Good morning and welcome, welcome to Matt Nair on air, Jane Matt Nair, Greg Buck, and Calvin Butenoff coming to you live from our studio here at Radio Park in Racine.
You can always join us, call or text, the number is the same, 855-752-4842.
That's 855-75 Civic.
You can also leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook.
YouTube and what used to be Twitter.
Lots of stuff coming up on the show today.
Very excited to talk to Civic Media's new news director.
New news.
New news.
Not old news director.
No, she is our new news director.
Charlie Pittman is going to be joining us after 9 30.
We have a wonderful news department that is scattered all over Wisconsin, covering things that matter to all of us.
So Charlie is going to be joining us.
We will speak a little bit more in depth about.
the U.S.
striking Iran over the weekend, dropping that bomb, we will...
Again, talk about that a little bit more with Charlie and other things that our news department is working on.
And I mentioned this, I just appeared with Pat Kratlow on his show right before the top of the hour news.
Sign up for our newsletter.
Sign up for the Civic Media newsletter.
It really is great.
And it's not going to cost you anything.
No.
And there is actually, there's so many ways to be informed with Civic Media.
You can go to, you can get the Civic Media newsletter.
From what I understand, there's even like a new and improved or another link.
We just want to get that information out to you, but you can also like wherever you listen.
So if you're listening to WAUK right now, you can go to waukradio.com and you can sign up for the WAUK newsletter.
And that is a more concentrated, more
regional
community.
Exactly.
And so you can stay informed with all the stories because that's
a great thing about civic media's news desk is that it's not just covering the statewide news.
It's not just covering the nation.
It's covering those, you know, hey, the cranberry festivals and such and such today.
It's all, it's got everything you need.
Yep.
What's going on in Oshkosh?
What's going on in Park Falls?
What's going on in Hayward?
Again, we have a news department scattered all across the state.
So Charlie will be joining us after the 9 30 news hour.
Number two, we're going to lighten things up a little bit.
PJ leash.
is UW-Madison's and Wisconsin's essentially bug guy.
He isn't entomologist.
And I've seen a lot of reports that ticks are worse than ever this season.
So we're going to talk about that a little bit.
Also, the Trump administration looks like it's going to cancel another study on the importance of pollinators.
Because why bother?
We have no one depends on that for almonds or cherries or.
you know, other
things we eat.
There is a farmer's market that Bridget and I go to every Saturday and there is a honey local honey place and they have a t-shirt that's available that says no bees, no food.
It's true.
Very simple.
Yep.
Pretty simple.
So PJ Lee's joining us in hour number two.
We will wrap up the show as we always do with this shouldn't be a thing.
Today it's the lost and found edition.
So
stick
around for that.
And as always, if you have a thing you think should not be,
Send it in to Greg and me at janesaysatcivicmedia.us J-A-N-E-S-A-Y-S, janesaysatcivicmedia.us.
Wanted to start off with this again, we're going to be talking about the U.S.
bombing Iran over the weekend.
After the 9.30 news, we'll get into a little bit more with Charlie Pittman to find out the latest on that.
The latest where we're
going
from here, but I wanted to start off.
We wanted to start a little bit more locally with what's going on in Wisconsin and Wisconsin's Chris capping capping.
Thank you.
We're finally going to say it correctly.
This is a, I will may, I will say this again to his face when he's on the show on Friday, but this is an apology to Dan Schaefer, who on the air said he was pronouncing Chris capping his name incorrectly.
Cause we've been saying capenga,
which is
not it.
No one has corrected us.
That's not it.
It's a
capping a capping a senator capping a was on WISN's upfront over the weekend Talking about the budget, but also talking about security of our lawmakers This is in the wake of the assassination essentially of the Minnesota lawmaker and her husband and the attempted murder of
of another Minnesota lawmaker and his wife.
And so Kaepenga was on WISN's upfront, talking about more security for Wisconsin's lawmakers.
Let's play that first clip, Calvin, please, from Sundays Up Front on WISN.
The security concern, I've been raising that for about the last four years.
And actually, when I was in the president's spot in the Senate, we researched security systems.
We had one picked out, but we just couldn't get enough support within the legislature to get that put in place.
And we've been, I've been to capitals all over the country.
There's not one capital I've been in that we haven't had to go through intense security screenings.
You mentioned your time as Senate president back in 2023.
You pushed for more security after a man was arrested trying to get a handgun into the Capitol, Governor Evers.
You say that didn't go anywhere because of support.
Where does that stand now?
Are you still having those conversations?
Yeah, I think this will obviously help.
I wish it wasn't something we had to have happen.
But I actually said that.
I'm like, what is it going to take for us to get serious about security?
It's probably going to take somebody getting hurt.
So let's just start off with the obvious.
We hear, Madden air and air, civic media.
We don't believe that violence is the answer.
We don't think it's right.
Politically driven violence is terrible.
We think that anyone in that building and anywhere period should be safe, secure and feel unencumbered by an attacker.
That should go without saying, Jane, but I feel like we have to say that.
I agree with you.
But what he just said in that sentence,
is so I don't want to say angering, but just frustrating for me as an American.
What does it take?
Why we we we don't want to what what it's the reactive nature we want to be proactive instead of reactive.
Every time there is any sort of mass shooting in this country and that happens a lot.
There is outcry.
There's outcry for
red flag laws, there's outcry for increased background checks, there's outcry for get rid of certain guns, get rid of certain styles of guns, there's a conversation that happens every time and we are always told by the right and by gun enthusiasts, don't politicize this, you're making too big of a deal of it, it's the Second Amendment, it's our God-given right, it shall not be infringed, everything is there.
And we're simply saying, how many times does this have to happen for
us?
Before something gets done.
What, Mr. Cappenga?
Kappenga is saying is what the what the Gun What's the word I'm looking for, you know, not gun gun lobby not the gun lobby the people who want to get some reform the gun reform individuals have been saying for years decades now is basically like what does it take to get some security?
What does it take to do something about this issue of weapons and let's just face it?
Let's say people aren't running in with axes.
They're running in with guns
So he's making the exact same argument that people on the gun reform side have been making for a long time.
So now all of a sudden, it's something we need to look at.
Right, because it's them.
Yes.
Because it's lawmakers.
It's about our lawmakers, not about our kids.
No.
Not about our kids going to school having to worry about being shot at school.
That's, that's not, we're there.
He's not talking about any of that.
No.
And if you want proof that he's talking about specifically about lawmakers, he's not talking about the people.
And that's the other thing that's really infuriating.
He's not talking honestly about the people in the building.
He's not talking about the assistants, the interns, the aides, the.
cleaning staff.
There's all kinds of people
that work in the capital.
All
sorts of individuals who work in there.
He's talking about the lawmakers who need to be protected specifically.
And that's true.
They should be protected.
Like everyone should in that building should be protected.
And once again, I'm saying the obvious again, but he is speaking about lawmakers in specifically on this one.
And that also upsets me because it shouldn't matter what your job is in that building.
Everyone should feel safe.
I would
say that every even as individuals should feel safe.
I what amazing idea, right?
We have another clip from yesterday's appearance senator Chris capping on WISN upfront Calvin play clip number two, please
What what Indiana for instance?
It's a great example that I bring up a lot is that Indiana is extremely conservative and and pro Now protection they allow legislators to carry into the building for protection, which I always do
I always have been armed to protect myself, especially when I'm up in the front in the president's spot.
That was, I just felt it was very important.
But the general public, they don't need to have their weapons in the people's house.
In the people's house, it's their representatives who are elected.
That's the voice of the people.
I need to be protected as a public servant.
So does everybody else who's been elected into that spot.
We should not be worrying about our lives walking into that building.
We still want lawmakers to be able to carry inside and on the floor.
Absolutely.
Lot to unpack there.
Did you just hear what he said?
Everyone listening right now watching on the live stream.
Did you hear what he just said?
He said that his life.
is more important for protection than the lives of others.
Because he's the voice of the people.
No, he is not.
He is the guy who cast the vote.
And right now he's doing nothing.
We'll get to the budget later.
But the people are important.
And the people's voice needs to be protected.
I have so many problems with this statement.
So many.
Well, and...
I don't disagree.
Yes, our lawmakers should be able to walk into the Capitol and not have to worry about getting shot.
I think our kids should be able to walk into school and not have to worry about being shot.
I think all of us as Americans should be able to go, I don't know, to church or the grocery store or the gas station or pretty much anywhere and not have to worry about being shot.
And the fact that he can stand up there and say that he is the voice of the people, when we know the joint finance committee that had four meetings around Wisconsin completely ignored the top three issue they heard from people, don't tell me that you're the voice of the people.
Well, and also he's designated as he is more important than.
His life has more value if life has more value there or he should be able to carry a gun into that building The fact that there's no metal detectors in there is surprising.
I'm I will say that
I don't have a problem with that
There should be there should be up to the state of the art security in that building and there should be
well-paid guards in that building to take care of it.
Who are trained.
I do not believe that lawmakers carrying guns in their pocket is somehow making it more safe to be in there.
I do not agree with that.
And I vehemently disagree with the notion that because he is a lawmaker, somehow he has more value.
That is ridiculous.
That is offensive and it's stupid.
It's a stupid argument to make.
just because you want to carry your personal defense mechanism.
It's a gun.
It's a gun, sir.
People are pro-personal defense.
It's a gun.
You want to carry a gun because you watched a Western and you want to feel like a man.
I'm sorry.
This is so telling to me what
he thinks of the people.
And I just found it immensely tone deaf.
Yes.
I did.
I found it really tone deaf.
Again,
Yes, I agree.
Our lawmakers should be able to do their jobs without the threat of being gunned down at work.
I think all of us are entitled to that as Americans.
And if you're going to be the voice of the people, Mr. Kappenga, then actually do what they're asking you to do.
Absolutely.
That's a thought.
Absolutely.
And this is splitting hairs here, but we're also ignoring the fact that this...
This lawmaker, these two lawmakers and their spouses were not gunned down in the building.
They were gunned down at home.
That's a whole other argument.
Whole other discussion we need to have about this.
What kind of security do you need to have off the clock, if you will?
We can talk about that.
But just because you want to carry a gun into a building, don't make the argument that you're more important than the other individuals in said building.
When we return Elon.
He's just gonna rewrite history the way he wants it.
It's all good, nothing to see here.
Stay close, you're listening to Matt and Air on Air.
This is the Civic Media Radio
Network.
Good, good morning.
Welcome.
Welcome to Matt and Aaron, Jane, Matt and Aaron, Greg Bach, sweet Calbee on the board.
Coming to you from our studio at Radio Park in Racine.
You can join us, call or text at 855-752-4842.
Leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube and what used to be Twitter later on today, 235 during the Todd Alba show.
Todd, welcome us back.
State Senator Kelder Roy's.
from the joint finance committee to talk about the state budget in hour number two on Todd's show, a weather edition of what's worse.
Is it the heat or humidity?
I'm just
guessing.
I'll bet you it's winter versus summer because I'm seeing a lot of the, especially in Wisconsin, the moon.
You say it's too hot now.
You said it was too cool.
All of that.
We do it every year.
Every year we forget that Wisconsin is insane.
It's weather whiplash.
Exactly.
You wait two days and it's going to change.
Before we went to the break, we were talking about State Senator Chris Kappenga appearing on WYSN's Up Front over the weekend, talking about that tragic assassination of the Minnesota lawmaker and her husband.
And he would like to see metal detectors at the Capitol, which I don't have a problem with.
But essentially he's talking about how important he is because he is the voice of the people.
Wow.
Yeah.
Just, I mean,
okay.
Cassandra from New London.
Wow.
I don't have a lot of words for this.
How you, how dare you say you are more valuable than my children.
Yeah.
And Sue from Franklin, I watched that yesterday and I was thinking the same thing.
They are so inward focused.
Yeah.
What does Jane say?
Good for me, but not for thee.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Security for me, but you, your kids five, they're going to be fine.
And if you want to talk to Mr. Kappenga's office, you can go to my vote.wi.gov.
You don't even have to be represented by Mr. Kappenga because he's the voice of the people and you are the people.
You are a people.
So go to my vote.myvote.wi.gov and you're going to put in your information and you can find not only all sorts of great stuff on voting.
which you should do now before this election, before you might forget, but also on your representatives.
You can find out from the president on down to your local school board and common council members.
So you can call his office up, be kind, be nice.
The person who's answering is either an aide or an intern.
So yeah, they're just there to talk to you, but tell them that your voice matters, that you will matter, and it's not, and he is not more important.
than you are.
Well, and also, if he's the voice of the people, maybe he should actually vote on behalf of what he hears from those people.
Absolutely.
It's just a thought.
Yeah, just a tiny idea.
We're not going to spend a lot of time on this, but I think this is really important.
Yeah.
And I think if you just spend a couple of minutes thinking about this, this is really disturbing.
Elon Musk has announced plans to completely rewrite human knowledge.
after his AI chatbot GROC, which I've never used but I see it show up on Twitter all the time.
GROC is like community notes.
So if you post something and you go to GROC and say GROC is this accurate, well unfortunately GROC has been discounting a lot of what Elon has said as far as it's not factual.
So GROC is correcting Elon, we can't have that.
Yeah, can have grok create a create a correcting the the most wonderful smartest man in the world Elon Musk So yesterday here's what he said on Twitter quote we will use grok 3.5 Maybe we should call it for which has advanced reasoning to rewrite the entire corpus of human knowledge Adding missing information and deleting errors
So Elon wants to rewrite history.
I deleting
errors.
Well, honestly, Jay, I mean, let's, let's just be quite honest, really quick about it all.
He is doing what the Texas school board has done.
He's doing what other school boards have done.
He is, he is making, but he's saying fancy space words.
Like I'm rewriting now.
No, you're not.
You're just going to say that you're going to say that, oh man, white Africans really had it harder than.
Then you think yeah, whoo.
Yeah.
Oh my gosh that a part that I really hurt them to yeah, so yeah This is I mean I should be shocked appalled I should be clutching my pearls, but he's really just digitalizing and advancing and making it look cooler what lawmakers historians school boards and other weirdo individuals who just want to
Want us to forget about slavery have been doing for decades and I'm sorry for over a century.
Well,
right and just
trying to disappear troops Yeah, absolutely.
Let's let's disappear things that are uncomfortable that make us feel badly about our past We shouldn't ever have to admit that we did things wrong.
Mm-hmm.
That's what I see some Donald Trump all the time Well, I mean who never admits that he's done anything wrong, but
This should be very concerning especially with AI and if you've seen some of the AI fakes going around Yeah, it's pretty astonishing.
So in different chats, I've seen people tell other people hang on to your books Hang on to your history books
What I'm hoping is that while he does his
redefining human knowledge in a space age, blah, blah, blah.
All my rockets blow up.
Is that there?
I blew up another one last week.
I know.
I think that I believe that there will be people or groups of people who will, who are just way smarter than Elon.
I'm just, I'm as smart as Elon, who will build systems, AI systems, things that will counter this.
I, I, yes.
Absolutely.
I think there are good people out there and I think they'll put their brains to good work and, and while
Grock is going to be funded by the biggest weirdo, loser, richest man ever.
I think there are going to be people who I wouldn't be surprised if that's not already happening, who will produce things that will fly in the face of what he's trying to do, especially in the rewriting of human knowledge.
Something to counter
this
at the very least.
And I know it sounds very basic, but you go to Wikipedia and while people can say, well, it's Wikipedia, but there are dozens of, uh,
citations on there saying where they got the information and you can go find out for yourself.
So while this is disappointing yet nothing new, I feel like good people will come to the rescue me like, Hey, step up.
Yeah, let's hope so.
We have news coming up next.
When we return civic media's new news director, Jolly Pittman is going to be joining us.
Stay close.
You are listening to Matt Nair on air.
This is the civic media radio network.
Good morning.
Welcome.
Welcome to Matt Nair on Air.
Jane Matt Nair, Greg Box, Sweet Calbee on the board.
Coming to you from our studio here at Radio Park in Racine.
Join us.
Call or text.
at 855-752-4842.
Leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube, and what used to be Twitter next hour after the 10 o'clock news.
He's the bug guy, entomologist PJ Leish from UW Madison is gonna be joining us to talk all things creepy crawlies, including ticks.
It's supposed to be a bad tick season, so we're gonna talk to PJ Leish.
about that after 10 o'clock right now, though, delighted to be joined by Civic Media's new news director.
Jolly Pittman is here.
Good morning, Jolly.
Nice to meet you.
Thanks for joining us.
Nice to meet you on air.
That's a hard one to say, isn't it?
New news.
New news.
New news, director.
You've been with us just about a month here at Civic Media for folks who don't know, including us.
If you want to tell us a little bit about your background, Jolly.
Sure.
Well, I've worked in broadcasting since I was an adult, since I was 18.
I come most recently from W-O-R-T, which is a community radio station in Madison, Wisconsin.
Interesting structure, mostly volunteer run and operated everyone on the air as a volunteer.
So very used to training and running a news department where we also had an hour-long news show.
Wow, that's great.
It's a big job.
Civic Media has news reporters all over the state.
We're going to talk about that a little bit more, a little bit later on.
But let's just talk with what happened over the weekend, Charlie, from the news department, at least as far as the U.S.
bombing Iran over the weekend.
Where do we stand right now?
Where do we stand right now?
Well, we're waiting.
We're watching and waiting, right?
Operation Midnight Hammer was the decision to strike Iran with these bunker buster bombs and these massive ordinance penetrators.
Obviously, our listeners heard that when we went live this weekend.
But right now, we don't know.
We are in the waiting period.
President Trump is slated to meet with the, I believe, the National Security Council later today.
The many nations around the world have condemned it or issued warnings, but we don't know.
Well, and I think the other thing that we don't know, the Trump administration has said, we completely obliterated Iran's nuclear capabilities.
From what I'm seeing this morning, that has not been confirmed.
We do not know that, correct?
Correct.
There are kind of aerial maps that you can look at and kind of guess at.
These three sites, Fordo Natanz and Isfahan, are deep underground, and they have this
I'm waving with my hands, but listeners can't see that calling attention to the limitations of the medium.
But there are these big, they're reinforced with concrete and all sorts of things in deep underground.
So they're hard to reach.
It's also hard to tell.
So we don't know that either.
Yeah, it's not like you can confirm this by sight and just say, yes, everything's been destroyed.
Because again, the president had warned
Iraqis or Iranians to evacuate with that was last weekend so They did have the the Iranians did have the opportunity to move things if they if they took that threat that Donald Trump said you should evacuate immediately if they took that threat seriously Then they we gave they they had a little time to move things
right now we aired the the
four minute, less than four minute address from President Trump on Saturday night.
And he claimed that their nuclear facilities had been obliterated.
But again, there's no way to know, especially that quickly.
And so we don't know what the potential is.
And this is, I mean, it's quite shocking on Saturday night, just to get the news coming through all the notifications.
And this came on the heels of him essentially saying, I believe you the Thursday or Friday, I'm going to give it two weeks.
He's
the king of the fortnight.
He loves two weeks two weeks to solve everything But he said two weeks and then this happened which obviously means that you know, I mean we have to assume They didn't just call on that Saturday said go this has been in the this has to be worked now I am speculating I do not work for DoD or state But for him to say two weeks and almost 48 hours later for this to happen
I don't want to say it's miscommunication, but it just doesn't seem like this was handled in the best way.
Hey, we have no idea what is going on behind closed
door and his
counsel.
I know that my Saturday night was disrupted.
Where were you, Greg?
I was right here running the Racine Raiders game at WRJN and going, oh, no, touchdown.
All right, cool.
Yay.
You know, it's like very much, there's.
There's no such thing as a quiet weekend or a slow Friday.
Every day, every day now, it can happen anytime.
News is always
breaking.
If you're just joining us, Civic Media's news director, Charlie Pittman, is our guest and we're talking a little bit about what we know as of today after the U.S.
bombed Iran over the weekend.
Where are Wisconsin's Republican lawmakers on this?
Where are Wisconsin's lawmakers in general on this, Charlie?
Glad you can glad you asked that you can find at civicmedia.us a roundup of reactions from Wisconsin's congressional delegation It's predictably divided Republicans mostly endorse it mostly and Democrats don't right and are calling on the passage of the an update to the war powers Sorry the
the War Powers Act, which would require congressional authorization to go to war.
To take
these kinds of moves.
Yeah, right, because
they did not have
this when he decided to do this over the weekend.
Well, so I watched the briefing yesterday at the Pentagon, and under the the War Powers Act of 1973, it says, you must inform Congress within 48 hours.
But what's new, there's a new resolution in Congress that was introduced by Representative Thomas Massey and also by a Republican from, I believe, Kentucky, and then Ro Khanna from California, who introduced a bill
into the house.
recently, but it hasn't been passed and it would require express authorization from Congress for any hostility, taking hostile action on Iran specifically.
For those who don't know, Thomas Massey is a Republican lawmaker who came out over the weekend pretty strongly against this move.
And now he is in the crosshairs of President Trump who said he's gonna make sure he's primaried and get him out of there because it does seem like
within the Republican Party or at least the magas, there is some division on whether or not this was the right thing to do.
Right.
And so I bring that up because Wisconsin's congressional delegation pointed back to that.
We have Representative Mark Pocan saying that this must be passed to block Trump from dragging the U.S.
into an unconstitutional war in the Middle East.
And we had others on the Democratic side echoing those statements.
Meanwhile, Senator Ron Johnson
endorsing it, saying, we could not allow Iran to become a nuclear power.
They were getting too close.
They wouldn't listen.
They wouldn't give it up.
So I support President Trump's action.
We had our own expert on Saturday night, Stephen Zunez, a professor at the University of San Francisco.
He called this nonsense.
He said the idea that there was some kind of imminent threat that required military action immediately was nonsense.
He pointed to the fact that we could go back to the Iran nuclear deal, but we don't have that anymore.
Right.
And that was a deal brokered by the Obama administration, which was in place and seemed to be working.
There were agreements, as far as if I remember this correctly, that our inspectors were allowed into Iran to check on their nuclear capabilities.
And then when Donald Trump was elected the first time around, he blew that up.
He pulled us out and blew us out of that, took us out of that deal that had been brokered by the Obama administration.
It's interesting though, Tulsi Gabbard was the one who essentially said last week that there were no signs of an imminent threat.
She did not go along with Donald Trump's assertion that it had been verified that Iran was ready to take a move.
And now it looks like Tulsi Gabbard has been kind of exed out out of everything.
Yep, I don't have much to say to that.
But she has now flipped and said that Iran could produce nuclear weapon within weeks.
So we're
going back and forth.
And back to Senator Ron Johnson.
He was on Fox News either it was yesterday or it might have been this morning because that is his favorite place to be.
And essentially said that this bombing now has done, he is even more resolved now to do more cutting in the budget bill.
Because what they want to cut from Medicaid and SNAP and all of that stuff, that's not enough.
Now that we've done this, he wants the cuts to go even deeper.
This is a very weird path to go from bombing Iran to Medicaid cuts.
One of the things I want to talk about really quick, and you both brought this up as far as the divide in the Republican Party, is that, you know, it's not just the lawmakers.
I remember listening to the Tom Hartman show here on civic media and a Republican called up and said, while he is a mega Republican, even this is giving him pause.
And when the world stage is saying, we don't like this, it is going to be interesting to see how, how president Trump will square this to the American public in the face of his own party isn't on board with this.
So.
But that's nothing like that ever makes him change his mind.
No, I know he just doubles down on it
and says he's right I didn't say it will change his mind.
I said it's how he's going to sell it
Well, let's talk about whether this is popular with the American public Anecdotally we had our reporter from Wisconsin Rapids Melissa K out there
on
Sunday And there was sort of an impromptu protest against this action She talked to people there and some told her that this reminded her of when president
Bush said there were weapons of mass destruction, right?
And is the child of parents who heavily followed that, you know, that has a deep and lasting impact on folks watching.
the United States potentially committed itself to yet another war.
Well, and you bring up a really good point, and George W. Bush and all of his advisors told the American people they had weapons of mass destruction.
That's why we needed to go to war.
And after how many years and how many lives and how many millions of dollars?
Trillions.
They did not have weapons of mass destruction.
Yes.
So, Melissa found a little...
Not maybe not necessarily swallowing the administration's claim that that ran was on the brink of attacking us Yeah,
yeah, she talked to the organizer who said it was a spur of the moment called action and that they were just too furious about the bombing of Iran to
they wanted to do something.
So, you know, not that there haven't been protests before in Wisconsin Rapids, but another thing to add to the protest list.
And I think that's a, you know, when you were speaking anecdotally, that's something that was very much on social media this weekend is, you know, pictures of George Bush saying there's WMDs and George and Donald Trump.
But also the other thing too, and I brought, I said this on Twitter was that during both his debate with now former president.
Biden and with Vice President Kamala Harris, he made it so clear that these two are going to be the ones that get us into war.
These two are going to put us in the crosshairs of World War III.
And I just found it very interesting that Russia invaded Ukraine in February of 2022.
And while we did give them munitions, we gave them resources, we gave them money, support, we never got involved in that war in almost three years if Joe Biden's presidency.
It took us
three months, less than six months to get into now what seems like a war with Iran, which is something that has been on the, has been on the stage for a long time.
That's something that people have really feared.
They've been pushing the notion of war with Iran.
Well, and again, you, you've said it correctly, Greg, in that Donald Trump said that everyone else was going to get us into World War three.
He's the peace president, maybe not so much.
We're going to continue our conversation with Jolly Pittman on the other side.
She is the news director here at Civic Media.
Stay with us.
You are listening to Matt Nair on air.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
Are my babies coming home tomorrow?
Ain't that good news?
Good, good morning.
Welcome, welcome to Matt and Air on Air.
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Our broadcast with baseball starts 6.05 today.
The crew hosting the Pirates.
Right now we are joined by Civic Media News Director Charlie Pittman is here.
And Charlie wanted to talk a little bit about the Wisconsin budget.
Yes, you're back at home.
OK.
You're back.
What's happening in Wisconsin?
Well, your guess is pretty much as good as mine here too.
I feel like I'm showing up and saying, I don't know, but I can help to get you to where we are at this point.
So last week, there were budget legislative committee, the budget writing committee, had a bunch of meetings and some planned meetings, not all of them.
materialized.
It will
take us back to last Thursday, it feels like so long ago.
The joint finance committee was scheduled to meet and it had some big ticket items on its agenda and they quickly, they canceled right before the meeting started.
So that's yours.
And
this was after, because we talked to some childcare providers who either closed their daycare centers or worked out special arrangements so they could drive three hours to get to Madison to attend this meeting.
And then our lawmakers, being as gracious as they are, just canceled it at the last minute.
Right and this was after a week of delaying the joint finance committee by by several hours I believe It's all kind of a blur, but I never quite entirely trust that these meetings are
gonna happen
time Or will happen at all.
Yeah,
so so that's where we were we saw a statement from Devon Lemay you that that the direction that were headed that the Republicans felt they were headed in a
in a direction taxpayers couldn't afford.
Now we hear from Tip McGuire, a Democrat who's also on that committee saying, look, you're giving into the desires of your most extreme legislative caucuses, and that's a quote.
And he's pointing to this internal disagreement in the Republican Party.
So first we had budget talks between Democrat Governor Tony Evers and the Republican leadership breakdown.
This last week, and coming into this week,
We have internal disagreement within the GOP.
There are two state senators, both Republicans, who say they're not, or have gestured that they're not going to vote for the budget, for a new budget.
And they are, let's see, Kappengut, Senator Chris Kappengut, and state Senator Steve Noss, a Republican from Whitewater.
two slightly different reasons.
Kappenga had previously said that he wasn't going to vote for it because he believes the existing budget should carry over.
In a kind of thread following his reasoning, he says it would be the lowest spending increase in a decade and that there would be no risk of Governor Evers veto pen.
And so that's why he says he's not going to vote for it.
And then there's state Senator Steve Nos who has repeatedly come after
kind of the GOP leadership and everyone to say that this quote might be the worst process used in all of his time in the legislature, unquote.
So the worst budget process.
So we have two kind of disgruntled Republican senators who, you know, because there's a slim majority, Republicans need those two to get to a deal.
So again, we don't really know, but what
What comes after this, right?
Well, we have Rumors swirling last week of an 87 million dollar cut to higher education funding UW Madison That is that's a cut when Governor Evers had proposed an 850 million increase for the universities of Wisconsin or UW system So we don't
You know that that's a huge disparity and trying to square that I think is a difficult difficult thing
and it sounds like this sounds like the federal level too You have Ron Johnson saying I don't like this budget and it's not because he wants to put more money into help you be like we need to cut more We need to cut even more more this programs me to get gotten rid of and Chris Cappenga is really just the human version of this whole process going Yeah, let's just do the old one
and I just find it interesting that
at least some of our lawmakers believe that they can take no action.
They can do nothing.
Again, after the joint finance committee traveled around the state, four different stops hearing from hundreds of Wisconsinites about the top issues that are important to them, but our Republicans apparently feel secure enough that them not doing anything is going to be just fine with everybody.
It's
going to be just fine.
Chris Kappenga, who said we should just wait and do nothing, is also the man who said in that same upfront interview that they are the voice of the people.
So apparently the people say, don't do anything, just it's fine, it's all good to go.
It's very disappointing to see this kind of gridlock and see the finger pointing that's happening.
If you would like our lawmakers to do something, you can always reach them in a real handy dandy way.
Go to myvote.wi.gov, myvote.wi.gov, just put in your address.
All the contact information for all of your lawmakers will appear.
You can always give them a friendly, polite phone call.
Check in on what they are or are not doing in Madison.
Shaly Pittman is the news director for Civic Media.
She's going to be joining us every Monday.
Thank you so very much, Shaly.
Really appreciate your time and we will see you next week.
Thanks so much.
We have news coming up next, and then we'll return, talk all things creepy crawlies with PJ Leish, the bug guy.
You're listening to Matt and Air on Air on the Civic Media Radio
Network.
My telephone ain't that good news Land ain't that news
Good morning and welcome, welcome to Matt and Air on Air.
Jane Matt and Air, Greg Bach and Calvin Butenoff.
Coming to you live from our studio at Radio Park in Racine, you can join us.
Call our text at 855-752-8552.
4842 you can also leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on facebook youtube and what used to be twitter he is known as the bug guy he heads up the entomology lab at u w madison pj leash is here good morning pj it's been way too long it's like been months and months and months since we had you on the show how you doing good
good it definitely has been a wild jane i know we collected connected last year about uh
all the craziness with the periodical cicadas.
And
that
was for me at this point.
But it's great to be back.
Glad to have you back.
I know that we're going to start with ticks.
And this is expecting to be a really bad tick season.
It is.
And for me, the tick season has really been going on for several months already.
That seems like way too soon.
Well, it does.
I mean, one thing I have been seeing, especially the last couple of years, you know, we had that mild El Nino winter two years ago, and this last winter was kind of wimpy in a lot of regards.
We didn't have a whole lot of snow where I'm located.
And folks kind of let their guard down.
They think, you know, in their mind, it's December.
It's
January.
I'm not thinking about ticks.
I'm thinking about
Christmas decorations and New Year's and stuff like that and I found quite a few folks will like stop giving their their dogs their outdoor pets that that preventive flea and tick
and then all
of a sudden they're contacting me in late January saying hey my dog's got
fleas as well.
It's it's been warm enough.
So when we aren't getting those kind of cold classic Wisconsin winter, some of these things are becoming active a little bit earlier.
You could potentially bump into them.
I mean, I never like I don't care what the temperature is.
Maybe I'll get her flea and tick medicine on the first of the month, every single month.
And I don't tell me that since that's crazy that people would think, well, it's not the it's not it's not hot.
And we don't live in the woods, of course, either.
So why would we
It doesn't matter.
Yeah,
but it's, you know, it's January.
You think I'd let my dog out?
They're going to pick up fleas?
It's January.
Right.
And I mean, generally, the risk is going to be pretty low that time of the year.
But like ticks, for example, if it's about above freezing, maybe it's 40 degrees or thereabouts, you can potentially bump into ticks.
So my journal mindset is if there's no snow on the ground and it's above freezing, you better be at least thinking about them.
Pets should be getting those preventatively in tick treatments.
Make
sure you're checking yourself and kids and grandkids and stuff like that because ticks are not something you want to mess
with.
Well, and there really isn't PJ, a good way except to bet even staying out of the woods isn't isn't enough to protect you from ticks because they're kind of everywhere.
They are showing up in more and more locations and it's really interesting to me because the tick situation
this is really something that is an emerging health threat in our lifetimes.
Because the first deer tick, and when I think of ticks in Wisconsin, we've got different species, but there's like the common one folks call the wood tick, also called the American dog tick.
If I were gonna pick a tick to be bitten by, it would be that one, because I know the disease risks are very low from it.
It's the deer tick that we have the most concerns with.
Everyone has heard of Lyme disease, but there's other diseases they carry, anaplasmosis, babesiosis.
There's even some viruses, very, very rare at this point.
Lyme seems to be our biggest threat, but our first deer tick wasn't formally documented in the state until about the late 1960s, early 1970s.
Fast forward today, and they've been found in essentially every county in Wisconsin.
in my mind we're kind of watching that that big bang or you know that that rock has been thrown into the pond the ripples are still expanding and we don't know fully when that expansion is going to stop and so you go back thirty years ago and you think of oh you know a hunter and avid hiker out in the woods they've got to worry about right
Now we're starting to see ticks pop up sometimes in backyards in suburban areas and stuff like that man That's a concern.
Yeah, I'm gonna ask a really elementary question PJ and it's about that what you just spoke about the Discovery of deer ticks was it a matter of they always existed and we didn't know them
or it's something that it was a new species of tick that we discovered in the... because I grew up in the 80s and 90s and I can't tell you exactly when, but I just remember there was a time before Lyme disease and deer ticks and then it was... that's all you heard for a very long time.
Is that what happened?
Is it like they evolved into a new species or we just didn't know about them and all of a sudden we discovered them?
Yeah, so if you go back to the 1960s, 1970s when we were...
Finding our first ones if you want to define that species you'd have to go way south of us places like Texas and stuff like that And so what it probably happened over time is ticks were getting carried up on birds or you know long-distance migration of mammals and things like that and
You know, there's some interesting things that that can go on when you have movement of species, be it ticks or other things.
You know, let's say in theory, you move a lone male from somewhere else and you put a male in that species here in Wisconsin.
That's the end of
the
story.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Right.
What if you moved a female?
Well, if she had mated.
Could there be a possibility?
Yeah, but you also have to have the right density of ticks.
You know, if in theory I moved a male of a species to Kenosha and a female to Douglas County, they're never gonna
find each
other.
So you need enough of these things being moved in for them to be able to find each other.
And once they do that, if the conditions are right, they can basically get a, you know, a beach head, so to speak, or get a foot in the door.
then they can start a population, start increasing their numbers.
If you're just joining us, PJ Leish is our guest.
He is known as the bug guy.
He heads the entomology department at UW Madison and we are talking ticks because ticks are a growing concern all across the country, essentially.
And so I'm someone who I went camping once and I found two ticks, one on my leg, one on the back of my ear, which wow.
And what do people do?
And, you know, there's one thing to avoid them.
We can talk about that.
But like you go camping or you're out in the woods or you're driving back and you find a tick on your leg.
What is the next step?
Yeah.
So the next step, if you find one on you is going to be to remove it.
Now, if
it's just crawling and it hasn't bitten you yet, that's easy.
Just, you know, grab it and squish it.
I probably wouldn't take it and well, I probably wouldn't even squish it.
per se because if there's pathogens inside the tech, you know, if you had a little cut on your skin or something like that, I wouldn't want to deal with that.
I would probably wrap it up in a like a tissue, put it in a plastic bag so you can seal it and put it in the trash or put it that bag in the freezer to kill it.
You know, if you happen to be
Taking a shower and you find a tick on you flush it down the drain
or
something like that But I wouldn't take it and just toss it back on the lawn
because they're they're
long-lived creatures
right
and that brings up an important point because
ticks differ from mosquitoes.
We know some mosquitoes can carry diseases and mosquito lands on you, they bite you, they don't feed very long.
When ticks feed, it's very different.
It's a long, drawn-out process.
They actually insert their mouth parts, they kind of glue them in place, and they might be attached for several days or upwards of a week.
So this is, it's not a fast process like mosquitoes.
Also along those lines, when a tick like a deer tick
transmits Lyme disease, it takes quite a while.
They really need to be attached for about 36 hours.
So about a day and a half before transmission can occur.
And that's why in my mind, one of the single best things you can do as a precaution is to do regular tick checks.
Because if you're out playing in your yard or hiking or camping, maybe you had a tick on you.
But if you know, oh, it could have only been on me.
three hours or six hours or 12 hours, even if it has lime, because you've removed it in a relatively short span of time.
It hasn't been on a day and a half.
Your risk goes down greatly to basically zilch.
So they really have to be attached.
So I generally remind folks to do a tick check at the end of the day if they've been outside or if I'm going somewhere where I know there happen to be a lot of ticks, I'm probably doing a tick check as soon as I get back to the car or as soon as I get
home.
Yeah.
because that's a great precaution to really, really reduce your risk.
When we found the one, the one in the back of my head was gone.
Like you could just flick it right off.
The one that was in my leg was buried.
And what we did was we took clear nail polish and we just brushed right over it.
So it can't breathe.
It can't breathe, suffocate it and then give it, and then getting rid of it was a challenge because it had borrowed its head into my leg.
And I went to the doctor, everything was fine.
But it was just that thing of like, I, I had just heard of ticks.
I was not educated on that.
And when that happened, I started to freak out.
And so that's good to know that, you know, that I did not know that until right now, that the transference of virus or disease takes a little bit longer.
So the tick checks are very important.
But PJ, going back to the best way to get it out, is nail polish or Vaseline or what do experts recommend?
Yeah, so the best thing is simply to use tweezers or forceps.
Grab it as close to the skin as you can in just a slow, steady pull.
We don't want to do anything that may be pretty traumatic to the tick.
I've heard of things that when I was a kid, this was this was circulate, you know, you burn it with a match or something like that, or, you know, you crush it.
Well, if that tick does have some sort of disease or disease or pathogen, are you potentially introducing that because you're causing a lot of trauma to the tick?
So a slow, steady pull is probably going to be your best.
route of action for that.
Ask him nicely.
Could you just back out of there?
That'd be really, I'd really appreciate that.
Go on my neighbor's dog.
I don't like that dog.
Go over there.
There's a lot of room.
The other thing too though, we're joking about this, but Lyme disease is very serious.
For folks who have had Lyme disease, that is not a joke.
Right, right.
Yeah, very serious disease.
And we do know some individuals can have, you know, kind of longer term problems.
in a lot of situations, if it is detected and caught early and treated with a course of antibiotics, folks usually respond pretty well for that.
And actually in some parts of the country, like the upper Midwest where we are and also New England, those are, if you look at a map of Lyme disease cases, those are the two areas that glow.
And so medical professionals
will basically for those parts of the country where you have lots of deer ticks and Lyme disease, if you are bitten by a tick and you know it's been attached for a day or two and risk is increasing, often a doctor or physician will prescribe a short-term course of antibiotics because we know that works very well.
If you basically hit it early, it doesn't have time to cause problems in your body.
Because from what I understand, sometimes, unfortunately, it can take people.
It can take several diagnoses to get to the point where they recognize that it's actually Lyme disease, which can be part of the problem.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And there's Lyme disease, and there's actually a couple related microorganisms.
There's anaplasmosis, babesiosis.
And sometimes the symptoms can be a little bit vague.
Not everyone gets the classic bullseye rash that we hear about for Lyme disease.
Or if you have maybe darker skin, it's just hard to see that rash, and it gets overlooked.
then those symptoms can be kind of vague.
It's
in genes and things like that.
And so
it can sometimes take a while to get a formal diagnosis.
Or be attributed to something else.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We're going to continue our conversation with PJ Leish.
He heads the Entomology Department Diagnostic Lab at UW Madison.
He is known as Wisconsin's bug guy.
We have a question for you on the other side.
PJ, from Haleen, from Muscaday.
That is all coming up.
Stay close.
You are listening to Matt Nair on Air.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
Swing man she can
you
Good morning and welcome back to Matt Nair on air.
Jane Matt Nair, Greg Bach, Dr. Slide on the board.
Coming to you from our studio at Radio Park in Racine.
Join us, call or text at 855-752-4842.
You can also leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube and what used to be Twitter.
Coming up a little bit later on today, Maggie Dawn's show from four to six.
She's going to be talking to Ellen Berman.
from the American Foreign Policy Council for a follow-up after the U.S.
bombed Iran over the weekend.
What does this mean for Wisconsin?
Join Maggie Dawn this afternoon from four to six across the network.
We are joined right now by Wisconsin's bug guy, PJ Leish, heads up the entomology diagnostic lab at UW Madison.
And before we went to the break, PJ, we were talking about ticks.
And we had a question from Halina in Muscaday.
What about adding nematodes to my yard?
Yeah, it's an interesting topic.
So pretty much everyone has heard of nematodes or roundworms.
So these microscopic, pale, worm-like creatures.
common and ubiquitous in soil around the world.
There are certain nematodes that are associated with plants, some with animals and things like that.
And so there's a small group of nematodes we call entomopathogenic or insect killing nematodes, ticks and things like that too.
There's been some work in the laboratory looking at, you know, using some of these, and if you put a tick in a petri dish and put in the right type of nematodes, they can become infected.
What I haven't seen really demonstrated would be the kind of the field study aspect of that, to be able to put these nematodes out on your lawn and have them make an actual difference.
And I think what would be most important in my mind is getting at the question of
Yes, do you kill some ticks?
But if you do that, does that make a difference for human health?
If we apply these, are we seeing a significant notable reduction in cases of Lyme or something like that?
So
again, I haven't seen that sort of thing from the field aspect.
There is still work going on on the biological control of ticks.
I will say I also have some colleagues here at UW Madison, Dr. Susan Paskowitz, who's our medical entomologist, and she's got a big lab group.
They do a lot of tick research, very, very active in that regard.
And they have been doing some studies just using like over the counter granular lawn type treatments you can get from the hardware store.
And it's been showing some good results in terms of cutting down tick numbers.
So there are some options out there.
We are seeing more and more companies offering tick control services.
And in my mind, you don't necessarily have to treat your entire lawn.
But let's say you have a situation where
maybe live in northern Wisconsin.
So you've got some lawn around your house, then you've got the
woods.
The
woods, yeah.
The high-risk area for me is going to be kind of the edge where your lawn meets the woods.
Usually a lawn, if it's open and sunny, that's often too dry.
It's not great habitat usually for ticks.
They like more of the vegetation, holds in more moisture.
And so if they're in the woods, they may wander into edges of yards.
So we know there's some research where
you could use a little bit of a granular product, kind of treat a band, like a perimeter around
your
yard.
And that may help the ticks from moving in.
So that way, if you have the kids swing set closer to the house, you know, risk is going to go down in locations like that.
I had read somewhere and correct me if I'm wrong and do possums eat ticks because I might just get a possum.
Oh, so there's there's this idea out there that possums are just like
Hoover vacuums going around sucking up ticks horrible things.
Yes.
I've done some digging on that and I have not really found you know a strong scientific backing for that and what some of this may come from and the same kind of thing comes I hear about like guinea fowl on occasion these chicken like birds and some of this goes back to like laboratory studies where you have
Some animal a bat or a chicken or something like that and you say oh it ate when we provided them it ate five ticks in this span of time Therefore we if we extrapolate they could eat a thousand a day or whatever it may be I have looked at papers in the scientific literature like
you know, folks have captured possums for studies or looked at roadkill ones and look at the gut contest just to see what they're eating.
And it's not completely full of ticks or anything like that.
So again, this idea that possums are just out there hoovering them up.
I haven't seen science to back that
up.
There goes my olive the opossum.
Well, Jane, if I've told you once, I feel like I tell you this every day, if you want to get a possum by a possum, just remember you will officially be
the lady with the possum.
That's
probably
not good.
Cindy from Appleton.
Cindy, we only got about 90 seconds left.
Thank you for joining us.
Did you have a question for PJ?
Cindy, go ahead.
No, apparently not.
Cindy cannot hear us.
Cindy, you can always call back if you want.
But again, we've only got about two minutes left.
PJ, we're not going to have time to delve into this too deeply, but
The state of our pollinators is still really serious, is it not?
We should be planting lots of flowers in our yards.
It is.
I mean, we've been hearing about this for years in terms of bees.
And usually in the news, what we get bombarded with is news about honeybees, which are really important agriculturally, but they're not native.
And as humans, we can raise them as colonies.
We can split them into two colonies, increase their numbers.
What is much more alarming to me are all our wild pollinators.
We've got
about 500 species of bees in the state.
So if you take out honey bees and bumble bees, we've got, you know, 475 or so other species that often just fly into the radar.
Folks don't recognize what they are.
A lot of them might look wasp-like and be mistaken for something else.
But then there's all the beetles, flies.
butterflies, moths, which often get a bad rap.
Those can be critical pollinators, too.
And we're seeing issues with those as well.
And really, we're hearing more and more rumblings about general insect declines.
And what's scary to me, I mean, we know agriculture and land use changes play a role with this.
But scientists are seeing in kind of pristine wilderness areas compared to 30 years ago, drastic declines in numbers and diversity of insects, which is really scary to me.
Well, they might be
creepy crawly, but we need them.
We need them.
We need our bugs.
Yes, very much so.
We're going to get you back before another six months go by.
PJ Leish is the Wisconsin bug guy.
He heads up the Entomology Diagnostic Unit at UW Madison.
Thank you so much, PJ.
We'll have you back soon.
Sounds good.
Thanks for having me.
Appreciate your time.
News is coming up next when we return.
Audio Sorbet.
We lighten things up for the last half hour of the show.
Stay close.
You are listening to Matt Nair on air on the Civic Media Radio Network.
you just
Good morning and welcome back to Matt and Air on Air.
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Dr. Slide on the board coming to you from our studio at Radio Park in Racine.
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Call her text at 855-752-4842.
Leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook, YouTube, and what used to be Twitter brewers hosting the Pirates later on.
Our broadcast will start at 6.05.
And you can listen to the game on Terrestrial Radio.
In Richland, center on W-R-C-E, W-I-S-S and Oshkosh, W-R-J-N here in Racine and Kenosha, W-C-Q-M in Park Falls near Butternut, and W-E-Z-H in Heyward.
They also may
have a chance to just go to a game.
Yeah.
They need to listen to here on Free Ticket Friday.
Free Ticket
Friday.
Exactly.
And I'm just thinking about baseball because I need to go.
Sorry.
I'm surprised you haven't been
yet.
Oh, me too.
Me too.
Maybe this will be the week.
But our broadcast starts tonight at 6 0 5.
The crew hosting the pirates here on Civic Media.
This is the portion of the show where we try and lighten things up and take a little break away from the news.
We call it Audio Sorbet.
The Cleansing.
the ears Just so we can all take a breath and maybe have a couple of chuckles.
We're gonna get in that many years and clean them.
We're gonna do that.
So This came up last week Yeah, we didn't get around to this but here is the Question of the day.
Yeah, do you still balance your checkbook?
8 5 5 7 5 2 4 8 4 2 do you still
Balance your checkbook.
That's our audio survey question for today.
855-752-4842.
And if you
place your hand upon your ear and listen to the West, you can just hear all the people under 40 going, what?
They do what?
You did what?
You do what?
Oh, my MEMA has a checkbook.
But now you know someone.
Well, I don't just know someone.
I know someone.
Some ones?
Yes.
No, no, no, no.
So one older, one younger.
That was, so I was hanging out with my mother-in-law, wonderful lady, Patty Becker, what's up?
And she was talking about still balancing her checkbook.
And it's just something she does.
It, you know, of course it does the job it's supposed to do, but it's also like a, it makes me feel better
thing.
I understand.
I like to know where all my pennies are.
And this is one
way I can do that.
I do not balance my checkbook.
I do not own a checkbook.
I do not write checks.
If I, I pay everything online.
And the only thing I would ever pull checks out for live cashier checks were for rent because I had, I had landlords in the past who would hold on to rent checks for a while until he got all of them.
And then Oh, that would
really screw up your
balance.
Exactly.
So.
So I don't deal with it.
I don't I mean fine do your thing, but I was I just sort of attributed it to like oh My mother-in-law is almost 80.
Of course.
She bows the checkbook.
She loves law and swell cuz adorable then my friend who is I'm three years younger than me shot up and goes I still balance my checkbook too.
I'm like oh I am the one who's out of place here right now.
You're the one I am I am not of the I am not of the cool cuz you know how you know how like
Bell bottoms always come back and records are now back with quite ferocity.
Trends return.
Yeah.
People listen to cassette tapes again.
I don't know why.
Maybe balancing checkbooks is the new cool retro thing to do.
Oh, could be.
Could be.
It could be.
I mean, that would, that would mean we are
embracing all kinds of retro things.
That would mean you'd have to go to a bank.
I don't mean just like, like texture bank.
You have to walk into a bank.
Go into the physical bank.
Order checks.
Wait for them to be delivered.
They're not just going to be like, oh, here's your digital scan copy of checks.
It's a process.
Once you get that big folder of checks, then someone has to teach you how to write a check.
Because I guarantee you a lot of people don't know how to write checks.
That's really interesting.
I never thought of that.
It's an involved process.
You got to get all the information correct or else.
You never know.
So we got two questions going.
Oh boy.
Do you
know how to write a check?
And do you still balance your checkbook?
855-752-4842, 855-75 Civic Todd from Depeer listening in Green Bay on WGBW says, I do balance my checkbook, but I use Excel every day.
Okay.
Rich in Wisconsin Rapids listening on WAUK.
Yup, I've been balancing for 51 years.
There you go.
Good for you.
I was never to say, I was, I have a, I was given the great gift of financial literacy from a very young age, not always responsibility cause I'm, you know, but financial literacy, I started writing checks at a young age.
I started having my own, being responsible for my own money at a young age.
But what's funny is that my parents never sat me down and said, all right, we're going to teach you how to balance your checkbook.
That always felt like something adults did.
I started writing checks.
probably in my early teens,
because
I had my own checking account.
And of course it was supervised by my parents, but I never learned how to balance a checkbook.
Plus it's also math, which at that age was like, no, thank you.
I'll just be broke.
I'd
rather be surprised.
I'd rather write a bad check than do mathematics.
Do you still balance your checkbook?
Do you still write checks, eight, five, five, seven, five, two, four, eight, four, two, that's eight, five, five, seven, five, civic.
There are a couple of things I still write checks for.
Like what?
The city of the water department.
Yeah.
I write a check to them quarterly.
Why do you do that?
Because it comes in the mail.
And I pay it.
I get my little card in the mail every, I think we pay it every other month.
I have a dashboard set up online, and I get an email saying your water bill is available, and I literally pay the water bill the moment I get it.
That day.
Because the first time I got a water bill, I paid it, then the second one, I just forgot about it.
And then the next water bill was like twice as much, and then I realized that.
It's an
unpleasant
surprise.
I do not write checks for that.
No, I just don't write checks.
I just don't.
And I did balance my checkbook for years and years and years.
Do you do what?
Roger from Steven's point it does he monitors his checking account through his
app see now I now I just check the now I check the bank website
Exactly, and
that's where I know how where I am I
have but
I but I do not fill out the physical Check recorder
and no no
haven't done that in a long time.
I have the same thing I check my app all the time And also I get notifications on my phone that say you know
Your account has been debited.
There's been a spending on your account and everything matches.
So if something even, even honestly, Jane, if it's like, if I go to quick trip and buy a soda for a buck five, it's telling me a buck five has been spent.
So I always know what's going
on.
checks.
Roger, from Steven's point, I monitor my checking account weekly, so I balance my checkbook through my bank's app.
Jan from Oak Creek, I balance my checkbook every day online for security, and because I must, I have gotten in trouble many years ago, now keeping a good track of it, and I have learned I must discipline myself
to
do it every day.
I don't write checks, though I do carry one in my purse, just in case.
And I keep the paper and pencil ledger.
of my check, my checkbook too.
Good for you, Jen.
Yeah.
But
again, good for you for recognizing that you got in trouble because you weren't paying close enough attention to it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And then honestly, like we always hear stories of identity theft and whatnot, but there are stories out there of people just like someone getting your information spent in
35 bucks on something or you know, it's so small they can get in there and
send those little Oh,
yeah, and and also fees are out there and it just it's a good you know The question of do you balance your checkbook is one that is is fun to talk about but it really that financial literacy of your account being being Vigilant and looking at whether it's in your checkbook whether it's online whether it's going to the bank and asking for a printout of your History, which they will do for you.
Yeah, but yeah, Jan.
That's very very good stuff to do but
I don't think I can't there's no there's no way I'm going back to checks I know thank you nothing anything well most of the places I go anyways don't accept them
yeah and you hate to well for one thing you hate to be the person at the grocery store pulling out the check with four people behind you because you will hear the collective groan do they even still accept checks anymore I think it depends about where you shop yeah I mean maybe in smaller yeah smaller communities Mike Gavin do you even know how to write a check
as our resident young person.
You know, I'm slightly offended by that, but I'll take it and try it.
Yes, I do know how to write a check.
I have a checkbook that being said, the last time I used it was probably paying rent in college.
So it's been a couple of years since I've even used it.
Wow.
Calvin, I was not
expecting an answer at all.
So you have every right to feel
insulted by that because I mean honestly at your age and there's a lot of landlords out there who accept Venmo or will do direct bank transfers and things that so I would absolutely assume that not only would I assume you didn't have a checkbook but you wouldn't know how because young people don't
Don't have
to you don't have to it's not something you need to do is to survive
see and maybe that's a generational thing too because the whole Venmo thing just makes me twitchy
I don't think it's a general.
I don't think it's a generation thing I know plenty people your age who are on Venmo.
I
know again because I Know why it's like I we are so automated and so there's I just know let me ask you a question
Have you bought anything online?
Perhaps what's the difference?
There's a little lock in the left-hand
corner.
You think Venmo is just like, it's like some guy named Steve.
His name is
Steve Venmo.
Hey Calvin, you gotta pay Jane.
I'll give us some money.
You pay me back later.
It's
just the newer technologies all, I'm like, I'm gonna wait.
I want to sit back a little bit and watch
this.
Venmo didn't come out
last month.
It's been around for a long time.
Not
for a decade.
Almost.
Those peer-to-peer paying sites have been around for a while.
I'll make you a Venmo site.
And it's secure.
I don't know.
I don't want it.
I'm not going to use it.
You sound like my mom.
You can't make me.
You sound like my mom when CDs came out.
She's like, I won't need CDs.
I have all these tapes.
And then a month or two later, she's like, I bought the Beatles
White album on CD.
8-5-5-7-5-2-4-8-4-2.
Do you still?
Balance your checkbook.
Do you still write checks?
Kurt from Eau Claire, I have had a checkbook for 46 years and never balanced it.
I write checks now because I refuse to pay convenience fees.
And now with the internet, I check my Friday every week
on Fridays.
That's a great thing to do.
That's really smart.
That's very, very smart.
Yeah, convenience fees ends.
I never thought about that.
I mean, they'll charge you fees no matter what.
If they can.
Yeah, exactly.
Cindy from Appleton is on the line.
Good morning, Cindy.
Thanks for joining us.
What do you want to say about this?
Well, Venmo, what's Venmo?
Oh, stop.
You've heard of Venmo, Cindy.
Thank you, Cindy.
I'm serious.
I have no idea what half of these things are.
And I do like you, Jane.
I go on my account online just about daily to make sure everything looks cultured.
But I'm starting to feel like I'm being discriminated against.
And I'll give you a little story from this weekend.
Continue.
Continue.
I went to, I was down in Fort Atkinson for an event Friday night and on my way home, I'm doing this 30 trails challenge with the Fox, these greenways.
So I stopped at the glacial river trail, rolled about six, seven miles on that.
And then I went up to Jefferson and got on the glacial drumming trail.
And when I got to the glacial drumming trail,
There was no place to pay anything except with a QR code.
I don't have a smartphone.
I can't use a QR code.
So I called the office number and I said, what am I supposed to do?
I don't have a way to do this.
I'm an old lady.
I don't believe in all this crap.
And so she said, well, nobody's going to do anything.
Don't worry about it.
And I said, well, tell you what, when I get home, I'll make a payment online, which is what I did.
But I'm like, this is baloney.
You are such a, you are such a good person for doing that, Cindy.
I think
it's so funny.
Good for you.
I will, I do, I do not have a smartphone.
I'll go online at home and do it.
Because she's a
good responsible human being.
Well done, Cindy.
You both
are silly, Billy's.
That's great.
All right, when we return, we're gonna wrap it up with this shouldn't be a thing, the Lost and Found Edition.
Stay close.
This is Matt and Aaron here on the Civic Media Radio Network.
Good morning.
Welcome back to Matt Maher on air Jane Matt Maher and Greg Bach Calvitini on the board coming to you live from our studio at Radio Park in Racine You can always join us call or text at 855-752-4842 You can also leave a comment if you're watching on the live stream on Facebook YouTube and what used to be Twitter coming up tomorrow Todd Alba
Our friend and colleague and host of the Todd Alba show from two to four across the network.
He is going to join us at 9 35 to talk all things news.
Maybe we'll have some movement on the Wisconsin state budget.
Yeah, probably not.
No, I
don't think so.
They're just going to walk away from it.
But anyway, Todd will be joining us tomorrow.
in the first hour at 9.35.
So I hope you can join us for that.
Right now, it is 10.53.
Calvin, that means it's time for...
This shouldn't be a thing.
As always, if you have a thing you think should not be, send it into Greg and me at janesaysatcivicmedia.us.
This is from upi.com.
Ben Hooper, our hero.
Ben
Hooper back
with me.
With the byline, headline reads, items left on British buses include bales of hay and a frozen turkey.
What?
British transport company Megabus, sharing some of its most unusual lost property that people leave behind on their buses, including hay bales, a frozen turkey, a walk.
and false teeth.
Now that you would think would jump out at you.
I mean...
You would need those unless you got an extra set.
I'm just imagining you're just taking your teeth out and putting them in the chair next
to you.
Or in
a little pouch thing?
A seat you have not paid for.
It's illegally writing.
That
your
teeth?
Yeah.
Yeah, I'm trying to think...
I feel bad for the person who forgot the frozen turkey, because they got off and they're like, and as the bus is pulling by, they're like, oh!
Meemaw's gonna kill me.
I had one job.
But you wouldn't think that would, you would miss that?
Like, I got onto the bus carrying a frozen turkey, I am leaving the bus without something.
Okay, I will defend this on one point.
Okay.
How often are you carrying frozen turkeys?
Never.
Okay.
How often are you carrying your purse?
More often, you'd say?
Yes.
So when you get off a bus or you get off a...
It's not a regular thing.
It's not a
regular thing.
You may not think about it.
And a bus can be like, I gotta get off the bus.
I understand why you'd forget something very unusual because you're not used to it being there in your life.
Therefore, you're watching the bus drive away.
I think you're being very generous.
I'm
being very generous because we've all forgotten that thing where we like...
I can't believe I forgot that thing.
My friend left a comedy event once to go get a mic stand because the mic stand was gone.
He went back to the club, got the mic stand, walked into the building without the mic stand in his hand.
So I can understand why you might forget something that unusual.
It
happens.
Exactly.
It happens.
We're talking lost and found on the British bus company Megabus, other items found in May.
In Justin May Winnie the Pooh stuff toy a jar of honey would have been nice if it was sitting right next to Winnie the Pooh a Radiohead vinyl record which one insulin oh god an electric razor a Neil Diamond CD a collection of historic coins and stamps oh boy a guitar tell me
more
and a single shoe
It's like, you're really driving Jane and you just see a shoe on the freeway.
How did that happen?
Yes, I went to a college with a young, with a woman who said that she claimed it was snow pigs.
That was her, that was, because we would always see them.
You always see one, you never see two shoes lying by the side of the road.
You see one shoe.
But
snow pigs,
what are those?
Snow pigs.
It was there invisible.
You can't see them.
They hide in drifts and then they come out and grab one shoe.
That was her, that was her explanation.
Well, yeah, it was college.
So this is just me, I, oh, Jane, we could do this monthly.
The monthly report of Megabus.
From
Megabus?
Lost and found, because if this is just May.
I know, just
May.
In years past, they have found three bales of hay, which are big.
Hay bales are big.
Yeah.
Family tree documents, a frozen turkey, false teeth, multiple single shoes and socks.
Megabus says about 95% of lost and found items are eventually returned to their owners.
Really?
Those that go unclaimed after 28 days get donated to charity.
Anyone who loses an item on a megabucks megabus is encouraged to report your lost frozen turkey on their website.
Oh, great.
You've donated a right tennis shoe.
Amazing.
Thank you so much.
Thank you, Megabus.
You're
helping the good work.
Really helped a lot.
I really hope there's a June report.
We'll go back.
We'll double check and see what.
We'll
request
Ben
Hooper to do this.
When Megabus does their next report on June.
How amazing would it be if we get Megabus on the show
monthly to talk about their loss and found?
We can try and make that happen.
Amazing.
We have the power.
We do.
All right.
That wraps up today's episode of...
This shouldn't be a thing.
Also coming up this week, Jim Santel will be back on Thursday along with Brittany Merlot, a little weather and wine.
We still have this heat warning in effect, I believe until seven o'clock tonight.
So please be careful, keep an eye on yourself and your neighbors and especially your pets.
Good time to let the dog, I don't know, chase the tennis ball in the house.
Yeah, yeah, indeed.
And then maybe storms coming in tonight.
So hopefully that's going to clear out here a little bit.
Cool.
Hot rain.
All right.
Thank you, Greg and Kelvin and all of our engineers, because without you, nothing works.
And thank you most of all for calling and for texting and for listening.
It means the world.
I hope you find some joy today, even if it's just a little bit and you have the chance to share it.
Keep it right here.
News coming up next, followed by Tom Hartman from 11 to two across the vast statewide, countrywide.
Take us global on the app.
This is Civic Media on Radio Network, and we'll see you tomorrow.
