Convention Recap (Hour 3)

Live, across Wisconsin on Civic Media, you're listening to Mornings with Pat Craiglow powered by Up North News.

Now, for my Lake Mesota studio, here is the founding editor of Up North News, Pat

Craiglow.

Canada.

No, wait, look, I'm back in Chippewa Falls.

Hey there, Wisconsin.

Good morning.

It is 6 0 6 on this Tuesday morning, June 17th.

It is another beautiful all-American 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 or listening or listening or watching us on all over different platforms.

Thanks for starting your day right here.

I got a question for you.

Can you believe they let me back into the country?

Tony on YouTube wait you came back and Alicia.

Oh, hey, welcome home.

Well, hey, yeah, here I am it it worked Here's here was the funny part about it Apparently my flight home Sunday from Saskatchewan, which was canceled had something to do with a tire issue So imagine how it was a bit unnerving sitting on this, you know propeller driven plane

I didn't even know they had those anymore.

And I'm in like row 19 now because I'm on the next day's flight.

And don't realize until I hear the kathunk and I see the wheel coming out because it's below the wing and I'm sitting right behind the wing.

And so I'm looking at this wheel coming down going.

Okay, I'm examining it like, like I'm a technician from Goodyear, you know, and it's like, hmm, how's that tire look?

Okay, it's okay.

And it worked.

The propellers worked, the tires worked, you know, and like Alicia says, hey, at least you know, you can you can take this show international.

Yes, I can.

Tony asks, does the air smell freer?

Oh, no, no, Tony, it does not at all.

Although it's always interesting to talk to people from another country about their government and what they think.

And in this case, in this day and age, how their government is compared to, say, our government and the complications that it's throwing at them.

We will talk about that today in the area of farming with Hans Breitenmoser this morning, because I do recall late last week, President Trump putting up a post saying, you know, all of this mass deportation might not be so good for our great farmers and our hospitality industry and things will change.

Did they?

Will they?

Or was that flip-flop just going to be flip-flopped again?

I honestly don't know.

We're going to find out and see more about what this uncertainty does to America's food supply, not just the farms, but everything else that's connected with it.

So we'll have that coming up with Hans Brighton Moser along the way.

Dan Schaefer will be joining us.

Civic Media's political editor, founder of the Reconpopulation Area, author of a column that said, Governor Evers should consider not running for a third term.

Dan then went on to cover the State Democratic Convention.

We'll see what the reaction was like to his column there.

And so we'll see what he's, if you got a lot of blowback, if you got affirmation, what did he, how did he interpret Governor Evers remarks at the convention?

I'll have a few things to say about the governor and the state budget debate in the legislature coming up at the bottom of this hour because a Republican state senator

may have already telegraphed what the Republican strategy is on the state budget.

Don't do anything.

Like literally do nothing.

Probably taking a hint from their friends in Congress who haven't been able to pass a budget bill in a couple of years here and will explain why they might do that and what would be the political benefits and the political risks, not to mention how it would affect you and me.

That's all coming up later this hour.

Lou Ann Bird will be joining us in the seven o'clock hour to talk about the ways that more people around Wisconsin are making it clear to their elected representatives that President Trump's big bloated boondoggle of a budget bill should not slash affordable stable health care from Medicaid to tens of thousands of people in Wisconsin.

And so Luanne will join us to talk more about that effort.

We'll talk to Dan Hagen from NewsWatch 12, WJFWTV and Rhinelander at his new time, which will be at 7.20 instead of 6.50.

Today's history lesson is as comedian Ron White likes to say, loaded.

There's a lot of history to pass along today.

So we will be working on that at 6.50 Dan Hagen at 7.20.

All that.

and much more.

Brittany Merlos forecast as well, which continues to have showers and thunderstorms in it for the next few days, but the heat is on the way.

And I mean the heat is on the way for the weekend.

So get ready for a hot, steamy weekend that could be coming up here in very short order.

a reminder that you can text the show at eight five five seven five civic eight five five seven five two four eight four two or you can text us from the civic media app or you can put comments on Facebook or YouTube that would be the Facebook and YouTube pages of civic media and the Facebook and YouTube pages of up north news if you're ever if you're listening on the radio and ever can't or ever want to catch

what we look like as we're trying to mug it up here and do this show for you, come find us on one of those social media pages.

You can also email the show radio at upnorthnewswi.com, where you can also answer our question of the week that we ask in our Sunday morning newsletter all the time, something that you can sign up for over at upnorthnewswi.com.

And it comes back to that Dan Schaefer column.

Three term Tony, up or down?

What do you think?

Should Governor Evers run for a third term?

And of course, you've got people in three different buckets.

You've got people saying, well, of course he should run for a third term.

He's the one best suited to win.

He's got a good record.

He would look like the centrist and the moderate to most Wisconsin voters compared to whatever extremist gets the Republican party nod.

And I don't feel like I'm engaged in hyperbole there.

I can't think of a moderate Republican that would be named one that would

Make Tony Evers look radical liberal by comparison.

So there's people who want Tony Evers to run There's people who don't who say we like them fans of them, but you know, he maybe can't win a third term and Democrats should pass the torch and then of course there's people that say they should that he shouldn't run because you know, they're Republicans and not fans of him anyway folks who get our Sunday newsletter

We're the first to start answering that question of the week.

You can send us an email radio at upnorthnewswi.com.

Lots of good responses have come in already and we'd be very happy to get yours as well.

Also, if you want to listen to the show as a podcast, well, we'd love to have you there as well.

All you got to do is head over to Spotify and you can then subscribe to the show.

Pottis, if you will, at Spotify, Apple as well, or wherever you get your podcasts.

And of course, it's civicmedia.us.

Brittany Merleau will be here a little after the seven o'clock news, but here's her state forecast.

She says, an unsettled week of weather rolls on with rounds of showers and storms continuing, but the heat will crank up just in time for the weekend.

She says, partly sunny with rounds of showers and thunderstorms, especially in southern Wisconsin today.

highs in the mid 70s up north to the mid 80s in the south a northwest wind at five to 15 miles an hour tonight partly cloudy up north cloudy south with chances of rain lows tonight in the mid 50s up north to the mid mid 50 to the mid 60s south and then a light northerly wind

as well.

Right now here in Chippewa Falls it's 64 degrees and despite many ominous looking lines of showers and thunderstorms we we got very very little here other places got dumped on some parts in the Twin Cities got heavy heavy rain flash flooding flooding out some of the streets for a time there so

You definitely want to stay weather aware and catch that local forecast throughout the broadcast day all across your favorite civic media stations.

Meanwhile, down in Madison, in Madison Studio A2.

We find Parker Olson, who did Yeoman's work yesterday filling in for yours truly when he had to dash off to the airport in Regina, make it back across the border and do this program, but Parker got the job done.

Parker, thank you and good morning.

Good morning, Pat.

I was starting to think you forgot about me for a second there.

I was like, dang, we're almost 10 minutes into the show.

He hasn't said anything about me.

You know, there's all the housekeeping to get done.

Sign up for our newsletter here are the guests.

Here's the forecast.

It's a lot of things.

It's a lot of things before we can actually be conversant over here.

But now we get to get to do it.

How is Laura Bird, our 830 guest yesterday, author who was going to talk about memoirs.

That's about the time I was dashing off to the airport.

Oh, wait, let me fix that.

Dashing off to the airport until my phone beeped.

And it said, it said, you, your luggage is no longer nearby.

Which doesn't make sense because we were dashing to the airport, but I have an Apple tag Sure luggage

left it at that

Well, the suitcase was in the truck.

I knew that Oh, but but the where I put the Apple tag is in my toiletry bag and that was still in the bathroom

of our

friends' house.

It's always the toiletry bag that gets you.

Which, you know, at first she was like, our friend who was driving was like, what do you want?

And I'm like, throw it out.

It's toothpaste.

It's toothbrushes.

Then I realized it's not just the apple tag, but my glasses were in there and something else.

We're like, OK, we got to go back.

So I was going to listen to your interview with Laura Bird at 8.30.

But things were a little sideways at that moment.

How'd it go?

It was good.

Luke came in pinch hit for that one a little bit.

I hosted him for the last half hour there.

I had a really good conversation with her about a couple of those books.

Yeah, it was a good time.

A little hectic.

It was good, though.

Did it give you any thoughts of writing your own memoir at some point here?

Oh, I've always thought about writing a book pad, actually.

I mean, as

Tony notes, you are a national champion, Parker,

right

there.

Yeah, that's true.

I might

have to write

a book.

I have many stories.

Do you have stories already?

Oh,

oh, yeah.

Oh, well, this should be good.

Oh, yeah The

I'm just trying to think.

How old are you again?

22.

Pat's going

22.

Oh, God.

What

stories could he have?

What stories could he have?

And then I think of my own stories and go, OK, I can see it.

Yep.

Look, everybody's got a story.

That's the thing.

And if you, everybody says, oh, I don't have a story.

If you ask the right questions in just the right way, if somebody's in just the right frame of mind,

Everybody's got stories.

Oh, yeah.

It's just a way of leading to it.

You don't know what's going to trigger it.

I wasn't going to tell the Apple tag in a toiletry bag story until the right moment came up.

And there it was, you know.

So, uh, stand by everybody for the memoirs of Parker Olson on a bookshelf near you sometime in the next 40 years.

The Milwaukee Brewers are on the road this week.

They were off yesterday.

Three games at Wrigley Field starting tonight against the Chicago Cubs.

It's going to be a big series and coverage begins at 630 on Civic Media stations in Richland Center.

Oshkosh we're seeing Kenosha Park Falls and Hayward head over to civicmedia.us to learn more but there will be games this evening tomorrow evening and I want to say

Thursday afternoon.

I think it's a day game.

I'm going to call that up right now just so that I'm not a liar.

Yep, sure enough.

So first pitch is 7 0 5 tonight and tomorrow and then 120 on Thursday afternoon is the first pitch.

And then they're off to Target Field to take on the Twins in games Friday evening, Saturday afternoon and Sunday afternoon.

Big series.

They'll be back home next Monday for a home stand that starts next Monday with three games against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

And again, if you're looking for a little day game, a little matinee, get off work for a little while.

And that'll be next Wednesday against the Pirates.

A 110 start there.

So maybe make a plan to play a little hooky and get on down to the ballpark.

Let's see the NBA Finals continued and the Oklahoma City Thunder beat the Indiana Pacers.

And 120-109 was the final there, so the Thunder are now up three games to two, coming close to being able to clinch the finals after a tough run by the Pacers, or the Pacers could tie it up next time around and force a game seven.

And then the Stanley Cup Finals tonight, game six in Florida.

Florida could clinch, or Edmonton could force a game seven.

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

I'm Pat Critello, this is the Civic Media Radio Network.

That's some unique bumper music there.

It's like a little grateful dead excursion right there.

It's part of our morning powered by Up North News.

That was interesting.

I think I've only heard that once before when we had deadhead Dan Schumacher on the program.

Yeah, that's how.

I think that's how they came down.

Back to our daily newsletter at Up North News in today's edition.

I was just peeking at that and Christina Laurie's got stories in there about cheese curds in Wisconsin, about great places to catch the northern lights.

And then she's also got a story and I thought I would share some of the details of it here.

Do you know how much it costs you every time Donald Trump goes to play golf?

And look, yeah, I can already hear people going, well, you know, President Obama played golf.

Yeah, they all play golf.

Well, most of them, but the expense, the extent to which some presidents, a certain president plays golf rather than, you know, working.

According to a government accountability office report, back during his first term in office, Donald Trump's trips to Mar-a-Lago, each one, each one costs about $3 million.

Trump and his entourage fly down on Air Force One.

The military is to bring down vehicles for his motorcade, so those come down on C-17 transports.

Because Mar-a-Lago straddles the width of a barrier island, police boats with machine guns mounted on the boughs patrol the intercoastal waterway.

A Coast Guard vessel is stationed off the beach.

There's explosive sniffing dogs and other law enforcement.

The Palm Beach Sheriff's Office has to maintain a presence in the air on the ground and in the water around Mar-a-Lago 24 hours a day.

That's an additional $240,000 a day.

And of course, to me, the kicker is always that Trump stays at his own properties.

The Secret Service is there to protect him, but he charges them for the rooms.

And it's one thing if Secret Service has to stay at a hotel and the hotel's reimbursed, but this is the president who's making money.

off of this.

And so all of that, all of that money that the taxpayer is charged for his own secret service protection goes to him.

So a lot more about that in our newsletter that you can sign up for over at up on news wi.com.

I was looking at some of the other stories that we have on the website here.

There's also one that I wanted to share called four Wisconsin factory tours that are worth the drive.

And we will talk about this a lot more in the coming days, but we love a good story about Wisconsin weekend road trips.

And so these factory tours involve bikes, beer, cheese, and more.

So look for that on our website over at UpNorthNewsWI.com.

Happy anniversary to the Watergate burglars.

It was on this day in 1972, 53 years ago, that five White House operatives were arrested for breaking into the offices of the Democratic National Committee to illegally wiretap the George McGovern campaign.

It was as stupid an idea in politics as they come because

as most folks of a certain age know.

Nixon would go on to win 49 states in the presidential election of 1972.

The only reason you would bug an opponent that you would end up winning in 49 states is out of paranoia.

And Nixon had that in droves.

He would resign and disgrace two years later for his extensive efforts to cover up his role in the whole Watergate mess.

But here's the thing that brings us to the present day.

One of Nixon's TV advisors was a guy named Roger Ailes, who didn't believe in things like honor and contrition and playing by the rules.

When Nixon resigned, it started the wheels turning for Roger Ailes for what would start as Fox News and the right wing media constellation.

That has become so prevalent That a guy like Donald Trump could not only get elected president twice not be impeached not once but twice after being caught red-handed committing crimes and Lacking any honor not only refused to slink away But positioned himself to become a potential dictator and that was all because a right-wing messaging ecosystem had been created

by Roger Ailes who thought, well, if only Nixon could get his side of the story out, you know, the side with the paranoia and the burglary and the using the attorney general as your own personal attorney and threatening to use the sick the IRS on your opponents.

If only you could go do those things and make it sound good.

You could get enough Americans to support you.

And that's exactly what happened since then.

By all accounts, for those of us who, again, grew up in a certain age, having somebody with 34 felony convictions, convicted on sexual assault related charges, so many business failures, would not come anywhere near sniffing distance of the White House.

Much less be in it with all of the transfer of wealth from the middle class to others, the charging of taxpayers, as I mentioned earlier, for all of his rounds of golf.

but a right-wing media ecosystem that has sprung up and cocooned those who would just as soon say, you know, we don't really need to have those pesky elections.

Why don't we see if we can get courts to overturn them?

Why don't we not actually have debates over ideas?

Let's just rule Congress.

at the state level?

Why don't we just gerrymander the maps and be proud of it until or unless a court forces us to make things better?

That's going to take me to my next topic at the state level where Republicans in Madison appear to be on the cusp of borrowing an idea from their brethren in Congress.

And that's to just not debate a budget.

Don't work with Democrats.

Don't look for a win-win.

Don't look for the moderate course.

And if you want to go extreme, go extreme.

And sometimes the best way to go extreme is to do nothing.

And I'll explain what we mean in just a little bit.

Dan Schaefer is still coming up today.

Chad Holmes is along the way.

Luann Bird and much more.

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

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

All right, this is normally the point where I jump on the little Civic Media sheet and I go, hey, who else is coming up on these fine Civic Media programs later on today?

That would include for Matinair on Air in the 10 a.m.

hour, retired Major General Randy Manor.

from National Security Leaders for America.

Then on the Todd Alba Show from two to four, there will be an appearance by James Small, the Rural EMS Outreach Program Manager at the UW School of Medicine and Public Health.

On the Maggie Dawn Show on the four o'clock hour, J.D.

Shulton, a former Courier Newsroom video creator and commentator who is now a U.S.

Senate candidate running against Joni Ernst.

He is a state representative in the Iowa legislature.

At 430, Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson

will give his perspective on having federal troops in Los Angeles and of course the tragic happenings in Minnesota and also the events coming up for Juneteenth.

And in the five o'clock hour, State Senator Dora Drake from the Milwaukee area will discuss some issues related to her role as vice chair of the Senate Democratic Caucus and chair of the Wisconsin Legislative Black Caucus.

And of course you can catch Night Light with Pete Schwabba this evening as well all across the

media radio network.

Let's get a bit of a Republican or get a bit of a state budget update now thanks to a post recently made by a Republican state senator Chris Kapping of Waukesha County.

He's giving the first unofficial indication of where in my opinion anyway Republicans were going to be all along on the state budget.

They are so

tired and frustrated by Governor Tony Evers veto pen and his partial veto powers which are among the strongest in the country.

They're so frustrated they'd rather claim that the more responsible path for a state budget is to leave things as is.

I've never been willing to bet the farm on Republicans actually passing a new state budget and capping his comments

are a fresh sign that this is the direction Republicans might choose to go in.

They may say they may see doing nothing as their best path forward.

On Twitter, Kappinger writes the following.

Wisconsin's state budget expires on June 30th.

There are three options based on what I'm seeing.

One, accept the governor's budget.

Keppinger writes, the governor made clear he wants significant spending and tax increases.

The request don't even make sense.

It's a non-starter, he writes.

Number two, support the budget being drafted by Republican members of joint finance.

This version also appears to be adding unnecessary spending without any reforms that would improve the budget process or dig into wasteful spending currently in place.

An additional major risk in doing this is the state supreme court has allowed the governor to do essentially whatever he wants it with his veto pen, no bueno, capping a rights.

And then he says option three, allow the existing budget to carry over.

It would be the lowest spending increase in a decade and have no veto pen risk.

Unless something improves, he says, I'm going with option three.

And some of the initial headlines made it sound like Chris Cappiga was having some kind of a revolutionary break with members of his own party.

And I disagree.

I think he's telegraphing where they might want to go.

Before I go deeper into that, though, can I just go back to his part about option number two?

which is what the Joint Finance Committee might eventually create, you know, the one that the Joint Finance Committee with 12 Republicans and four Democrats.

What I find interesting is his insistence that while he's insinuating his fellow Republicans haven't done enough to do, how did he phrase it here, the reforms that would dig into wasteful spending currently in place.

Tell me again, who's been in charge of the Wisconsin legislature for the past 14 years?

If there is wasteful spending currently in place, who's doing it?

Can't say it was Democrats.

They haven't been running the legislature for 14 years.

But anyway, back to the larger picture.

Kaikman says, maybe don't pass a new state budget.

Just keep limping along without updating how state government operates.

Now, if this sounds familiar to you, it's because it's what Republicans in Congress have been doing for the past two years themselves.

We see the deadlines.

We keep hearing about the potential for a government shutdown.

And then Republicans pass what are called continuing resolutions that simply kick the can and keep the old budget operating.

It's also why there hasn't been a new farm bill since 2018.

Kicking the can.

because governing is hard.

Now, this is not completely unexpected in terms of a strategy.

Think back to about a year and a half ago or so, Senator Ron Johnson was asked about being part of the least productive Congress in history, and his response was to say that if he had things his way, Congress wouldn't pass any more bills.

None.

They'd stop working.

He says this with his usual extremist anti-democracy hyperbole.

He says every bill that gets passed makes things worse.

No, it doesn't.

Those are the words of someone who doesn't want democracy where you have to debate your values and accept the results in Congress or at the ballot box.

Ron Johnson believes he knows what's best for you, and if you'd only let him and Donald Trump rule by executive orders rather than writing bills and holding votes, well, things would be better off.

Especially if you're in the same tax bracket as Ron Johnson or Donald Trump.

So let's bring it back to state government.

Why would Republicans not send a new budget bill to Governor Tony Evers?

Isn't that politically risky?

It is.

It does open up Republicans to charges of being a bunch of do-nothings in line with their practice for many years now in the legislature of doing only a few months of work at the start of the year and then taking taxpayer-funded vacation for the rest of the year, despite a full-time salary, despite full-time job status.

To them, that's what small government is.

Don't solve problems, don't invest in making anything bigger.

But there's more to this approach of not passing a budget.

And it comes back to something I haven't mentioned for a while, but I have been talking about it for nearly four years now.

They're trying to pull off a heist.

Because once again, there's a budget surplus at the state level.

And once again, they would love to put all that into tax cuts aimed at helping their wealthiest friends first.

and maybe some crumbs for everybody else.

But Tony Evers and his veto pen are in the way.

So they stall.

Their hope four years ago was that he'd be one term Tony.

He'd lose his reelection bid and then a Republican governor, in this case Tim Michaels, would sign their budget bill that squanders those billions of dollars.

It would have been a heist.

And they would have gotten away with it too if it weren't for those meddling voters.

who gave Governor Evers a second term.

And now we're at that point again.

If Republicans don't send him a budget bill, the surplus, your money, just sits there the way it has been.

It doesn't fix a broken school funding system.

It doesn't expand affordable healthcare in the state.

It doesn't create jobs through infrastructure and economic investments.

It sits and waits.

for a Republican to maybe win the governor's race in 2026 when the heist can finally be pulled off.

This is all serious stuff, but allow me to lighten things up and explaining why I don't think it'll work.

You see, when Republicans try to be cute this way, I've seen it in Madison, I've seen it in Washington DC, they always end up looking like Wiley Coyote in the old cartoons.

In this case, Governor Evers is the Road Runner, and his veto pen is the Acme and Ville that keeps getting dropped on their heads.

Chris Capunga is signaling that they still see Governor Evers not as a partner in governing.

They don't want to govern together.

They don't want to work together on tax cuts and important investments.

They see Governor Evers as an opponent, like the Road Runner, to be defeated.

And their tactic...

could work.

If they spend enough money next year on election ads, they could maybe convince enough voters that not writing a new state budget was their only way to be fiscally conservative against a mean and extremist governor.

But their excuses will come undone.

because voters see the long record.

They see the extended taxpayer funded vacations.

They see how much Republicans detest Governor Evers.

They see how they sneer at affordable healthcare coverage for more than a million people in the state through Medicaid as welfare.

They see Republicans blocking extended postpartum Medicaid health care coverage to new moms blocking health care coverage to new moms They see the gerrymandered maps They see the negative messages that have lost what four of the last five state Supreme Court elections Voters don't like to pay a lot of attention to politics, especially state politics

But they do pay attention to messaging.

They do pay attention to productivity.

They do know who's working on their behalf much of the time.

And so if what they want to do over the next few weeks is not pass a state budget, well, in my view, it would be best for them to get one of those tiny cartoon umbrellas opened up to guard against another Acme Anvil that voters are gonna drop on their heads next year.

Over in the comment section, Alicia is looking at what the legislature has been doing the past few years and says about not writing a new state budget.

It screams laziness, stubbornness, and childishness to me.

Tony says, because everyone knows government has got it all figured out.

Wait, tons of things are broken, like the tax code.

And,

whatever happened to auditing health insurance companies who deny a bunch of claims.

That's the kind of thing that Tony Evers put in his budget bill that Republicans took out.

And again, there's so many things going on that most folks didn't even know Governor Evers proposed it.

Fewer yet know that Republicans pulled it out.

So I'm gonna mention it again.

Governor Evers proposed in his budget a provision.

That says to health insurance companies if you're doing business in Wisconsin if you're taking Wisconsin taxpayers premium dollars to provide health care coverage and you have a consistent track record of denying legitimate claims You're going to get audited And let's find out what's behind this and let's find out are you a health insurance company or are you scamming?

The taxpayers of Wisconsin the health insurance customers of Wisconsin

It's a bold pro consumer idea to ensure that businesses are not Taking advantage of unscrupulous business practices and Republicans took it out of the budget bill Now will they write their own budget bill?

That's the part that remains to be seen But we've now told you why why they might choose not to and if they don't the current budget, you know state government won't shut down

We'll just continue to operate under the old budget.

It also means things won't get any better.

We won't be fixing the things that we could be fixing.

We won't be addressing the things that need to be addressed like PFAs in our drinking water.

If that's really the goal, to do nothing, to look fiscally conservative, as Chris Cappinger puts it, to have the lowest spending increase in a state budget, I mean, they can take that to the voters.

I feel pretty confident how enough voters are going to interpret that.

Still ahead, Dan Schaefer, Chad Holmes, Lou Ann Bird, Hans Brighton Moser, but first today's history lesson is next as we always do.

Mornings powered by Up North News and live here on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Hey, Pat, you're muted.

Oh, here, I had such a good riff going on about Lola.

I'm sure you did.

I wanted to hear you singing with her.

With faded feathers in her hair and a dress cut down to there.

Yeah.

Happy birthday to Barry Manilow, who is 82 years old today.

Born in Brooklyn, gave us 51 top 40 singles on the adult contemporary chart.

36 hits in the top 20, 28 top 10 hits.

13 number ones.

Is that good?

That's pretty good.

That's pretty good.

The guy was everywhere in the late 70s.

And the thing is, before that even, he was a successful jingle writer.

He's the one who wrote, like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

Really?

He wrote, I'm stuck on Band-Aid because Band-Aid's stuck on me.

He wrote, you deserve a break today for McDonald's.

Wow.

He he wrote jingles for Kentucky Fried Chicken and yeah, for Pepsi and more.

Wow.

So quite the resume.

Yeah, he's he's written a few tunes and he's 82 years old today.

Congratulations.

Happy birthday to Barry Mandela.

Folks going, hey, where's where's Dan Hagen?

He's normally here on Tuesdays.

We've we've made a bit of a schedule.

There's so much history all the time.

Didn't it always feel like we weren't given Dan nearly enough time?

I always felt bad going like, hey Dan, do you have a 30 second story you can share real quick?

Yeah, so what we've done is Dan's going to join us now at 720 on Tuesdays.

So he'll be here in less than a half hour.

If by chance you're listening to a station that cuts away and does a local update at 720, you can watch us online, Facebook or YouTube or subscribe on Spotify or Apple as a podcast and catch Dan later.

So you'll be seeing him there in 1972.

On this date, the spinners stepped into a Philadelphia recording studio for the first time with their new producer, Tom Bell.

And the session is very productive, yielding two of their biggest hits, including this one.

The spinners would also...

put out I'll be around from that session again 53 years ago.

On this day in 1885 the Statue of Liberty arrives in New York Harbor.

Nowadays Donald Trump would turn the boat away.

Dolly Parton stepped into a recording studio this day in 1973 and here was the result.

On this day in 1963, the U.S.

Supreme Court ruled eight to one against a school district about requiring the reciting of Bible verses and the Lord's Prayer in public schools.

Just a reminder, freedom of religion allows you the freedom of your religion not to dictate somebody else's.

The number one song this date in 1978 was by Andy Gibb.

That's more birthdays here.

Venus Williams, tennis legend is 45 years old today.

Kendrick Lamar is 38 today, born in Compton at eight years old.

Kendrick watched Tupac and Dre film California Love in his neighborhood filming the video and decided right then and there he wanted to be a rapper.

On this day in 2008 came Katy Perry's major label debut, one of the boys with this hit single.

This was a big day for a lot of folks in 1994.

On this day in 94, following a low-speed highway chase, O.J.

Simpson was arrested for the murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.

And he would eventually beat the charges, but be convicted of other crimes and passed away not long ago.

On this day in 2006, Shakira landed her first number one hit in the US.

On

this day in 2021, the Juneteenth National Independence Day was signed into law by President Joe Biden, making it a federal holiday and it will be observed on Thursday of this week.

It is Global Garbage Man Day.

That's the name of it global garbage man day.

So if you have a garbage lady or a garbage hostess, whatever, no offense taken, it just happens to be marked as global garbage man day.

This is National Apple Strudel Day.

This is National Eat Your Vegetables Day.

Parker, are you a vegetable eater?

Not a big vegetable eater.

I mean, corn, sweet corn, love corn on the cob.

Oh, no.

Now we're going to hear from people about whether corn is a vegetable or not.

You ever know, so you get that with almost everything.

Oh, tomato, it's a fruit.

We know what we like.

I don't care what it's called.

I'm going to eat it.

There you go.

Born this day in 1923, Elroy Crazy Legs Hersh.

Passed away back in 2004 and native of Wausau.

Crazy Legs Hirsch played college football as a half back at the University of Wisconsin in 1942 and Michigan in 1943, turning both teams into top five powerhouses.

He received the nickname Crazy Legs for his unusual running style.

Dan Janssen is 60 years old today.

speed skater from West Alice High School, inspired by his sister Jane.

He took up speed skating while growing up.

In Calgary, he fell a couple of times.

Shortly after his sister had passed away, he won no medals in 1992 either, but then in 1994, Dan Jansen struck gold, setting a world record in the 1,000 meters for speed skating.

Another sports related birthday, Mark Tosher is 48 years old from Auburn Dale High School, spent his 11 year career as an offensive tackle for the Packers after making the Badger football squad as a walk on in 1995.

He was a key blocker for Ron Dane in his 1999 Heisman Trophy winning season.

He remains an advocate for childhood reading, having lived in Sun Prairie and talking about how childhood reading programs

helped him overcome early difficulties.

Still a lot ahead for two more hours as we get rolling on another one of these Tuesday mornings powered by Up North News.

We've got Dan Schaefer coming up for long talking about the State Democratic Convention this past weekend.

I'm Pac Rightlow.

This is the Civic Media Radio

Network.

Live, across Wisconsin on Civic Media, you're listening to Mornings with Pat Crichtlow powered by Up North News.

Now, for my Lake WSOTA studio, here is the founding editor of Up North News, Pat Crichtlow.

Hey, good morning.

It's 7 0 6.

Nice to be back in the central time zone here to say it's 7 0 6.

and nice to have you here up north.

Not as far north as Saskatchewan, but nice to be back home on this Tuesday morning, June 17th, 2025.

Along the way, we've got Luanne Bird standing by to talk about holding members of Congress accountable for their support of cutting people's stable and affordable Medicaid health care coverage.

That's coming up in just a bit.

We'll talk to Dan Hagen from WJFW News Watch 12 in Rhinelander.

We'll be talking to Lincoln County dairy farmer Hans Brayton Moser about the latest round of uncertainty caused by President Trump when it comes to mass deportations and workers on farms and frankly throughout America's food supply.

Then in our next hour, we'll be talking to Chad Holmes from 989 WXCO in Warsaw and finally Dan Schaefer from the Reconbobulation Area and political editor for Civic Media.

We'll join us to talk about the state.

Democratic Convention and a reaction to his column last week about whether Governor Evers should run for a third term.

So a lot to cover here this morning, but first, let's get to that forecast where it was, it was a stormy one for a lot of folks.

Not everybody saw storms yesterday, but the ones that did, got some really heavy rains.

Let's see what the rest of the week holds before a big, a big hot change for the weekend

from

meteorologist Brittney Merleau.

How are you doing today?

I'm doing pretty good um you know a little rough last night up northwest you know we had a tornado warning just south of Hayward um Trigo there was a funnel cloud spotted there and of course that tornado warning went out into Stone Lake into the reservation area and stuff and heavy heavy rain like you mentioned and now finally

We're in the clear.

There's some spots of sun, especially south, even far north, mixed in with those clouds right now.

Temperatures are at about 60 degrees north, 70 degrees far south, and highs today are climbing.

We're talking 80, about near 80 degrees up and in the Northwoods and near 90.

far southeast today.

So it won't be as sticky as yesterday, but still a little bit far south.

And that's where more storm chances are going to be popping up today.

So Northwest Wisconsin, you're in the clear.

You've got a few dry days ahead of you.

Now the storms are going to be focusing on the southern part of the state.

We've got a front that's stalled out there.

It's going to hang out there today.

It's going to continue to pump more rain showers and storms through the area tomorrow, which will become more widespread.

But South, you are looking at the flooding potential as

go into tomorrow so heads up for that but tonight after about six o'clock we are looking at those storms starting they shouldn't last long they should be done by about eight or nine we could see some high winds or hail with those otherwise widespread rain showers storms moving in tomorrow probably midday for the entire evening winding down overnight we could see some flooding like I said a good one to two inches in places

yikes okay and what's with the the shirt today says bigfoot stole my curds

What's

that about?

It's one of my favorites.

You know, Simon's cheese and Appleton.

They sell this shirt and I just fell in love with that.

I had to get it.

He's got his little bag of Kurds and he's walking away through the woods.

So

never underestimate the marketing power of a good t-shirt.

Exactly.

It's

very true.

Let's see from Robin Tigerton.

Good morning.

It's cloudy 69 last night in the Tigerton area.

We had seventeen one hundredths of an inch of rain.

I was busy mowing four yards in the Wittenberg area.

He says yesterday in Juneau, Alaska, they had their first ever severe thunderstorm warning with 60 mile an hour winds.

Alaska also had its first ever heat advisory.

Can you confirm either one of these things, Brittany?

I cannot confirm just yet, but wow, you know, it is interesting.

The high pressure sets.

up there.

They can get those heat domes.

So I wouldn't doubt it.

It's

possible.

I know.

I have not checked in with Dr. Kristen Lyrely yet because I know she's up in the hibbing area and they had some real rough weather and tornado warnings up there yesterday and Rob goes

on to

note with more rain and then the warm weather this weekend.

The corn crop will grow big time and he'll be even busier.

mowing lawns.

I don't know

when he's

going to find time to do yours and mine or Parker's.

I know, right?

But he's right.

Rain is a good thing.

All that growing.

God, I love it.

That's right.

I

suppose he wants one of those pain gigs.

So all right, sounds good.

Thank you, Brittany.

Talk to you

more in an hour.

We'll probably get into whether you eat all your vegetables too, because you know, today is eat your vegetables day.

And now

we're now we're getting into definitions of what a vegetable is off air.

So

stick around for that.

Very interested in that conversation.

I'm very interested in what Luke Mather sent us during the commercial break here.

But we'll look at channeling that one in an hour or so because we got to get to Lou Ann Bird, our friend who's helping continue to make people aware of what is in President Trump's big bloated boondoggle of a budget bill, the cuts to Medicaid that are in there and much more.

and the members of Congress from Wisconsin who all supported it and need to hear more about how that would impact people.

Lou Ann Bird, good morning.

How are you?

Good morning.

I'm good.

Thank you.

Thanks for having me on.

Hey, you bet.

Nice to see you again where again, you have.

You have not lost a step in your public advocacy out here for causes like this, like letting people know, you know, that there's a lot of affordable health care out there that is at risk in this Trump budget.

And is it today that you're doing some activities in the first congressional district to let folks know about Congressman Brian Stile and his support for the bill?

We are, we're holding a town hall in Oak Creek at the Oak Creek Community Center, which is on Howell Avenue in Oak Creek.

That's from 6 to 730.

And we're hoping to hold him accountable to talk about what our demands are.

And that's what we're doing tonight.

So this is again a case where a sitting member of Congress has been invited to a town hall.

And again, if this is something you feel strongly about, that this is a budget you support, you kind of figure as a member of Congress, you should be willing to go anywhere, anytime and talk to people about it.

But I have to admit, Luanda, I'm not really going to hold my breath that Brian Stahl is going to show up tonight for your event.

That's right.

That's right.

We aren't expecting them.

They never respond to my requests.

So what we do is we have people come up to the microphone.

We have a replica of Brian Stiles standing there.

uh kind of kind of cute and it's whites because he ghosts us and um then we're going to record everybody's comments and today we're moving from just comments to accountability we want their questions and we're going to list those questions and then take those to Brian's style and we did that last time there was a group of us that marched right to his office uh you know a couple days later and we go to the office in um

down south here in Milwaukee County and it's in St.

Francis and deliver and gave them comments.

We gave them signatures.

We gave them no cards because all of that matters.

We have the power.

We have the power to change things.

We own it and we're changing it.

That's our model.

That's our, you know, in this area.

And the thing, Luan, is that it's not just these events that you're organizing, but I mean, you show up at several places.

The last place I saw you was having a very earnest conversation with Speaker Robin Voss, for example, about him still being the single obstruction

to expanding Medicaid coverage for new moms from 60 days postpartum to 12 months, a very vulnerable time in a woman's life.

And why not expand Medicaid overall for that matter?

And he at least engaged you in a conversation, which wouldn't happen if you weren't out there willing to say, hey, can I talk to you for a second?

That's right.

I showed up at his town halls.

No, they were called listening sessions.

So that's what you got to do if you want to have access to people.

And within a couple of weeks, I was in front of Ron Johnson as well, because I went to his local event here.

And when they walk in the room, I don't sit there.

I get up and I go talk to him.

And I brought my videographer with that time.

So we've got lots of footage of what

Robin Boss said about a lot of issues, including guns violence and how they're manipulating the state budget.

There's all kinds of things you can do.

You just can't sit back.

So we have access, we have power, and I'm using it every time I can.

We had 1,000 people show up on the corner of Layton and 76 for the No Kings protest in Greenfield.

More than 1,000 people, we lined the streets for blocks.

up and down there.

And it just happened to be a day when they closed the highway off.

So there was a ton of traffic coming down laden.

And that's what we do.

We're taking our power back.

And so many people came out for the first time and held those signs up and said, we don't want a king.

We want democracy.

We're standing up to this regime.

And yet, because of the tragic events in Minnesota last weekend, I feel it's really important to make the distinction that, you know, in the case of the No Kings rally and all the things that you've been doing, that it is possible and it is frankly mandatory to state your point of view and protest with a big crowd, whatever the case may be, but you can do so peacefully.

And that is a cornerstone of democracy.

That's right, and I was at the Democratic Convention Saturday, so after the No Kings protests, I went.

to the Dells, and there was a big police presence there, and I did not realize why.

I didn't realize that some of my colleagues, my friends, I should say, in the Wisconsin State Legislature, including our friend Tammy Baldwin, and I was with Marpo Can Saturday night.

I didn't know they were targeted.

That shouldn't happen in America, and we should denounce anything like that.

You're right.

We should be safe, but we also cannot let it stop us.

We

can't let it stop us.

And I'm going to say,

that the majority we the responses we got when we were standing on that street corner were positive.

People are tired of this and now we just have to find ways to organize and take our make our views known.

And the other thing I did is I went last week a couple of us went down into a low income section eight housing unit in Kenosha and we listened to their concerns and by the way

Most of the people in there were actually Trump people.

And by the time we were done, we had built a high level of trust.

And we found out that we agree on everything.

And I learned what SNAP is.

These are the things that are being cut in the budget.

These folks get SNAP.

You know what that means?

$2 a day for food.

And we have to cut that.

And then they say, well, you can just go to a food pantry.

You know what, Pat?

They don't have cars.

They can't drive.

They're poor people.

So I learned a lot.

questions to Brian Stile and he actually responded.

And I'm glad about that because I say that as somebody who grew up in section eight housing with a mom who did not have a car.

And so, you know, racing off to the food pantry wasn't an option, but we were on snap

benefits.

And

again, like like so many other and you know, she was waitressing the overnight shift, you know, at the time at a truck stop.

They're all kind of hardworking families doing this.

And I just I bring this up because I don't want somebody like a Brian style or a Derek van Ordner was

whatever to say, well, I'm not holding listening sessions because of all the political violence out there.

That's a cop out.

That there are plenty of places where you can meet people like Luan Bird and others who can make their point and you can make their point to them and do so in a civil fashion and maybe change some hearts and minds along the way.

You know what else I did, Pat?

I took a, in order to give you folks that are listening an opportunity to take action.

We took, I made a phone booth so that I could make my point.

It was a big red phone booth, took it to the park at Humboldt Park so that people could use their what I'm calling superpowers and make phone calls.

So it was like a Superman, a play on Superman.

I had my red cape and my little red mask.

And I'm like, come on you guys, all you gotta do is call this number, you know, 202-224.

five, two, three, two, and call Ron Johnson and say behind me, like, vote no on the budget.

Vote no because we don't, and here's what Ron Johnson always says.

We don't want to mortgage our children's future away.

This budget's going to increase the debt.

It's not cutting spending.

It's rearranging the dollars.

That's all you got to say.

Don't go to that.

Oh, it's bad.

It's cutting, cutting, you know, benefits and everything.

No,

it's

just vote no.

Lou Ann Bird remains a force Lou Ann Bird LU ANN bird LU ANN bird dot com to learn more.

Lou Ann, thank you so much.

Always so great to see you.

All right.

You too.

Thank you.

Have a great day.

A local update is next for some of you.

Others will be back as we visit with Dan Hagen from News Watch 12 and Rhinelander and in 15 minutes we'll talk to Hans Brighton Moser from the heart of America's up north live from Lake Wissota here on the Civic Media Radio Network.

The Milwaukee Brewers are on the road this week.

They've got three games at Wrigley Field starting this evening.

Let's see, pregame coverage is at 6.30 on stations in Richland Center, Oshkosh, Racine, Park Falls, and Hayward, where you can catch the Brewers and Cubs this evening, tomorrow evening, then again on Wednesday afternoon before they head to Target Field in downtown Minneapolis for a weekend series with the Minnesota Twins.

Oklahoma City.

beat Indiana last night to take a three games to two lead in the NBA Finals and Florida is up two three games to two over Edmonton in the Stanley Cup Finals and could clinch with a win tonight in Miami.

If Edmonton wins, there will be a game seven Friday night up in Edmonton.

And one more interesting sports trivia point and I missed this yesterday.

Yesterday was the 50th anniversary

of the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar trade to the Lakers.

It was on June 16th, 1975 that the Bucks traded the soon to be three-time MVP for Junior Bridgeman Dave Myers, Elmore Smith, and Brian Winters, a trade that really enhanced the makeup of both teams down the line.

A lot of what-ifs if that trade had never happened.

But there you were.

It was 50 years ago yesterday that that happened.

724, the time right now.

Let's bring in Dan Hagen from WJFW.

WTV and Rhinelander News Watch 12.

How are you, Mr. Hagen?

I'm doing well.

I believe I'm going to do my actually Pat.

Um, it was Lou Elcindor, right?

That was traded and then

later as an agent, I

know it's Ruslan Harris.

No, no, no, I, I, I had forgotten to update the, uh, the copy on here.

So thank you for clarifying that.

Uh, how are things in your neck of the North Woods?

Life is good, although we've had a dismal stretch of days, I don't know what it's like for you down in the Chippewa Falls area, but...

cloudy, rainy, and we got rain to the forecast pretty much every day until Thursday, unfortunately.

Yeah, we've said for some time here, it's one of those where if you if you have to mow the lawn, and it's growing like crazy with the rain, but you got to find just the right time where the grass is dry enough to mow.

But before the next round of rain comes in.

And if you don't, I mean, I live next door to a farm so I can borrow their hay baler if need be.

Otherwise, it is it is clump central this time of year.

If you don't get it to

just right.

So what kind of stories you're working on up there for the nice folks at News Watch 12?

Yeah, of course.

So it's it's interesting having Hans Brighton Moser on following me because he relates to a story about a nursing home.

There are about 36 county owned nursing homes in Wisconsin still.

So these are nursing homes that are operated by the county and funded by taxpayers in the county.

And there's a

There's a nursing home in Lincoln County, which is Tomahawk, Merrill, if you're unfamiliar, a nursing home called Pinecrest Nursing Home.

And it's been funded by taxpayers by for about 70 years.

And a lot of people who are poor stay at this place.

It accepts Medicaid and Medicare.

And the county has been trying to sell Pinecrest for a couple of years now.

A previous sale fell through because a county board member sued the county and the buyer pulled out.

But there's a new buyer now.

This buyer, Ensign Group, has nursing homes all over the country.

The latest chapter will be this evening when the county board meets and the county board will vote on whether to approve the sale or not.

A lot of people are upset about this potential sale given that they're worried that the quality may suffer and it may be more expensive.

And then on the flip side of that, it's been operating at a loss generally.

nursing home pine crest, maybe like a million dollars a year, more than a million dollars a year, it costs the county.

People would argue that it's a good investment, but just that's both sides of it for

you.

Yeah.

Well, here's where you really get into it.

And again, I'm surprised to hear that there's still 36 county-owned nursing homes.

I mean, it used to be a staple of all the counties as a new reporter 40 years ago.

Some of my first stories were whether Eau Claire County should still be in the nursing home business, should Chippewa County still be in the nursing home business.

but again that's one way to frame it is should the county be in the nursing home business the other way is should nursing homes be a business because as you know you know once you bring in that for-profit corporate business model you have to ask yourself

Did we just privatize an essential service?

You know, we don't, we don't privatize the phones.

There's a lot of things we don't, or the roads rather.

We don't privatize a lot of things and should this be one of them that, you know, these are folks who have been your taxpayer for decades and now, you know, they're, they're, they don't have a lot of means, but they want to stay in the county.

Should a nursing home be one of those, you know, essential services that a county provides?

So yeah, I've, I've been covering both sides of.

this, it seems, you know, for decades.

And obviously, it will be something that happens for some time to come.

And I'm not a bit surprised to hear Dan that it continues to generate a lot of debate both both ways around there.

Yeah, I mean, just going off of your argument there, and these are literally the most vulnerable people, they're old, they don't have a lot of money.

And like you said, they've been paying a long time.

taxes to support this nursing home.

And, you know, this new group, Ensign Group has, you know, they're in the New York Stock Exchange, right?

So what's going to be their first priority?

But like I said, it's costing the county money, so I don't quite know how all the figures work into that, but

it's an interesting debate.

It's like when people say, well, you know, trains, you know, we have an expanded rail because they should pay for themselves.

Again, coming back to the road analogy, we don't do that.

We don't say, well, the roads have to pay for themselves.

It just does.

We don't say, you know, the military has to pay for itself.

You just you just do and you have to make that decision.

And all these things are these the things you do or do you say, well, it's no longer an essential service.

Let's turn it over.

Cassandra puts on YouTube, you know, it will suffer if a private company buys it.

Private companies are horrendous.

I could tell stories.

I'm sure there are benevolent companies out there as well.

I'm sure there are some that start benevolent, but they start, they get so big, you know, and then they start looking for cost cuttings and things like that.

You can completely see why this is such a hot topic for folks in Lincoln County.

And yes, Hans Brighton Moser, a former Lincoln County board member will be joining us right after the break.

But we got caught up on the news aspect of it with Dan Hagan from NewsWatch12 and Ryan Lander.

Thank you so much.

Good to visit with you here.

Anytime Pat.

Thanks so much.

All right.

Thank you so much.

Have a great day.

And yes, Hans Brighton Moser is standing by.

We'll talk to him about that.

And President Trump's latest flip flop on ag mass deportations right after the Midwest Farm report across the civic media radio network.

Hey, Up North News now has newsletters seven days a week, our regular Monday through Friday, which is a mix of Wisconsin features and news.

We have a new sports newsletter on Saturdays, all about the good stories and good people behind Wisconsin sports.

And then on politics, the guy that does that show, Mornings with Pat Critello, you know him.

He does a newsletter now called Sunday Mornings with Pat Critello, all about Wisconsin politics.

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Click subscribe up in the top banner.

It always includes a question of the week, which this week is whether Governor Tony Iveres should run for a third term.

We'll talk to Dan Schaefer about that one hour from now here on the program.

But Hans Breitenmoser was at the State Democrat

convention and I'm guessing it may have been a conversation there.

We'll get into that and we'll get into the conversation we were just having with Dan Hagen about the Pinecrest Nursing Home and whether counties should continue to operate their nursing homes or sell them off to the private sector.

And then there's that whole thing with Hans being a farmer like you know trying to get into the field where it keeps raining and things like that.

So we got a lot to cover in the next few minutes.

Hans, how are you?

Good morning, Pat.

I'm fine.

How are you?

I'm good.

Thanks.

We were saying before about, you know, you have to time out your lawn mowing just right with all these waves of rain.

Are you getting much in for field work?

Well, we got our first crop done before all the rains came, and that was done in good order.

And yields were not spectacular on some of the grassier stands because we had such strangely cold weather.

But we got it all done before it rained, so we're happy about that.

And the corn is growing, the beans are growing, the second crop is growing.

So we could use a few sunny days, but I guess that's better than drought, so we'll take

it.

I guess so, yep.

The latest USDA crop progress report for Wisconsin says, first cutting of alfalfa hay was 79% complete two days ahead of last year.

The all hay condition was rated 78% good to excellent.

That's down three points from the week before.

corn planting is nearly complete and let's see other soybeans planting is again is nearing completion as well so that's a quick update on what's happening on the farms all around Wisconsin but some of those farmers yourself included do some work off the farm which might include public service and for quite a time you were on the Lincoln County Board and so

as we continue that conversation about counties and and being you know the operators of nursing homes you know about the pinecrest issue up there that's something pretty near and dear to your your time of service on the county board

yeah yeah so um so yeah i

was

on the county board for 10 years and i've been off the county board for a couple of years now but um

But it is the case that during my time on the county board, we managed to keep the doors open of our county-owned nursing home.

And ever since this current crop of board members came on, they've just been hell bent on selling our nursing home.

And it's really unfortunate because it is a five-star facility.

It's been doing well.

It's in the black.

There's no financial reasons to get rid of it.

There's just really absolutely no reason to sell this nursing home.

But I really feel like it was this sort of ideological bent of the current majority, the current county board supervisors who came in and said that government just shouldn't be involved in anything.

And we're going to whittle it down.

This is the same county board who got rid of UW Extension in our county.

And we had a fight like hell to keep 4-H.

They got rid of just basically anything that's not mandated by the state is what they want to get rid of.

And it just doesn't make any sense.

Because while this proposed owner of this nursing home, they own 340 other properties.

perhaps they're quite good at it.

But the reality is if your grandma's in a nursing home and they own 340 facilities like that, I'm here to tell you she's going to be a number on a spreadsheet.

She's not going to get the same level of care that she would in a county-owned facility.

And that's proven by facts.

There's plenty of evidence out there that suggests it's a publicly owned nursing homes provide a higher level of care than the private ones.

And it doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure out why.

It's because the private ones are there to make a profit and there's no shame in that.

But bottom line is there's 4% that's gotta go out the door to make sure that the operation is profitable.

We don't have that motive here at the county level.

Yeah, it comes back to that whole notion of, look, these are folks who have been taxpayers in the county.

They've been citizens in the county for all of this time.

And should some of those taxes go toward this kind of care, we don't weigh the benefits on other essential services like, you know, the roads and things like that.

And just because the private sector does something,

does not necessarily mean it's the only option that needs to be available.

You're really making a sound, and I'm not surprised, that this is so much more about political ideology than it is about, you know, community service.

It's totally about that.

And it's unfortunate because I think a lot of that political ideology has come from the, you know, from big business who

you know, set their eyes on things like nursing homes and prisons and schools and said, there's money to be made here.

And so we need to convince people out in the hinterlands that, you know, the government is incapable of doing anything right and the private sector does everything splendidly.

And then, you know, and then that ideology seeps in and here we are.

But it's not, there's no basis in fact.

And I think it's a county board's job or any local government's job to look at the

facts that they have on the ground see how their situation is is going and also listen to their constituents by God because you know I know here in Lincoln County there's just been a huge outcry.

about this.

There's very, very few people that are in favor of this change to a privatized nursing home and the county board flat out refused to do a referendum question or have any public input taken seriously.

So many closed door meetings and so forth.

And it's just really unfortunate how this whole thing has gone down.

And so I'll be at the county board meeting tonight.

you know, giving my two cents from a different podium than I used to have.

We're talking to Hans Brighton, most reformer member of the Lincoln County board here and a dairy farmer as well.

And so let's get into that other farm related topic, which was.

somewhat surprising on Thursday when President Donald Trump put up on his tiny social media site something about you know how his mass deportations maybe it hasn't been great to be doing mass deportations in the hotel and hospitality businesses and so he has been instructing ICE and others to kind of let off the gas for hotels and hospitality and basically come down even harder in

you know, in those big bad blue cities because apparently, you know, work there is different than work out in the country.

It really, I don't know, Hans, what do you think motivated it?

Does he really mean it?

Is it gonna change anything?

I'm sure I don't know, Pat, because I think if we know anything about this administration, they have the capacity to flip and flop quite frequently and regularly for no real good reasons or anything that can be explained.

with any sort of any kind of common sense whatsoever.

I mean, it's clear that this administration is perfectly capable of doing things that are absolutely politically motivated.

And so if all sorts of...

you know, blue areas, urban areas are in the crosshairs, that doesn't surprise me.

So is this going to be, are we going to feel less pressure here out in the countryside in agriculture with regard to undocumented folks who work for us?

It's difficult to say because things do change quickly, but I think some of the going after blue areas more than red areas

I think that is by design.

I also think that some organizations like the American Business Immigration Coalition has done a really good job in lobbying the administration and lobbying our lawmakers, both Republican and Democrat, on how important foreign-born employees are to agriculture, and hopefully that's starting to sink in because they are.

Hopefully we can get over this notion that everybody who's come from another place is somehow some raging criminal and they're up here just so busy committing crimes that they're not going to work.

Well, you'd certainly think so based on Trump's post, where after talking about change would be coming, he said in a post on Sunday, we need to focus on our crime-ridden and deadly inner cities, and those places where sanctuary cities play such a big role, you don't hear about sanctuary cities in our heartland.

Well, actually, last week or so.

there were at least a couple of rural sheriffs that were passing emails back and forth about not necessarily cooperating any further with ICE, you know, seeing how things were being handled and really Hans, I mean, it's about going after

brown people first and foremost, it's just that now instead of going after brown people in red areas, it's going after brown people in blue areas, which again, our politics is overly simplistic based on colors, team red, team blue.

But in Trump's case, he's like, Well, as long as we're going after, you know, the, the, the brown people in the blue areas, the white people in the red areas who need the brown people to make money are going to be okay.

And I think that's

That sums up Donald Trump in a nutshell, maybe?

Well, I think you're right.

Unfortunately, I think that's kind of where we're at.

And obviously, all these things are more complicated than we'd like them to be.

But that's reality.

That's what it means to be a grown-up.

Things are complicated sometimes.

And what I can say is that...

The dairy industry falls completely apart in the state of Wisconsin without foreign board employees.

We need a mechanism by which we can have people from other countries coming in and doing jobs in this country.

Otherwise the economy just doesn't work.

Any economists worth their salt will tell you that.

This isn't economics needing a PhD.

This is simple math.

And so anybody that can't see past the idea that we're simply demonizing a group of people and scapegoating them for any problems that we might have, they're simply kidding themselves.

And I'm willing to forgive people for that, but I have a hard time forgiving policymakers for that because by God, they should know better.

Yeah.

And I mean, honestly, when my response to that is when it comes to racial politics and Donald Trump and the mega wing, sometimes things really are as simple as they might seem.

But that's that's my whole two cents on it.

I got just over a minute left and wanted to ask you just just in general, about June Dairy Month, there have been activities that are going on.

We've spoken at length about it.

And I always worry that as the years go by, and as more of these factory farms come in, and then people start taking things for granted.

Do you still feel like all these June, Dairy Month activities, they make a dent, they help folks around Wisconsin appreciate what's going on, or are you more concerned that maybe it's not what it used to be?

Well, I don't think it's what it's used to be.

you know it's hard not to be nostalgic for the days when there were 13 dairy farms on my road and now there's only three of us left that that the dairy industry has changed a great deal but I do feel like the the june dairy events are are well received and well attended and they go to some very nice farms some large and some small and it does it does help the public appreciate

what the dairy industry contributes to the state economy and helps educate non-farmers on what happens on real farms.

And getting back to the earlier conversation, I hope that as we go forward, part of that conversation is the fact that there's brown people that work on those farms as well.

Exactly.

Hans Brighton Moser from Lincoln County.

Thank you very much.

Have a great day.

We'll talk to you a little later.

You bet.

Be good, Pat.

Thank you.

All right.

You bet.

A local update is next for some of you.

For the rest of you hanging around here, we'll talk about Western Wisconsin happenings and more.

And in our eight o'clock hour, Dan Schaefer and Chad Holmes, powered by Up North News on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Do we have a little Dick Dale going on now?

Is that what that says?

I have no idea.

I just found it yesterday.

It's like, hey, it's time for new music.

Let's just do it.

Rip the Band-Aid.

We're going crazy.

It sounds very much like the surf music of that era.

And I'm like, I wonder if this guy's got any copyright problems over here.

But hey, you found it in the library.

If it's in the library, it's fair game.

We're clear.

Letter roll.

All right.

Welcome back, everybody.

753.

right now catching up with some of the other headlines I was looking around in western Wisconsin.

For example, Governor Evers was recently in La Crosse talking about the topic of affordable housing.

This from the WEAU TV site where he was looking at an affordable housing project in the area called Collective on Fourth.

And he told folks there, every time we talk about what we need to do better in our state, housing is something everyone has to have.

It's critical.

It becomes kind of a linchpin to the good life here in Wisconsin.

Nicole Solheim said, the city of La Crosse has been proactive and vocal about the need to prioritize housing and says that talking to leaders like Governor Evers is important to emphasize how affordable housing is to be key for a thriving community.

And it is something that I've heard discussed by legislators.

Frankly, on both sides of the aisle, they may disagree on the best way to get there.

One side is basically addicted to the idea of tax credits as opposed to direct investments.

But at least the conversation is on the table there someplace, and we're going to need that.

because otherwise, you know, we're just going to continue to see in some of these communities an inability to keep jobs if you don't have enough affordable housing, meaning that that first wave of housing, your starter homes and things like that.

People love to build, you know, McMansions.

You get high profit margins on those, but you have to incentivize a good stock of affordable first time homes if you're going to have a thriving local community.

Well, Congressman Derek Van Orden was rightly given the publicity that he deserved in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel yesterday for taunting Minnesota's governor, Tim Walls, as a clown and as stupid.

That's how Derek Van Orden reacted to the assassination of a Minnesota legislator, the murder of her husband, the shooting of another legislator and his wife.

And the story by Lawrence Andrea from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel notes that shortly afterwards on Derek Van Orden's official Twitter account, he says, political violence has no place in America.

I fully condemn this attack, along with all forms of political violence and intimidation.

Yeah, but not too long after that on Derek Van Orden's personal account.

is where things go sideways.

Where he wrote, yesterday a whole pack of election deniers got together and spewed hate talking about the Saturday protests.

One of them decided to murder and attempt to murder some politicians that were not far enough left for them.

In other words, spreading the misinformation that the shooter was somehow part of left-wing politics when, of course, as it was learned, not too shortly after that, he was most decidedly a far right extremist.

But he went on to refer to Van Orden, went on to refer to Governor Tim Walls as stupid and a clown in posts that came after that.

It drew attention from people like Congressman Mark Pokan pointing out the vile nature of this.

Mark Pokan responded by saying, downplaying the killings of elected officials in Minnesota so you can try to own a liberal is pathetic.

Did Van Orden seem humbled?

Did he seem apologetic?

No.

He responded to Polkan saying this, it is statistically impossible that you could be dumb enough to believe what you are writing.

That is Derek Van Orden.

Later when Governor Walls posted a photo of himself with the murdered legislator, Melissa Hortman, Van Orden replied.

to the governor's post saying, you appointed the crazy zealot that murdered her to one of your boards, you clown.

Because that's wrong on every level, I will again ask publicly, is there anybody on Derrick Van Orden's staff that can pry his password away to his personal account?

Because it's no longer, he's been embarrassing long enough.

He is embarrassing the third congressional district.

He is embarrassing the state of Wisconsin.

He's an embarrassment to the state of Wisconsin.

There's nothing else about it.

So asked about the social media posts Van Orden put out a statement to the journal Sentinel that said the reason politically violent rhetoric and political violence has gone on for so long even going back to people burning cars when President Trump was first elected is because nobody is holding the perpetrators accountable

Republicans do not push back when we are insulted and political violence continues because of it.

The individuals who spew this hatred need to be called out, Van Orden said.

Well, okay then, Derek Van Orden, I'm calling you out.

Knock it off.

If you don't know the facts behind the story, don't post it.

And if your idea of political discourse is to refer to a governor in mourning of a state,

As a clown, delete your account.

Better yet, delete yourself from office, resign, step away.

By the way, when I said delete yourself, he right away says, oh, that's a threat.

I'm going to report you.

No, Derek Van Orden, you simply need to be removed from office by the voters.

More on our eight o'clock hour on Up North News Radio.

Coming up we're going to be talking to Dan Schaefer from the Reconbobulation Area and Civic Media Political Editor.

We're going to be talking about the State Democratic Convention.

I have a feeling there was some things said about the Third Congressional District where there are three candidates right now each hoping to remove Derek Van Orden from office next year.

And also, he wrote a little column about whether Governor Evers should seek a third term.

There's also a new chair of the State Democratic Party that was voted on at the convention that Dan Schaefer was attending.

And we will talk to Chad Holmes as well from our Civic Media Station in Wausau, 98.9 WXCO, about the stories that he's following, especially given that spring sports is finally starting to wrap up.

The man is finally starting to get a rest.

But we'll also have an updated forecast from meteorologist Brittany Merleau all coming up after the eight o'clock news on these mornings powered by Up North News on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Live, across Wisconsin on Civic Media, you're listening to Mornings with Pat Craiglow powered by Up North News.

Now, for my Lake Mesota studio, here is the founding editor of Up North News, Pat Craiglow.

Hey, good morning.

Welcome back.

Nice to have you here up north at 806 on this Tuesday morning, June 17th and still ahead.

Chad Holmes from 989 WXCO is going to be here.

Dan Schaefer will be along at the bottom of the hour.

Meteorologist Brittany Merlois here as well.

But first from the text line, responding to Fred in Cottage Grove, who says, am I too late for the tickets?

Been busy and have not checked my phone.

Yes, Fred, you are several days too late.

The Piscani summer text to win contest ran through last Friday, but thank you for the immediate paranoia.

I went crazy Parker Quickly looking like did I miss I'm looking over here.

I'm looking to see if other stations text lines Do they have words that are text in so Fred?

My who needs coffee my blood's pumping now.

Thanks to you buddy

And

that's how

this that's how this works.

So no, I do not have tickets for you.

Also on the text line, and we're going to hit up Brittany and Chad Holmes with this as well.

When I mentioned that it's National Eat Your Vegetables Day, Eat Your Veggies Day, however it was, we had some comments from I think Alicia says, Oh, hey, I get my fresh veggies delivered today.

So

She said a veggie subscription that she's got maybe going here.

And so then we got from Luke Mathers.

We got, you know, corn because you said corn was a favorite vegetable.

No, people are going to push back, including the handsome and capable Luke Mathers who says corn is a grain.

Vegetables don't exist.

They're an illusion.

All things you think are vegetables are truly something else.

I could go down this rabbit hole for hours.

which I was like, yes, by all means.

And then Alicia says, I would contest that vegetables are the umbrella over all the groups of food that are considered vegetables, which is kind of breaks your brain if you think about it for a bit here.

But, I mean, so that gets into the, is a tomato a fruit?

Is a corn a vegetable?

Is it a grain or whatever?

Brittany, I mean, none of us are master gardeners.

like Kristen Lyrely.

We should have got her to talk about this instead.

Do we forget to ask

Hans about this?

Hans is a dairy farmer.