Tony Evers’ Legacy (Hour 3)

Cross Wisconsin on Civic Media.

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

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

Hey there, Wisconsin.

Good morning.

It is 6.06 on this Thursday morning, September 11th, 2025.

It's a beautiful morning to have you here up north, live from Lake Basota.

from wherever you're spending your mornings listening across the civic media radio network or listening or watching us on all the different platforms that are out there.

We appreciate you getting your morning started right here.

September 11th has always been a little bit more of a somber day and this would have been a slightly more somber show anyway, given the events of 24 years ago this morning, but more so this morning in light of yesterday's act of political violence.

and the aftermath.

So as I like to say most mornings, I've got a question for you.

How many Americans were the victims of gun violence yesterday in our nation?

One victim got most of the attention.

A few victims of a school shooting got a little of the attention.

But all of yesterday's other victims, who are also somebody's father, mother, son, daughter, spouse, friend,

So many lives were turned upside down yesterday from gun violence, but they are, in the larger picture, barely footnotes in this country's long and growing list of shooting victims.

Because there was a long list yesterday, and we already know there's going to be a long list today.

We will of course cover yesterday's murder in Utah of a conservative provocateur and reaffirm that political violence has no place in a civilized society.

Even as the congressman from Western Wisconsin jumped right into the fray overnight and implied there needs to be more violence or at least more political fireworks because nothing tones down the rhetoric like a member of Congress dropping F-bombs and saying the gloves are off.

We'll have more about this in just a moment.

First, let's pause and take a look at what else we're going to have on this morning's program.

Brian Kennedy will be along.

The mayor of Glendale is the national chair of the Democratic Municipal Officers Group.

This is the time of year that they start to see people expressing interest in running for office next year and they provide guidance, resources, training for people who want to run for local posts because national figures

get most of the attention, but it's the people who serve on our county boards and city councils, town boards, village boards, mayor's offices, village presidents, and other bodies who get so much done in our communities and perhaps it's your time to serve.

We'll talk to Brian Kennedy about that at 735.

Sean O'Malley gives us the latest on your money and the markets at 822.

Joseph Peck, he talks politics with us at 835, including Governor Tony Evers' appearance last night at Ideas Fest in Madison, talking about his legacy after two terms as governor.

Now, if you can't stick around to listen to all of this, get over to Spotify and follow us.

or Apple, wherever you get your podcasts, and that way you can listen on demand and catch everything that we do weekdays from six to nine a.m.

Parker Olson will be along in just a little while.

Brewers lose yesterday six to three getting swept in Texas the first time they've been swept in a three game series since the first series of the season way back in March against the New York Yankees.

The Brewers have a day off today.

They're home against St.

Louis tomorrow.

The Packers play at home tonight against Washington Thursday night football and you'll be able to hear the game across several civic media stations pregame beginning at five o'clock.

Learn more at the Civic Media website to find out the stations that are carrying tonight's Packers game.

Well, there's no way around getting to the big story and what it means to this country and the reaction to it.

First, the overview, because not everyone knows who exactly was at the center of yesterday's murder.

Charlie Kirk, 31 years old, started a network of groups when he was about 18 with variations on the name turning point.

He was raised in the Chicago suburbs and dropped out of college after being inspired by what the Tea Party was doing in 2010.

Charlie Kirk's legacy was established long before yesterday's events.

Charlie Kirk called Martin Luther King Jr.

a bad guy, awful.

He said civil rights laws had become too broad.

He said the problem isn't that we incarcerate too many Americans.

He said there's not enough that mass imprisonment would be beneficial.

Charlie Kirk was a straight-up racist, evidenced in quotes like, if I see a black pilot, I'm gonna be like boy, I hope he's qualified.

He called the COVID vaccine medical apartheid.

And there's no telling how many people died because they listened to his misinformation about the pandemic.

He made wildly unsubstantiated claims about voter fraud and helpful meant the violence of January 6th.

He was a regular spreader of false information about a changing climate.

Charlie Kirk called empathy a made up new age term.

He said parents shouldn't let their daughters take birth control because it, quote, makes women angry and bitter.

He opposed abortion ban exceptions for women and girls who were raped or victims of incest.

Just last year, Kirk went to his Bible and pointed to Leviticus, chapter 20, verse 13, if a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination, they shall surely be put to death, their blood is upon them.

and Charlie Kirk called that, quote, God's perfect law when it comes to sexual matters.

Anyone who disagreed with him, he called them indoctrinated.

And when it came to the Second Amendment, here's what he said two years ago, quote, I think it's worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights.

That is a prudent deal.

It is rational.

Now you can tell me Charlie Kirk was a doting father.

He had a three-year-old daughter and a one-year-old son.

I don't doubt that he loved his kids and I don't doubt that in his own perverted way he wanted a better country.

But I can say those nice things about a lot of people.

Like the people who attacked the United States Capitol and wounded scores of police.

or the people wearing masks now who are kidnapping people off the streets without due process in the United States of America.

I do agree that today is an awful day for those who know and love Charlie Kirk.

I agree that it's an awful day for the families of those who were targeted and shot in a Colorado school shooting yesterday.

There have been more than 40 school shootings this year already.

including the one at a university in Utah that claimed the life of Charlie Kirk.

But behind all of this, behind that man's legacy is this universal agreement among right-thinking Americans.

Violence is not politics.

There are no good intentions when it comes to political violence.

It's always counterproductive.

and only encourages reprisals.

It only encourages more violence.

There is nobody who followed Charlie Kirk, who's waking up this morning and saying, well, I guess I don't agree with his views anymore.

That's not how violence works.

Political violence triggers people.

People like Derek Van Orden.

Just minutes after Charlie Kirk was shot and still at the hospital,

the congressman from western wisconsin took to his primary constituency that would be the audience on twitter and wrote that this quote left-wing political violence must stop now whoever does not condemn this is part of the problem the gloves are off end quotes later after kirks death was announced

Van Orden went back to Twitter and claimed that House Democrats, quote, just shouted down openly praying for Charlie Kirk, we might as well scratch in God we trust from the rostrum on the House floor.

Van Orden, of course, was not sharing the full story.

As noted by reporters on the scene and in video of the event, there was indeed unity in a moment of silent prayer.

as has happened on the House floor after every mass tragedy.

But then Colorado Representative Lauren Boebert broke the silence and demanded a spoken prayer saying, quote, silent prayers get silent results.

I'm no expert, but I don't think her pastor would back her up on that one.

Anyway, Democrats quickly noted that the House held silent prayers after other shootings, but Boebert wanted special treatment for her favorite shooting victim, and shouting broke out.

A Republican from Florida, Anna Luna, started shouting F-bombs on the floor of the House and telling Democrats they caused this.

Anyway, this is just the beginning.

I'm going to need an entire other segment, probably in our next hour, to read everything else that Derek Van Orden tweeted out overnight.

Lots of F bombs from him as well, lots of hate, lots of rooting for a civil war as he further cements his place in radical ideology and not in line with the values of actual Wisconsinites.

In Wisconsin, we are right to abhor political violence.

We are right to abhor gun violence and we are right to remember

That about 300 people on average are shot each day in America and about 125 people a day die from being shot Charlie Kirk was one of them on one day one of 300 one of 125 And he was indeed part of the problem as is every politician or political figure or talking head who keeps this nation under the gun to put it figuratively

So if you can, please forgive me for not exactly mourning.

I'm angry.

I'm especially angry at whoever the idiot was who did this.

Nobody was supposed to murder this guy, no matter how repugnant his views and actions.

Nobody had that right.

Nobody had the right to drive the wedge a little deeper today between Americans.

And I also can't use the cliche here that, you know, somehow we will rise above it.

We won't, not right away anyway.

We will eventually put this behind us, just as we did with Columbine and the Pulse nightclub and Las Vegas and the attack on Paul Pelosi and the murder of a Minnesota legislator and her husband.

And whatever it was that happened at that Donald Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, we carry on.

And we hope that the people among us have learned to step back from violence instead of just being a derrick and fanning the flames.

And maybe, just maybe, some of the people who mourned for a man who was murdered yesterday, one of 300 who were shot, maybe they will start to think that maybe we do need to stop making it so easy to get guns and do bad things.

It would be, if that were to ever happen, a turning point that would do this nation some good.

Again, we'll talk more throughout the course of the morning about the events in Utah yesterday and the reaction from one Wisconsin congressman and many others who don't seem to have learned anything from the violence that happened yesterday.

We will switch gears coming up here and we will get back to life in Wisconsin.

It includes plenty of events to consider checking out this weekend when Sharita Booker joins us.

We will have today's history lesson and we will visit with Parker Olson as well.

Brittany Merlot is off today but listen throughout the course of the morning for your updated local forecasts on your Civic Media stations.

Again, the Brewers lost to Texas six to three yesterday and have a day off.

They have a series in St.

Louis that starts tomorrow.

Tomorrow also marks free ticket Friday when you can win Brewers tickets to a future game and the Green Bay Packers play at home tonight against the Washington Commanders.

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 Krightlow.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

Welcome back.

We're talking to Sharita Booker, social media manager here about some of the weekend events.

I know we've mentioned a few of them, but here are a couple of more because there's no packer game this weekend and the weather is going to be beautiful.

So everybody's going to be out and about probably except me.

This is the weekend.

We're going to scrub siding and, you know, get some house stuff ready for the fall.

Maybe I'll get to one of these things.

Hey, Sharita, how are you and how's your weekend looking?

Good Pat.

Um, I don't have any plans except I'm going to get my daughter's hair braided So that'll take a few hours of my Saturday, but other than that, I'm just chilling.

Okay.

All right.

Good.

Well, let's start in Lake Geneva with Taco Fest.

What's that all about?

So it's their fourth annual Lake Geneva Taco Fest and it's back through

tomorrow through Sunday at Lake Geneva House of Music and that festival will include dozens of vendors serving up authentic tacos plus live music, cultural dances and fun for the whole family.

This year visitors will also get a chance to vote for who makes the best taco with the official award competition and some of the entertainment include the jalapeno and hot pepper eating contest, Chihuahua beauty contest, a mechanical bull,

a low-rider car show, pinata smashing, midway rides, and games for the kids.

Admission is just $10 Friday in advance and $12.50 Saturday in advance and Sunday is free for everyone.

And for more tickets and information, visit LGTacoFest.com.

That again is LG for Lake Geneva Taco Fest.com.

It kind of gets away from the tacos here, but the pepper eating contest and you see the the hot one show with the hot chicken wings.

I love that show.

Could you could you do

the hot sauce and the hot peppers?

Let me tell you something.

So my boyfriend loves the show.

I started watching with him and we bought the last dab.

I think no, it's not the last dab.

It's the other it's one of them.

One of the last ones that they do and that's where everyone freaks out.

But I had it.

And oh my God, I almost puked.

It was so bad I could not handle the heat and went to run my tongue under the water.

I didn't know what to do.

I was freaking out for like 10 minutes.

I felt so sick.

Oh, no, no, I just can't I've said before, I'm like, I love spicy stuff like spicy for flavor, but not necessary.

And you know, a little bit hot.

But you know, those things that are just heat alone, they just don't

They don't do it for me, but clearly they do for some and some people are going to put a lot of hot sauce on their tacos this weekend at Lake Geneva Taco Fest.

And closer to my neck of the woods here in the Chippewa Valley, we have the Fall Festival in Eau Claire.

And that is this Saturday from 10 to 4 p.m.

in the downtown area.

The celebration will be packed with over 100 street vendors, 20 food trucks and live entertainment throughout the day.

There will also be kids and families done with two free bounce houses, face painting, balloon art, and characters.

Adults can enjoy the reboot main stage, beer garden, and catch performances by some local favorites like Turn Turn Turn, Weapons of Brass Destruction, and the Woodland Spring.

The performing art stage outside the firehouse will be serving cold drinks, while there are performances from Eau Claire Improv, a sneak peek from the Chippewa Valley Theater Guild, and music from Annie Cat and a drag show.

And if you're worried about parking, head over to Carson Park to hop on the free trolley shuttle to the festival.

For more information, visit EauClaireFallFest.com.

Did you say one of the bands is called Weapons of Breast Destruction?

Yes.

That's awesome.

Love that.

Yes, all kinds of things here at EauClaireFallFest.com for more of the details.

And now let's head over to Pepin for Laura Ingalls Wilder Days.

Yep, so celebrate the life and legacy of beloved author Laura Engle Wilders at the fourth annual Laura Engle's Wilder Days, happening this Saturday and Sunday in Pepin, the very place where she was born.

And this family-friendly festival is bringing the pioneer era to life with traditional craft demonstrations, fiddle contest, candlelight crafts on Saturday evening, kids' games, wagon rides, food vendors, and plenty of old-fashioned fun.

And this year's special guest is Allison Arngrim, the actress who played Nellie Olsen on The Little House on the Prairie.

and Allison will be making multiple appearances throughout the weekend, including autograph sessions, photo opportunities, and a special evening presentation.

Some of the highlights include pause fiddle showcase, a spelling bee, a medallion hunt, a pie eating contest, square dancing, a grand parade on Sunday, and a tomahawk throwing, and tomahawk throwing.

Families can also enjoy the barrel train rides, face painting, and activities at the Wayside Cabin and Laura Museum.

For the full schedule of events, visit laurdays.org.

And again, that's Laura's in L-A-U-R-A, like Laura Ingalls Wilder.

LauraDays.org.

I can't believe they've got Nellie Olson.

Who's coming there?

And I'm looking at the website and she hasn't changed a bit.

It's like growing up Nellie Olson is gonna be there from the old TV show.

That's wild.

That's something.

Are you familiar to, have you read the books or even caught the old TV show at some point?

The Little House on

the Prairie?

I used to watch a TV show when I was a kid.

I don't think I really read the books though.

I was one of those Junee B. Jones girl.

Did any of it motivate you to like, you know, churn your own butter or no catch your own roof or anything like that?

No store for me, please.

Same here, same here.

I mean, in the area of crafts that do you do any anything like that, you know,

um knitting crochet so anything any task that would fit in a little house on the prairie if you were dropped into one

i do know how to knit so i was raised by my grandparents and my grandma loves knitting so she of course she took me to a knitting class when i was like

nine, 10.

So I got taught how to crochet by a bunch of grannies.

That's perfect.

That's that's exactly how to do it.

My mom is teaching granddaughters how to sew right now.

And that's a skill you're always going to use.

Alright, so there are just some of the events that get covered.

Sherita Booker covers those for us and all of our social media posts over for Up North News.

Sherita, thank you.

Have a great start to the weekend.

You

too, Pat.

Parker Olson's with us now as well.

And I just want to pick it up from there, Parker.

Good morning.

Do you have any skills that you could translate if you were dropped into a little house on the prairie?

I could entertain myself with juggling.

That's about

juggling.

Hey, see, we got something because back then they didn't have football.

Packers playing tonight against the commanders.

Short week.

It's going to be late.

I am predicting boldly that you and I are going to sound very tired tomorrow morning.

Ding, ding, ding.

My dad's gonna be at the game.

He's gonna be more

tired tomorrow.

Right.

Didn't take much to nail that one.

Coming up, we will talk about today's history lesson, including a birthday for Harry Connick Jr.

and another Beatles album hits number one.

When do these guys run out of hits?

We'll be back.

You're up north.

Welcome to today's history lesson for this September 11th.

It's a Thursday morning.

It's a foggy morning across many parts of Wisconsin once again.

So take care out there on the roads if you're about to head out.

Keep yourself nice and visible with your appropriate lights on as much as possible.

Those are the tunes of the Buckingham's Dennis Tafano, the lead singer, turns 79 years old today.

The Buckingham's sounds like one of those British invasion groups, right?

No, they were from Chicago.

Their original name was the pulsations But the record company Parker wanted a more British sounding name, although I think pulsations Would have been a great band name.

I think so too.

I would go see the pulsations

Yes, yeah, and you know, they were from Chicago.

Well, that name was already taken But anyway, Buckingham's had a couple of hits there and Dennis Tifano is 79 years old today Mickey Hart

the drummer for the Grateful Dead, 82 years old today.

On this day in 1789, Alexander Hamilton is appointed the first secretary of the U.S.

Treasury.

Do you suppose they sang that song for him when he showed up?

Alexander Hamilton.

They should.

Well, Pat, I am a little upset that we don't have a song from Hamilton.

You're right.

We've sprinkled those in a couple of times.

Here's one of the things I noticed though, in getting these.

Now, I'm not saying that it's an entirely adult play, but you really have to listen carefully.

They drop a few naughty words in the songs now and then.

They just kind of weave them in.

He's like, oh, can't use that clip.

Can't use that clip either.

The Disney Plus video of Hamilton is kind of funny to me because they do have to take out.

there's I think two F bombs on the show and they take

out

the one of them that I think is far more impactful than the other one.

It kind of upsets

me.

It does because that that one I know which one you're talking about and it is a very impactful phrase.

Yes.

Let's see on this day in 1916, the first true self service supermarket.

Because prior to that, prior to 1916, you know, you went to this general store and everything was on shelves behind the guy, behind the counter, kind of like going to a bar and ordering from the bartender.

And you go, I want some of this and I want some of that.

And the first truly self-service supermarket was a Piggly Wiggly.

That's the name that Clarence Saunders gave his grocery store when it opened in Memphis, Tennessee this day in 1916.

And now you know.

I did not know that was a thing.

It absolutely is a thing.

And you know, who would know that Nellie Olson?

We'll have to ask her about that from Laura Engels Wilder's days.

I hope she takes all this in good spirits after all these years.

That's just like, Oh, God, another another case where I got to pretend to be Nellie Olson.

I hope she has fun with it.

Happy birthday to Tommy Shaw from Styx who is 72 years old today.

And Tommy Shaw, 72 years old today.

Actress Taraji P. Henson is 55 years old today.

On this day in 1977, it was a big day for little Pat Critewell, the real little Pat Critewell, not Kristen Lyre was little Pat Critewell.

The release of the Atari 2600, which revolutionized the video game industry with its little tiny plastic joystick that allowed you to play Pac-Man and other new games like Space Invaders and Asteroids.

Did you by chance, I did put a link to the audio for pitfall.

Did you happen to grab it?

I did grab a little bit of it.

I've got a

little sample.

This is this is my favorite.

This was one of my favorite games, pitfall, where you're basically running through the jungle.

You're like the stick figure.

You know, you have to jump over crocodiles and you have to grab the rope and swing over, you know, a pit or something like that.

Here is the action packed pitfall as heard on the Atari 2600.

Roll it.

And let me tell you, you were sweating bullets the entire time, wondering if that crocodile was going to get you or if you're going to fall into the pit or some of the other, the other graph.

I don't suppose you looked at the, at the game itself, the graphics.

Oh, I watched the video of it.

Oh yeah.

Did you watch it?

Oh, that's right.

I only looked

at like a minute or so of it.

I was like, wow, yeah, this is four bit.

Does that to you?

Does that, does that resemble like, like caveman drawings from prehistoric times?

I mean.

Yeah, I'm the whole spectrum of things.

Yeah,

I

suppose.

But

like, I did have some of that growing, not bad, but like.

Yeah.

I mean, things, things get better every year, but they had to start someplace and they started with the Atari 2600 Tony putting up on YouTube.

Ah, the memories from that sound.

Yes.

Yes.

Exactly.

Um, and I had to look at pitfall right away because it was one of my favorites listening back yesterday going, wow, I sure got excited about something pretty simple.

Didn't I?

Well,

anyway.

Yeah, let's roll on with the birthdays today.

Harry Connick Jr.

turns 58 years old

today.

And finally found the somebody

Harry Connick Jr.

in a lot of movies and TV shows.

But before that, quite a successful little career as a singer and a band leader from New Orleans.

Charles Kelly of Lady A is 44 years old today.

It was on this day in 1967 that the Carol Burnett show premiered on CBS.

And since I've already done my rant a few times lately about whatever happened to the Great American Variety Show.

more comedy show.

I'll just let it go at that.

So that's the one I've

actually seen a little bit of.

Oh, you have.

Yeah.

It used to be on, I think, right after or right before Hogan's heroes.

Yeah.

And I watched Hogan's heroes.

I was watching

Hogan's heroes last night, actually.

You were watching Hogan's heroes last night.

Yeah, I like

Hogan's heroes.

Oh, I did too.

I never missed it.

You know, again, it was already in syndication.

You know, when I was watching it in the mid 70s, but yeah, every

And there were no five o'clock newscasts back then.

So that was that was five o'clock Gilligan's Island.

It was 430.

Yeah,

I think the Flintstones might have been four o'clock.

Oh, those were the days.

You know, let's see.

Happy birthday to Ludacris born Christopher Brian Bridges.

Today he is 48 years

old.

On

his day in 2001, Jay-Z released his album, Blueprint, which featured contributions by Eminem and Kanye West.

Yes, I mentioned the Beatles have another number one album on their hands.

It was on this day in 1965 that an album went to number one and stayed for nine weeks.

This was the title track.

The tracks on there included you've got to hide your love away from me to you ticket to ride You're gonna lose that girl and more so help was the number one album 60 years ago today Little closer to home on this day in 1903 at the Milwaukee mile in West Alice Was held the first race ever at the Milwaukee mile 1903.

Oh, that's that's what makes this the oldest major speedway

in the world and still in use

today.

I thought you meant the first race of all time.

No.

It's like, dude, what?

Nobody ever raced before that.

That is misinformation.

You know what?

Let me type that right in.

The first automobile race at the Milwaukee Mile in West Alice was held, 1903.

There we go.

Let's see.

This is National Make Your Bed Day.

And in honor of that, I did not.

Most days, yes.

Some days, you're just so tired.

Yeah,

I just kind of straighten out the blankets and throw them on top and call it good.

Are you a make your bed person or don't make your bed person?

In the last like two years, three years I've started to, but like it's literally just like flatten out the blankets on top over the entire bed in that way.

The actual covers, the what's it called?

Duvet?

Yeah,

the duvet.

Who came up with duvet?

Comforter.

Comforter sounds nice.

Comforter.

comforting and now we've got the duvet with the duvet cover duvet covers none of that none of that from the people that invented like CD packaging you know and other things like that makes no sense anyway so it's national make your bed day this is also national school picture day and although it's radio I guess I should have dug up a couple of school photos just to give Parker a laugh although

you have seen who Kristen Lyrely refers to as little Pat Krightlow little PK and with the bowl haircut and the thick glasses and yeah, that was me.

So again, meeting him was just the most uncanny thing like looking into a time machine, you know, so that's that's what a lot of the school pictures looked like.

And then in ninth grade, which was 1978 79, I went from the bull haircut to putting a part

in my hair from from left to right parts over on the left side.

And it's been there ever since I I've only changed this hairstyle once since the 1978 79 school year.

A story I know I've told a couple of times because of a consultant at the TV station who basically put me back at the bowl haircut and really short.

Apparently to look like George Clooney on ER it did not look like that at all.

And I went back to what I've had since ninth grade.

The only variation of it has been volume and now color.

Volume wise, I mean, back in the big 80s, there was a lot of hair there.

I've seen that UWEC weather report.

Yes.

That's not

exactly short hair, if I remember

right.

No, no, and that was, that was still getting it cut like every, I don't know, four to six weeks or something, but.

It, it just, it grew like crazy.

I was going to say four or six

weeks.

That's nuts.

I do mind like every couple of months I feel like.

You really?

Yeah.

I think so.

It might just be fear that I'm losing hair and I don't want to touch it.

Yeah, well,

we're not going to

go down that road today.

There is that.

I mean, and some things happen rather speedily.

Either you quickly notice that you have less and less hair, or in my case, like they'd always been just a little bit of gray.

And then, you know, within these past couple of years, I don't know, maybe it was the show that did it, but somebody hit fast forward on the gray machine.

And it's we're getting pretty close to full out silver right now.

You look good.

I meant to ask I was gonna ask you and ask listeners as well when I was talking about the old Atari 2600 was What was your first game console or?

What game console did you like best?

Do you remember most and I mentioned the Atari 2600 because there were other things there was Coleco vision and there were there were other things back at that time, but I mean the Atari was like that was

That was the thing, the hot thing when it was introduced in 1977.

And then Game Boy came along and, you know, Cube and Xbox and everything else.

So what, what someday, when you're my age young man, what will you fondly look back on when you think of video games?

I believe the Game Cube is the first one I can remember.

There was, there was like a, I think it only had like a game or two on it, but there was like a controller that we had.

that had a game or two on it.

That was, that was like a Scooby-Doo one that

I remember.

Scooby-Doo game?

Yeah, it

was like, the controller was literally the mystery machine and it had like a joystick sticking out of the top.

Uh-huh.

Yeah.

But yeah, Gamecube, I think, is the first proper council.

Then we had a Wii and PS4, but

yeah.

Okay, well, okay, I'm glad you said the Wii.

I'd forgotten about that.

So we went without video game, you know, when we raised our daughters, we just...

didn't, they weren't video gamers and we didn't seek it out.

And then once we had grandkids, and we was like the hot new thing, we thought, well, let's get that.

So we did.

So we had years of fun with that.

And then it just finally walked and we haven't replaced it.

And I'm wondering, do we have to get like, you know, VR?

Is that the only way to go with video games going forward?

I'm not sure.

So what does somebody in their 60s get if they just want to play a few games?

Not go to war or anything like that.

Getting another Atari.

Maybe Atari would be great.

One last note on 1982 on this day, Frank Zappa's Valley Girl reached its chart peak of number 32.

I'm Pat Crichtlow.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

Enjoy a little bit of Moon Unit playing Valley Girl in this tune.

Welcome back.

It is 652 on a Thursday morning here live from Lake Wissota across the Civic Media Radio Network.

57 degrees right now here in the Chippewa Valley.

57 in La Crosse, 55 in Amory.

Oshkosh is at 61 right now and the cool spot in the state is at the Franklin Coffee House in Sparta where it is 50 degrees right now.

Parker and I here we're just talking in the last segment about

video game consoles and games and things that you play here.

Alicia notes on YouTube.

The first I played on was Nintendo.

We didn't have game systems in our house growing up.

She also says she gets her haircut every three to four weeks and says the silver is very nice, Pat.

We're talking about the hair here.

So thank you for that.

I appreciate that.

So we do want to know.

what was either your first game console or your favorite one.

But also, if you have any recommendations, I mean, are there other grandparents out there listening going, you know, there's this, there's something that I can play with my grandkids, because I know I have tried the the VR goggles.

I did have, you know, grandson saying, let's do this roller coaster one and another one is let's fly this plane and

even though you know it's virtual reality, you know, you're on that rollercoaster and your head's doing this and finally it's like, okay, all right, I'm gonna take this off.

There's

videos of people like walking into walls and

Oh,

yeah.

Jumping

into stuff.

Yeah.

Yep.

Oh, no, that happened to a family member who was, you know, swinging his hand around playing with the VR goggles and smashed his hand right into something that needed stitches.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, they there's a reason why they tell you to kind of have this wide open area where you can play.

Let's see.

Tony says that he had Sega and the often forgotten Dreamcast.

Yes.

I had forgotten about it.

I don't know if I knew about that

one.

So last night, there was a little extra bonus pat time for better or for worse for the cap times idea fest, ninth year that this has been going on.

And so I was hosting the intermission between speakers.

And the speaker that was going to follow was Governor Tony Evers.

And we'll talk more about his remarks here in just a bit But I wanted to lead into it by saying that we had set up a chat here at the at the radio place and Making sure that technically everything was working and that we were hitting things on time When to come from Madison the chip will falls and back to Madison when the hit commercial breaks all that and then there's a little light shit chat in there as well I You know we I said, okay, the governor is coming up next and then it was bedtime for me.

So I logged off

I went back and looked at the chat.

Oh, you didn't see that till today.

I did till this morning.

And did I I laugh because you were part of you were down there as well, right?

You were doing a little work last evening.

And now, if people say a naughty word on the radio, there's this thing called the dump button.

It's how we got that seven second delay or I don't know how long our delay is here, seven or 10 seconds, whatever.

And so if, if Parker hears a naughty word coming from the, you know, a phone caller or even the host, that's been known to happen.

You hit that button and that way that naughty word gets covered up.

You have time during the delay.

So that's, that's the whole thing about a dump button.

That was just so tickled to look at the chat this morning and find a very intensive debate on standing by on the dump button for Governor Tony Evers because Mr. Aw Shucks and folks and all that holy mackerel has holy mackerel has dropped the BS bomb more than once and You know you you can't put one on the radio, but the debate was about

a different word that he said, which, which didn't get dumped.

And we're not going to get in trouble for it, but we're also not going to overuse the term, the alternative word for a donkey.

Yeah.

So when he used that, the chat back and forth, should we hit the dump button for that?

No, no, you can call somebody a jackbox, you know, or whatever.

No, you can BS, no go.

But donkey alternative.

Yep, you go on it.

For no other speaker, would you see this kind of debate about the

the dump button except the folksy governor of the state of Wisconsin.

I couldn't believe it.

It was crazy.

I thought that that was great.

He was like as in Tony Evers terms, he was like off the rails.

Oh, really?

Okay.

He was like very loose last night.

It was awesome.

Look, there is there.

There is nothing like the feeling of the weight coming off your shoulders.

When you when you say on your own terms, I'm done with this.

And as you're as you're gliding things in for landing.

Now the alternative, of course, is you get fired, or you lose an election, you know, like I've done, that people get fired, that's soul crushing.

But if you can do it on your own terms, like I did at the TV station, it is very nice.

You feel much more

carefree shall we say and you know that that was something I'm sure that came out in what Tony Evers was saying so we'll maybe get to more of his remarks in just a bit but I did want to take one more note of something else that happened this week kind of in the the video game techie window and

That would be the newest announcements from Apple about their products.

The new iPhones, including now an iPhone Air, because everything has to be an Air.

There's a MacBook and a MacBook Air.

So why wouldn't there be an iPhone Air now?

Something that's thinner and smaller.

And I know there's no one right answer.

There's different phones for different people.

But I'm one of those who it's like, it is very possible for your phone to be too thin.

Yes.

as anybody would know who has put their phone in their back pocket and then sat down and mostly you catch it at the very last second you kind of stand up in much the way you're sitting down in the restroom and you suddenly realize somebody didn't put the seat down and you quickly get up before you get splashed.

The same goes with that feeling of that's that's a phone in my pocket.

got to get that out of there.

But for some people, that is that is their thing.

So there will be a new thinner iPhone coming out.

And then there's these new AirPods.

And I've been talking about, you know, the ones that I recently got.

And I love the noise canceling feature on them.

But this one does instant translations.

I heard about that.

It's it uses AI and can instantly translate the kind of thing that again, you only saw in like the movies or cartoons or things like that.

And it's just a wonder where this is all going.

So check out the things that Apple's put out and then head over to my Amazon wish list and see if you can't send me some of these things for the holidays.

I'm kidding.

Of course, I'm kidding.

Look, coming up in our seven o'clock hour, we're going to talk about running for local office.

It

just might be the calling that you've got to run for mayor or city council, town board, whatever the case may be, to shake things up.

We'll have that with Brian Kennedy.

Coming up as we continue along on these mornings powered by UpNorth News, I'm Pat Crichtlow.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

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

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

Hey, good morning.

It is 706 and nice to have you back here up north on this Thursday morning, September 11th, 2025.

We'll be talking later this hour with Brian Kennedy, the mayor of Glendale in Milwaukee County, all about running for local office.

He's the national head of a group called Democratic municipal officers, and they work to recruit and train.

the next generation of candidates who serve as mayors and village presidents and city councils and town boards and things like that.

So if that interests you, or maybe you're thinking about recruiting a friend to do that, then give a listen later this hour.

And of course, if you can't stick around, then we invite you to listen to us as a podcast head over to Spotify and follow us that way.

And you can catch up with shows anytime that you like.

It's a very foggy morning out here on Lake Wissota, and we are definitely not the only place a dense fog advisory will be in effect until 9 o'clock for a big chunk of the western half of Wisconsin basically draw a line up from Phillips.

I'm sorry not from Richland Center through Tomah up to a Neilsville Medford Phillips, Ironwood, Michigan and Ashland and all those points west of that line.

are in a dense fog advisory with low visibility of visibility a quarter mile or less in some places and so if you're out there driving go at a slower speed use your headlights and leave plenty of distance ahead of you and the temperatures of course are going to be warmed up nicely as Brittany told us before she began her long weekend and we have local forecast updates throughout the day on your local civic media station.

All right, we were asking we were talking about video game consoles a little bit earlier and because it's the anniversary of the Atari 2600 from 1977 and Alicia already told us that she played on a Nintendo and Tony had Sega, but there was also a Dreamcast as well.

And so we were wondering if there were consoles that you remember or consoles that you would recommend if people were going to be, you know,

replacing what they have or buying a console for the first time because frankly everything has come up a step from the Atari 2600.

So we're recruiting and seeking out your recommendations and your memories on video game consoles this morning.

On a much more serious note, however, is I know you think I'm going to be talking directly about yesterday's murder of political agitator Charlie Kirk in Utah.

And we've we've spoken about that in the last hour and about violence not being the answer and that violence is not is not politics even though some people mistake it for that that there is no good political violence it encourages other people to either engage in violence or to speak in violent tones Like the congressman from Western, Wisconsin

Derrick van Orden has been on a tear overnight since the murder of Charlie Kirk in Utah and not not in a good way.

And I can't read all of his tweets because of the swearing that's in there.

But there's a lot of tweets where he says the gloves are off.

and threatening things like federal funding.

In one tweet, let's see, from nine hours ago or so, he says, we will be making sure that any institution that celebrates political violence will not receive a single penny of federal funding, gloves are off.

And then there's one where he refers to dirty scumbag reporters who are directly culpable for Charlie Kirk's murders.

Somebody asks, how do you coexist with people that want to murder you?

And Derek Van Orden's response is, you don't.

In other words, in his mind, the de-escalation comes...

At the point of a gun apparently and this is a man with military experience and I don't doubt all kinds of access to weaponry There's one where he says you take shots at Rebecca Cook and Congressman Mark Pocan Saying people like them would have fit perfectly into the Soviet Union They think they're smarter than everyone and that the government should tell you how to live your life

Okay, here's a couple more here where he simply says the the gloves are off as he You know reposts others You've got actor James Woods who puts a lot of extreme and violent language out there And he says don't call it gun violence.

It's Democrat violence which Derek Van Orden reposted and said correct

He refers to disgusting the chaos that broke out on the floor of the House of Representatives.

The chaos that broke out when fellow Republican Lauren Boebert of Colorado insisted on a spoken prayer rather than a moment of silence.

In other words, she wanted special treatment for Charlie Kirk compared to all of the other moments of silence that were held for victims of all political stripes.

Most of them innocent victims.

But Lauren Bulbert wanted something different and when people disagreed needless to say There was a woman from Florida the Republican who started shouting F bombs at the Democrats Just not one of the more graceful moments on the floor of the US House Here's another one about Derek Van Oren saying the gloves are off and these horrible vultures claiming to be journalists must be held accountable

Here's one where he says, in response to somebody, F these bags of scum.

Let's see, there's another, the gloves are off.

Here's one where Nicole Wallace from MSNBC speaks on how political violence has often been committed by Republicans and people who consume conservative media.

And Derek Van Orden puts it up and says, this is the problem.

This garbage is the problem.

Here's one where he says of another podcast host, I would love to have coffee with this piece of, and then uses the S word there.

Once again, we get another shot at Mark Pokan, where he says to somebody, you and your golden corral fat

F-Buddy Mark Pocan do not seem to understand how far out of touch you are with everyday Americans.

You people are culpable for Charlie Kirk's assassination.

Here's another one where he pledges zero tax dollars.

Here's one where he says, I don't think the SOBs, and he spells it all out, of course, that are celebrating this horrific crime have ever watched the movie The Unforgiven.

They called the wind and they are about to reap the AI-empowered whirlwind.

These people want a Nazi fascist country.

We're not gonna do that.

These are all from a congressman, all right?

Here's an F this terrorist referring to the show TMZ.

When somebody asks, why are you surprised?

Derek Van Ordnery posted and says, because they hate God.

Here's one where he says to another journalist, you are directly culpable for this assassination and the attempted assassination of Donald Trump.

I am not sure that you understand what you and your horrible people have done.

Gloves are off you effing mayonnaise person.

And oh wait, Moore have come up.

He's still going.

Wow.

I refresh the screen and so many more have come up calling people scum.

Every every chance he gets more scum, more green with people who called other people scum.

And I know I have one or two others.

Nope, that was just a scum again.

This one you sowed the wind you punk.

Again, Derek Van Orden essentially threatening violence.

to other people.

Here's more scum.

He says of another group saying this is the left, meaning the political left.

This is the left.

They are about to get a right, you know, as in a punch.

All right, I hear some of you calling for mercy and saying, look, how long are you going to be rereading?

Are you just going to read Derek Van Orden's Twitter feed?

In this particular case, yes.

And you know, it's something I've wanted to do for a long time.

But I knew it wasn't going to necessarily make for great radio.

Except now in this kind of context.

I mean, Derek Van Orden talks like this all the time, usually in drips and drabs, but occasionally these late night rants, where he goes off in tens, if not dozens of tweets.

calling people names, sometimes not directly, just reposting other people's things and referring to them as scum or using the F word for them.

This is his primary constituency.

These are the people he most wants to talk to and the people he most wants to please and the people he most wants to agitate.

And you might say, well, he is just reacting very strongly to Charlie Kirk's murder.

I believe it has gone further than that.

This is no longer a man reacting or reacting angrily to the murder of a political figure that he agrees with.

At some point, you are now using this killing for political purposes.

You are politicizing what's going on, especially when you're continuing to want to agitate so division and more or less encourage violence with all of the times that he

essentially said, you know, that a punchback is coming in some way, shape, or form.

Derek Van Orden was nowhere to be found in some of these other mass shootings that have happened.

And in political violence, he went so far as to do some inappropriate name calling after one particular political violent tragedy.

And you all know this, if you listen to this show, we've talked about this.

So why am I bringing it up again?

because so many of your neighbors don't.

They see the softball coverage on local TV stations or the quick little write-ups in newspapers.

And I'm not saying there's never been a hard-hitting story done on Derek Van Orden, but on the scale between fluff stories and journalism that tries to hold Derek Van Orden to account, the scales are not balanced at all.

And some of it borders on stenography.

Having seen what a member of Congress from Wisconsin has put out in less than 24 hours since an act of political violence in this country, I am again asking, challenging Wisconsin media to, first off, whenever he does pop up again because he's not doing town hall.

So whenever he does make another spontaneous appearance, if you're able to be there,

I really hope your first question isn't about whatever it is he wants to talk about, but whether he thinks this is behavior befitting a member of Congress, or don't wait for him to show up unexpectedly in your community and call the office right now.

And frankly, a lot of his constituents could call the office right now or at some point during the day.

I'd urge you to look up his Twitter feed just so that you have it in front of you.

And that way they're not saying, well, you're just going off things that you heard.

No, take a look at it.

And then maybe call his office.

And remember, the people who work in these offices, they are not the members of Congress.

You do not need to unload on them.

But you can make your point of view known and say, I would just like to know if the Congressman thinks that this is the kind of behavior that he thinks is appropriate in the wake of an act of political violence.

He knows better.

He knows it's not, but he can't help himself.

And those of you who are already fighting about this in the comment sections today, watching this program, you may as well take a step back.

You know where we stand on this, and you can only throw sand for so long before we start hitting hide and delete buttons like I wish somebody would have done a long time ago to Derek Van Orden.

I'm Pat Crichtlow.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

you

Here's a text from Michael in Wauwatosa.

My first video game system was the Sears version of the Atari 2600.

It was a black and silver wedge shaped box.

It had push buttons and lights.

It was very futuristic looking.

I wish I still had it.

How fun would that be?

Some people hold their game consoles maybe a little too long and I can't remember.

Nintendo has all these different names.

I don't know what Nintendo's original system was called, but I know that

Sherry's parents my in-laws had it at their farmhouse I think one of the other one of Sherry's siblings maybe had it originally but for a good Decade after everybody else was no longer using it in America We are all still using it to play like Mario Brothers the original Mario Brothers and and duck hunter remember duck hunter with the

gun Flying

by

variation of it.

Yeah

Oh, yeah.

See, that's the thing.

I'm sure that those are still out there in some way, shape, or form, but they're so much more technical now.

They can do so much more.

I get that.

But they should have a level where it's like, you're a man in your 60s who played on the Atari.

Here's the version you might prefer and go with that.

This is the super pixelated version of it.

Have

fun.

Yes.

It sports the Texas Rangers beat the Milwaukee Brewers six to three yesterday afternoon to complete a three game sweep of the Brewers who still have the best record in baseball.

And it's only the first time they've been swept in a three game series since the season began with that oh and three start against the Yankees.

Things were looking good for the Brewers at the start.

There was a leadoff home run from Bryce Durang.

Next man up was Jackson Churio.

He hit a home run, so it was quickly 2-0 in the first inning.

And he got Freddie Peralta on the mound, who had, you know, was tied for the most wins with 16.

He was going for his 17th win, didn't get it.

He allowed five runs on a season high 113 pitches in five innings.

I tuned the game in somewhere in the fifth inning and there's the pitch count for Freddie Peralta was that like 105 106 107 like what are you guys?

What are you doing Murphy?

But obviously, you know, it's like we got to save the bullpen and this game is out of hand.

Yeah, I'm starting to worry a little about where the Brewers are at is not so much as how they're playing.

Although that is a little concerning and just more where they're at in terms of injuries and

energy as we kind of crawl into the end.

Yes.

And we've, we have seen this before of the Brewers that, you know, again, the, the elite teams, if you will, kind of know when to peak and others, they just get on a hot streak and they go and go until they essentially burn out.

I mean, look at, look at Freddie Peralta.

He'd gone 30 consecutive innings without giving up a run.

But then the Rangers, Jake Berger, homered off him in the second inning.

And then homered off him again in the fifth inning when his pitch count was in the hundreds at that point.

And the Brewers, to be fair, we've talked about this before, more bad luck.

They are hitting some balls that are like lasers.

Yeah.

But they go right where the outfielders are standing.

It's like, you almost have to try.

To to have luck that bad at one point christian yelts.

I mean that would have been a home run or at least a you know a triple in so many other areas center fielder gets there just in time and he as he's going back to the dugout jogging back He's got his hands up to this guy and he looks up to the sky.

I

saw that Yeah,

what what do I got to do to get a hit here?

And

so Mike Clemens has a report that I think that we've been running today that Pat Murphy's been saying like, you know, it's not that we're For lack of trying or anything.

It is not that we've

are taking our foot off the gas.

We're hitting the ball.

We're just not finding the results, which absolutely sucks.

And it's not fun baseball to watch.

Exactly.

And so the the Brewers are still up five and a half games on the Cubs.

I know the Cubs were playing Atlanta.

And I'm just quickly trying to look up whether the Cubs won or lost yesterday.

They won.

They beat Atlanta three to two.

And also, I want to add about that to the Brewers.

They're not in the playoffs technically yet, but like the Brewers aren't technically playing for all that much right now.

Right.

The Rangers are hardcore playing for something right now.

Yes.

They've made a lot of ground to try to get a wild card spot.

And so they are, I mean, they're motivated.

And again, it's not like the Brewers are dogging it, but Texas was motivated coming into this and it clearly paid off for them.

So Brewers are off today coming back home for a series against the Cardinals game tomorrow.

will be at 635 the pregame on several civic media stations.

So it's St.

Louis at home this weekend.

And then they stay home to start the week hosting the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of next week.

And then they hit the road next weekend in St.

Louis.

So we've got a bunch of games coming up with the Cardinals here over the next few

days.

I don't like how they make schedules.

It's so weird.

I know.

Let's see, we've got the Packers playing tonight against the Washington Commanders at Lambeau.

Coverage begins for the pregame at five o'clock this evening on four Civic Media radio stations.

Let me tell you what they are.

WRCO in Richland Center, WCQM in Park Falls, WRJN in Racine, Kenosha and WAUH in Watoma.

And then we've got, of course, the Badgers are playing on Saturday at Alabama.

I don't think I'm gonna have you look for something.

I've never on the show talked about bedding lines.

Okay, it's too.

It's too tempting to go down that rabbit hole and all that.

But I will ask out of curiosity if you can look up.

And again, Alabama, not what they used to be.

But with the Badgers going to Atlanta, I'd love to know what the what the odds makers are saying about that 20 20 and a half.

So the Badgers are 20 and a half point underdogs going into it.

So you're saying there's a chance.

The pregame begins at 9am Saturday on stations in Richland Center, Amory, Wisconsin Rapids, and Ripon.

And then, of course, there's all the high school football that's going to be coming up as well.

And we'll talk to Chad Holmes about some of that coming up just after eight o'clock as well.

And he'll tell us the kind of stories that he's following in the Wausau area from our civic media station out there.

Now, coming up in just a bit, we'll hear the Midwest Farm Report, and then talk to Brian Kennedy about running for something.

Would you like to represent your area better than, say, Derek Van Orden?

Because that's the kind of folks we're going to get until more people like you decide it's time to run for something.

That's coming up.

I'm Pat Cradle, live from the lake here on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Up North News is a separate entity from Civic Media, but we sure appreciate this partnership that we get to do every weekday morning from 6 to 9 a.m.

But you can follow my team over at UpNorthNewsWI.com.

Sign up for our newsletters there, including the weekday edition and the Sunday morning politics edition that I put together.

Again, we'd love to have you as a subscriber, UpNorthNewsWI.com.

A dense fog advisory is out until

at least nine o'clock for much of western the western half of wisconsin so take it easy out there on the roads and again forecast updates throughout the day on your local civic media radio network station i really like doing segments like the one we're about to start here with brian kennedy because first as a reporter and then an elected official at the state level and now in my capacity here

I could not possibly express enough admiration for the people who run for local office.

I got my start covering county boards in Eau Claire County and Chippewa County, the Chippewa City Council.

And then I've been to more county board, town board, village board meetings than I could possibly count over the years, either covering them as a reporter or speaking as an elected official.

It is thankless work.

And yet people continue to do it because of a certain level of satisfaction and service they give to their communities.

So having said all that, perhaps you might be interested in running for a local office and want to know where to begin.

I got a guy for that.

from suburban Milwaukee.

Let's get down to Glendale and talk to Mayor Brian Kennedy, who's also president of the group Democratic Municipal Officials, nationaldmo.org is the website.

I'll put that up on screen on social media in just a bit here.

Mayor Brian Kennedy, good morning.

How are you?

Good morning, Pat.

I'm doing great.

How are you this morning?

It's good.

Good to see you.

It's been a while.

It's great to talk to you and especially about this.

particular subject.

I mean, I've, of course, have now expressed my admiration for local officials.

You're one of them, but I'm sure you would agree with the concept of people serving in their hometowns and what it is that you appreciate about them.

Yeah, you know, running for local office is basically because you want to serve your community.

There's really not for most of us, but this is a part-time gig.

You know, we all have day jobs, but we feel like there's a way that we can give back to our community.

You know, most people don't understand that when you run for school board or you run for city council or, or run for mayor that, you know, you're basically saying, I'm going to give up my nights and weekends to try and serve my community.

And I'm really not going to get paid very much for it.

You know, when I first ran for this position, Mayor Glendale paid about

$5,000 you know my wife is like why are you taking a job that pays a dollar an hour?

Because that's what it felt like as much time as I gave back to the community But you know there's there's a lot of good that we can do and there's a lot of great opportunities to help shape what your community will become in the next 10 or 15 or 20 years by decisions that are made today

and I will from a political standpoint

I'm going to put it this way.

We need all kinds of folks who are willing to run for local office and you do not have to be a died in the world Democrat or a died in the world Republican to serve in local office.

The vast majority of all of us are correctly described as somewhere in the center left to center right part of the spectrum.

But if people in that very large part of the spectrum don't serve, then that creates a vacuum for people on the fringes to get in.

And I know, Brian, you've seen the danger on school boards and other places where the only person who runs is somebody who shall we say service is not exactly their primary motive.

No, you're absolutely right.

You know one of the reasons why in Wisconsin our local elected offices are all nonpartisan is because there really isn't a Democratic way to pave a road or a Republican way to pick up the garbage.

We're talking about providing services to our community that involve for example making sure you have clean drinking water, making sure that the parks are well maintained so you have a place to take your kids or your grandkids to play, making sure that our schools have the funding they need so that you know the libraries are well stocked, their class sizes are small enough that the teachers can meet the needs of all of

of the students in the classroom.

We're not talking about setting agendas that are necessarily partisan.

But the thing I've noticed, and one of the reasons I got involved with Democratic municipal officials or DMO, is that the people, it seems like whose political philosophies are about serving their community and wanting to give back are more often than not.

on the left or the center left.

We don't necessarily engage in this because we've got some great agenda.

We just want to make sure there's a place for everybody, everybody feels included, and that people's needs are met.

And so that's why I think you see so many of Donald Trump goes after the Democrat cities, but I think you see so many of our

municipal offices being held by Democrats across the country, it's because our natural inclination is to create community and to create a space for everyone and to meet people's needs.

Yeah, another way to put it would be, you know, service driven.

And you and I have both met and befriended people who are to our political right.

who are amazing people because they have that service component about them.

Again, we're not going to agree on everything.

We're not supposed to agree on everything.

We're supposed to work together, but you only work together

If people with differing opinions still at least have service as one of their central values And if people go, why do you keep doing this?

Why do you engage in politics talking politics serving politics?

Brian, it's because I genuinely see those people and I know you still do today people You don't always agree with but there are just so many good people who want to serve their hometowns

No, absolutely, you know

Years ago, I made friends when I was the state American Federation teachers president.

I made friends on the other side of the aisle in the legislature.

I now serve on the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewage District Commission with a good friend who was a Republican.

member of the state assembly and we you know in terms of you know developing our policies around you know how are we managing stormwater runoff how are we making sure that we're you know reclaiming the water before and fully cleaning it before it gets returned to Lake Michigan you know we're on the same page we're about serving you know so so Jeff Stone who you know he didn't always agree with when he was in the legislature you know was a Republican member of the assembly he and I now serve and sit next to each other at the MMSD meetings and

We're on the same page about serving the community.

And you're right, there are people in both parties.

But I would say DMO finds itself with a very large audience because I think you just see a lot more of that service component from people who were about building community and not necessarily about pushing through some sort of an agenda.

We were talking to Glendale Mayor Brian Kennedy.

talking about democratic municipal officials the group their website is national dmo.org and in looking at the website brian i mean there there's no shortage of

trainings out there and seminars and other things for people thinking about going into, you know, politics or public service in some way shape or form.

And yet you guys, you're basically, you're giving it away.

You're, you're put right there on the website.

It says, um, you know, here is a campaign starter kit and you click on it and up comes a five page Google doc of things to keep in mind.

So I mean, I

can't imagine a better place.

I'm not saying it's one stop shopping, but this year looks like it should be the first stop for somebody interested in running for office.

Certainly.

And you said it's funny.

Wisconsin, Wisconsin Democratic Party has probably the best outreach for local folks that want to run for office.

You can get so much help and assistance from our state party that most state parties in the country do not have.

And that's where national DMO comes in.

And what we offer is essentially for those people in all those states where their state party just isn't really equipped to offer them the resources to build a local campaign, we offer free resources.

goal here, we recognize if you're running for school board, you're probably running on a budget of $500 to run a campaign.

That's some yard signs and some door hangers, right?

And then you and your friends are going to go out and knock doors together.

So we've tried to help at DMO to how do we put together the right kind of trainings and the right kind of resources that we can offer to Democrats who want to run for local office.

And that's even if you're running for a nonpartisan office like we do here in Wisconsin, you know, I'm still a member of the Democratic Party.

And so anybody who is a Democrat who wants to run for

the local office has access to this training, the training materials that we have.

When I would say this summer we did something we've never done before.

We offered an all day candidate camp.

So we.

collaborated with the DNC training department.

And on a Saturday in July, we had a seven hour training where we essentially walked through all the different aspects of how do you put together your messaging?

How do you build a database of supporters?

How do you fundraise?

How do you talk to people at the doors?

What should your website look like?

What kind of things did you focus on?

And we went through a whole day of training.

We had 545 people from across the country registered.

We'd never seen anything like that before.

And even some of the reddest places like Kentucky and Tennessee, 545 people, 15% of the people who registered were from two of the reddest states in the country.

So we're making significant outreach to teach people how to run for local office and to recognize that it's not that hard.

It just seems daunting if you've never been a part of the political space before.

And so we've tried to create these very user-friendly, easy materials, trainings that have been recorded, you can watch, and a whole bunch of other resources.

including even access to vendors that will charge a congressional or a gubernatorial campaign a whole lot of money, offering free or almost free services if you're running for local office because they recognize we're building a bench here.

Yeah.

And on the website, you can find things like getting your campaign started, creating a logo and building your website and how to get started on fundraising and voter contact and mail and email programs and merchandise and even polling.

And again, connecting to other folks, like you said, maybe your state Democratic Party or others.

As you look back now, Brian, and I forget how long you've been involved in public service here, but if you could go back and talk to yourself as a

very first time candidate.

Is there one thing that you would tell yourself that you to do differently or to focus on more or to sweat about less?

Yes.

Don't look to national messaging when you're running for local office.

talk to your neighbors, talk to the, you know, the parents of your kid's friends, you know, talk to people at the grocery store, you know, knock some doors, find out what people actually think.

You know, one of the things I think we have seen far too often is we have this national messaging machine that tries to tell Democrats what they need to say.

And the real answers here, honestly, are found at the local level.

Because if I talk to my neighbors in Glendale, it's going to be different than if you're talking to your neighbors in Chippewa Falls, right?

We have different local

And so I would say, listen to those people and craft a message for your specific campaign that is very local.

And I did want to add one other thing about DMO.

DMO isn't just about getting elected.

We have two sides to this organization.

Once you are a municipal official, we actually have a policy arm that combines with National League of Cities, with National School Board Association, where we hold events and we hold trainings, where we share best practices

across the country.

So policy language that might be implemented in a suburb of New York City, I might find in one of these trainings and say, hey, that would be really great for Glendale.

And then somebody who is on a city council in suburban Kansas City might say, hey, I want to take that same language.

So we do share best practices across the board.

DMO wants to help you get elected.

And then once you're elected, it wants to help you be effective when you're in office.

But the thing is, while we look at those national ideas,

you still have to tailor them to your own specific municipality and the messaging that works in your community.

Yeah, you're not running to be, you know, a Donald Trump light or Barack Obama light or anything like that.

This is as hometown service as it gets.

And that's why there are all these resources that are put forth by Democratic municipal officials at nationaldmo.org again, nationaldmo.

and Brian Kennedy, the mayor of Glendale down there in the Milwaukee area, is the national president of the group and was kind enough to join us today to talk about getting your thoughts together about maybe running for office.

Brian, thank you.

It's always great to connect with you.

Thanks for sharing all these resources.

Hope you have a great day.

Thanks, Pat.

Appreciate you having me on your show.

You bet.

Anytime.

And again, national dmo.org is the website address coming up in our eight o'clock hour.

We'll talk to Sean Malley about your money in the markets.

Joseph Pecky about some of the big headlines of the day.

Chad Holmes will tell us what he's following from our Civic Media Station in the Wausau area.

That's all coming up after the eight o'clock news.

I'm Pat Krightlo.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

Hey, we're playing football tonight.

And by we, I mean, all of us, because we're all Green Bay Packers.

You know, the Parker's got his packer shirt on.

I'm wearing green.

Todd lives in Wisconsin.

So, I mean, we're all together on this.

I've

been wearing my green so often, I haven't washed it, I guess.

That's the

problem.

Well, on these short weeks like this, I mean, I'm sure some people tonight will be like, oh, wait, I haven't done the laundry since Sunday.

Well, put on that smelly jersey tonight and join Civic Media on several stations pregame at five o'clock for the Packers versus the Washington Commanders.

Although I still liked Washington football team better myself.

But anyway, Todd, I did.

I wouldn't mind getting back into that.

Like, like soccer, you know, soccer has a lot of like, isn't it?

Is it like Madison FC or FC Madison?

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's a charm to

that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I don't mind that so

much.

Anyway,

Todd Albus here.

You can hear him weekday afternoons from two to four across the Civic Media radio network.

yesterday last last evening, we were chatting back and forth during idea fest, as I was anchoring some of the coverage last night, you're going to anchor some of the coverage tomorrow night.

Did you hear our discussion an hour ago about needing the dump button for Governor Tony Evers?

I did not I was in the shower yet at that time.

But I heard I heard the first couple of minutes of

in the first five or eight minutes of Evers last night, and so I get where you're

going.

He's all folksy and everything, but it just makes it that much more effective when he uses a word that maybe isn't radio friendly, but he was described by others as being very carefree.

Again, that

Feeling of liberation that comes when you're you're going out on your own terms And I think that that worked out very well for him last night and again civic media will have more idea fest coverage on Friday I've never been to one of these events to get all these great national guests to come in as well I don't know if you've ever been to one of those sessions, but I just I

love

the idea of an idea fest and just bringing these speakers in

Well, number one, I want to thank Governor Tony Evers publicly on air because it's taken a lot of heat off of me for me and my guests who may slip once in a while.

All I got to do is say, hey, the governor does it.

So I appreciate the governor setting the bar here on civic media for words we can and can't use.

But yes, I actually went to, and here's me guys.

I think you'll appreciate this.

I could have gone and Luke Mathers, a great operations director said, hey, we got tickets if you want to go.

I could have gone and seen Stacey Abrams.

I could have, oh, I guess I would have been helping the anchor on Friday for Tim Walls.

I could have gone and seen Pritzker.

But no, here's the one I went to last night, or Wednesday.

Pardon me, Tuesday night was Tom Oates, the great sports reporter and writer for a longtime Wisconsin State Journal.

And Mike Lucas, longtime announcer for the Wisconsin Badger basketball and football team, now is back at the Capitol Times.

They did an idea fest and recorded one of their podcast episodes along with the former Wisconsin men's hockey coach, Tony Granato.

And it was really cool.

It was really cool.

It was down at the old Italian Worker's Club down in the Green Bush neighborhood here in Madison.

And number one, the pizza was fantastic.

But number two, just listening to Tony Cronato, and I think it's a great example of.

People like us get so wrapped up in politics and government and, you know, it's kind of partly what we're paid to do.

But it was a great reminder and you guys have your packer stuff on today.

There's lots of life lessons to be learned from sports, from how you get along with teammates, how you go through adversity, how you.

understand and get along with people that you don't necessarily agree with or not from your same background.

And Tony Grinnell also spoke openly about his battle with cancer and going through that as Mike Lucas has had.

So it was just a good reminder that it doesn't always have to be from a Republican or Democratic platform to learn political lessons.

Sometimes it can be found in sports.

Yes.

Yesterday, you and I both had on Milwaukee County Executive David Crawley, newly announced Democratic candidate for governor.

Because of the limited window that I had with him, I wanted to get in one question about affordable housing because he'd been up in the Chippewa Valley talking about the issue.

And of course, it's an issue in the Milwaukee area as well.

So because of our limited time, were there other topics that you got into that you took away from your interview with David Crawley?

I thought I was really prepared.

I thought that I went there, I guess you'd say, and said, look, you happen to be a person that's black.

I happen to be a person that's gay.

We have people running that might happen to be women.

And my former party, the Republican Party, which I don't know too well, is really good at honing in on the things that divide us and using that politically to win the latest former governor, Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes in his campaign for the US Senate.

They darkened the pigment of his skin.

They exaggerated things.

I said, are you prepared with?

an inoculation plan politically.

And, you know, understandably, he wasn't going to give all of his cards on our little show, but it seemed like he did.