really get a chance to catch up with him properly.
So I called him and we talked for two hours yesterday.
Oh, wow.
And he said, yeah, I can feel free to speak freely with you, but I couldn't speak freely with them.
And he proceeded to share some of his thoughts about politics and about the way of the world right now.
Was
it a similar view that you have?
But
he didn't feel comfortable
to
share any of those thoughts in the presence of our other
Former classmates
so this is this is this is the opposite of what's the you know Republicans have complained about for so many years on campuses that they they're afraid to speak up Now it's the other way around or actually it actually both sides now it
is an awful lot of people are afraid to speak up and and You know and I I wrote a book that that isn't political right, but but it talks about
Sort of the matters of the heart that we have to struggle with
in our
country right now and it does speak to to the current moment in our country and and it and it brings ups It has some themes that I think some people in Trump country would tend to cringe at but the interesting thing is is that you know the classmates I talked to who had read the book yeah
Seemed enchanted by it.
Oh,
and so it kind of got got them beyond The
political
divide and they all know they all know they know that I ran for governor and they know that I ran the Wisconsin democracy campaign for a long time And they say they kind of an idea of my politics, but they
kind
of want to they want to conceal or cloak their's but
They, you know, the book kind of helped them get past all that.
And we, and we had some really good
conversations.
The book is miracles along county Q in case folks out there have not read it yet.
They're curious about it.
Thank you.
But it is, it's an excellent book.
746.
We're talking to Mike McCabe, a substack blogger and author.
So, all right.
So we have all this fear out there.
We all agree on that.
What's the, what's the antidote?
What's
the solution?
How can we get back to being, you talking your.
in your article here about getting to, you know, be fearless again and have some hope and have some, you know, look toward the future with, hopefully, you know, some solutions coming down the pike.
But how do we deal with this fear in the meantime?
Well, that's where, you know, I go back to what Edward R. Murrow said to the American people in the...
Small pot?
Is that what he said?
What he said is,
we did not descend from men full of fear.
He kind of reminded people that there have been dark times before throughout American history, and he was telling people, we're living in a very dark moment here.
And he described just how vile Joe McCarthy was, and he said it right on the air.
He didn't pull any punches.
He described just how vile this man is, but we can't be afraid of him.
and we can't live in fear.
One of the fascinating things, and I mentioned it in passing in my article this week, when I got back from, we did this trip to Tanzania when we got back, I can't tell you how many people said, weren't you afraid they might not let you back in the country?
And it's like, we can't be afraid to travel, we can't be afraid to speak up, and we can't be afraid to live our lives.
even though some ugly stuff is going on around us.
Well, we got a response here from Kurt.
He says, it's not just about fear.
It's about what's right and what's wrong.
People are being harmed.
Of course.
Yeah.
Of course.
Which, you know, everybody's got their own perspective of who's getting harmed the most, you know,
right?
Right.
And then, but we end up, we end up just sort of seeing each other as enemies.
I
don't
recall a time when more Americans
Saw each other as enemies
as
right now.
Yeah, either.
All right, 748.
We will continue with Mike McCabe in just a moment on Johnny Gordy in the morning.
Stay with us.
Don't be afraid.
No fear.
I want you to get mad.
I don't know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the Russians and the crime in the street.
All I know is that first, you've got to get mad.
You've got to say I'm a human being.
Damn it.
My life has value.
I want you to get up right now and go to the window, open it and stick your head out and yell, I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore.
That's great stuff.
WMDX 92.7, John and Gordy in the morning along with Mike McCabe and you know at the time that movie came out and all of that was presented we thought well that's over the top that's ridiculous that'll never happen.
No, there
we are.
There we are.
7.53.
This portion of the show brought to you by Virlo Mattress.
You can wake up and sleep better on a Virlo Mattress.
Their 4th of July sale continues for a few more days.
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Virlo Mattress, east side or west side, or just go to Virlo.
dot com for more information.
All right, a few more minutes here with
Mike McKay.
Mike McKay might be afraid of our next caller.
I don't think he has any fear.
It's our mega friend, CJ, who has the rest of the story.
CJ, welcome to the program.
Good morning, CJ.
Good morning, gentlemen.
Thank you for taking my call.
You know, the list of accomplishments
are amazing already by this president we now have a secure border you know how many legals came across no order last month
none
zero
yeah
that's right now
that's
right we listen to mayorkas we listen to president biden and our borders are yep bp harris who lied to us for three three and a half years about what average
6,000 a day for four years.
Isn't that an amazing zero last
month?
The thing is, we welcome
the immigrant.
We're a nation of immigrants and what we needed was,
we
needed immigration reform and the Republicans did not want to have any kind of reform, not just that one last proposal that Trump said we need as a campaign thing, but we've been trying to reform immigration for years and years and the Republicans want to keep it as something
that
they could use
in their elections, and they also wanted to be a white nation.
You know that, right?
So go ahead.
What you guys call secure, this is the secure border.
So we want legal immigration guys.
So how's your life improved because we have a secure border now?
How is your life improved?
How is your
life improved, CJ, now that we have secured the border and no one's come across?
How do you feel now?
You buy a house.
Can you buy a new car?
Can you want to deflect?
You guys want to deflect from it, but we're gonna find out the truth the truth is that we don't have a labor wanted comprehensive They want they want they want they were selling the material for the border wall Biden was they didn't want
security they wanted a comprehensive how much how
much how many billions of dollars do you want to keep putting into that border wall into deportation yeah and deportation and prison in the troops you want troops in all the cities by by the way uh homeland security homeland security spending more money on these prisons now than we actually spend on our federal prisons in the country that's how that's how big this
is
Do you know how much we've spent on illegal so far a hundred and fifty five billion dollars?
You know what
these supposed
illegals when
they work in this country they put money into Medicare and Social Security Okay, she's a Trump.
It's gonna be amazing.
Yeah, we got three
It's wonderful, guys.
CJ, thanks for the
questions.
Mike McCabe,
what do you think?
Well, that was fun.
What do you
think?
You know, here we have a labor shortage in this country and we're getting rid of the labor, the labor that contributes to social security and Medicare, but to get no benefits for it.
I don't understand any of this and these people
are working hard.
They create and start businesses.
This is what our future is based on and they're keeping these people out and kicking them out, right?
All I can say is that I, to quote,
Edward R. Murrow, I did not descend from men and women full of fear, but I did descend from men and women who were immigrants.
Yeah.
Yeah,
we're a nation of immigrants.
Yeah, correct.
Yeah.
And did you check out any of the Mehdi Hassan debate that he had with fascists?
He was surrounded by 20 fascist young kids, you know, Gen Z fascists, and he debated them.
Have you seen this at all?
I did not.
On jubilee.
You know, it's a, it's a great.
Great watch,
it really is.
Just got a couple more minutes here, Mike.
Do you have any events coming
up?
Oh, you know, you did, I got a mission, because in your column in Substack, you mentioned all of the times that you've been asked about, did you fear this?
Did you fear that?
I mean, our lives are filled with that.
It's not just
people, yeah, talk to me.
Full of anxiety, full of, you know,
We kind of walk around with this sort of risk-averse attitude.
We're
living on the edge of
something.
Yeah.
And so there have been so many times when I've decided to leave jobs for something else, people think, aren't you afraid that this is going to be a bad turn
for you or whatever?
And the thing is, is that every time you turn over a new leaf, there are these wonderful new possibilities.
And I don't think we should ever be afraid of new possibilities.
That's why we shouldn't be afraid of immigrants, by the way.
We shouldn't be afraid of what America has the potential to become.
We shouldn't think that we have to hold on to some version of America that we knew in the past.
We should not be afraid to let America evolve and become something brand new.
Boy, that's great.
Thank
you.
We got to leave it there.
Mike McCabe, thanks for
joining us.
My pleasure.
See you next Wednesday.
Yeah, it's
always good to talk to you.
You can check out his sub stack blogs there and check out his book too, Miracles Along County Queue.
Excellent reading.
Let's see, Stephanie Miller is coming up next.
And we're going to be on, we're
in the
afternoon.
We're on from
Megidon today for four till six.
We've got Jim Santel
as a guest
and Pete Shrabba will be with us in the last half hour of the program as well.
Talking about movies and posters on our walls as teenagers.
fun tune in this afternoon four to six.
Stephanie Miller's next have a great day so
long.
