You're listening to Civic Media.
You can tune into any of our live shows on any radio station across the state with the Civic Media app.
Find us in your phone's app store and listen anytime, anywhere.
All across Wisconsin from Civic Media.
This is Up North News Radio.
Now, live from our Lake Wissota studio, here's the founding editor of Up North News at Brightlaw.
Well, hey there, Wisconsin.
Good morning.
It is 6.06 on this Wednesday morning, March 26, 2025.
It's another beautiful morning to have you here up north.
Live from Lake Wissota from wherever you're listening across the Civic Media Radio Network on the app, on social media, or by podcast.
We appreciate you getting the day going right here.
here in the middle of the week and on this last day of winter.
And by that, I mean the last day of baseball winter.
The regular season opens up tomorrow.
I got a question for you.
Is there a term, either behavioral, psychological, something, when someone is caught lying?
and not only refuses to take responsibility for the lie and for the bad deed that they're lying about, but then just blames everybody else and even takes credit for doing the bad thing that they did that they're lying about and denying that they did.
I'm sure that there's a right term for it, but since I'm not a medical professional, I won't go there, but you can, I'm sure think of terms and we'll talk about the Keystone cops out there in the White House and their group text about national security matters and the culture of denial and bro-ism that is far too pervasive in leadership circles in this country today.
Tony right away on YouTube.
I believe the word you're looking for is called MAGA.
Perhaps.
I don't know if that's the medical diagnosis, but there's something in there.
Coming up at 630, we have our climate check.
Normally, we'd be talking to Melissa Baldoff.
Melissa's off this week.
We have a very special guest at 630 talking about the ways that
groups in Wisconsin are still connecting people to the resources that can help them retrofit their homes, save on their energy bills, contribute to job creation, reduce our carbon footprint.
It's work that goes on even as President Trump tries to make all of these benefits go away.
So a very special guest talking about that coming up at 630.
At 730, we talk about a flaw in Wisconsin school funding formula that everyone's known about.
for decades yet nothing gets done about it.
There are school districts in this beautiful state with all these beautiful lakes, for example.
School districts with lakes and other features that lead to a handful of high-end properties.
That reduces the amount of state aid even though most of the families and kids in the district live in low-value households.
but a few pieces of high value property are skewing the formula.
Why are we still using land value to determine whether kids get a well-funded education or not?
We'll have a couple of guests from Lake Holcomb here in Chippewa County where the school district could shut down based on the results of next week's referendum to try to make up for what's being lost in a flawed state funding formula.
We will also have your next chance to win in Civic Media's statewide break into spring text to win contest.
That's just an hour away.
Download the Civic Media app and be listening starting at 707 for your first chance of the day to win.
You'll text in an hourly keyword and be entered to win an hourly prize and be part of the grand prize as well.
A reminder that early voting is underway.
You can go to your local clerk and take part in absentee voting.
early in-person absentee voting to find out more about your clerk.
Contact them directly or if you don't know how, go to myvote.wi.gov, myvote.wi.gov and get the contact information for your local clerk's office.
Find out when you can go fill out a ballot and be done with it.
Then you don't have to worry about making time on April 1st, maybe standing in line.
Yeah, there might be a line.
It's not that I mean, it's not a presidential election But it is a big important election.
You might get there during a particular rush of folks There are communities that are still having a tough time finding enough election volunteers to be poll workers and things So skip the hassle and just go ahead and vote.
I already did I got the little stickers right here on my
on my computer, holding it up for the camera here.
There's the lighting I voted today.
He did a couple of days ago anyway.
So again, myvote.wi.gov.
Soak up the sunshine now, says meteorologist Brittany Merleau, because a wet weekend will keep most of us indoors.
Heavy rain that may mix with snow in spots has its sights set on us for the weekend.
So enjoy what we're getting now.
Her state forecast for today says partly cloudy, a bit warmer highs mid forties up north mid fifties south or west wind at five to 10 miles an hour for tonight.
Light rain arrives in the west early and spreads east overnight tonight lows in the upper twenties up north upper thirties south with a light southwesterly breeze and we'll get Britney's full forecast when she joins us right after the seven o'clock news here on Up North News Radio.
A reminder that you can sign up for our newsletter.
It comes out every day.
Go to upnorthnewswi.com.
Click subscribe in the banner on top of the homepage.
You would also then get our Sunday morning politics newsletter that I put together, which this past weekend included clips from our recent Supreme Court event in Madison.
with discussion points about how important this election is next week for state Supreme Court to avoid going back to rigged gerrymandered maps.
The prospect of an abortion ban is very much on the ballot in that Supreme Court election.
And we talk about Brad Schimmel joking about the knee pads that he needs to ask wealthy donors to contribute to his campaign.
And in our question of the week,
We ask, how do you like your health care?
How would you like to have your health care done with absolutely no government intervention?
Everybody just buys their own insurance, whatever they can't afford.
Do our tax dollars help provide at least a catastrophic policy for everybody?
Do we just keep the Affordable Care Act and try to keep improving on it, which uses public dollars to help you afford private insurance?
Or do we go to universal health care?
you know, like every other developed nation.
So that's in there and people are sending back emails.
You can certainly respond to that question right now.
You can send us an email anytime.
Go to radio at upnorthnewswi.com.
Let's see, I mentioned the forecast, but I didn't tell you temperatures around the state.
It's 26 here in Chippewa Falls, 20 in Hayward, 26 in Amory, Wausau is at 21, Wisconsin Rapids 25, La Crosse 33,
Green Bay 23, Madison's at 30 right now, Milwaukee's at 31, and it's 28 degrees at Radio Park, where we bring in one Greg Bach, who's doesn't have the brewer gear on yet, but I guarantee you tomorrow, I know the wardrobe for tomorrow, is going to be all about the baseball because it's back.
Mr. Bach, good morning.
Good morning, Pat.
How are the 2D?
How
are you doing?
How you doing?
Did you just as I was gonna say, did you lose track of your these and those?
It's 6.15 in the morning.
I don't have to do myself right now.
How are you today?
I'm good.
I'm good because I'm I'm not having to fight with insurance companies.
I was thinking about health care and that question of the week and Tony's already popped in with
I want to go to the hospital and not have 18 calls with insurance companies on whether something is covered or getting a prior authorization, et cetera.
And can I say being married to a physician and having to occasionally overhear some of those phone calls where again, she's the doctor.
The doctor and the patient know what needs to be done.
The patient has paid their bills.
They have paid their premiums and yet
some yo-yo at insurance company can go, nah, you don't really need that.
We're not going to cover that for you.
You may need it.
You may need it, of course.
I mean, that's a whole different conversation, but we're not going to help you with it.
No,
no,
no, no.
We're going to keep your money,
you know.
I'm going through my own thing right now with, I'm, I'll say, well, you know, I'll say it because I said it on Matt and Aaron last week, I'm getting a CPAP machine
and it's going
through.
It's going through the the necessary channels.
It's been very smooth sailing Thus far and I have to also go in in April and get a procedure done not my I don't have a TV in septum, but I just have
sinus issues that need to
taken care of and Man, I I feel one I feel lucky that it's been moving the way it's been moving There's been no hiccups.
There's been no roadblocks And then we also have a health savings account which not everyone can do not everyone can do
also very lucky.
So it's going to cost us basically what's in the health savings account and not out of our own pocket.
So that's good.
But the thing is, I want that to be the normal for everyone.
There's just like, here you go.
Here's my card.
There we go.
We're all taking care of it.
Whereas I feel like I'm walking on just the thinnest device waiting to fall through the lake of health care.
of health care bureaucracy that says, no, no, no, that's not going to work.
Yeah.
Well, you'll have to let me know how this goes because I feel like I'm probably like three to six months behind you on that whole process that you just outlined.
So I'm seeing somebody next month as well.
And I was resisting it as long as possible.
So you're talking about sleep apnea and, you know, you're sleeping, you know, breathing, being interrupted and like, I don't want a machine hooked up.
And then I had dinner two weeks ago with some family, including one of my cousins, who's like a little brother to me.
And he's just a few years younger than me.
And he talked about being on a CPAP machine.
I'm like, oh, how's that?
And he's like, it was the greatest thing.
It has changed my life.
like, what are you talking about?
I thought it would be this horrible thing.
And he's like,
I feel so much, I have so much more energy now.
I mean, it was a hassle at first, but oh my, changed my life, Pat, you got to get it.
So I went from dreading this appointment next month to kind of looking forward to it.
It's like, okay, if this, if this helps, this helps.
I have a friend who's in the exact same situation.
I said to him, I said, how do, how, like, how, how long does it take before you feel?
So he was, but he said, by the end of the first week, I felt like a new person.
And
it really, I mean, Pat, it's, I have not had, I'm so excited to get it.
Cause I want to know what a real night of good sleep feels
like.
Again, same thing here.
I just thought, well, I just, I work really hard.
I do a lot and all that, but to think that there might be a, you know, a medical thing that can help.
Tony adds on YouTube.
My dad has a CPAP machine, big help for him.
So there we go.
We turned into a great commercial.
Not so much for the CPAP machine, but taking care of yourself and especially guys, guys like to go to doctors.
Yeah.
Yes.
Men are you listening?
Bridget, for you, Sherry, for me, like just, just go, just do it for me
it.
And it's better.
Guys, do it.
This is great.
Hey, we didn't have time this segment, but we've got a busy day out across the Civic Media Radio Network.
You've got a couple of good guests.
Your Korean Hendrickson is coming on, I believe, talking about the daycare crisis.
And do you have another guest off the top of the show?
Well,
as far as I know, I'll say it.
Okay.
Ben Wickler is coming by.
Okay.
There was a question mark next to the name, so I wasn't sure if it was confirmed.
I'm living in the world that it's confirmed.
Then my world is confirmed.
If he doesn't show up.
That's good enough for me.
It's good enough for me.
Ben, if you're having your corn flakes right now, you got a date with Matt Nair on air with Jane and Greg.
So tune in for that.
When we come back, we're going to get you up to speed, not just on the the text chain debacle, but also I regret to inform you that the mayor of Warsaw is at it again.
We'll explain wherever you're listening across Wisconsin on this Wednesday morning when you're here, here up north live from Lake Wissota on the Civic Media Radio Network.
You're listening to Civic Media.
Stay up to date on the latest news and information for your local community and Wisconsin by signing up for our free email newsletter.
Visit civicmedia.us slash email to get started.
The Milwaukee Bucks are in Denver tonight to wrap up a five game trip out west.
They are two and two on that trip so far.
And then of course, the Boroughs we've mentioned, they kick off the season.
I should stop saying kick off for the baseball season.
They open up the baseball season tomorrow afternoon at Yankee Stadium.
So looking forward to that truly spring is finally here.
Let me start first in this segment with some
Some words of wisdom from Anne Jacobs, uh, chair of the Wisconsin elections commission.
I forget that that seat rotates every so often.
So I believe she's the current chair.
She may be past chair.
Anyway, very smart lawyer knows what she's talking about and was quick to jump on social media after Donald Trump signed an executive order that he says will now require a voter ID and proof of citizenship.
but in federal elections, because he does not have any control over state elections, but all the headlines are about, oh, this is going to upend voting, and it's going to, you know, have all these impacts.
And Ann Jacobs quickly jumped up on social media to say, here's a quick note about this new executive order.
It changes nothing for the upcoming election for state Supreme Court on April 1st.
She notes that state elections are governed by state law, not federal law.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court race is a state race only, so any federal demands do not and cannot affect this race.
The executive order focuses on the National Voting Rights Act and reports to require proof of citizenship for people that use the National Voting Rights Act.
The NVRA form to register to vote but Wisconsin is exempt from the NVRA form.
In fact, it's prohibited from using it after a court ruling from a Waukesha County judge that even using the NVRA registration form is not allowed.
so Wisconsin has its own deal.
No voters are registered using that particular form because of that court order.
The part of the order demanding proof of citizenship to register for federal elections doesn't even take effect until 30 days after the executive order, which would put it well past next week's election date.
She notes that Wisconsin already uses paper ballots or paper voting trails.
There is no direct recording of machines in the state.
There is a paper record of every vote cast in Wisconsin.
And finally, she says it's disappointing that the federal government is attempting to make people worry about voting this close to an important election.
She says, I hope this is not a ham-handed attempt to shore up a failing bid for Wisconsin Supreme Court by a candidate who is currently losing.
That's Anne Jacobs, chair of the Wisconsin Elections Commission.
So whatever you heard about President Trump signing yesterday, you can disregard it in terms of next week's election.
Here's today's civics lesson.
Do your job.
Do it well.
Do it within the bounds of your job description.
Don't give yourself job duties that you don't rightfully have.
And abide by the safeguards that come with your job.
Don't assume you are above basic safeguards.
These would be great things for Michael Walts, a national security advisor to know as he continues to deny that he did anything wrong and accidentally including a reporter in a text chain.
that helped plan a military attack.
Rather than resign yesterday, which would have been what any honorable person would do, he shows up on Fox News and thinks that talking to Laura Ingram, he can explain it away.
Here's 90 seconds of that attempt.
So
you don't know what staffer is responsible for this right now?
Well, look, a staffer wasn't responsible.
And look, I take full responsibility.
I built the I built the group to my job is to make sure everything's coordinated.
I mean, I
don't mean to be pedantic here, but how did the number have
you ever had?
Have you ever had somebody's contact that shows their name and then you have an and then you have somebody else's number.
Those mistakes, right?
You've got somebody else's number.
on someone else's contact.
So of course, I didn't see this loser in the group.
It looked like someone else.
Now, whether he did it deliberately or it happened in some other technical mean is something we're trying to figure out.
So a staffer did not put his contact
information.
No, no, no.
But how did it end up in your phone?
That's what we're trying to figure
out.
But that's a pretty big problem.
That is what we got the best technical minds, right?
And that's where, I mean,
I'm sure everybody out there has had a contact where it was said one person, and then a different phone number.
But you've never talked to him before, so how's the number on your phone?
I mean, I'm not an expert in any of this,
but it's just
curious.
How's the number on your phone?
Well, if you have somebody else's contact, and then somehow it gets sucked in.
Oh, someone sent you that contact.
It gets sucked in.
Was there someone else supposed to be on the chat that wasn't
on the
chat
that you thought was on the phone?
So the person that I thought was on there was never on there.
It was this guy.
Who was that person?
Well, I'm not.
Look, Laura, I take
I take responsibility.
I built the group.
But look, that's the part that we have to figure
out.
That's the part that we have to figure out.
All right.
Well, good luck with that, sir.
The fact that you felt the need to lash out at the reporter that you accidentally included and call that person a loser and cast this person that maybe that person was somehow responsible for it.
As I heard that denial and as I heard the president saying yesterday, oh, you know, there was no no classified intelligence on there He's a good guy a collective shrug from Republicans in Congress If I may as an older white male This is all through the looking glass now this this lack of reaction from members of Congress and others None of this would be taking place if it weren't for one thing
And that is the privilege afforded to unqualified white men whose group bravado is one of their many talents along with, you know, professional victimhood and they're able to convince enough others that they must be competent because they say they are.
Now you put those same denials into the mouths of anybody else and all those white guys would group
shriek DEI so loud it would be deafening.
The Secretary of Defense is incompetent, was never qualified for the job and the moment that he started putting military planning on that text chain was the moment that he should have been out of a job and the moment that nobody stopped him or second guessed the group is why that whole group is a bunch of dudes
and Tulsi Gabbard, who clearly are not up for the job.
I believe the White House Chief of Staff was on there too.
But again, these guys that they enable are absolutely unfit for duty.
And yet they know that if they circle the wagons, if they claim politics, if they blame Democrats, if they blame the reporter, they will get away with things that no other group of people could do.
And they put people's lives in jeopardy.
There could have been a way for the hoodie rebels to be tipped off.
One of the guys was in Moscow on this text chain.
Whether it's Russia or China, if they would have known that U.S.
attention is on another part of the world, they could have decided to do something mischievous.
The ramifications are immense, but the ability to deny, deny, deny for people to believe them, if this doesn't scream what patriarchy is, then
Honest to God, I don't know what does.
Climate check with a special guest.
We're back now on Up North News Radio 634 on this Wednesday morning and joining us now for this week's climate check is not
Melissa Baldoff or if so, she's she's got quite a head cold because the this voice is about to be a lot deeper.
Former Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes is our special guest for climate check this week.
Pinch hitting for Melissa Baldoff.
How are you, sir?
That's, that's, boy, I got to be careful when I text message.
I mean, if the secretary of defense can get caught up in a bad text message, goodness only knows here.
Good to see you.
We're going to talk a lot about what you've been doing at Forward Together Wisconsin on climate matters.
And of course, you chaired the governor's task force on climate change a few years back.
But I guess I will start with the current
political climate as as Melissa and I otherwise would, you know, it's it's a much more hostile world out there.
You've got a, you know, a jury in North Dakota, basically trying to put Greenpeace out of business with a mega award.
You've got EPA data being, you know, erased by the Trump administration.
So scientists are rushing to copy it.
You've got, you know, Enbridge line five on a fast track for development through Northern Wisconsin.
It's a it's a
a very challenging time.
So for somebody who's active in something related to climate and energy, where do you see the bright spots that remind people that there is still going to be some progress made out there in the world?
So it's hostile.
It's all the above is unfortunate.
It's ridiculous.
I can't think of enough adjectives to describe what's going on.
But, you know, we have been in tough spots before and I told people all the time once we got the inflation reduction act passed, it felt like all those years of hard work were finally starting to materialize.
Unfortunately, it's because we didn't take the steps in between and I've been, you know,
talking about this a lot.
I mean, the reason why we haven't had significant action, bold action on climate, and the reason why it's so easy for people like Donald Trump and Elon Musk collectively to be able to do away with this work, it's because we haven't necessarily done the real education in communities.
So often, the first time people were hearing about
you know climate change or what it means politically is through door knocking during campaign season when people are being inundated with so many other things so much other information and what's important for us to do anybody who's interested in climate and sustainability and conservation we need to make sure that this is a bigger part of the conversation in people's daily lives it already shows up in people's lived experiences with these catastrophic storms seems like every weather event
is an historic one.
And we have to tie this to people's personal interaction with the climate, with the planet, just like we do any other issue.
And there are certainly some bright spots.
And despite the fact that North Dakota is trying to put a green piece out of business, despite the fact that the EPA is seeing these challenges, I do truly believe that there's a level of defense that is being built up, a level of resistance that is being built up.
This is not a good place at all.
I'm not here to sugarcoat it by any means because most of what is happening is bad.
It is so hard to just enjoy things these days.
But I want people to realize that that is exactly why we continue this fight.
It's exactly why we're here.
It's exactly why we're in the space.
If you have organizing capacity, we need to be full throttle in this moment.
Four together, Wisconsin.
We are taking our show in the road last October.
We had a huge convene and we brought together a bunch of folks who had necessarily been a part of the sustainability conversation, people from nonprofit organizations, community organizations, civic and religious institutions as well.
It was an incredible show and a folks we had experts when we had a friendly White House, people who were actually willing to talk to us and people who are willing to actually provide information to close that gap.
But we'll be from May.
or excuse me, the first week in May, we're gonna be in Green Bay, we're gonna be in Racine, Milwaukee, we're gonna be in Prairie du Sac, we're gonna be in La Crosse, and then we're gonna wrap it all up in Bayfield.
And for folks that don't know for Together Wisconsin is the organization that is bridging the sustainability divide.
We are bridging that gap for folks who haven't always had access to the tools and resources available for them to reduce emissions and be a part of the solution and save money in the process.
And that's what this is, you know, often come down to when we talk to folks about this is whatever your feelings on the climate, obviously, most of us think that it is serious, but you can set that aside to look at the economic opportunities from a household expense standpoint, from a job creation standpoint.
And yeah, we're in this kind of
Purgatory right now is maybe one way to put it on the one hand a judge has stopped Trump's EPA from clawing back some 14 billion dollars in climate grants
But on the other hand, the money also can't go out the door to the entities that would benefit from it while this court case goes on.
So it's kind of, it's Schrodinger's money, if you will, on deciding what to do.
But there have been funds out there.
There are programs that are out there.
Forward Together Wisconsin, like you said, is getting some of that done.
For folks that might have missed our earlier conversation about it.
tell folks the heart of Forward Together Wisconsin, you know, its main mission, whatever, you know, the money situation out there is, it really, it starts first with information about the ways that, you know, a household, a school or a business could benefit from considering some new ideas, right?
And if you are able to watch this right behind me, making sustainable.
wrong side making sustainable attainable uh that's our mission as an organization again to close that sustainability gap that exists whether folks are low income or whether folks are uh low information when it comes to the resources uh that they have access to and we started to be a direct connector
for people in the Inflation Reduction Act.
The Inflation Reduction Act, again, being the single biggest piece of legislation to reduce carbon emissions, to create jobs, and to combat climate change overall.
And as I said, I wish that it didn't have to be the single biggest piece of legislation because with all of this mass came a lot of folks who
were just completely unaware of how it worked.
I can add myself to that number.
I wasn't fully aware of what the IRA could do until I immersed myself in it.
So it was real tough for the casual observer and also it was so many opportunities for people to try to pick pieces of it apart in the event of a new administration which we are experiencing right now.
However, the work that we have been able to do, we see ourselves playing three different roles.
One is direct services.
You mentioned the work that we're doing to help out people and that includes a revolving loan phone or even helping low-income homeowners cover the upfront costs for energy assessment and then also be able to cover the upfront costs for insulation work to be done on those homes and for select group of people.
We're going to work to get ground source heat pumps installed.
The second way we do this is through our sustainability partnerships and our sustainability partnerships allows us to work with schools and school districts, small and large businesses alike, religious institutions and organizations to be able to take advantage of some of the
resources are out there for them in the form of tax rebates.
And some of this can be a little challenging for folks to navigate without the technical assistance.
And we have a technical assistance director on hand to help walk people through that process.
And then the third way is through community engagement.
This is how I got my start.
And it's the work that I'm continuing to do.
And it means we put people on the ground in communities knocking on doors when there's not an election going on.
And we talk to people.
about the resources and the benefits that they would have otherwise not known about.
And we've gotten some unique stories as a result of those conversations.
We have a QR code for people to be able to scan.
You plug in your address, your utility provider, a couple other...
bits of information and it shows you exactly how much money you can save per year.
It shows you exactly how much you can look for in the form of tax incentives and how much, you know, making that conversion to solar or getting a heat pump.
What would that price tag look
like?
When Melissa and I talk about this, all these many facets, you understand the one thing you don't hear in there is Republican or Democrat and
even now in congress uh and melissa and i've covered this before that there are just about two dozen republican members of congress who who signed a letter uh to the president to their own leadership saying hey hey hey i know you want to pull back the entire inflation reduction act just because it's joe biden's thing
but it's creating jobs out here and it's providing economic opportunity out here and I have to think that again those conversations with regular folks who who again are homeowners or small business people they work with school districts or whatever they see
Virtually no partisan politics that should be involved in some of these things that can lead to, you know, job creation, lower energy prices, modernized homes and things like that.
This is the only people who are making this political are the ones who want to, right?
Oh, for sure.
unnecessary to make it political.
And that's some of the feedback we get on the doors.
And it won't be unnecessarily said, oh, this shouldn't be political.
But I would say that there have been a lot of folks that we talked to last year, the year before that, who said that they weren't fans of the president.
They didn't support Joe Biden in any way.
And there were even some people who were skeptical of the concept of clean energy.
They said it was a boondoggle.
But we literally told them how much money they would be able to save in that same conversation.
But they seem to be OK with it when it meant money that they as individuals were able to save.
So again, it comes back to making it very personal for folks.
And I think about other conversations that we should be having right now.
And certainly public health is directly related to climate change.
But in terms of public health, I think that we do need to have this conversation about personal health.
because personal health makes it real for other people, where a lot of selfish people, you know, unfortunately, and a lot of people who just aren't considerate of what impacts, you know, exist for other people in society.
It's not the way I choose to live, but it's the way some people do.
And so we should talk about personal health.
I think about conversations like...
the session of, uh, of cigarette smoking, right?
Like we see the number of cigarette smokers and how that has dwindled.
And that's because people saw the personal health impact.
Uh, you could talk about the impact the second hand smoke has some effect for sure.
Uh, but when people saw directly, uh, what was happening to them as individuals, you saw numbers of, uh, cigarette smokers start, start to decline, especially in young people.
Folks want to learn more about, uh, forward together, Wisconsin.
What can they do?
That's where you'll find out more about it, get some of the basics.
And let me conclude by asking about just the power of conversation because we're in election season right now.
And there are all kinds of messages that have been out there from, you know, from the fossil fuel industry.
They always, you know, run ads, you know, making it sound like they're, you know, all rainbows and unicorns when their message is anything, but
So even when you've got a record number of political ads out there, like we do for the current races, there's still a lot to be said for knocking on people's doors and having these conversations and setting the politics aside.
People are still open to that.
Forward Together Wisconsin, you can find more at forwardtogetherwi.org, former Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes.
Thanks so much for what you're doing here.
And I know Melissa's been a good ambassador for climate stories, but it was nice of you to pinch it for and tell us what what all you've been up to.
That sounds great.
I think he did all right.
I think, I don't know, Greg, what do you think?
Do you think he passed the audition?
We could maybe have him back on as a climate check correspondent for us.
I say we bring him back for round two.
He can
do that, absolutely.
I'm a dork.
Thanks very much for coming in.
Time for one more story before we take a break and have today's history lesson.
And it deals with the mayor of Warsaw is at it again.
This time, the mayor, Doug Denny,
has revoked key card access to City Hall for an elected member of the City Council, somebody that he's having a disagreement with.
They're both accusing each other of, you know, creating a bad working environment at City Hall.
Key card access to City Hall does not strike me as being part of the mayor's duties.
And it's rich that he thinks that the city council person is violating some kind of employee handbook.
Elected officials don't, they don't have the employee handbook applied to them.
They have a code of conduct of which the mayor is accused of potentially violating when he committed that heist of an absentee ballot drop box closer to the election.
So in the pot kettle black category, I would urge the mayor to restore that key card access into
take care of his own shop first.
We'll be back after this,
you're up north.
This one from Diana Ross, who turns 81 years old today.
A song that was the alternate show name for this program, Love Hangover.
We opted to go with the North News Radio instead.
Melissa K is here from 97.5 WFHR and what's that other station there?
1055.
1055, WIRI.
Tiny, tiny letters on the screen there, but I managed to get that in.
How's Melissa today?
Great, good morning.
It's wonderful.
I'm glad to be here.
All the more reason folks to get on the live stream and watch the secret show.
We're all convincing.
We're fine.
We're fine.
So good.
Good,
great, great.
Let me get through some birthdays and then I'm gonna ask what's new in Melissa Kay's world.
A lot of mid-decade milestone birthdays today.
Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is 85 today.
Actor Martin Short is 75.
Nobody puts baby in a corner, but baby's got an AARP card.
Jennifer Gray is 65.
Today, baby is 65.
Stephen Tyler from Aerosmith turns 77 today.
It's still between this song and Dream On when he first came on the stage.
That was 1973.
It could be that long ago already.
because it is.
That's what time is.
It's a flat circle.
So Melissa, what's new in Wisconsin Rapids?
Oh, you know, we've been doing a lot of interviews with our local candidates running for local boards.
Not me personally, but James Maloff on our midday magazine show and Pam Hielke, who is a scheduling goddess.
Yes, she
is.
managed to get all of those done.
And so if you missed them, they're on the podcast.
They're podcasted.
Thank you, Laura.
She's also fantastic.
We have such a great team at WFHR.
I am so
glad.
Yeah, you do.
I know.
We do.
We do.
But yes, all of those Canada interviews are available on our website on the podcast version of the shows if you miss them airing.
But yeah, it's important to know who's running for these boards.
And some of what's happening is a little spicy.
So there you go, tune in.
Spicies like the word of the year now for things like, oh, that's the secret show gets spicy sometimes when we talk during commercial breaks, you know.
On this day in 1971, Bangladesh came into being, formerly known as East Pakistan.
It declared its independence on this day in 1971.
Now you know.
And on this day in 1979,
Egypt's Anwar Sadat, Israel's Menachem Begin, and President Jimmy Carter signed the Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty at the White House.
Singer Teddy Pendergrass would have been 75 years old today.
It's a great voice when he was singing lead for Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes.
So I know you hear that and you're thinking, wait, isn't that Harold Melvin?
No, it's one of those cases where the guy's name is on the group, but you don't hear him all the time.
It was Teddy Pendergrass instead, who passed away back in 2010.
The number one song this day in 1977 was by Hall and Oates.
They would go on to have six number one chart toppers.
This was the first one.
See, if we were doing a music quiz, it'd be time to ask Pat, can you name all six number one hauling notes songs?
To which I would then say, well, you got kiss on my list.
You got private eyes.
I can't go for that.
Man-eater and out of touch.
And then you'd say, Pat, you're reading it right off your notes, aren't you?
And I'd say, yeah,
I
am.
I got nothing for that, yeah.
We earlier played Man in the Mirror from Michael Jackson because
That was the fourth of a record five number one hits from Michael Jackson's bad album.
And you might ask Melissa, you know, hey, do you know the other number one hits from bad?
And she'd say, well, I just can't stop loving you and bad and the way you make me feel and dirty Diana.
And I'd say, Melissa, you're just reading it off your notes, aren't you?
And she'd say, yeah, yeah, yeah.
If you sent me the notes, yes, that's what would happen.
Yes.
Here's somebody whose other hits I can't rattle off because I didn't make notes for these.
Kenny Chesney is 57 today.
There you
go.
So, happy birthday to Kenny Chesney, who I guess you hear a lot of on certain civic media radio stations.
You know,
the song though is just like...
She's not finding Kenny Chesney sexy.
She finds the tractor sexy and that's a whole of the conversation on modern relationships in America
Well and country songs.
I mean if your truck, you know, it's your truck.
It's your tractor.
It's whatever but
It's the
things you avoid on dating apps.
Red flag,
red flag, red flag.
Red
flag, even if it's a red tractor, green tractor, whatever.
It's a red flag if we're, if we're basing it all on the, on the truck, the tractor, the guns, the dogs, whatever.
Fish.
Let's get the fish.
Yep.
Let's get to the person inside.
On the national calendar today, this is national Red Cross giving day.
Purple for epilepsy awareness day.
Uh, it's national spinach day.
Nice.
Oh, it's manatee appreciation day.
I, I should check Derek van Orden probably is going to send me a card for that.
What a, what a nice guy.
Uh, and it's, it's national.
He called it.
He called Pat tubby.
Oh yeah.
Yes.
And, and then I
did.
I saw that text, but I sorry.
And then came back later, like hours later to, to also use the word corpulent.
I'm like, you look
that up to the Thessaurus.
know.
Uh, and I did check, by the way, and not only did he not, uh, criticize the secretary of defense for the text chain debacle, he praised him and said that he stands by him.
So that's where your congressman stands.
And finally it's national Nougat day.
Nougat.
I love it.
You hear about it in candy bars.
It's whipped egg whites, honey, and roasted nuts.
All that
puts in three musketeers.
Uh, I get it.
No, it's Snickers.
Yeah.
The, the three musketeers is like marshmallow fluff or something like marshmallows, something fluffy.
We'll get deeper next week into the secret ingredients of our favorite candy bars with Melissa Kay.
Welcome to
anatomy of a candy bar.
Our first and last show.
Thank you so much, Melissa.
Have a great day.
Always good to see you
boys.
Your next chance to win in the break into spring text to win contest is coming up next year up north.
The national news cycle never stops.
but it can be hard to find news about your local community.
Civic Media is dedicated to providing quality local and state news coverage across Wisconsin.
With the Civic Media app, you can get notifications about local stories that matter to you and your community.
Find the free Civic Media app in your phone's app store and choose notifications from the menu to tell us what kind of news you want to hear about.