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These are the times that try men's souls.
In the course of our nation's history, the people have rallied bravely whenever the rights of men have been threatened.
Today, a new crisis has arisen.
Citizens, hear me out.
This could happen to you.
I'm upset.
Okay, I want a damn concerted effort.
This is a god-last damn time.
I want somebody who uses...
WMDX John
So just be careful if you have breathing problems.
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What do you mean?
In downtown Middleton today, you know, I was gonna do my best Sylvester Stallone.
Really?
You know, I was gonna get up on the steps of City Hall, about three or four steps.
It's not exactly like Philadelphia.
No, but you know, I'm thinking, you know, it was an effort.
You know, it's consciously something I'm trying to do.
Yeah, but you know, because of the
Severe smoke warning now.
I'm just gonna have to put it off another month.
I guess so just stay home a month again a month next month Okay, it's it's a few hours away.
Mmm.
So we have we have this text I thought people at Harvard are smart if they blend if they bend the knee and fork over
half billion Trump is truly just come back for more.
That's right, he's gonna come back.
He'll come back for more.
Sure, why wouldn't he?
He will get mad at whatever they're gonna do next and ask for more.
So that's what it's really all about.
Now let's get into, let's get into the church key real quick here because this, we've been getting texts on this and it is,
yes they stay open
Well, real quick on the church key, I always had a little problem with the fact that
Uh, real good friend of ours, father, his visitation was there back in the early seventies.
It was a funeral home.
was.
Yeah.
But, um, to the excuse of the day, Trump with the Epstein thing.
Um, you know, just one little word was so out of line and nobody picked up on it except the late night people.
When he was asked about, you know, had he been to that, uh, Errol Flynn Island or whatever they called it.
Yeah.
Right.
He said, no.
I hadn't had the pleasure.
Right.
I don't know who said it, but Colbert, I think that it was classic.
He goes, well, I haven't had the pleasure of dining with Jeffrey Dahmer either.
didn't somebody pick up on it and say pleasure?
Excuse me.
Yeah,
slip.
Yeah, I'd say that's all.
It's not so much an agenda and people supporting that agenda and saying, hey, you guys got some great ideas and we're going to compete.
But no, instead they're just going to do it the easy way and that is to gerrymander.
No, like they did here in this state.
Of course, in this state, the Republicans
insist they did not gerrymander.
Did you know that?
No, I didn't know that.
It's not a gerrymandered map at all.
Let's
Hello guys.
I wanted to bring your attention to one James Taylorico in Texas.
He's a liberal pastor.
Democratic legislator down there, and he might turn Texas blue.
And I love that he's flipping the argument and he's taking it to this abuse of the Christian faith that the Christian nationalists and MAGA are doing.
So, yeah, look into him.
He's a rising star.
Thanks, guys.
All right.
Thank
in
trying to play by one set of rules and these folks on the other side of play by.
completely different set of rules.
So much so that the president of the United States called Greg Abbott and told him, in essence, find five additional seats so he can rig the election next year and maintain the power and authority with the House of Representatives, which de facto amounts to no power, no authority, complete capitulation so Trump can continue to run rough shot over our rights and liberties.
We're trying to play by one set of rules, and these folks on the other side have played by a completely different set of rules.
So much so that the President of the United States called Greg Abbott and
There's a little problem with California maybe trying to do the same thing.
When Newsom's plan faces an independent commission...
in the golden state that has maintained authority over redistricting since 2011.
So they've got an independent commission doing the redistricting.
So they have to convince them to go back in the middle of the decade to redistrict.
So it comes a little...
It's independent, so they don't have to do it.
In fact, they would rather not do it because it's independent.
They're trying to maintain some separation between the influence of politics in doing the redistricting.
let's listen to that.
I'm sick and tired of being on our heels, got to be on our toes.
It's not about, you know, fighting back.
It's about leaning forward and it's about setting the tone and tenor.
I'm sick of this party needs to wake up.
These guys aren't screwing around.
And I say this not in literal sense, but they're assassins when it comes to the way they weaponize grievance and the way they play politics.
Enough.
I mean, what more damn evidence do we need?
I mean, they've rolled back the last half century.
In real time, that's just six months.
Can you imagine this guy having an additional 42 months with no system of checks and balances, no oversight?
I mean, seriously.
The hell else more evidence do you need?
This is an existential moment.
And so Democrats, if we want to have a party, if we want to be functioning, not just as a party, but as a democracy, if we want a system of checks and balances, we believe in the rule law.
If you believe in popular sovereignty, this is not about popular sovereignty.
This guy wants to wire.
He tried to break this democracy, try to light it on fire on January 6th.
He just made a call to the governor of Texas saying, in this case, not find me the votes, but find me new seats to rig the game.
If we want to still be in this game, we need to disabuse ourselves, disenthrall ourselves.
of the status quo in the past.
We have got to enter a new mindset and we've got to get back on this playing field and we've got to do with the kind of vigor that our kids and grandkids deserve, that liberty and freedom deserves this moment.
The founding fathers deserve, the principles that define the best of Roman and public and Greek democracy.
That's on the line unless we stand the line and stand guard of this democracy and that means we got to go on offense.
No more defense, go on offense, fight fire with fire.
So you ask me, am I in?
I'm all in.
You ask me, am I committed?
I'm all in, committed and resolved.
And so this is not a bluff.
This is a moment to be held to a higher level of accountability.
He's fired up.
Yeah.
Well, there's a lot of talk about what the Democrats can do, the positions they should take, and, you know, I'm getting bored with it all.
You know, it seems pretty obvious what you should do, and that is to tell the truth, and make a plan.
We've been talking about on this program for a long time.
Promise universal health care.
Get rid of all these little things that, by the way, by the way, they're being weaponized now.
They're taking healthcare away from people to punish them, to make them do what they want for this particular administration.
That's the bad part of using healthcare as a weapon against the public.
So if we get universal healthcare, they can't do that anymore, period.
But at the same time, let's face it, by the end of this four year term, we're not gonna have the government we knew for the last two centuries, right?
I mean, it's gonna be gone.
So what we need to do is promise how to rebuild it.
Not sustain what we had and go back to what we had, but rebuild government and reconstruct it.
And if we came up with a plan of doing just that, and I think that's important as well, that should be our agenda.
Universal healthcare and restructuring the government to become more efficient and better serve the public at a lower cost and giving public government programs
the initiative that they need in order to solve our
Let's see, we've got a call on the line, but we don't have time for it, but hang on the line there, 608-879-8255.
We'll get to that in a moment.
And coming up in our next half, our Jim Santel, attorney at law, will be with us.
But you're right, John.
I mean, the Democrats have got to do something and they've got to get together and maybe have a convention or something where they...
Get all the they need youth all the leaders and the up-and-coming leaders.
You're listening to Civic Media.
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Standing by.
It is 723.
And it's going to be a pretty nice day all in all, much cooler, not as humid, highs in the 70s.
We'll talk to Brittany in just a moment.
This portion of the show brought to you by Madison Hearing Aid Center, 4706 Cottage Grove Road in Madison.
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Oh, hang on a second here.
Emergency, emergency.
Man speaking.
Warning all of you to brace yourselves for big news.
Okay,
I don't even know.
Can you hear me through this cloud of smoke?
I don't know.
awful.
I can't even see you guys.
This is not healthy.
This is very, very unhealthy.
Oh my gosh.
We're in an air quality alert, right?
We've seen this for a couple of days now, but it is so thick.
Across the state, we're all in that red level, about approaching 200 AQI, but up in Green Bay, Door County, Northeast, Northwoods, they're in the purple, very unhealthy levels.
I'm seeing pictures right now where you can't even see very far.
It's
thick of smoke.
my weather window is definitely saying that too.
So
this is going to expire at noon,
think that a lot of this smoke is gonna kind of linger through the evening should be out here probably eight or nine o'clock completely I hope fingers crossed because I had enough of this but the DNR Wisconsin DNR has mobilized some of our Personnel and trucks and stuff and they are going they're already in California Canada stuff like that, so they're helping out in different areas, but
Yeah, that was it, right?
We
have
read this in today, so
near a fire.
I've got that set up in my house.
That's helping me.
You go outside.
rough.
other
that.
Very, very comfortable.
So comfortable.
Highs today 75 degrees.
We're still looking at mid 70s tomorrow.
Upper 70s on Saturday and flirting with 80 degrees on Sunday.
And once this wildfire smoke is gone, there's nothing but sunshine.
All day,
tomorrow, and all weekend.
No rain in the forecast, nothing like that.
So we're good to go with all our outdoor plans.
morning.
it struck me when i had the dog over his walk this morning listen to tim and they attack on education i mean there's nothing new conservative governments to go after educators i mean that's that's why they went after socket he's because he was they said while he was cropped in youth by making them question their government and uh... thinking rather freely uh... yeah that it is it is just uh... with trump doing this stuff is the attack on education attack attack on democracy itself
and it's nothing less than that because these guys do not believe in democracy and we have to confront them any people, any of these people, Republicans and Democrats, that matter, that are not criticizing Donald Trump for doing this stuff, telling the universities, oh, the anti-Semitism, what about the anti-Semitism in this country?
They kept this country from accepting Jews to escape the fascists in Europe, back prior to World War II.
I mean, and the anti-Semitism has been going on for
you know thousands of you know a couple thousand years apparently when the Romans you know it just you know sacked Jerusalem and and caused the first diaspora that um it is it is just uh beyond me that they we don't recognize that and for that they're not criticizing jews necessarily criticizing the the israeli government right is a whole separate thing
Yeah.
They're just saying that in order to attack the universities.
This is an anti-Semitism.
This is just protesting.
There may be a few people out there who are saying some really bad things, but we can't.
paint everybody with that paintbrush, and that's what they're doing, and then they're going after the funding to these colleges in order to make them count out to their line.
And it's just being used as a weapon.
That's all it's being used for.
It's not anti-Semitism in any kind of movement whatsoever.
All right.
Let's remember that Trump never did kind of criticize.
He said, oh, there's good people on both sides for the guys.
Oh,
He said, no, Jews shall not replace us well.
that's what the Nazis did and and Trump doesn't care and
Thank you for that call All right, it is 729 when we come back.
We'll be talking to attorney Jim Santel
And this portion of the show brought to you by Virlo Mattress.
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A lot has changed since 1958.
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Check them out.
Virlo Mattress, two Madison locations, east side and west side.
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Back with more of John and Gordy on WMDX, Madison.
Next, Jim Santel.
We've
Good morning, gentlemen.
Thank you for taking my call.
And Mr. Kanoli, thank you for taking my call too.
Yeah, you know, I you talk about the Democrats problem.
I don't think they have a problem I want them to keep doing what they're doing Going that further left road We see it with anti-semitic statements the colleges
mayor running in New York.
Yeah The globalization of antipodata and
I think it's just beautiful.
You guys keep going.
I love it.
paying
for the
Yeah.
Amazing.
We were complaining about
Go ahead.
You know what I say?
Buy American, guys.
yes.
Then you don't have to pay the tariff, right?
Buy American, gentlemen.
Every time you look at those labels,
When you go to buy a new car, you know what?
And now the European Union, you make fun of the tariff.
We're going to be able to sell Cadillacs now.
OK.
You know, CJ, I can't wait till we have Tennessee olive oil.
You know, for some reason, it just... All right, CJ, thanks a lot.
We've got to get to our guest Jim Santel here, but I appreciate the call.
Jim, welcome to the program.
We've got so much going on legally.
I think tomorrow marks a big day in the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
Let's talk about that.
Yeah, tell us about
Absolutely.
And Walsh Bradley, who's been on the bench since 1995, 30 years, a tremendous tenure.
on the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
She is concluding her work officially today.
And Susan Crawford gets sworn in tomorrow as the next newest Chief Justice, not the Chief, but the Justice of the Supreme Court.
She joins a bench that is for demographic purposes, we should account.
It has six women and one man.
And diverse as we know from terms of perspective, the departure of Anne Walsh Bradley as much
as the continuing judges, justices, and the arrival of Crawford, all significant.
But Ann Walsh Bradley has been an icon in this state for an entire 10-year major decisions.
And it's also one of those people on the bench, whether it's the Circuit Court and Appeals Court, Wisconsin Supreme Court, she is a good person.
She's a serious person.
But she is also a good person in terms of always asking, what is the right thing to do?
How do we analyze this in a way that makes sense under the law?
What are the facts?
And regardless of where you come from, what your perspective is on life, whether it's politically, partisan views,
That's the kind of person you want on the bench.
Somebody who applies the rule of law, and she has been just that.
We celebrate her today.
She is going to, obviously, she's going to continue to be a part of our community, just not on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, effective tomorrow.
Yeah, well, one of the big races next year, of course, we'll be talking about the next Supreme Court race.
And it's not so much I want to see more liberals on the bench.
I just can't understand...
What's your name?
Rebecca Bradley.
I've never seen anybody more partisan, more unqualified to be on the bench than Rebecca Bradley.
And in that, you know, that's not hard to say.
I mean, we had some bad people, Gabelman, who lost his license.
He was on there at one time.
So, you know, this is gonna be a great race to check out, especially against Rebecca Bradley, who is very partisan.
Prior to her being on the bench, we knew all about her.
She really hated the gay community.
She really hated liberals and Democrats in editorials that she wrote for the university newspaper.
I mean, all of these things are documented and she has actually done that on the bench.
She's been very partisan called, who was it?
Governor Evers, I believe, a tyrant.
for asking people to stay home during a pandemic.
And those issues, to all of that, to that list, you add that last point, John, which is language, right?
When we look to judges, again, we anticipate, as I said with Ann Walsh Bradley, that they're going to be doing their jobs.
It means something when judges speak as they do, and they set the tone for the state, they set the tone for the country, and you can disagree, as our United States Supreme Court does, as justices on the Wisconsin Supreme Court do on a regular basis, and you can write about your disagreements and explain those.
The ad hominem attacks, the nature of the language, and the ways in which he describes the behavior of government officials, other members of the bench,
All of that is beyond what you would anticipate from any justice on the bench at all.
Let's listen to this cut.
This is, oh, I don't exactly have that.
I'm sorry.
Anyway, I had a cut from Rebecca Bradley.
Kind of lost the number on that one.
But anyway, let's move on to Some of the other things do you want to talk about here?
There's a lot going on actually so let us know what what's happening?
Mm-hmm
Yeah, got this this I believe and I think most people looking at this of believe this to be once again a very self-focused move
Got our president through the Treasury Department think about that to begin with it was imposing sanctions Upon the Brazilian.
Yes, I didn't get that wrong.
He's in Brazil.
He's presiding over the trial the criminal trial of Jair Bolsonaro What was he charged with by a charging authority there in a foreign country over which we've got no jurisdiction, right?
What was he charged with he was trying to put together a plot and the initial indications and
awful an awful lot of evidence just to support his attempt again to stay in office this was in 2022 and that matter going to trial in front of this particular judge in Brazil by the way that issue that subject should sound familiar right right and because of that my president has always endeared himself to Bolsonaro again no longer in in the position of leadership there
And just the past day or so is now through his Treasury Department, sanctioning this judge for his what?
His handling of the case involving Bolsonaro.
Could you imagine if you name your country, name your country, name the head of any country out there, whether it's France, North Korea, Australia, you name a Thailand, who would be sanctioning a judge in America.
because of the way that she or he is handling a criminal case in our jurisdiction.
It's stunning.
And of course, again, it's just a part of this general attack on the judiciary everywhere and anywhere.
But it is stunning.
Once again, it's it's it's also imposing speaking about tariffs as you were just doing.
We basically have it in for Brazil these days.
And that was his subject matter just a day or so.
But this judicial matter
Again, it is stunning to use our government to try to impact legitimate judicial actions of another nation.
And that's what my president is doing this week.
Talking to attorney Jim Santel at 744.
Jim, what do you think about, you know, closer to home here?
This whole brouhaha about the Epstein files, and she wanted to go.
Justine Maxwell wanted to go to the Supreme Court.
Did that get knocked down?
Have they decided they're going to hear something on this case?
I
But she's, she's seeking review.
She's, she's filed all courts sorts of things, including a petition for habeas corpus, which basically means just release me.
Um, like to think I would hope that those kinds of things are going nowhere.
The greater concern there, Gordy is this entire undertaking with the deputy attorney general, who's sitting down with her last week and tell her.
It is extraordinary, first of all, that the second in command, he's responsible for administering the Department of Justice, that he is the one who personally is doing this, all kinds of reasons why you don't want that to happen.
You want an agent to do it if you decide to do it at all.
But ask ourselves, what is the end game here?
Mr. Epstein himself has killed himself.
He is no longer here.
She has been convicted that it can be under review.
There are no further cases to investigate here.
We know who the victims are.
We hope that they're getting the support and the assistance that they need from the federal government, from the state government, everything out there.
What is the end game here in terms of law enforcement?
What is
And the answer is none.
And so one asks once again, what is the Department of Justice doing?
Are you doing gets back to this notion that this was a fellow who is the former lead counsel of my president during the course of that trial in front of Judge Mershan, 34 counts of violations of New York law.
He has an attorney-client relationship.
It continues to this day with the president.
Those never go away.
Everyone has to look at that and say the motivation for this is because the president looks to him and says, I trust you, although Mr. Blanche was not successful in getting an acquittal there, but I trust you, go down there, find something for me to seize upon.
This is doing the president's own personal bidding to accomplish
What?
And it just, again, he's dangling pardons out there.
Perhaps there's a way of doing what, encouraging her to say something that's going to affect this case.
There's so many questions.
What are we doing here?
Is the ultimate one?
And the answer is nothing law enforcement
Um, there is one thing though, uh, you know, the tariffs are, uh, going to go into effect, uh, the threatened tariffs anyway, uh, tomorrow.
But, you know, there is, uh, uh, hearing, I believe, appeals court hearing today in regards to Trump overstepping his authority to put any tariffs at all in place.
So, wow.
You know, after all of this.
And
government can do these kinds of things, yes, but it's got to be the right branch of government.
It can't just be...
The judiciary doesn't do this, and it's got to be the right branch.
It's the legislature.
That's what the judges are saying.
us.
You're listening to Civic Media.
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Harkening back to that.
Thank you.
752.
Also, phone lines are open 608-879-8255.
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Back with Jim Santel now.
he
confirmed by our United States Senate, not surprisingly, just this past week, and so he will be on there, a lifetime tenure.
He is 44 years old.
That's very young, as all your listeners know well, which means he will be on the bench probably for decades.
Now, this is the fellow who is responsible for all these
either directly or indirectly, all these firings of former prosecutors, those who prosecuted with Jack Smith, the cases against Donald Trump, those who prosecuted the January 6th insurrectionists.
And it comes from Emil Beauvais' pen and hand.
He is also the one who very notoriously
will not
And it'd be interesting as a litigant.
I'd not be me.
Others out there in the third circuit.
If the judge now from the bench looks at an appellant appellate lawyer and says, we need to have you do this, your client.
What is your response among the alternatives now?
We've got what?
Emil Beauvais at least had suggested the Department of Justice lawyers when it comes to handling the governments, the nations, the public's business.
We don't care about judges.
Just
FU.
And we talked about this a bit when Adam Schifter in the course of Beauvais's confirmation hearing asked him about those not public reports, but reports from whistleblowers.
Now we've got at least two, maybe three people confirming the same thing.
He said, did you do this?
Recall what now Judge Beauvais said.
I don't recall if I said that.
Well, and again, good Adam Schiff, former assistant U.S.
Attorney, former prosecutor, did not let him get away with that and said, you don't recall a conversation about how we handle.
controversies in court.
And this particular matter, you don't recall saying that just weeks ago.
And the answer was, I don't recall.
was the
behalf of the government, the Solicitor General, again, very different administrations, asked for emergency relief, a whopping eight times, eight times, four of those granted.
In Donald Trump's first term, he asked for it 40 different times.
And by my count, we're up to 20 right now.
And so again, the issue is not only the shadow docket,
but also the emergency nature, the urgency, what to fire people to basically go after the, again, as you indicated before, go after the courts in this land.
to do all these things to stop government from happening that has been going on for decades, if not generations.
And the urgency, apparently the Supreme Court also identifying and saying that only, yes indeed, we've got to stop this terrible thing from happening that's been going on for all this period of time.
And then also will grant you what you want absent any description about why it
Uh, Jim Santel, thank you for joining us.
Yeah, it's a pleasure.
You can always listen to Jim's great show, Amicus, a law review every Saturday morning from 9 to 11 on the Civic Media Radio Network.
Coming up tomorrow, we've got Free Ticket Friday, four packs of Brewer tickets to give away.
Also, Civic Media sports reporter Mike Clemens will join us and Savannah Tome Olson.
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