Passing the Bill to See What’s In It (Hour 1)

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You're listening to Mornings with Pat Craiglow powered by Up North News.

Now, from our Lake WSOTA studio, here is the founding editor of Up North News, Pat Craiglow.

Well, hey there, Wisconsin.

Good morning.

It is 6.06 on this Friday morning, May 23rd.

We've made it to Memorial Day weekend, 2025, and it's a beautiful morning to have you here up north, live from Lake WSOTA.

For more every year, spend your mornings with the Civic Media Radio Network app.

social media pod, however you do it.

Thanks for starting your day and ending your week right here.

I got a question for you.

What is the biggest weather mistake you can make this time of year?

The biggest weather mistake.

Take the severe weather out of it.

This is a this is a lighthearted question.

It is.

leaving the window open overnight when it gets warm by day, but it can still get pretty cold overnight.

And this home office here up in Chippewa Falls was a very chilly place this morning.

but you know it was worth it to have the windows open and get the lawn mowed yesterday and have some gorgeous weather heading into the weekend not as warm as I'm sure most of us would like but sunny is better than stormy so I will take that we'll talk more about the weather in just a second coming up on the program today the house republican tax bill

is already getting, of course, a lot of attention for being a massive giveaway to the super wealthy, but the package is even worse than advertised, though much of its impact wasn't learned until after it passed because the process was so rushed.

We'll get some more tidbits about all of the sludge that's in there from Courier Newsrooms, Key of the Keel.

Also, in a few minutes, I will play a quote from Ron Johnson about the House bill and why Ron Johnson doesn't like it.

and then I'm going to laugh at him.

There's been a lot of discussions in newsrooms about how artificial intelligence can either supplement news reporting or

undermine its credibility.

And our Week in Review panel includes a couple of veteran Chicago journalists, so we're going to discuss, along with many other things, how a Chicago newspaper learned the hard way just how badly AI can be set up to report stories that seem to be written by humans only to discover the published product was an embarrassing work of fiction.

Thanks, robots.

Dr. Kristen Lierly will join us later this morning.

And on Fridays, along with, you know, fun games, we will try to get in a little health news as well.

And we're gonna talk about preeclampsia, a condition during pregnancy that can lead to high blood pressure and serious impacts to mother and baby and find out what it is that pregnant women, moms to be, need to know to take care of their health and avoid that very serious condition.

We are going to wrap up our second round of interviews with the candidates for state Democratic Party chair William Garcia will be here in our eight o'clock hour.

And for folks who used to watch me anchor the news in Eau Claire, back in the day, as they like to say, be prepared to hear something that's going to make you feel a little older.

very soon.

Stick around for that as well.

Temperatures around the state look like this.

It's 40 here in Chippewa Falls.

In Hayward right now, it is 28 degrees.

Amory's at 39.

Wasaw 38.

In Wisconsin Rapids, it's 40.

La Crosse 43.

Green Bay 42.

Madison 45.

It's 44 degrees in Radio Park.

So 45 in Madison, where we find Parker Olson, 44 degrees at Radio Park, where we find Greg Bach.

Gentlemen!

Good morning.

Happy Friday.

Good morning.

How's Mr. Bach this morning?

I'm doing fine.

This has not been, this has not been your, your, you know, it's, it's been a week of, and I'm, I'm in the same boat, but mine's jet lag where we've just been, it's been a tiring week.

And I am, I am just

So bursting with happiness that we're heading into this three-day holiday weekend.

That's right.

That's happening too.

Ah,

yeah.

Yes Except for that one thing and I think I mentioned it yesterday is that we will have some pre-recorded programming on Monday because of the holiday

Yeah, but

it means you got to cram it in so today is do this show and then finish preparing Monday show and then write the weekend newsletter That's got to go out from courier newsroom on Sunday and that at that and Todd Alba shows up on my doorstep

any time now because he's gonna do his show from my back deck with the view of Lake Wissota behind us here.

So Todd Alba's show is live from Pat's place two to four o'clock today, Greg.

What could possibly go wrong?

I'm so happy I don't run that show.

I'm gonna take my

stuff and get and go.

Uh, where would you, I mean, right now you're still getting settled into things, right?

So can, have you've got a friend that you can imagine?

I, you know, I love my friend, but if he were to suddenly bring his or her workplace to you, you, you went set the thought of the chaos that's about to ensue.

That would be most of my friends.

Yeah.

Yes.

Yeah.

Exactly.

So, which is why it's Friday.

I've got the Roy Kent mug for the coffee today.

Again, just to remind me that, um,

There we go.

Somebody who can say the things that I can't on a radio program.

Mr. Bach, whether it's laughing tap or just life in general and Southeast Wisconsin, what are you doing this weekend?

Oh, God, what am I doing this weekend?

Oh, we got three shows at the laughing tap.

We've got Nick Vaterot, who is an amazing.

He's got he's got what I would argue the greatest Conan set I've ever seen in my life.

Oh,

yeah.

And he is a writer and a comedian.

He's written for tons of TV shows.

He wrote for real time with Bill Maher, which... But Nick is... Nick is a... Well, I don't like Bill Maher.

Nick is a singular mind.

No one sounds like him.

No one talks the way he does on stage.

He's just wacky and artistic and a sweet man.

One day when I have more time...

I will tell you the story of how I met Nick Vaterot and it was all my fault and I apologized.

But we got those shows coming up and then Sunday, nothing really.

And then hopefully Monday, even more nothing.

So even

more,

I don't, I don't generally get, I mean, this is a, this is an appeal to, for friends, but I don't really get invited to a lot of cookouts for Memorial Day.

I don't go to them.

I just, I'm such a homebody.

I'm never happier than when I'm just at home.

So hopefully that will be the thing.

Again, you're working like six jobs here.

So yes, any moment of peace that you can get.

Mr. Olson, yourself?

Ah, Saturday, I'm heading back down to whitewater.

I'm going to be calling a baseball game.

Super reasons.

Yeah.

Dom and I are going to be having a rivalry this weekend.

I'm excited about it.

Did you ask us

versus whitewater?

Oh, that's

right.

No, you didn't go to school.

Okay.

I

went to whitewater.

That's

right.

You're the fight.

You're the fighting whitewater whales.

And he is the fighting

with the

way chocolatey Claire's.

That's it.

Yes.

No, no, no.

That's the blue golds.

The Claire's.

Yeah.

Isn't that Eau Claire?

They're the

fighting, they're the fighting chocolate declares.

Okay.

From Oshkosh.

Oh, oh, oh, the, oh, they're the, they're the fighting.

Um, they're the fighting O's the fighting.

Also knows the fighting zeros.

Yeah.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no.

The Oshkosh folks do not want to hear that.

Let's move over to Brittany Merleau's forecast for the state today, noting that high pressure has settled in.

It has steered the rain away.

There's a lot of rain out there in parts of the country.

And we've got this high pressure system steering it away, keeping our skies clear.

But the downside of that is we're going to have below average temperatures again today, partly sunny, cooler than normal.

Highs today in the upper fifties only up north mid sixties in the south.

And we still have that north wind at 10 to 20 miles an hour.

for tonight, chilly with another chance of frost up tonight in the mid thirties in the southern part of

Along the way, if you would like to join the show, 855-75-CIVIC is the number to call or text us, 855-75-CIVIC.

You can also use that Civic Media app, and I'm gonna have to change my on-screen reference to 855-75-CIVIC call or text through the app, because now through the app, you can leave us a voice note.

as well.

And you know, if we see it like it, we'll pop it up and folks can hear your hot take on the radio of what you've got to say.

It might be something serious about the news.

It might be your two cents on one of the other topics that we've got going on.

So go ahead and use it.

Start to send us voice notes through the app.

And of course, the usual way through social media.

The comment section, the Up North News Facebook page, the Up North News YouTube page, the Civic Media Facebook page and the Civic Media YouTube page are the four places where you can watch this show as we put it on and put up your comments.

In terms of weather mistakes, Cassandra says, this time of year, leaving the car windows open and a pop-up rain comes in.

I am very guilty of that, including...

Again having this Jeep Wrangler and leaving the top down and it was a it was literally a pop-up thunderstorm There was nothing on the radar and it was one of those times where you look at the radar and it's like wait suddenly There's this green red yellow blob and we're sitting at a place and suddenly we're like the skies are getting dark and you're thinking well Maybe we'll get a sprinkle or two and it just downpours and I had a Jeep

with one to two inches of water in it by the time all was said and done.

So a little bit more than leaving your window cracked open, but it is the kind of thing that you don't want to do.

Yeah.

Let's see.

Oh, this is not you guys, it won't matter.

But I put up a Facebook post last night.

But this is for people who watched me anchoring the news channel 13 for low those many years.

And they still obviously people still recognize and that's great.

It's a great honor to be welcomed into people's living rooms, you know, night after night.

Love doing the radio thing now, but people still bring up the thing at Channel 13 anchoring the six and 10 for all those years and put up a post yesterday.

Usually I'm the one grousing about feeling old.

Now I'm going to do the same for you.

My last day at TV 13 was 20 years ago yesterday.

I've been gone from the TV station for 20 years.

I was only there for nine So it's it's got some staying power, which is true, but yeah 20 years

That I've been free and clear of the TV station and yet my co-anchor Judy still there Judy Clark.

God bless her She's now a WBA local legend Bob Gallagher is still there so many other folks behind the scenes still there Tom Benson just retired from there after years and years and years of service Starting when he was like 12 years old, so I'm I'm happy for all them, but I gotta say 20 years away from you know that job I've been able to do a lot of fun things

Like you guys, you guys are the next fun thing.

So thank you.

I haven't already been fun.

Well, you're like the preface, you know, you're, you're, and then, then Parker came on board and now it's like,

we're writing the next chapter

here.

Oh,

I see.

Oh, I'm old now too.

Well, yeah, that was my whole point.

Now

people feel a

little bit

older.

I

am just incensed.

And I was too when you stopped working at TV.

What you were to yeah, see that's that's what I get all the time now as people come up and they go Oh, were you on TV?

I'm like, yeah, and then I go don't say it and then they go I watched you when

I was a little kid like great.

Thanks so much for that Appreciate it.

Yikes

This is the point where I normally tell you how the Brewers did last night and it occurs to me remember Greg I was saying right before the show I feel like I'm forgetting something I feel like I'm forgetting something.

Yeah, the Brewers were in a rain delay when I went to sleep

Oh,

they still have those because some people are dumb and don't have domes.

That's exactly it.

So so let's let's learn together here.

Here we go with seconds to spare.

He calls up from the Associated Press.

Christian Yelich homered twice and the Milwaukee Brewers hold off the pirates after a long rain delay.

Brewers win eight to five.

Oh boy, we beat the pirates.

Yeah.

Now because it was eight to five it means the the pirates didn't break the record they are tied for the record of having

Four runs or less in the most games in a row, like 24 games in a row.

Not a powerhouse team, boys and girls.

Don't you just love

baseball and their weird stats?

I know, I love it.

But the Brewers win, and that's what counts.

From the heart of America's Up North, live from Lake Wissota, thank you for making this the place to spend part of your mornings.

I'm Pat Critello, and 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.

Welcome back on this Friday morning, 6.23 right now.

Keva Keel coming up in 15 minutes or less here.

Let's see, talked about 20 years since I left TV 13 and Roger from Stevens Point puts on Facebook.

Speaking of last day's delivery news on TV, this is Bill Jartzes last week at WBAY in Green Bay.

That's right.

And so congratulations to him on a very long and respected career too.

Head over to our website up North News W I dot com sign up for our unabashedly Wisconsin newsletter there and today Christina Laurie is writing all about Wisconsin's wine scene.

There are many wineries and vineyards and other places to enjoy a glass of, you know, rosé or chardonnay or whatever your preference is.

So learn about that as one of the options in our daily newsletter.

There's also our weekend newsletter that I mentioned I'll be putting together later today coming out Sunday morning to folks to wrap up the week in Wisconsin politics.

Obviously that includes a lot of reaction to the Trump budget that passed the House of Representatives yesterday.

There's appeals court judge Chris Taylor getting into the Supreme Court race.

There's Derek Van Orden calling for canceling spring elections because for Derek Van Orden, what will help him is less democracy.

And let's see, what else do we have going on here?

Oh, yes, of course, I asked last week from my trip to Portugal and the election with 10 parties.

What's the right number of parties that we should have in this country?

Do we just need one valid third party?

Do we need a fourth?

Do we need five or more?

And so we'll have some of those responses in our weekend newsletter.

Sign up again over at UpNorthNewsWI.com.

And over on our website right now as well, getting set for Memorial Day weekend, everything you wanted to know about brats, including this little tidbit prepared to be, prepared to be dazzled, Greg and Parker.

the number of countries where you can find Johnsonville Bratz is roughly equal to the number of people in Johnsonville, Wisconsin.

Is your mind blown?

No, I know.

Wait, say that again.

The

number of countries where you can find Johnsonville Bratz

is

roughly equal to the number of people in Johnsonville, Wisconsin, which always begs the question, is Johnsonville a real thing from Johnsonville Bratz?

Exactly.

I'm like, aren't they from Sheboygan?

Well, yeah, but Johnsonville is a little community just outside of Sheboygan, the hometown of the guy that started Johnsonville Brats.

He named him after the little town, home of about 45 people.

And you can get Johnsonville Brats in about 45 countries around the

United States.

I feel like I picked the wrong music for that the way you were spinning it.

Now you're doubting the legitimacy of the neighborhood.

It should have been.

There we

go.

Are Johnsonville Brats even a thing, man?

Are they even real?

What's real?

I'll tell you what's real.

Johnsonville Brats, you simmer those things in beer for a while and throw them on the grill.

Charcoal, of course, people.

All right.

Settle down, grandpa.

Oh, man, I'm already hungry thinking about it.

This is great.

All right, well, let's talk about that Republican tax bill that passed the House of Representatives yesterday, only long enough to get reaction from one of the Republicans in the US Senate, Wisconsin's own Ron Johnson.

Because here's the thing, let me set the scene for you.

This is not any kind of a fiscally responsible bill.

All right, let me say that from the get go.

It's calling for a trillion dollars in spending cuts.

And you could say, okay, well, that's fine.

If that gives a trillion dollars in tax cuts, then maybe you can make some kind of an equivalency argument.

But it doesn't do that.

It's a trillion dollars in cuts, but about three and a half trillion dollars in tax giveaways targeted toward the very wealthy.

So that's adding

to the deficit.

The people that loved to talk to you about Democrats engaged in deficit spending and they're all they talk about being deficit hawks.

This thing is anything but it was described as spending like a drunken sailor who just won the lottery.

So here's Ron Johnson.

In this case, you could almost agree with him as he says why he would never support this thing because it goes against Republican orthodoxy of the past 40 years.

I'm concerned about my children, my grandchildren, and the fact that we are stealing from them.

We are stealing from our children and grandchildren $37 trillion in debt and we're going to add to it as Republicans.

That that is unacceptable and that's why there's no way I'm gonna vote for this bill in this current form

So couple of things here first off the stealing from your children and grandchildren Stop it.

Nobody believes you because the last tax bill the one that you had your fingerprints all over Mon Johnson blew up the deficit by two trillion dollars to

Trillion dollars.

So now your line in the sand is one that blows up the deficit another four trillion dollars Not exactly winning any credibility contest there.

So he says I'm not gonna vote for this thing No, he's not gonna vote for this thing.

The Senate is gonna craft it how it likes and the question is whether Ron Johnson puts More stuff into it.

That's good for him the way he did back in 2017 But this whole notion of stealing from your children and grandchildren come on

What are we doing here if you get to get away with something like that?

We talked yesterday to Sean O'Malley in our eight o'clock hour about the uncertainty that has already been caused in the markets by Trump's trade wars and these unnecessary tariffs.

But now you add in the uncertainty about this budget bill and blowing up the deficit and, well,

You see why the the bond markets again cratered earlier this week.

So Ron Johnson against the bill says it's too much of a deficit We agree on that much.

It's a matter of how do you how do you equal things out?

One could argue that you could instead try to grow the economy By growing the economy you would bring in more revenue.

You don't grow the economy through massive layoffs

and cuts in services that make more people reliant on charity rather than having a job.

Well, let's see if the Senate figures that out sometime in the next few weeks or whatever it takes.

We'll talk more about this with Courier Newsroom National Correspondent Keeva Keel in just a bit here first.

Thanks for spending some time here as part of your mornings powered by Up North News.

We will have more live from Chippewa Falls after the Midwest Farm Report here on the Civic Media Radio Network.

I'm Pat Crightlow.

Welcome back on this Friday morning, 635 the time now, where we check in with Courier Newsroom, National Correspondent, Kea McKeel and the other 18 titles that I forget now, but we'll go with the tried and true.

Kea, how's it going?

Going all right, Pat.

You know, scrambling to cover all the news that is fit to print, as they say.

So, but it's going all right.

I have to ask just your opinion, we saw the division among House Republicans, among those who thought this doesn't even cut enough yet.

And it was gonna be a big black eye for Mike Johnson and for Donald Trump.

And they did it with one vote to spare.

What's the level of surprise on that, that they actually did get something done?

I'm not particularly surprised you know Republicans the one policy prior one of the only policy priorities they have is tax cuts for corporations and super rich people that is and making poor people suffer more sorry to put it so bluntly but when you pass a bill that is going to take Medicaid away from almost 8 million people and the Affordable Care Act away from several million more and take food away from several million more.

and take all sorts of stuff away from several million more.

I don't know how you defend yourself as a fighter of the working class.

So the odds were always high.

They care about tax cuts.

That's more or less it.

The Freedom Caucus for all their posturing and insistence that we must cut deficits, they fold every single time.

They

work so hard to find to get through with just that one vote to spare.

fully aware it's got to go over to the Senate where Republicans over there are not necessarily on the same page at all.

Yeah, I think you know, I think the most likely outcome is you'll start you'll see some changes to this bill.

I don't know what those changes will be.

It'll still be a terrible bill.

But you know, there's a lot of Republicans who don't want to cut Pell grants, which this bill does.

There's a lot of Republicans who don't want to cut certain student loan paint programs, which this bill does.

There's a lot of Republicans weary of making such major cuts to Medicaid, which this bill does.

uh, on and on and on so Do I think they'll ultimately still pass something I do?

Um, this is and the reason for that is not because I think they are all in unanimous agreement It's because of what we saw this week where you know if if there is division all that has to happen is the leader of the house or the Republican calls in Donald Trump and Donald Trump essentially brow beats them into voting for it because it is ultimately not a party of

Beliefs or ideologies or values anymore.

It's a party of field to Donald Trump

Without a doubt and I mean if you don't don't don't believe us believe that

big golden plane that he took this week from from Cutter, uh, which is allegedly going to be Air Force one, but we'll maybe get back to that before the segment's all done here.

Let's, let's keep it to the bill.

And again, learning what's in there and I'll bet a couple of things that you've said already have caught people by surprise.

Like, like Pell grants, we were, uh, you know, internally, all of us on the political staff, uh, moving things back and forth in terms of, oh gosh, this is in the bill and that's in the bill.

It's going to make, uh, college more expensive.

of, or it's going to increase the cost of student loans, it's going to increase tax filing costs.

You

shared one with me that said it eliminates grad plus loans, which allow grad students to cover the full cost of attendance.

What's that going to do to law schools and med schools and all

the other

graduate programs out there, Kia?

It's going to destroy them.

Because essentially the way the student loan program works is, you know, and this won't go into this would theoretically go into effect for the 2026.

2027 school year.

But essentially what this would do is make it so that you can no longer get the amount of loans to cover your full cost of tuition.

And when you're in med school, that can be like 100 grand a year.

So tough luck.

You essentially then just have to either not go to med school or go take out a really rapacious private loan that's super predatory and that you'll

can exploit you with crazy interest rates.

So what it's going to mean is a lot less people go to med school, a lot less people go to law school, a lot less people go to grad school.

And we know that Republicans don't particularly care about academia, but you would think they care about having a workforce of doctors and nurses and certain lawyers and other highly educated fields, engineers, psychologists.

addiction counselors, etc.

A lot of which require master's degrees.

But this bill suggests otherwise it just suggests they could not care less.

So then we take it to the local level and that of course is what all the courier newsroom outlets are doing up North News and the others and you and other folks on the national team.

Look at all these local stories as they come through.

So I'm just curious as you've looked through, you know, more than 10 state newsrooms coverage.

Are there things that some of the individual states are bringing up that

really catch your attention?

Yeah, I mean, I think obviously the one of the big ones is Medicaid.

You know, a lot of states have recently seen their Medicaid rolls grow because they passed expansion, whether it's Virginia or North Carolina.

This is something that Wisconsin I think famously has yet to do.

But passing an expansion under the affordable care act.

While this bill, the house pass does not, you know, undo Medicaid expansion or threaten it.

It still has, you know, measures in it that will cause some of those people to lose coverage.

It has work requirements for quote unquote able bodied adults.

It has bureaucratic, you know, paperwork red tape hurdles that it creates.

And, you know, our Virginia reporter was at an event yesterday where a mom who whose daughter is adult daughter who has cancer is on Medicaid right now.

And, you know, we saw.

that she said, you know, if her daughter lost coverage, she would not be able to get her cancer treatment.

And so that's terrifying and appalling.

And, you know, we're seeing things, obviously in California, which is not one of our states, they're repealing this, you know, California's ability to set its own emission standards to protect the environment.

There's a lot of stuff that I think is going to affect hunger in Nevada.

We're seeing a lot of issues with hunger already, you know, as federal cuts have taken place and food banks get less grant funding.

and costs go up and families are struggling, you know, stripping a couple hundred billion dollars from the SNAP program, which, you know, some people might better know as food stamps, is going to make that worse.

You're taking the hungriest, poorest people in America and essentially telling them to go to hell.

And so, you know, if people can't eat food, what happens?

And so, yeah, we're seeing a lot of really kind of devastating local angles on this.

Yeah, I mean, one of the areas that you've seen pushed back, and again, maybe it was just all talk, but Republicans who saw how repealing provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act was going to kill clean energy jobs in their state.

And I, again, without having all the details in front of me, it it

I got the impression that Republican leadership did backtrack on some of that to to win back some of those Republican votes.

But it seemed like the clearest example where Republicans looked at this bill and said, oh, wait a minute, there's there's going to be a cost to to my district, the jobs that are going to get lost there.

So I mean, it doesn't it's not like this is only going to hurt blue districts or blue states.

No.

And there is a lot of quote unquote, moderate swing district Republicans who

did not like a lot of what was in this bill, but voted for it anyway because they can't dare to oppose Trump.

There's a lot of provisions of clean energy jobs in Republican districts and swing districts in red states that are people are going to lose their jobs.

Companies are going to go under.

You know, people are going to have invested in things that they're no longer going to benefit from as a result of this bill.

And a lot of those Republicans who made hay about this for months just hold it.

Yeah, they water down some of the provisions.

But at the end of the day, this does undo a decent chunk of the Inflation Reduction Act.

And what you're going to see is a lot of essentially regression.

We're going to undo the major investments we've made in clean energy to try to protect our climate, our environment, and our kids' future.

And instead, we're going to keep funneling money to oil companies and gas companies and subsidize their work in the billions of dollars, hundreds of billions.

And it's just a big fat check to fossil fuels.

And those moderate Republicans, the only justice there is is they will lose their jobs next November in a lot of what places, and they deserve that.

And they deserve to never again represent the public because they lied to their constituents.

They lied to their voters.

They're taking their health care away.

They're taking some of their food away.

And they are making their environment way more polluted.

and Democrats in the House certainly during the final debate and across the country are echoing some of the things that that you've said that essentially there enjoy the moment now because it's not going to last and look I'm not measuring the drapes for Kim Jeffries in the Speaker's office but I know other people you know who who would do that looking at this and saying

Well, you guys got your your win today.

You're winning the battle.

But in terms of the war for 2026, it's hard to see how the general public eventually welcomes all of these cuts for tax cuts for the wealthy is a good thing.

No.

And here's the thing.

It's like if you wanted to try to this bill doesn't even cut taxes for like working class people or ordinary people.

It cuts taxes for the rich and for corporations.

Traditionally, Republicans at least sneak in something

Oh, that'll give most families a $500, an $800, $200, $1,000 tax cut while they give billionaires hundreds of thousands, millions of dollars in cuts.

They didn't even bother with that this time.

People earning under $51,000 lose out.

They will actively see their resources and their income decline because of the various benefit cuts in this bill.

If you make over 51,000, I think you get a very, very marginal cut.

And then if you make over a couple hundred thousand or a couple million, it's massive.

So those moderates are going to lose their jobs.

And I think that's baked in.

Republican leadership already knew they'd probably lose the house next year.

And obviously the House Freedom Caucus mostly represents safe red districts.

They could not care less.

So it is really on these front line are moderates who essentially just signed their own death warrant for a lot.

It's not a great phrase, but you know, what they just did.

Yeah, political death warrant where, you know, I don't know how they're going to go defend this to their voters, but I'll be very curious to see.

And one last thing, just in closing, I want to tip our caps to our colleagues in North Carolina, they did a live event this week.

And that one was focused primarily on the cuts and how they impact veterans and their health.

If I as I was

reading into it correctly again just a nice way to show you know not nice you know what I mean to show local impact of some devastating decisions.

Yeah absolutely they yeah our folks our team on the ground there had an event on I believe it was Tuesday went really well they focused on you know what cuts to the VA could do to veterans what already some of these cuts that Doge and Trump have done are doing and you know we had a lot of really

kind of devastating testimony that, you know, people will see sort of go up on our social pages over the next couple of weeks.

But, you know, all these cuts, a lot of veterans are on Medicaid, like thousands, hundreds of thousands of veterans rely on Medicaid, because, you know, the VA doesn't necessarily cover every single person who's ever served.

And so a lot of veterans with disabilities are on Medicaid, and it is going to cost some of them their coverage.

Um, and that is appalling, you know, I don't think anyone should lose their healthcare coverage, but if you've gone overseas and served and come back with PTSD or physical injuries or, you know, you were near burn pits, um, and now you're suddenly have to go prove you deserve this health coverage or you lose it without getting the chance to check in.

That's awful.

And like really, you know, deeply, profoundly troubling and, you know,

the people who voted for this should be ashamed.

And, you know, we're going to cover the impacts of that in North Carolina, just like we are in all of our states.

And we heard little bits about that on Tuesday about, you know, what cuts to Medicaid will mean.

And they're going to be devastating.

They weren't the impact.

It will no longer be fear mongering.

It will be the actual pain that people are feeling as a result of the vote that was taken this week.

Kia Vakil, Currier Newsroom.

Thank you so much.

Have a good weekend.

You too, Pat.

Thank you.

Today's history lesson is next as we always do mornings up north here 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.

I don't care what you say, I am a straight, I am, I am here.

I am a, I'm all in on rock music with a trumpet section.

I know, was it Dire Straits that said, you know, that it ain't rock music if it's coming from any trumpet playing band, I believe was

the words.

Wrong.

Wrong.

Ides of March peaked at number two this day in 1970 with vehicle.

The number one song that week was American Woman by the Guess Who.

But now I have to add the standard disclaimer over time, where I've always loved the song, going back to when I was, what, five years old and heard this song.

And eventually you kind of pay attention to the lyrics and you're going, ooh, there's a bit of an ick factor to that.

Oh, now I'm going to look them up.

I'm the friendly stranger in the black sedan.

I'll take you anywhere you want to go.

I

got... Well, he's friendly.

Yes, I got pictures.

I got candy.

I'm a lovable man.

I

can take you to

the

nearest

stuff.

Come

on.

See, when you first hear it, you think he's flirting with somebody that he knows, but then you go friendly stranger in the black sedan.

OK.

Great God in heaven, my goodness.

You know I love you.

Let's

move on.

You like that stuff?

Then I will send you an old band that I was in, eight piece band with horns.

Oh,

nice.

Rock

band.

All right.

I'm going to take a break here in today's history lesson to tell you that it's Friday.

And as promised earlier in the week, we're giving you a chance to win Brewer's tickets on most Fridays throughout the summer.

They are tickets to specific games.

It's a four pack of tickets.

But if you can go to that game and you text us the keyword and we pick yours randomly from all the statewide entries across the civic media stations, right now the keyword is radio.

You use that civic media app.

You text us radio and one entry drawn statewide is gonna earn four tickets to next Tuesday's game versus the Boston Red Sox.

Complete rules at civicmedia.us and I'll rattle off more of the rules when we do this again in our next hour, right after Brittany Merleau's weekend forecast.

All right, back to the history lesson here.

The Everly Brothers started a five week run at the top of the charts with this song on this day in 1960.

This of course would be Kathy's clown and again nothing against the Everly brothers But you kind of understand a little bit more why the Beatles were so big when they came out a couple of years later on this day in 2006 the chicks released their seventh album Taking the long way a lot of folks thought the Dixie chicks now the chicks had kind of faded away They had not this was a very award-winning album, especially with this single

Sorry the wrong button.

There we go.

Here we go And Pat you sent me an acoustic like live studio version Did I and yeah, you did but I'm what my point is that this sounds like it was off the album is so Good like there's their vocal.

I love this group so much.

I do too.

I mean, they're so good so much talent so much

just crazy partisan persecution, which was a topic for another day.

But I'm glad they came back with this album in that single.

On this day in 2007, Jordan Sparks won season six of American Idol.

Let's see, Jewel, the singer, is 51 years old today.

I got a whole bunch of birthdays for you coming up in just a minute, but one more musical note.

It was on this day in 1969 that The Who released their fourth album.

It was a rock opera about a deaf, dumb and blind kid by the name of Tommy.

Okay, here are the birthdays.

Joan Collins.

Remember Joan Collins from Dynasty?

90, 92 years old.

No, I was not talking to Parker on that one.

No, no.

Joan Collins, 92 years old today.

And Drew Carey is 67 years old today.

Have I asked Greg any inside on meeting Drew Carey in your comedy circles?

I've never

met Drew Carey, but what I understand he is a spectacular

example of a human being.

During the

Ryder

Strike, there

was a

restaurant close.

He would pick up the tab every day for all of their lunches.

He's just a good human being.

He loves people and he loves just being good.

I love him so much.

That's great.

Well, happy birthday to him.

67 years old today.

There are a lot of birthdays over this holiday weekend.

So I thought I would go through all of those right now.

Stop me at any point if you want to talk about them.

Bob Dylan tomorrow turns.

turns 84 years old today, which reminds me of all the, you know, vacation stories that it told this week.

I failed to mention that on the flight over to Portugal, I finally sat and watched in the airplane, a complete unknown.

The movie about Bob Dylan.

Did you either of you get to see it yet?

I have not.

I want to watch it.

I'm probably going to like some Sunday when I got time.

But yeah, it's a I've heard it's very good.

It's very good.

You know, I'm not going to give it, you know, all the Oscars or anything like that.

But yeah.

Happy birthday to Bob Dylan or as Tony reminds us from up north Bob Zimmerman Robert Ellen Zimmerman turning 84 years old tomorrow Tommy Chong turns 87 tomorrow So don't kids tell you how drugs will cut your life short Tommy Chong has an alternate point of view.

Yeah, I'm at

Patty LaBelle is 81 years old tomorrow.

Priscilla Presley turns 80 tomorrow.

Roseanne Cash turns 70 years old tomorrow.

Not much on the Sunday list, but let's get to Monday Memorial Day.

Stevie Nicks turns 77.

Lenny Kravitz turns 61 on Monday, which again, I hasten to add, that makes him the same age as me.

He's just like 38 days older.

I did not get to be a rock and roll superstar.

Lady Kravitz did.

He did something right.

And Ms.

Lauren Hill turns 50 on Monday.

This is National Don't Fry Day.

Not grilling, but sunscreen.

Don't Fry Day.

It's

National Taffy Day, and it is World Turtle Day.

So much more ahead in the next hour, including Democratic Party chair candidate William Garcia, Kristen Lyrely, and more on the Civic Media Radio Network.

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