Baristas vs. Billionaires (Hour 2)

Good morning.

I'm Matt Rothschild.

Welcome to John and Gordy in the morning.

The guys are off this morning, but they're back this afternoon to law degree from two to five all across the civic media radio network You can catch them there.

Yeah, that is one of the longest I've ever

Make heads or tails of that

You're listening to WMDX's station manager, Catherine Lake.

She and I will be with you this next two hours excited about the show.

I am too.

This should be really fun.

And the weather is going to get worse and worse as we do it.

And it's not great right now, actually.

I mean, the 14 coming in from the south of Madison was fine, but the side roads are a little dicey and Madison's side roads are still dicey.

And maybe I'm crazy, but you know, I've never lived in the south.

Never.

I've always lived in the Northeast.

I did, sorry, but not true.

LA for two years, but it's like a dream, bad dream that I don't

remember much.

I was going to say better using me.

I'm not a big fan of LA.

That's why I came back to Madison.

But I like driving in the winter.

I like, I'm good at it.

I'm sorry.

My dad was a very good driver.

He taught me he was a.

pilot, you're going to learn how to drive in the winter.

You turn into the curve if you're turning

this way.

I hate driving snow.

I love

it.

I do not like it either.

Really?

No, I'm not a big fan.

I don't know.

And you have reason to recently.

I can't wait to get my kid, my 15-year-old, soon to be 16 into the car at Easttown Mall parking lot and get her doing spins.

We are going to go out there.

I'm going to teach her how to control a vehicle on this snow.

I taught my kids how to drive in the cemetery right near West High School.

We're gonna go through the cemetery here.

They're already dead.

You can't hurt anything.

It's brilliant.

That's where and you have to make turns.

Right.

And you gotta be respectful.

But

the roads are bad this morning.

They're supposed to be worse starting at about four or five this afternoon all through the night.

So it's going to be snow, rain, mix of snow and rain, freezing rain, icy roads.

Be careful.

When does it start?

Let's see today.

I think here around four o'clock four or five o'clock.

OK, so you got some time.

Get up and there was something last night.

You'll be surprised.

Your car is going to be covered if it's outdoors and there's a little dusting on your driveway.

Yeah, just to make things slick.

Just to make about a quarter of an inch.

I had to do a little shovel this morning.

scrape the windshield.

So it's not pretty on the side roads.

Even on the main roads, I know I went on the belt line this morning and it was also

You know, it was a little,

a little dicey, a little dicey.

Well, Dominic, you're going to have to keep us on track here because John and Gordy know how to do radio as we know, because they're on 24 hours a day right now

on

all the stations.

So, um, but for now, Matt Rothschild is in the air chair.

He's the boss today.

I'm going to just help him keep on track with time, but you've got quite a show planned here.

What are we having coming up here?

Yeah, we've got a terrific show this morning.

So I'm very excited about it.

And I hope you, the listener.

I hope you're also excited about it.

You can call us 608-879-8255.

That's 608-879-8255.

So yeah, at 635, we've got Juliana Bennett.

she is running for the assembly in the 76th.

That's this district here in Madison, a seat currently held by Francesca Hong, who's running for governor, as you know.

Yes.

And then at seven, we've got right after the news, Dane County executive, Melissa Agart.

She's a favorite.

I love Melissa Agart.

I loved her when she was in the state Senate, and she's gonna be with us for 20, 25 minutes there.

And then at seven, 35, Glenn Silver, famous here in Madison for making the documentary, The War at Home.

about the uprising against the Vietnam War here in Madison.

He's got a new documentary he's the co-producer of called the baristas versus the billionaires.

And that's gonna be playing at the Barrymore tonight at seven o'clock and tomorrow night at seven o'clock

for filing purposes baristas versus billionaires

So

much the baristas versus the just in case we get it, you know chronologically in order but Yes, it's baristas versus billionaires and it's it's I can't wait now.

I didn't know he was also the director of that

like you said, famous film about the Vietnam War here in Madison.

It was a

big deal here.

Yeah, and the movie opens the war at home for those who haven't seen it.

The war at

home.

You should look it up and watch it.

It starts with, you know, Madison's, the all-American city.

It's the most pleasant place to be, and then, you know, cut to the huge demonstrations against the war.

You get to see Paul Sogno with his head broken open with a bandage on his head.

Come on, did you

really?

Yeah, this is at the Dow Chemical riots.

And so...

It's quite a story about the radicalization of this small town we call our own, Madison, Wisconsin.

So Glenn Silver was the director of that movie, The War at Home.

He is the co-producer of the current documentary about this fight at Starbucks.

Yeah.

Among, from... In

Buffalo.

In Buffalo.

Of

all places.

Which was the first place to Union organize a Starbucks.

And the Starbucks workers still don't have a contract, though.

To this date?

Yeah.

And that's why just last week Dom and I had here in the studio, Allie Kerr, one of the Starbucks workers who's organized boycotts at the local Starbucks stores.

So don't go to Starbucks.

OK, well, that's an interesting thing to say.

But I don't understand how a company that sells not five, not six, seven dollar cups a Joe can't let.

their workers be happy.

How can they get unhappy?

Especially when Howard Schultz, the...

founder and

he's such a tool.

He's a tool and he's in this movie.

He's a billionaire.

He's one of the billionaires.

We've got quotes from him, right?

I mean, Dominic,

he's like, can

we say tool on the air?

He's wondering.

But we have some quotes from him.

He is awful.

Yeah, he's terrible.

And I think he's the main villain of this film, this documentary playing at the Barrymore tonight at seven and tomorrow night at seven.

So we'll have the co-producer Glenn Silver, whose name is familiar to people of a certain age here in Madison, who've seen the war at home.

I've talked to Glenn Silver before, I'm looking forward to speaking with him.

He'll be right here in the studio, so that's gonna be

fun.

Oh, wow, okay, yes.

And he's staying at the house of one of our friend's editor of a paper, right, isn't he?

Norm Stockwell, who runs the Progressive Magazine, where I used to work for 32 years.

Where

I used to work.

Like he was just a

guy delivering the Progressive Papers.

No, you were like the flippin' editor, right?

Yeah, for a long time.

For a long time.

Editor and publisher.

Norm is doing a great job.

over there, so normal be escorting in, Glenn Silver.

Why the heck did you ever leave?

Why would you retire?

Why would you stop?

You haven't stopped.

Look at you.

You just can't stop.

You're on the radio.

Well, it's because you dragged me out of retirement.

I

did.

You can't not.

So, yeah, Matt Rothschild, speaking of people who are well known in Madison, you've been here all your life.

No, I grew up in the North Shore, Chicago.

Did you?

Went east for some years.

went to work for Ralph Nader for a couple of years and then came back to work at the Progressive.

Where was Ralph Nader at the time?

Washington, D.C., okay.

Yeah, in the early 80s.

Okay.

But yeah, you know, I loved working at the Progressive.

I loved working, especially with the poets and the writers, tremendous writers, Molly Ivins, Howard Zinn, Terry Tempest-Williams.

You got to

meet Howard Zinn.

Yeah.

In fact, he came and gave one of his last public talks for our 100th anniversary celebration at the Progressive.

Robert Redford was here.

Come

on.

See, that's why you know everyone.

You know, I asked, you know, how do you know all these people?

You're

like,

yeah,

you know, I've been around.

They would write for me and Robert Redford was a fan of the Progressive.

That was great.

It was a highlight of my wife's career when she got to meet Robert Redford.

I bet.

So that was a lot of fun.

But yeah, I got sick of raising money.

Actually is the true story and and doing exhaust and doing personnel too.

Yeah, so all that, you know, and we were totally under capitalized We would have like two weeks or four weeks of savings in the bank and you're supposed to have a year Or at least a half a year if you're a decent nonprofit

or a human,

you know, we're all supposed to

have a little something

in the bag And it's hard to do but yeah, I was like half of the American public and I was I was

going paycheck to paycheck there, running to the post offices to see if our fundraising mail brought in enough money to cover

payroll.

Open that envelope.

Get it to the bank.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah.

So I

was in the nonprofit sector too with arts management and it is, it is, it's makes your heart sick because you just, you just care so much.

Anybody in the nonprofit sector cares.

Yeah, it's very dicey.

I guess we have a phone call and you can join our conversation at 608-879-8255.

We got.

Matt, is that from Madison, my glasses?

From Middleton.

Get your

readers out.

Come on.

Hi, Matt.

How are you this morning?

Thanks for calling in.

Hey,

guys.

Thanks for filling in.

For John and Gordy.

I have a fairly meat question here.

It's a big macro look at the world and the trouble we're in.

I'm a big fan of Orwell and Huxley.

And I always think day to day now, seeing this dystopia that the

right wing wealthy and the uber religious and these people that want control control control are forcing us towards i get the impression that the vast majority of people on this planet do not want that yet we're steamrolling towards it and huxley in an interview in 1976 or 69 one of the camera but which is mike wallis famous uh

60

minutes at a

time.

Oh,

yeah.

Huxley said and warned about this.

He said that the answer to avoid totalitarianism and the dystopia they wrote about was to decentralize the more consolidation of power industry finance All these things is what leads to this dystopia and we see it happening all over So my question to you guys is do you think it's possible to create a new

localized, more human labor, more people making products locally to break away from the big Walmarts, the Amazon, like start a fresh economy where we boycott and ignore and fight against this dystopia.

Because my impression is, like I said, most of us do not want this.

And if you presented it to them and told them exactly what was happening and now that they're seeing it,

I think people would be on board with that.

And I have seen stuff on PBS where certain areas of states have tried this, where they started sourcing the products and ingredients and things for their products within a state, or maybe the state next to them.

And they kind of go more locally, so they don't have to travel as far.

And it does work.

I'm sure.

I'm sure, Matt.

Thank you.

Good thoughts and a great question.

I'm going to let you.

move on to the rest of your day, but I want that question to be centered in Matt's head for the next two hours.

And he's asked you to solve the world's problems.

Matt,

can you do

it?

Can you do it right now?

Between now and eight?

I mean, seriously.

I appreciated the call.

He said it right.

Yeah, Matt from Middleton with another thoughtful call.

He often falls in with really wise concerns.

And of course, the concern about totalitarianism has been the authoritarianism or fascism.

coming from Trump or from these other authoritarian leaders all across the world.

That's been the central nightmare for the last many years here that we're wrestling with.

And I do think it is possible to get to an economy that serves people, but we can't get there right away because those who hold the power want to hoard the power.

And it

took a while for them to get to this place and it's going to take a little while to

fix it.

And they used a very strategic

plan for the last 50, 60 years, you know, the far right billionaires to get someone like Trump in to get their agenda through.

Right.

And we can respond, though, by shopping locally, by trying to help out our local businesses and trying to help each other out.

Interestingly, Madison, I think, has been very good about that thought all along to this day.

There is no Starbucks on State Street, as far as I know.

Yeah, there may be one, because I think our person who was here was boycotting there.

I think it's...

Is it

on sale?

Yeah, there's also one downtown at...

ML King Drive.

And there's one right here, too.

Oh, there is?

On the

state?

Yeah, right around.

So I wasn't sure.

But there are choices.

That's the important thing.

You can go to Collectivo Coffee, which is a unionized coffee shop.

There are other great local coffee shops.

You can buy locally.

You can buy your presents this holiday season locally.

So do that.

We're going to be right back here on WMDX 608-879-8255.

The John and Gordy Show, I'm here with Catherine Lake.

I'm Matt Rothschild.

Please hang on.

2.

That's hysterical you brought that

Shawn Michael Durgan helped me with that

Matt Ross and child you are hysterical 622 at 92.7 WM DX on Catherine Lake.

We're filling in for John and Gordy Thank You Matt for doing this and for the

podcasts you continually do.

You've been doing those with Dominic for a little bit now.

Yeah, the Wisconsin Forward podcast.

We interviewed every one of the Democratic candidates, except Mandela Barnes, because he hadn't joined the race until last week, and I've got feelers out to him.

So you can go to the Wisconsin Forward podcast at civicmedia.us and listen to a half-hour conversation with each of the candidates, figure out which one you'd

prefer at this point.

So to wide open primary, it's very interesting

to

watch what's going to happen there.

We do that little bird song intro because I every time I come on, I like doing two things at least other than talk politics, which I can do till the cows come home.

There's a cliche for you.

But one of them is is talk about birds.

You know, one out of three Wisconsinites is a birdwatcher.

I've been a birdwatcher since I was four years old.

seriously so that was the intro we have and we do a bird of the day when I'm on and the bird of the day is the tundra swan which when I was growing up was called the whistling swan let's take a listen

you do not have the sound

yes we do and now if you're listening

and you live near Lake Mendota, you've been hearing that sound a lot over the last couple of weeks, because there are flocks of tundra swans on Lake Mendota.

They come down from the Arctic when things freeze up there, and they look for open water, and we've got some open water here still.

They'll be on Lake Mendota until it freezes.

So you can, you know, and sometimes they're on Lake Minona also.

I've seen them over there near the east side.

Business Men's Center now Eastside Community Center, I think.

I don't get it.

Until it freezes.

These big birds

come down from the Arctic.

It's great.

I get it.

They're coming down because it's too cold.

Honey, we're going to go today.

We're going today to get the kids.

We're going.

I get that.

But how do they know when it's going to freeze the next morning in Mendota?

They got to get going before that.

How do they?

I know.

They're pretty hardwired.

Birds are hardwired.

Hardwired.

That's the coolest thing about them.

They also know when a low pressure snowstorm is coming.

So they'll be, the little birds will be eating your feeders ravenously this morning because they know there's this.

And

there is a storm coming.

Yeah, we're gonna get up to maybe 33 degrees today.

Wintery mix expected to move in this afternoon.

High winds, let's see, no, wind Southwest 5 to 10, not that bad.

Here's the thing.

I want to troll Gordy Young right now, Mr. Weatherman, because as we all know now, 80% chance, right?

What does that mean?

80% chance of precipitation.

To you, what do you think that means?

80% that your

life has an 80% chance of being rained on, right?

Well, I think 80% to me means definitely.

When the weather people say it's 80% to me, it seems like it's 100%.

It's not the chance, though.

It's 80% of the area.

Oh.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's that's the thing.

And it's irritating because right here on the weather channel's language is chance of precipitation, 80%.

But what they mean is 80% of you will get it.

Well,

or the area,

my advice is expected.

It's coming.

You're going to get it.

If you're

listening,

you're

going to get this weather.

It's going to be a bad day.

So listen, I also.

So if you want to call in with your bird sightings, you can always do that.

Six, eight, eight, seven, nine, eight, two, five, five.

If you've seen a tundra swan here in Dane County, let us know.

But I two things I've never heard John and Gordy talk about birds and poetry and both of those things you guys talk about before you went on the air.

I

always bring those in.

So I want to do.

two little poems.

Okay.

Because you mentioned, I was working at The Progressive, we would publish Wendell Berry, the great poet from Kentucky, I actually stated his house once.

Here's a little poem that's been circulating on Facebook recently.

I'm going to read that and then I'm going to read one for you, Catherine.

Okay.

So this is a morning poem, a seize the day poem, an old young man poem.

from Wendell Berry, though the body grows old and bears the ache and weight of many days, the life by which it lives is young, for life is young or it doesn't exist, is not even dead.

And so as I walk in the land's holy Sabbath under the tall trees, I come at once into the old young joy that has moved me all my life to be here in the early morning light.

I just love

that.

That's nice.

By home again, please.

Wendell Berry, Kentucky poet, short story writer, novelist.

So, Katherine, when I was coming in, I heard on WMDX, this station, your lovely voice saying, WMDX, where thinking is still fashionable.

Even apparently.

And

so, I found another Wendell Berry poem in this book.

If we have become a people incapable of thought, then the brute thought of mere power and mere greed will think of us.

If we have become incapable of denying ourselves anything, then all that we have will be taken from us.

If we have no compassion, we will suffer alone.

we'll suffer alone the destruction of ourselves.

These are merely the laws of this world as known to Shakespeare, as known to Milton.

When we cease from human thought, a low and defective cunning stirs in the most inhuman minds.

Wow.

That's absolutely prescient.

Stirs in the most inhuman minds.

It's stirring in the mind of Donald Trump and Pete Hegs.

I'm sorry.

It's exactly what's happening.

Yeah.

Wow.

628 currently.

What temperature do we think we're at right now?

So that

was Wendell Berry.

Yeah.

You can pick up a Wendell Berry book of poems and open it to almost anything beautiful and deep like that.

Yeah.

That's a gift.

28 degrees currently.

Thank you very much.

And later on today, we're going to be talking with who has just arrived.

That's Juliana Bennett.

She's running for the State Assembly.

She used to be on the Common Council.

She's going to be speaking with us right after the bump, right after the news.

So I'm looking forward to speaking with her and hearing about her race for the State Assembly.

That's going to be good.

That's Matt Rothschild.

I'm Catherine Lake, just helping out with some clocks.

That's it.

That's all I'm here for.

It's all Matt all day.

Oh,

don't undersell.

For now, I'm just saying.

John and Gordy, of course, coming in this afternoon, but we'll do all of this.

Coming right up, stick with us.

Good morning.

92.7 WMDX.

My name is Catherine Lake.

Matt Rothschild is in the air chair this morning, subbing in for John and Gordy this morning.

Having fun doing it.

Oh my gosh.

You've been doing this for a while now, a couple of Tuesdays a month here, right?

Yeah, I love doing it.

I'm a morning person.

This doesn't bother you getting up at four?

Yeah.

Four is a little early.

I'm usually up by five, five, 15.

Usually anyway.

Yeah, I go up, feed the birds, get a little...

Granola, read the newspaper, get my wife some coffee.

You said granola.

That's how we get going.

You are such a granola.

Granola cruncher.

You're such a

granola cruncher.

Don't wear Birkenstocks, but

I do eat the

granola.

Oh, good lord.

24 degrees right

now.

It's 635 again.

Matt Rothschild in the air chair.

And Matt, introduce your guest.

Let's get into

it.

Juliana

Bennett.

Yeah.

Thrilled to have in the studio with us right now.

Juliana Bennett, former Madison Alder, running for the 76th Assembly seat.

currently held by one Francesca Hong, as you know, running for governor.

Juliana Bennett, welcome to the show.

Hello, thank you for having me.

Kudos to you for being able to get up so early.

I set at least five alarms.

Five alarms, just to make sure you got out of there.

No, it's starting at 4.30.

You know, I don't set an alarm.

That's the weird thing.

You didn't?

No, I never set alarms.

You

almost left me hanging here.

I've never overslept though.

I always get up and I'm neurotic.

So I'll get up every two hours thing.

Oh my God.

Oh, I was

definitely up and I was my eyes opened at one, two and three.

Definitely.

Yeah, I do that.

It's ridiculous.

Good for you.

Oh, it's ridiculous.

Anyway, this is about you, Juliana.

Yes, Juliana.

Tell us why you want to be in the state assembly.

Yeah, well, look.

So as you mentioned, I was a Madison alder.

But.

Really, I'm just a normal human being.

That's 25 years old, one of the youngest people running for a state seat right now.

And I'm very, very passionate about this work.

I got my start when I was 21, while I was a student activist at UW-Madison.

And that was during the global racial uprising.

There was COVID.

I was motivated to action by feeling a deep sense of anger and frustration with our system and not seeing our leaders step up to the plate.

So that's why I first decided to run and now here we are again.

I will say, well, there's three things I want to listeners to get away from.

First is that my kind of, the personal story I have for my wife is about three years ago now, my dad experienced cardiac arrest.

He had a 6% chance of living, survived, thanks to the healthcare workers at the Meritor MBA Hospital.

And at the time I was a student, I was an alder,

just got a job at Lita, and... A

little busy.

A

little busy, yeah, just a little bit.

Getting your life going.

Dad has the nerve

to get sick.

Dad has the nerve to almost die.

Unbelievable.

And then you have this crisis.

Right.

He survives, but the cost of his life came at the cost of an eviction.

No.

Mm-hmm.

And a $500,000 medical bill.

Wow.

A half million dollars for a heart attack.

For a heart attack.

That's

outrageous.

That's amazing.

Yes, I can't I can't that's a real number.

I'm

looking right at you

Yeah, and this is what so many people deal with this is why people go into bankruptcy because of these health care bills or get evicted and so you decided to You know use that experience to try to do something about people similarly situated

exactly exactly.

I mean look at We are at a time where

It is incredibly difficult to get by.

People are completely locked out of home ownership opportunities.

The new average home buyer age is 56 years old.

And it's brutal in Madison.

It's horrible in Madison.

Okay, but

Juliana, Juliana Bennett running for state assembly.

Running for state assembly.

Juliana, this has always been the case.

You know, buck

up, buck up and just pull yourself up and just, just make it so.

I mean, what's the deal?

What's the problem?

Why is half the country having such trouble?

Well, pull yourself up by your shrew's trap is a lot of crap.

Right?

But that's what we're told since, you know,

that's what we're told.

Well, look, I currently work in the state assembly for state representative Angelito Tenori, which is the second thing I wanted to get across is that I have experience at both a local state and federal level.

And what I've learned in that experience is that people in the building talk to lobbyists and mega corporations more than they talk to everyday people.

Oh, come on.

Really?

That was your observation.

Yeah.

I mean, shocker there.

Also that like 26 year olds are running the country right now.

And I don't know what talks about that.

Like our country is run by these staffers that are all like in their under 30s.

Yeah.

I mean,

that's true in Washington DC too.

And unless the elected official is really on the ball, they delegate so

much of their

responsibility to their staffers.

We're all doing it.

So the problem with not actually connecting with everyday people is that the policies and legislation that we see being put forward benefits.

these mega corporations.

I mean, heck, look at the reason why data centers are coming here is because there's a tax incentive for them to do so.

Wisconsin has a bigger tax incentive than most states or some states.

Do you know about that?

And I don't

know if that's the case.

Are we really trying

to

get data centers here?

Well, it was kind of backroaded in.

And we really haven't.

Data centers is an issue that

We haven't we haven't legislated on a because it's like all just like coming for us with a boom of AI all at one time, but also we Don't have an integrated resource plan or an IRP which is a plan for our utilities hence utility rates are going up skyrocketing out of control as

a result of data centers every time

Well, it's data centers, but also the fact that we aren't encouraging the use of renewable energy over coal and gas.

And plus, they're going to be sucking up just a ton of energy and water, too.

Exactly.

These

data centers.

That's why there's a rebellion among local citizenry against these data centers.

But Juliana Bennett, you're talking about who runs the show and the state capital.

And it's always the...

people who can donate the most money.

I mean, that's a campaign finance issue.

And Republicans in the state legislature changed that law in 2015 so that corporations for the first time can donate directly to political parties.

And so the super rich can, for the first time, give unlimited amounts to independent.

Campaign so the sky's the limit right now and and the folks with money have more power than ever in there And you're gonna want to get in there and try to change that how would you do that?

That's the plan.

That's the plan.

Well, look I said this before and I'll say it again I think that part of what we need to do is also look within our own party

I've seen so much how we moderate ourselves and bold, progressive, innovative ideas get stopped before they even reach the light of day.

And I have experience on the council with actually...

doing legislation.

I was behind the Madison Housing Forward Initiative and legalizing duplexes city-wide, upzoning Madison to make sure that we bring in more affordable housing.

And, you know, local processes work really slow, as does the state.

And so having that experiencing and bringing it to a state level will be beneficial.

And I think the reason why I'm so excited to run for the seat A is because, like,

As a Madisonian, like I went to West, I couldn't imagine running anywhere else.

Um, and B, this seat is so important.

We are like a plus 80 dem deep.

blue seat.

And it is important for this person in the seat, not just to be in it for the political theater, but to be someone that actually wants to take action.

So you have actually stated that we're short about 200,000 affordable homes.

Yes.

How do you how do you propose we fix that?

I mean my goodness, you can't just build them and say this is a cheap house for you

How do we do this?

Look, we are in a shortage of 200,000 affordable homes in and not just Madison but like Wisconsin itself does not have a plan to get there and we First of all, yes, we do we do need to build more housing.

That's just a fact of

back to the matter.

But also, while we're building housing, we should be building housing that is public housing and deep, permanent, affordable housing.

That means utilizing our current financial structures that we have with the low-income housing tax credit program, which two out of three proposals for the

a low-income housing tax credit program get rejected.

That's housing units that we could be putting online right now that would be deeply affordable that we are rejecting because we haven't increased the amount of tax credits that we give as a state.

Furthermore...

introducing a statewide community land trust program and really empowering local governments.

I know that, you know, as Madison, I have a lot to say about, like, how we can... You?

change our zoning practices, but we have tied local government's hands and we should be allowing for more local control and beyond that.

I mean, that's a big point, Juliana Bennett, because, you know, Republicans used to say they were the party of local control.

And as my friend, Mike McCabe, who comes on John Gordy show a lot says, actually, they're the party that controls the locals.

They've passed more than 200 bills starting with Scott Walker

that

curtailed.

Local control.

Yes.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Juliana Bennett running for state assembly here in Madison, former, uh, Alder.

Did you like being on the council?

Oh, I love it.

What was the luck for you?

Hmm.

It was, hmm, insightful.

Um, but no, it was, it was cool because I was, you know, I was 21 years old at the time.

And so I think going in, I had a little bit of naivety about like, you know, how slower processes work, but also, um, by the end of it, I felt very well seasoned and respected by my colleagues, which I appreciate.

I can see why.

You know, Juliana Bennett, I was at your website too.

I appreciated the frankness that you use under healthcare.

The first sentence you say, I don't even know if I can say this on the air, but our healthcare system is no good.

You said

it.

Let's

put

it that way.

Our healthcare system sucks.

There it is.

Your

word.

There you go.

You

said

it.

What would be the first thing you'd want to do on healthcare once you get...

to the state assembly?

We need to expand Medicaid, period.

We haven't done it, and the reason why we haven't done it is because we're Republicans and it's hurting Wisconsinites.

We need to expand Medicaid.

I mean, they wouldn't even expand it for women who just had babies, and we're second only to one other state, Arkansas.

Dude, that is so annoying.

You know what's actually crazy?

There's one person that is holding that up, and that is Robin Voss.

Like, literally almost every other member of the state assembly wants that.

Shocking.

Giuliana Bennett is here.

Can you have another minute or two?

We just need to pay a couple bills.

And then we'd like to finish up talking

with you.

Oh, yeah.

Please, please, please.

Well, no, you know, hopefully we'll make your bills a little cheaper.

Oh, she's

got it.

Giving us a discount.

Yep.

Matt Rothschild is in the air chair for John and Gordy.

I'm Catherine Lake is just helping out just a little bit.

648 back in a sec.

All right, all right, all right.

Come on.

That's pretty good.

Not

bad.

I sound just

like him, don't I?

Katherine Lake, I'm in here with Matt Rothschild, who is in for John and Gordy.

They are going to be in this afternoon.

We're getting kind of a rhythm going.

They do two shows Mondays and Fridays, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.

You never know what you're going to get.

But thank goodness Matt has been here for a lot of the Tuesdays.

And maybe for the rest of the week as well, I don't even know.

We gotta figure it out eventually.

But meanwhile, right now, we have Juliana Bennett here.

She is running for state assembly, 76th, right here in Madison.

Juliana, you write on your websites about the need for criminal justice reform.

What are some of your ideas in that field?

Absolutely.

So this is something very near and dear to my heart and why I ran in the first place.

For criminal justice reform, look at our prisons.

Our prisons are at 130% capacity.

What?

Yes.

We have people incarcerated that do not even go outside at all, that don't even have windows.

That's not healthy.

No, it's awful.

So...

Clearly, we need some reform there.

And that takes place by having a reckoning that we do not necessarily need to lock more people up for more crimes for more time.

Instead, we should be investing in a system that actually rehabilitates people and gives people opportunities for housing, healthcare, jobs, et cetera.

The reason why people are committee crimes in the first place is because they do not have access to the services that they need.

Juliana, you're so young.

She's so naive.

This is not possible.

How can you get all this done with the assembly?

I mean, my goodness.

My goodness.

You know, I know.

Look at me wanting to change the role.

What are the odds of flipping the assembly in the state Senate, though?

That would be dramatic.

Look, we are at, we have a real shot.

at a democratic trifecta this year.

And that is why it's so important for these deep blue seats to have people that want to take action

and shake

things up.

Because the more we lean in to being blue, the more that we can actually find a place where we pass democratic proposals instead of basically Republican-like

proposals.

Well said.

I mean, on day one, if there's that trifecta, what would be the first bill you'd want in other than the Medicaid expansions you talked about before?

I mean, on your website, you talked about legalizing marijuana.

That would be... That would be dope.

That would be dope.

Unintended.

I think we're going to leave it there.

Juliana Bennett, thank you so much for being here today.

Thank you.

Really appreciate it.

Good luck in your race.

Yeah, how can people support you if

they'd like?

Yeah, hit us up.

Giuliana for the people for

Most socials, let's shake things up and take action and deliver for the working class.

Thank you so much.

That's Bennett, two ends, two T's.

Two ends, two E's, two T's.

Absolutely.

Six fifty-five, we have very little time left in this hour, but we've got to try and get at least a little bit in with Amy Good from the Dane County Humane Society.

I can't believe you're here, Amy.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Good morning.

Good morning.

So we are going to talk about, you're the director of development and marketing, aren't you?

I am.

Oh my gosh.

So you're going to tell us about, you're going to market some wonderful animals.

They are up on the screen.

If you are able to look at, what is it, YouTube.

And where else can they see these?

John and Gordy YouTube, as well as the John and Gordy Facebook page.

Facebook page.

As well as the 92.7 WMDX Facebook page and YouTube.

Very

good.

You'll see our silly mugs, but you'll also see Amy Good.

And oh, the first floof.

This one's called Who.

What is this one?

This is Ginny.

And she has quite a story.

She's traveled pretty far to get to us.

She originally came from China and was brought in by a local rescue.

Come on.

Several years ago.

And unfortunately, her family moved out of the country.

And she's now with us at the Humane Society looking for a home.

She is

adorable.

Super cute.

I think they believe she's a shih tzu and a pecanese mix.

But she's about 30 pounds.

Yeah, she's medium size.

She's not teeny tiny.

Yeah, so she's a good size and you know, she's probably looking for a home where she's the only dog.

Okay.

And well, she's from China.

I apologize.

How's her English?

How's her English?

I mean, she came from overseas.

My goodness, she might need a little time.

She knows, I think she's been here about seven years.

I think she's picked up the language.

She's bilingual.

Yeah, good.

Yeah.

All right.

So she's, she's a sweetie, just

probably needs to be no kids, no other dogs.

All

right, we'll take a look at that doggie with Gordy sometime soon, because I think that looks perfect.

Oh, and this one.

Oh, my gosh.

Tell us about Scout.

So we don't see these very often, but this is a chinchilla.

And we actually have three of them right now.

They are so soft.

This one is Scout.

So that's a rodent.

That's a little bit bigger, about a pound.

You've got a

drinking dog, Mary.

Yes.

That is

absolutely

unmistakable sound of a drinking

dog.

Absolutely.

That's my, and we have a cat too, because that's my life.

Lapping

it up.

I'm going to give you Think Society and some of them come home.

Hilarious.

Okay, Amy, so yes, this chinchilla, go on.

Yes.

So they're kind of an interesting animal that people don't know a lot about just because you don't see them very often.

So they're nocturnal, mostly, so they sleep during the day.

So if you work at home and don't want the noise, there you go.

They're going to sleep all day.

But they're really interesting animals.

This one's about six, which these live a lot longer than like a guinea pig or a gerbil or a hamster.

So they can live up to 20 years.

Okay.

It's pretty incredible.

Chinchella, a trio of Chinchella.

Chinchella.

Okay.

And we have about one minute.

So let's get

through

really quick.

This

last one, what's the name?

This is Iris.

Iris.

And she and many of her friends came to us last week from a home where somebody could no longer take care of them.

Little black kitty.

Yeah.

Yes.

We have a lot of black kiddies right now, including many in the room that Iris is in.

Seems like a lot of her family were black.

So she's an adult, not really sure exactly how old she is, but she's pretty sweet.

All right, Amy.

I'm so sorry.

We hit the top of the hour hard.

So I'm going

to let it.

Thank you so much.

Three great animals available at the Dane County Humane Society.

Check them out when you get a chance.

Hey, Matt Rothschild here.

John and Gordy aren't here this morning.

I'm subbing in with Catherine Lake, station manager here at WMDX.

John and Gordy will be on this afternoon, though.

You can catch them from two to five all across the Civic Media Radio Network.

You can hear them all day, all the time.

You can get your fill.

You can get your fill, for sure.

Thank you, Matt, for doing this.

It's been really fun so far, 7.06 right now, and it is time for a contest.

We're doing text to win again.

Can you believe this?

Daily cash prizes of $200.

There you go.

It's

possible to get your hands on.

Three grand prizes.

We have a brand new snowblower, a stainless steel cookware set, which is really interesting to me.

Portable air conditioner, which I can't imagine.

Is that like in the window, or can you roll it around your garage if you

just don't have a- Yeah, it's just a window one.

I think you need the snowblower right now.

Oh yeah,

that's right.

You're right.

You're probably right.

So you have until the end of this hour to enter the keyword by text.

Best way to do it, grab that app, the Civic Media app.

It is so easy to download and to use, just find our station.

And it is a multi-state contest, by the way, that you need to know.

You download the app, you text the keyword that I'm about to give you via the text feature on the WMDX page.

You choose WMDX and get it done.

Yeah, you'll get an automatic message and you can get more entries if you

follow those instructions when you get that confirmation of your text.

Most of you know exactly what I'm talking about, and you do not need to hear me talking anymore.

But they need to know the keyword.

They need to

know the dang keywords.

So we're gonna fast forward to the pages, and here it is for this hour, the keyword on Tuesday, 12, 9, 7 a.m.

Sorry, winter.

Winter's the word.

There it

is.

Winter.

Drum roll,

winter.

W-I-N-T-E-R.

Winter, please send that in via text via the app.

Ideally, otherwise, you're gonna be out of luck.

And you'll get 200 bucks maybe.

We'll draw for that.

And then also the grand prizes.

Here we go.

The word is winter.

Winter.

And right now, I'm delighted to have with us on the show, Dane County Executive, Melissa

Agart.

I've been dying for this interview.

How are you doing this morning, County Executive?

I'm good, Matt.

It's good to be here with you guys this morning.

Well, I was looking forward to this because, you know, I've been following your career since you were in the legislature.

And I got to ask you, what's that switch been like from Senate Minority Leader in the state capital to Dane County exec?

It's been a pretty wild year, I will say.

Certainly making the decision to take the leap out of the legislature after serving for 12 years in that building.

During one of the most challenging times, I would think in the history of the state of Wisconsin's legislature for Democrats and progressives.

I mean, that must have been a headache being in there during the Walker years, wasn't

it?

Well, you know, I think I still have a bruise right here

on my

forehead.

Right there.

Walking into walls, it felt like almost every single day.

Yeah.

But, you know, I loved my time in that building and as a little girl growing up in Madison.

Madison

East.

Madison East,

I schooled my kids there

now.

You know, it's a magical building.

And the potential of what can happen in that building is quite amazing.

And I feel the excitement of what's going to happen in 2026 in our state capitol and for all of us in Wisconsin.

But making the decision to run for county executive to come back to local government where I really started out my public service to my community.

Taking the the leap from the legislative branch to the executive branch I wanted to give to my community in a new way And this is felt really authentic, but holy cow This has been quite a year of learning and unprecedented experience is not only for me, but for our community and our nation And I am so proud of who we are as a community what we stand for and the potential of

what the county can do to continue to protect and preserve our quality of life, what we care about, who we care about in leading not only in Wisconsin, but on a national level.

Now, let me ask you one of the things that we deal with in all businesses and including ours in radio and media, the leadership, transparency.

We're always asking for transparency.

We're always asking for, you know, let us see what's accountability.

How do you do that under

you know, the number of agencies you have to deal with at this level.

How do you have transparency?

What does it mean to be transparent for

you?

I love that question.

I ask myself that question every day because I am a true believer in having a transparent government as a more effective government.

And, you know, there's no place that you get, oh, you're elected county executive.

This is how you increase transparency or how it is that you're going to make the biggest impact on the community.