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Across Wisconsin on Civic Media, you're listening to Mornings with Pat Craiglo powered by UpMorth News.
Now, from our Lake Mesota studio, here is the founding editor of UpMorth News, Pat Craiglo.
Well,
hey there Wisconsin, good morning.
It's 6.06 on this Thursday morning, May 22nd, 2025.
It is truly a beautiful morning to have you here up north live from Lake Wissota from wherever you're spending your mornings listening across the civic media radio network.
If you're not listening on a radio, maybe it's through the app, maybe it's watching us on social media, YouTube or Facebook or by podcast, however you do it.
We're glad to have you here for this Thursday.
I've got a question for you.
Would you like to leave us a voice note and
have an alternative to the the texting and the emailing and Everything else that's that's going on out there
We have a new way to do it.
We're trying to make it so convenient for folks to reach the show and we're going to tell you all about the new voice note feature through the Civic Media app coming up in just a little bit.
Also today, we're going to continue our second round of interviews with candidates for State Democratic Party Chair, Joseph Pecky is here today.
William Garcia will be here tomorrow in our eight o'clock hour.
Devin Remacher was on yesterday.
We're going to talk about the cuts being proposed.
by Donald Trump and congressional Republicans.
The House of Representatives is wrapping up its second all night session to try to ram through this bill with minimal Republican opposition, even though it's probably going to get changed erratically in the Senate, but right now the way it looks in the House would be some massive cuts to vital programs just to give billionaires more tax cuts.
And we're going to talk to somebody who's on the
front lines of the fight against poverty right here in Wisconsin.
And he's in Washington DC this week trying to warn members of Congress about the real damage that'll be done by cutting safety net programs like food assistance and health care coverage.
We're going to talk to Michelle Velazquez from Planned Parenthood about how the cuts being proposed won't do a single thing to curtail abortion care.
The cuts that are being considered in Washington
are only going to hurt basic health care services provided to women and men all across Wisconsin.
Meanwhile, on the Senate side, Wisconsin's senior senator and foremost conspiracy theorist is at it again.
Ron Johnson could have been content wishing former President Biden a full recovery from his new battle with prostate cancer.
Instead, he announced a committee investigation of Biden's health and questioned his fitness for office.
We will assess whether there's validity to the questions or if it's another ghoulish effort to distract from Johnson's work to a slash those important services and funding tax cuts for folks in Ron Johnson's tax bracket and above.
We'll talk to chat homes about that and more in our eight o'clock hour.
We'll examine some new reporting about Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's conveniently timed stock sales just prior to President Trump's tear of details that sent markets crashing.
All that plus Brittany Merleau with the forecast and more ahead.
Brittany's state forecast says the sun returns today and it has the warmth.
Not so much.
Brittany says there's still a chance for frost in parts of Wisconsin as we head toward the weekend.
So her state forecast for today says partly sunny and breezy statewide highs ranging from the mid fifties to the mid sixties.
Still that north wind at 10 to 20 miles an hour.
Cold tonight scattered frost chances up north lows in the mid thirties up north to near 40 in the southern parts of the state.
Still the northwest wind at five to 15 miles an hour.
A reminder that Up North News is a separate entity from Civic Media.
We love having this partnership every weekday morning from 6 to 9 a.m.
but we'd also invite you to follow our team over at UpNorthNewsWI.com.
Click subscribe and the banner on top of the homepage and you can get signed up for our daily newsletter.
Among the stories in there today Wisconsin is at the center of the world and we're not even talking politics.
We're at the center of the world by a very unique unit of measurement, you know the 45 45 degrees of latitude 90 degrees of longitude or whatever it puts us right in the northern half of the Western Hemisphere the very middle of it and some folks have gone to see the little historical geographical marker that's out there, but it also means
Because there's four of these points around the world at 45 degrees and 90 degrees.
You always get that question.
Well, can you dig a hole through the through the world?
And if you could, where would you come out?
Well, thanks to these measurements and these points, we now know it would be 1500 miles southwest of Australia, where maybe we could look for that Malaysian air flight that is still missing.
So look for that in our newsletter along with Bob.
playing more coverage up north news wi.com.
Now I mentioned that we've got new ways to reach the show here are the old reliable call us or text us 855-756-855-752-4842.
You can use the civic media app to call us or to text us.
You can put a comment up on Facebook or YouTube.
That would be the up north news Facebook or YouTube pages or the civic media Facebook or YouTube pages.
Then Tony asks over on YouTube radio, what am I a boomer?
I listen digitally and we appreciate that watching on social media or wherever.
And those are some of the ways that you would reach the station.
If you call in, you'll get one Greg Bach at Radio Park and eventually you'll get Parker Olson, who's in Madison and fresh to the show.
Gentlemen, good morning.
Morning,
Pat.
Hi.
Hi guys.
So Parker.
You came back.
You came back.
I came
back.
Congratulations.
Thank you very much.
I'm really excited to be here.
Well, we didn't we didn't scare you off.
It's very good to know.
Clare Bear says it's crisp here in Nolton.
Shiju says I enjoy watching your lovely faces.
That's totally directed toward Greg.
The only one with a lovely face on the screen.
No, this lighting is terrible.
My hair is gross and I feel so tired.
He's also in the warm spot of the state.
48 right now is 48 in La Crosse.
Hey, words at 33.
Yes, it's 43 here in Chippewa Falls, 38 in Amory, 39 in Wasaw, 43 in Rapids, 45 in Green Bay and 46 degrees in Madison right now.
So gentlemen, we talked about the new way to reach the show.
Have you, before we unveil it, have you
Have you looked at it?
Have you?
Are you as excited about it as the rest of us are?
I'm bursting with fruit flavor,
my friends.
Here's the deal.
It's very, very simple and simple for me because I don't have to do much with it.
It's all on these guys.
And Greg is checking the phones right now.
It's not that you have to call in.
And at this early hour of the day, not a lot of folks really feel like calling in and talking about news that's, you know, this early.
You certainly can, but that's why we have the texts and the comments.
But then there's that civic media app.
that folks can get and I hold up on my cell phone poorly lit over here here in beautiful Chippewa Falls and you click on any one of the stations and I always click on 93.5 the tap here in Chippewa Falls and there are all the ways to reach the show you can call the show you can text the show you can email see if I can get that tip and tip that just right here there we go and down at the bottom along with the call and text and email there's a new one called Voice Note
And it's exactly what it is.
Basically, you're leaving us a voicemail.
You're leaving us a voice note.
But when you do so, it shows up on the same screen where we see the calls come in and where we see the texts come in.
And we would also get the note that you recorded to us.
And it allows broadcasting professional experts like Parker Olson here to listen to it and say, hey.
We should share that with everybody and we can then pop that up on air.
So if you, if you don't want to talk live on the phone, but you still want to leave a verbal comment instead of putting something in the dumpster fire that is off in the comment section, you can leave us a voicemail like that.
Parker, I think this is outstanding and outstanding advance in app technology for morning radio.
I'm excited about
it.
Is
this what drop a line used to me?
Well, I think drop a line was more, more like a text or an email, but it could be.
I don't know.
Let's ask grandpa Bach.
Who's who's back?
If you're
going to drop a line with that, with that means making a phone call.
Okay.
Okay.
So
we is the young
and is the young and asking us about our old talkie talks back in the day.
a little asking about the old talking.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, and apologies to Tony, he took Umbridge at the note of dumpster fire in the comment section, he said, I leave only the highest quality comments.
And it's he's
very true about that.
So thank you for that.
He also tells us it's a toasty 38 in Ashland.
Alicia says Marinette is a clear and crisp 43 degrees.
But Alicia also notes that this sounds like a pretty cool new feature.
So now instead of just reading what Tony puts up and what Alicia puts up and what she's you puts up and everybody else.
Leave us a voice note.
And we'll put that up.
We get to hear from
you.
It will put it up if it's nice and kind, not mean, and you don't swear.
Well,
yes, exactly.
It's got to go through the gatekeepers, which would be Greg and Parker over here.
So go ahead and play with it.
We'd love to see what you guys can.
hand over to us.
All right, one news note here to get things kicked off this morning.
This is fresh news from the State Democratic Party of Wisconsin.
They have just put out a release announcing their keynote speaker for the State Democratic Convention next month in Wisconsin Dells, and it will be Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock.
And so he will be speaking on Friday evening, June 14th, to delegates that will be gathered in the Dells.
And then I believe it's on the 15th on that Saturday when delegates will be voting on who will be the next
state party chair.
So again, Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock will be the keynote speaker on Friday night the 14th.
And then on the 15th, the convention continues with selection of a new state party chair.
We heard from Devin Remacher yesterday, we will hear from Joseph Pecky today, and William Garcia tomorrow, all in our eight o'clock hour.
So tune in for that.
And if you miss it, if you can't catch it, you can always head over to civicmedia.us and listen back to
prior episodes.
If you've never done that before, every hour of the show is its own little mini podcast episodes.
So basically every day, we crank out three episodes for the six, seven and eight AM hours so that you don't have to listen back to the whole show, but listen to what you might have missed.
So head over to the Civic Media website and do that or just catch us at the eight o'clock hour today to hear more from Joseph Becky.
A little sports now at 618, some ninth inning heroics at American Family Field were not enough as the Brewers fell to Baltimore eight to four in 11 innings.
The Brewers were on the verge of losing three-two in the bottom of the ninth when Caleb Durbin hit an RBI single to send the game to extras.
In the 10th, Baltimore pulled ahead, but the Brewers tied it again on a Jackson Churio RBI single.
But then the Wills came off the bus in the 11th, the Orioles got a three-run homer, and then one more for good measure off pitcher Tyler Alexander.
So the Brewers are now 50 games into the season and they are two games below 500 as they head to Pittsburgh for a four game series and That four game series starts tonight with pregame at 505 both today and tomorrow on Civic media stations in Richland Center Oshkosh Racine Kenosha Park Falls and Hayward would love to have you listing along on the
on the Brewer's radio network through these fine civic media stations.
All right, I don't want to spend a lot of time dwelling on it, but I did mention that it is happening.
Yes, Senator Ron Johnson has said he will launch an investigation into President Biden's health.
He told Axios that it's in light of quote unquote new revelations in that new Jake Tapper book about what they claim or White House efforts to hide
the former president's health conditions, and it has reignited attacks from the Republicans toward Biden, who is not president.
who cannot do anything right now that would harm Americans the way that Ron Johnson and fellow Republicans could in Congress.
So like many things, buying Greenland, things like that, it's a distraction.
It's a ghoulish distraction, but a distraction nonetheless.
From the heart of America's Up North, live from Lake Wissota, thanks for making this the place to spend part of your mornings.
I'm Pat Crightlow.
This is 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.
All right, let's play a new game called, does Pat know what day of the week it is?
I know it's Thursday, but as noted by Joe up and superior on the text line, I got the days wrong on the State Democratic Convention.
I got the dates right, the 14th and the 15th, but apparently this year the convention is a Saturday Sunday, which is actually really surprising to me, but I know that
for years.
And I'm sure Republicans have gone through this as well.
It's well, should the convention be on a Friday, Saturday or Saturday, Sunday?
I know there's times when it's gone Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
And you're talking about roughly 1000 delegates, give or take in both parties.
Again, these are
regular folks, you know, who have jobs and can't necessarily make it on Friday or stay till Sunday.
And so, yes, that fault is all mine for assuming the convention was a Friday, Saturday thing.
It is a Saturday, Sunday thing, which means that Senator Warnock would be speaking on Saturday night.
And then we would probably find out on the Sunday who won the election for state party chair.
There is some reporting in the
outlet called ProPublica.
Some people say ProPublica.
Maybe that's where I need to go on that.
But anyway, it is all about stock sales of members of Congress.
Conveniently timed here given what has happened with tariffs and markets.
And according to its reporting, and I'm just going to read excerpts from it right now.
two days before President Trump announced dramatic plans for reciprocal tariffs on foreign imports.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy sold stock in almost three dozen companies.
The February 11th sales occurred near the peak of the stock market just before it began to slide amid concerns about Trump's tariff plans and ultimately plummeted after the president unveiled the details of the new tariffs on April 2.
Disclosures filed by Duffy show that he sold somewhere between $75,000 and $600,000 of stock two days before Trump's February 13th announcement and about up to 50,000 more on the day of the announcement.
Now transportation secretaries normally have little to do with tariff policy, the article says, but Duffy has presented himself as one of the
intellectual forefathers of Trump's current trade agenda.
As a congressman in 2019, Duffy introduced a bill that he named the United States Reciprocal Trade Act, the bill which did not pass in many ways mirrors the plan that Trump eventually unveiled.
Duffy worked on that bill with Trade Advisor Peter Navarro.
Trump's tariffs were the culmination of that work Duffy posted online, referring to his own bill in the House.
In response to questions from ProPublica, a transportation department, spokesperson said an outside manager made the trades and Duffy had no input on the timing of the sales.
But Duffy is the second cabinet secretary to have sold stock at an opportune time.
Last week, ProPublica reported that Attorney General Pam Bondi sold somewhere between one and $5 million worth of shares of Trump media, the president's social media company, on April 2nd.
A government ethics agreement required Bonnie to sell the shares within 90 days of her confirmation, a deadline that would have given her until early May.
So why she sold on that date, April 2nd, is unclear.
But after the market closed that day, Trump presented his tariffs, sending the market reeling.
Among the stocks sold off by Sean Duffy were Shopify, whose merchants are impacted by the tariffs, and John Deere.
the agriculture machinery manufacturer that has projected hundreds of millions of dollars in new costs because of Trump's tariffs.
And it gets us back to this basic notion.
And if I may be so bold as to steal from Greg Bach right in front of him
on
the show, this shouldn't be a thing.
Oh, what's it doing there?
Yeah, that's
very nice.
Members of Congress buying and selling stocks while they're
in office.
Yeah.
And and by the way,
both parties, all of them, they all do it.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's when we can completely jump on that.
What I what I object to are the people that, I mean, honest, honest to goodness, lose their minds talking about, say, Nancy Pelosi or somebody else and are unwilling to say the thing that we're saying.
Yeah.
Yeah.
This should this should impact both parties.
Yeah.
You shouldn't be able to do this.
This I I am
quite certain.
I ran on part of this while running against Sean Duffy in 2012 and we've been talking about it for years before that and yet we have a congress that has had its integrity you know shattered for many reasons but this is certainly one of them.
You have US Supreme Court justices accepting luxury vacations and things like that and we have
None of the confidence that there are our ethics there are disclosures, but look how wide the disclosures are we we only know that Duffy sold somewhere between $75,000 and $600,000 worth of stock.
Yeah, I'm sorry But if you're gonna be buying and trading stock, I think we should be able to see the full thing
Absolutely
because because we know how much we pay you we pay you $174,000 or whatever it is as a salary
We need to know if you're making tens of millions of dollars
one way or the other on this I'm gonna go one step further Pat I don't think they should be allowed to buy or sell stocks as people like they can have a blind trust have someone but they cannot in and any nefarious any sort of Backdoor or insider deals You're done.
You're out.
Goodbye.
Yeah,
cuz you're
millionaires your millionaires anyway, so let's not let's not pretend you're of the people
No, no, no.
And that's where, again, we get back to Senator Ron Johnson, acknowledging that in the last tax bill, the 2017 one, he personally held it up until there was an expanded loophole added for something called Pass Through Corporations that he said did enrich him personally, and that it also enriched some of his billionaire donors.
But here's the thing, as upset as you might be today about this,
It doesn't come up enough during the campaigns where, you know, Ron Johnson admitted, monkeying with the tax code for personal benefit, but you know, if you can just convince enough people with negative ads that Mandela Barnes is a dangerous person, well, you should keep Ron Johnson in office, despite that.
And Sean Duffy's gonna do the same thing with whatever he does moving forward.
And I would again, just urge people to keep their eye on the ball for the things that are real, the real ethical lapses that include members of Congress from both parties and now cabinet officials
buying and selling stocks at very conveniently timed opportunities.
All right, thanks for spending some time as part of your mornings powered by Upground News here live from Shippewa Falls.
We will have more after the Midwest Farm Report here on the Civic Media Radio Network.
I'm back right now.
to do our weekly climate check with Melissa Baldoff.
And this time around, we're going to talk about Donald Trump would love to call it his big, beautiful budget bill.
But as one energy newsletter put it, Trump's big oily bill, the anti clean energy provisions in Trump's budget bill could raise household energy costs by as much as 7%.
Melissa Baldoff, hello.
How are you?
I'm doing OK.
I'd be a whole lot better if I
this is not what we were dealing with, but you know, such as life that we've got this, you know, so-called big beautiful bill that's going to cause as Forbes is reporting $1 trillion in economic damage from the House reconciliation bill.
And the funny thing is, not funny, of course, but that it's so not necessary, the way that climate has been
politicized rather than, you know, an existential human crisis, a crisis for the planet, but also as an opportunity, an opportunity to create all of these new jobs and all of these new industries.
And I'm still looking for
anything based in facts or science that would give rationale to what this Trump agenda looks like right now.
And I still don't have an answer other than if this is what big oil companies want, then I guess that's what we're going to do.
Yeah, I mean, that's that's really the only answer here that this is just, you know, a blatant and corrupt giveaway to, you know, billionaires and polluters.
You know, it's a great it's
Great for them, right good news for them bad news for everyone else in this in this bill Because there's really no there's really no other explanation for it.
You know this you know, these are people who ran on a promise to lower costs for the American people and You know on everything across the board.
We are seeing much higher prices
And when it comes to energy costs, this is just one example.
This plan to repeal clean energy tax credits is going to send energy prices through the roof.
According to analysis, this bill would raise electricity prices for American families by more than $110 a year.
This is going to put about $400,000.
good paying jobs at risk and most of those jobs are actually in Republican districts.
This is real people and real families, real households that are impacted by these decisions.
And quite frankly, these Republicans know it and the rank and file folks, they know how unpopular this is.
I have to imagine that's part of why they're doing some of these things and making these votes in the middle of the night because they don't want the light of day on some of these decisions that they're making.
No, which is why we talk about them as often as we do.
And some of it is just flat out grifting.
You know, the bill would also allow gas pipeline developers to pay a $10 million fee to bypass the normal
permitting process.
It would allow fossil fuel companies to pay the Department of Energy a $1 million fee to determine that a proposed methane gas export facility is quote
in the public interest or as written up by the climate group Evergreen Action, this makes a farce of our permitting process and essentially legalizes corruption with a pay-to-play privilege for gas pipelines and that Americans will be severely impacted by gas pipelines being built through their communities.
Again, it seems like such a gimme question, Melissa, but there's a reason why we have a, quote, normal permitting process for these kinds of things.
Exactly.
There's a reason why we have a process for things, and it is to ensure that there is fairness.
There are standards that are followed, that there are quality controls, that communities that are impacted have an opportunity to
you know, to engage in the process.
But, you know, as with most things, we know that Trump and his administration, you know, they value influence and money more than any of those things.
So whether it's, you know, allowing polluters to, you know, just buy in to, you know,
a pipeline facility or whether it's allowing people to just buy into our immigration system, they don't want to follow normal rules when it comes to their friends and someone they think might be able to enrich them.
I mean, Tony puts it up on YouTube.
So, well, finally, Republicans can be corrupt and public and not have to hide it anymore.
I mean, that, again, putting on your political strategist hat here is just the time I never thought we'd live in where, well, if you do your corruption right out there in the open, people will say, well, it must not be corrupt if he's doing it right out there in the open.
But it is still what it is.
It's still legalized bribery.
Exactly.
It's just, it really is stunning to watch every single day the things that are really being normalized by Trump and this administration and it is all the more important that we continue to talk about it like we do here and like so many others are and talking about it because we cannot ever let it become normal.
We can't let it become the standard.
We can't let people
believe that just because they are doing it out in the open, that it is okay, that it is something that is what we want this country to be and to be representative of who we are as Americans because it is counter to everything that this country was founded on and that we believe.
Melissa Boldoff with our climate check.
As always, Melissa, thanks for catching up.
We'll do it again next week.
Sounds good.
All right, this is a bit of a twofer in this segment here, along with that excerpt from our visit with Melissa near the end of the show yesterday.
We also get to hear now from new state Supreme Court candidate, Chris Taylor, and her Tuesday appearance on the Maggie Dawn Show.
I have really focused my entire 30-year legal career as an attorney, as a legislator, and as a judge on protecting people's freedoms, protecting people's rights.
I want to continue to do that.
That kind of work is a justice on the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
My priority as a judge is that Wisconsinites get access to justice in the fairest, most impartial, most independent way possible.
You know, ever since I was a little kid, a little girl, I really saw that the law is a way
to improve people's lives.
And all I wanted to ever be was an attorney.
And I dreamt of being a judge because I thought you could just do so much good for people.
So I'm really committed to that.
I really think government needs to work for the people of Wisconsin.
The judiciary needs to be about the people of the state.
And, you know, I'm excited to do it.
I know it's a long road, but I have great faith and confidence in Wisconsinites, and I'm just really heartened by all the support that I've received so far.
I wanted to ask you, as you mentioned, Judge Taylor, you've been a Democratic legislator, you are a lawyer for Planned Parenthood, you also serve
policy director, and I asked now justice, or soon to be sworn in, Justice Crawford, now Judge Crawford, the same question when she was running.
How do you assure Wisconsin voters that you can set aside your prior advocacy for a particular organization instead of issues, and as a Democratic legislator, to be an apolitical jurist on the Wisconsin Supreme Court?
Well, Megan, look, I've been a judge now for five years.
I've been a circuit court judge, and now I'm on the court of appeals.
And I understand the difference between a legislator and a judge.
As a judge, I look at the law.
I apply the law to the facts of the case.
And I try to do it in the most fair way possible so people are heard, so people feel like they are getting justice, so people feel like it's a fair process.
So that's what I've done for five years.
It's just a different role, but I have to say, being a legislator is a great, great advantage to
me
as a judge.
I understand the legislative process, a lot of what we do.
A lot of what I do as a judge, a lot about what judges do is interpret the law.
We have to know legislative intent.
We have to look at statutes very closely.
So I really think it makes me a unique candidate in that way.
I have looked at the law from so many different angles.
As an attorney, I was in private practice the first six years of
being in my legal career, so I've also been in private practice, and then as you acknowledge going over to Planned Parenthood and doing a law and policy for them, then in the legislature, being a circuit court judge where people were in front of me every single day, and now at the Court of Appeals, I just have a really unique background and an experience that really has taught me that people are the center of the laws.
people are what matters.
So every case I decide, I'm always thinking about who's this going to impact, who's this going to affect.
And I'm proud of the things I've worked on.
I think that the values that I have are reflected and are held throughout this state of Wisconsin.
I don't think it's at all unusual to feel that women and families should make their own personal and private health care decisions.
I agree with the state Supreme Court's decision that we had unfair maps that discounted people's votes.
These are values that I hold very, very, very dear to me, but I have shown how independent I can be.
I was independent in the legislature.
I worked with Democrats, Republicans.
I didn't always agree with everything, but I'll tell you.
I have always been committed to working out problems, to reaching across to other people who may not see things exactly how I do, and coming up with solutions to people's problems.
And that's what government really should be.
Certainly that's what the judiciary should be.
That's what we do every single day.
That again was appeals court judge Chris Taylor, who is now running for state Supreme Court and will be likely
challenging Rebecca Bradley, the conservative justice whose tenure term is going to be up next year.
And there was an interesting word there that you heard over and over again.
And I think for good reason, values.
I recall once upon a time, it was the folks on the right who ran on, you know, family values.
And then so much of what they did, either in their policy or in their personal actions, showed a dedication to anything but family values.
And so now you have people from the left side of the aisle predominantly talking about values.
And in Chris Taylor's case, the values that connect her to most people in Wisconsin as an attorney.
as a legislator, as a circuit court judge, and now an appeals court judge.
And keep in mind that for the whole history of this republic, we have had lawyers go on to serve in politics, we've had politicians serve as judges, so there's nothing really new here, except that unlike previous campaigns where candidates tried to put some distance, they were kind of above it all, we're in a time now where
candidates for judge or for justice want to show a connection with the people who will be voting and who truly espouses their values.
Chris Taylor has been doing that for her whole life.
Compare that to somebody like Donald Trump or Ron Johnson or other people of high incomes and what their values are making them do in Washington this very hour as we speak.
Today's history lesson is next as we always do mornings up north on the Civic Media Radio Network.
You're listening to Civic Media.
Find the latest news, information, and archives of all your favorite shows on the Civic Media website, civicmedia.us.
This was the number one song in America 48 years ago today on this day in 1977 Stevie Wonder hit number one with Sir Duke a tribute to Duke Ellington who died a couple of years earlier Welcome to today's history lesson for this May 22nd 2025 where Bernie toppen turned 75 years old today longtime Singing songwriting partner with Elton John and a great songwriter in his own right
Back to 1977, though, for a moment, because this was the number one song on the album chart this day in 1977.
Fleetwood Mac's rumors took over the top of the album chart from the Eagles album, Hotel California.
That's a pretty big year for albums that year,
huh?
Boy, Stevie Wonder, Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles, whatever
happened
to them, they're just, you know, nothing.
Yeah, a bunch of fly by nights.
Yes.
Which, by the way, reminds me.
We are talking, we've got young Parker Olson here joining us.
Freshly graduated from UW Oshkosh, correct?
Go Titans.
No,
no, no.
Whitewater.
Oh, whitewater.
Who was the Oshkosh one?
That was, uh, that's Dom.
I'm sorry.
Parker graduated from whitewater.
It is, you know, go fighting whitewater waves.
That's their mascot.
It's a Wisconsin Dells Wave Park.
That's their entire mascot.
Either way, the point I was trying to make with both of our two new producers here is that I'm going to try to get better about having a history segment that isn't just me saying, hey, have you ever heard of the song?
You're so young.
To
be fair, and I've made this point before.
And Parker, I think you'll enjoy this.
You, for who you are, where you live, all the things, you put some very modern songs in there or modern-ish.
Like, there is definitely songs that younger people have heard, and I think you do a good job of that.
That was called a compliment, man, seriously.
I
know.
They don't deal with that in this generation.
It's just, you know, the stuff in the comments section.
Tony on YouTube, what's an album?
Tony.
Alright, let's get to the number one song this week in 1961 by Ernie Cato You see boys and girls this was back in an era where Making fun of your mother-in-law was all the rage in songs and in TV plots and and everything And now we live in an era that why would you do that?
But it was a running gag back then you could have a number one song based on
That's your mother-in-law.
My mother-in-law is amazing.
I
was gonna say, mine's a saint.
Yes.
Yeah.
Whatever.
Eddie.
All right.
On this day in 1804, the Lewis and Clark expedition officially got underway as they left St.
Charles, Missouri.
On this day in 1840, the British government stopped sending prisoners to Australia after about 60 years.
You know.
Things are coming around again.
Now we're shipping people off to El Salvador.
You know, potato potato.
The Beatles had their eighth number one hit in the U.S.
this week in 1965.
This was the number one song 60 years ago today.
Now if you're going, hey, but do these guys have any stain power?
11 years later, this week in 1976, Paul McCartney and Wings had the number one song in the country.
Didn't we just talk about this the other day?
Like this is the Paul McCartney song in terms of how he wants to write.
Yeah,
I'm just gonna do silly love
songs.
Yeah, he stopped writing about anything real in 1971.
Everything is just like, I love you.
The world is great.
I am rich and I'm Paul McCartney and you're not.
I
love
Christmastime.
No, don't you dare.
I don't have it.
I don't have it up for playing right now at this any
moment.
Don't you dare.
We cannot.
We don't have enough time to break in Parker to all of the inside jokes of this program, though we did sing Wichita Alignment to him during the commercial break.
And Luke
didn't appreciate it.
So
whatever.
No, we did not to which, you know, I'm like, wait, Tony put up on YouTube.
Does Luke want to be the one singing?
I don't think so.
Or maybe Luke does.
Do you think Luke is secretly jealous that he hasn't sung?
I
think Luke is secretly the lead singer of like a cover band somewhere in like Middleton and he plays a Thursday night gig.
He's like Duke Silver from Parks and Rec.
He's like our own Hannah Montana.
We don't know what a star he actually is behind the scenes.
The Wright brothers were granted a U.S.
patent this day in 1906 for their flying machine.
I heard righteous brothers.
I'm like, what?
No, the
right.
Yes.
Yes.
I know.
I know.
I know.
You've lost that flying feeling.
Finally, on this day in 1976, Blue Ester Cult released their most popular album, Agents of Fortune.
It sold over a million copies, thanks to one little single on that album.
Get your cowbells ready.
See and this is the point now where again, I'm not gonna take it out on Parker But there are these songs where my daughters when they were like teenagers they'd hear something like that and they'd go oh wait the cowbell thing was that from a real song and I'd just like slump over my steering wheel like yes Yes, I find the original song to play for them dad Paul McCartney was in a band before wings, but I Was somewhere in my like late 20s when I heard much younger folks like
preteens or something.
Describe the Beatles as Paul McCartney's first backup band.
Keep in mind that Paul McCartney and Wings was like the big band at the time.
Yeah.
And it killed me.
I died a little bit that day.
This is National Chardonnay Day.
If you're more of a beer person, today is National Craft Distillery Day.
That's not beer, Pat.
Come on, man.
That's not beer.
Oh, that's OK.
Spirits.
Spirits.
Oh, distillery for spirits.
OK, make your own booze.
Yeah, this is by a musical instrument day.
Done.
And and this is National Solitaire Day, which I never play like with the deck of cards.
But from the trip last week, that is like my go to phone game on an airplane.
It was like, how do you play it then?
You're like, I don't-
I didn't- I didn't-
I didn't think of phone.
I just thought when you said I don't play with the deck cards, I'm like, then what game are you playing?
I'm playing three-dimensional chess with a great box of mind right now.
That's what it is.
So much ahead coming up in our next hour.
We've got Michelle Velazquez from Planned Parenthood Advocates.
Zab Martinez is going to talk about helping people get SNAP and Medicaid benefits and how much they would be hurt in Wisconsin under Trump's new bill.
Chad Holmes, Joseph Pecky, Brittany Merleau, two more hours to go as we get rolling with another one of these Thursday mornings powered by... The national
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