
Transcript
Margie’s Money, Putin’s Puppets, DOGE Is Dead (Hour 1)
Mornings with Pat Kreitlow · Mon Nov 24, 2025
Good morning.
It is 6.06 on a Monday morning, November 24th, 2025.
It's Thanksgiving week.
And it's another beautiful morning to have you here up north, live from Lake Visota, from wherever you're spending your mornings, listening across the Civic Media radio network, or catching us as a podcaster on social media, or wherever, however you got here.
Thanks for starting your day right.
Doesn't it always feel better on a Monday after the Packers beat the Vikings, Parker Olson?
It just feels so good.
The air, it tastes good.
It is.
It's very cheesy.
Yes, in only the best ways.
That's not my question of the day, though.
I got a question for you.
How far are you going for Thanksgiving this week?
Coming up, and are you traveling Wednesday with, you know, one billion other people it feels like?
Or are you getting an early start, a belated start?
Are you just heading across town?
Now, this isn't a contest.
to see who's traveling the far list for Thanksgiving.
It would just be nice to collect a sample of how far everyone is traveling this weekend.
I kind of did mine this past weekend.
We greeted you Friday from Madison and then we finished our drive to see grandkids 475 miles away from Lake Wistoda to visit the grandkids in Kalamazoo.
So how about you?
you can give us a call eight five five seven five civic tell us where you're off to or just tell us how many miles you think you're you're putting on the the car or the the airplane that you might be hopping on or you can you know simply get in the comment sections of facebook or youtube or you can use that civic media app to send us a text or to record a voice note and let us know what are you up to this weekend or at least how far are you going
We'd love to kind of get a relatively good sample of destinations from folks and whether you're even going this weekend at all.
Like I said, we saw family this past weekend because, you know, we've got some work to do this weekend.
So it's kind of a home weekend here.
So some people, they move their holidays around, especially with us with two kids in different states and all the grandkids and people with jobs and everything.
It's not there.
There's definitely years where Thanksgiving doesn't happen on Thanksgiving Day and Christmas or Christmas doesn't happen on Christmas Day.
You take what you can get.
So we'd love to hear what's happening with you as well.
855-75-CIVIC-855-7524842 is the number.
Let's see.
And I know Parker's been collecting phone calls and input's been coming in already.
How's everybody looking out there?
Everybody being nice on the phone to you already this morning?
to be better this
Well, I'm heading down to Racine to see a couple of friends I haven't seen for a while.
That's as far as I'm going.
But I'm so glad I don't have to get on an airplane because I with what's going on right now with our
whole system.
It's just I can't imagine people are going to put themselves in that position to get stranded somewhere for who knows how long.
So anyway,
Cindy, it's been so long since I have I've gone out of my way for trips that do not involve changing planes because we had such a bad experience a couple of years back that we now when we've gone on vacation, we've picked places that are only direct flights.
It is just that
It's that bad out there, but Cindy, you know, Sean Duffy's gonna fix all this.
If everybody would just not wear pajamas on the plane, that's gonna fix everything he says.
So, I mean, that has to make you feel better, right?
Yeah, yeah.
See, I gave Cindy a laugh.
We're already starting the week on a good note here, right?
Yep.
Good.
Well, Cindy, I appreciate hearing where you're off to this Thanksgiving and I really hope the week starts off better.
Let's get that, let's get this past weekend in the past for you as soon as we can, okay?
All right, so good.
Thanks.
All
Yes, trust me, there will be days when it's like, you know, it's gonna feel like planes, trains and automobiles or something.
Roger and Steven's point up on Facebook, my wife and I are hosting on Thursday, then I work on Friday, but I am thankful that I am no longer in retail.
That's a whole different question of the day.
Maybe we'll do that one tomorrow is, you know, Black Friday.
Is that, is that still a thing?
You know, do people shop and everything?
So maybe we'll tackle that tomorrow.
But for today, let's get into the Thanksgiving trekking.
and how far you are going.
Coming up on the program today, we'll be talking to Abigail Swetz from Fair Wisconsin as part of our Movement Mondays, where we talk to groups that continue fighting for fairness, justice, democracy all across Wisconsin.
And this time we're going to be talking about the ongoing battles to make sure that our friends in the LGBTQ community, our friends, our neighbors, our loved ones are being treated with respect, most especially by some of our politicians.
So we'll have that today.
It is Monday, so Dr. Kristen Lierly will be along and so will Up North News reporter Selena Heller who talked to a member of the cast of Wicked for Good who is from Wisconsin and who plays somebody in a wheelchair in the movie just as she does in real life.
And so Selena will have a little bit of that interview for us and we have our regular visit from author Laura Bird whose monthly batch of book recommendations
Certainly is in the spirit of the season, things to be thankful for, books that express gratitude, things along that nature.
That's coming up at 8.35 this morning.
Wait, you say you can't, you might not be here at 8.35?
You might miss this.
You don't have to.
You just head over to Spotify or Apple and you follow us as a podcast and we'd love to have you as a follower.
You can learn more at civicmedia.us where you can also click on shows and see all of our past episodes each hour by hour by hour and click on it and listen through the website that way to catch a guest.
But it would be especially nice to have you as a subscriber as we pod this program.
Oh, let's see.
We've got the daily newsletter from UpNorth News.
You can sign up for it at UpNorthNewsWI.com.
And Ellie is, she is really getting it done collecting and soliciting photographs from our viewers.
There's a beautiful one here of a place called Gibraltar Rock from Jonathan who sent that in.
Let's see.
She's also got a story about 12 different Wisconsin holiday parades that will get you into the holiday spirit.
Which I honestly, I was not thinking that holiday parades were like a big deal in this part of the climate.
You know, you kind of see the one on TV from like Walt Disney World or something like that.
But more places have added a little bit of holiday cheer.
There's, you know, the downtown Appleton Christmas Parade.
West Alice has one.
Of course, here in Chippewa Falls, what really got it started for me.
was the Bridge to Wonderland Christmas Parade.
When we moved here 30 years ago, I could not believe such an adorable, beautiful parade could be held in cold, snowy weather, but that's how we do it all the time here.
is that first weekend of December or so and there are many other Christmas holiday parades that people could want to learn about and you learn about them in our newsletter.
You sign up over at upnorthnewswi.com.
It's also where you can sign up for our Sunday morning newsletter and on there you can find our question of the week and recall that last week we asked
Whether you have a close friend involved in not involved in politics, but who is politically the opposite of you and The final results turned out to be 6040.
Yes.
So about 60% of readers who sent in Answers said they do have a close friend It was clear by the answers that it was uncomfortable sometimes but that their friendship Had to last over, you know, the the political climate that we live in the other 40% though plenty were very
sincere as well about not wanting to surround themselves with people whose values might be so opposite of their own.
So thanks to everybody who sent in responses to that.
The question that we've got
This week is about artificial intelligence.
And again, we'll do more about this later on, but just a quick preview of how do you feel about AI?
And I give four different options about whether you think AI is going to be a positive or a negative and to what degree.
And so we'll get into that a little bit later on, but again, sign up for our Sunday morning newsletter and you can be the first to see and respond to our question of the week.
And, you know, if you need all this in a one-stop shopping form, head over to UpNorthNewsWI.com slash mornings.
UpNorthNewsWI.com slash mornings, where you can see the stories that I write for the UpNorth News website.
You can subscribe to the show as a podcast right there, and you can sign up for the newsletters all in one handy-dandy place, as they like to say.
Let's get back to the really good news parker of the day, and that, of course, would be the
Green Bay Packers and the way that that defense absolutely dominated the Vikings Although it begins first.
We got to come over to the offense And ask the question that a lot of other people are asking Emanuel Wilson who?
Hey, no, no, no, no.
I was on this guy Yes, yeah, I believe you've told us that.
Yes, you spotted him early.
I think
I, I think I was still kind of stuck, I'm still learning the name like, like Emanuel, uh, wait, isn't that the kid from Webster?
No, that was a different, this is Emanuel Wilson, an undrafted free agent from division two, Fort Valley State.
Where is Fort Valley State?
I don't know, what counts is that he's here now, made his first career start for the Packers on Sunday, rushed for a career high 107 yards, two touchdowns, filling in for the injured Josh Jacobs.
to back up a dominating performance by Green Bay's defense as the Packers trounced the Vikings 23 to six.
The Packers forced three turnovers and produced five sacks to each from Micah Parsons and Devonte Wyatt.
The Vikings in the second half of the game totaled a net yardage of four.
The Vikings got four yards of net offense in the second half and three turnovers.
I listened to the whole game because we were driving back from Kalamazoo and that was a fun one to listen to.
I think a little bit of worry for some people about how little they use Jordan Love, but frankly, he's basically dealing with a separated left shoulder right now.
Yeah.
So definitely want to be a little conservative with him.
And yeah, if Emmanuel Wilson, if you can give him the ball 28 times and he can score two touchdowns, why not?
Well, yeah, I mean, again, it's, it's not like a requirement that I have to know who these people are.
It's like, if they're showing up and they're in a, they're in a green jersey and a gold helmet, hand them the ball and if they can get it done, then later on I will.
Figure it all out, but don't don't wait on me Green Bay improves to seven wins three losses and one tie two and oh and divisional games So far this season pretty good after going one and five against the the NFC Norris as they like to say last season This is part of a stretch of three straight divisional matchups for the Packers.
They visit Detroit this week Thursday
Thanksgiving game starting at noon and then they host the Chicago Bears on December 7th which again that game has been flexed as they like to say.
It's no longer a noon game against the Bears on December 7th.
It's now a 325.
Consider yourself warned.
Are we going to be ready for the Lions on Thanksgiving Day?
I think they did.
I was worried about the quick turnaround and injuries, but I actually think with how little they passed the ball, I think that they're going to be pretty good.
I think it was a good week to get some receivers healthy.
Jordan loves starting to feel good.
defense, though.
How about it?
Come on.
How
Give it up for them.
I know.
All right.
Well, coming up, we'll kind of set the record straight on a little bit of misinformation that's in the headlines today.
Donald Trump's peace plan for Ukraine.
Give me a break.
From the heart of America's up north, live from Lake Wissota.
Thanks for making this the place to spend part of your Monday mornings.
I'm Pat Kratlow.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
So if you missed it off the top of the program, our question of the day is, how far are you traveling for Thanksgiving?
Man, you don't have to give us the detailed plans if you don't want, I mean, if you want to, 855-75 Civic, 855-752-4842, where are you going?
Who are you gonna go see?
Is it something new?
Or is it the, you know, the same old trip, you know, year after year?
I know ours is a little different now because we did, we made the same trek year after year.
one of our relatives basically called dibs on Thanksgiving.
And that's what we did for, I don't know, was it 12, 14 years?
Something like that.
And, you know, we're all, we're all getting up there a bit.
And this relative said, that's it, I'm retiring from, from Thanksgiving because it started as, I don't know, maybe it was a dozen people, but then as other siblings got married, as others had kids, and as we became grandparents ourselves, it got to be rather unwieldy.
You know, where half of Thanksgiving dinner, half the crew is in the garage, you know, at tables and you hope it's not too cold of a day out there.
So our traditions have had to change a little bit.
How about yours?
Are you doing the same old thing?
Are you shaking it up?
855-75 Civic, 855-752-4842.
How far are you traveling for Thanksgiving?
That is our question of the day and we would love to hear from you.
All right, there are a couple of notes here that I wanted to share.
from they're more national and international stories.
We try to do as much Wisconsin news as we can here.
But I do want to share this because in an era where misinformation and outright lies come from places that should be trustworthy beacons of American values, it's important to set the record straight from time to time.
So I'm seeing news coverage that says things like this.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio sought to downplay widespread claims that President Trump's peace plan for Ukraine was originally written by the Russian side.
Downplay claims?
He's the one who said it.
As reported by several outlets, there were U.S.
senators, including Angus King, independent of Maine, who spoke by phone.
to Rubio on Saturday and said that Secretary Rubio described the peace plan, quote unquote, as a Russian proposal rather than one drafted by the United States.
And apparently the president got a little upset about hearing that he was having it being inferred that he was, again, just being Putin's puppet and saying, no, no, no, no, no, no, I wrote this.
Donald Trump wrote this.
You know, the guy who hasn't written a health care plan yet, he has concepts of a plan.
But we're supposed to believe that he wrote a peace plan for Ukraine, one that, by the way, would strip the country of plenty of territory and give it to Russia, limit the size of Ukraine's armed forces, and has no significant concessions asked of Russia other than to stop fighting, stop killing innocent people, and accept the spoils of its invasion.
What I'm about to read is a quote from a Republican senator, Don Bacon of Nebraska.
He posted this on Saturday online.
Some people better get fired on Monday for the gross buffoonery we just witnessed over the last four days.
This hurt our country and undermined our allies and encouraged our adversaries.
That's a Republican senator saying that.
Again, just days after the vote on the Epstein files, we're just about every Republican abandoned the president's original position.
The the mega movement had better if it wants to stay coherent But better get its act together in terms of some kind of you know credibility on things like a more realistic proposal for what to do in Ukraine
Let's see, Dan's noting on YouTube here.
Dan, you are absolutely correct.
I misread that, that Don Bacon is a US representative from Nebraska, not a senator.
I was busy looking at the other senators who were talking about the Marco Rubio call.
Thank you for jumping on that right away.
Also in the news, Marjorie Taylor Greene.
If you missed this over the weekend, she is quitting Congress.
She's quitting.
She's just up and quitting.
Marjorie Taylor Greene, one of the first big
Public allies of Donald Trump could not be enough of a sick event for the the president But who had a break with the president on one issue that you know covering up for pedophiles is bad That's it.
That's that's where the break was but that was apparently enough because Donald Trump and others have been roasting her to the point where she is quitting now
That that alone would be enough.
Except that you go, why quit?
Why not just say I'm not running for reelection?
Why are you leaving?
And as a famous saying goes, the answer to all your questions is money.
She's going to be quitting on January 5th, if I'm seeing the date right, which by the way is two days after her fifth anniversary in Congress.
Do you know what you get when you reach your fifth anniversary in Congress?
A lifetime pension.
That's right, a lifetime pension for five years in Congress.
Now it's not much, don't get me wrong, it's not a windfall, but it is a bit of guaranteed income as she leaves to go make what will undoubtedly be more money.
in the private sector as a talking head or working for a think tank, which sounds like a weird phrase to use with her, but she's gonna go make her money now and does not have to put up with the pressure of trying to defend a president who for months tried to cover up his relationship to a sexual predator and now that it's all spilling out, she's the one getting the heat, so she's leaving, but she's leaving with a pretty nice payday.
And one other story that we're following, the death of Doge
I have to inform you that Doge is dead eight months ahead of schedule.
Yes, it's true.
What got accomplished under Doge, which was supposed to cut all this spending?
Well, it got rid of a lot of regulations that would otherwise apply to Elon Musk.
Tens of thousands of federal employees were fired, but many were offered their jobs back, which amounted to months-long paid vacations.
There was millions in interest fees, interest and fees after government projects were frozen.
And all along this past fiscal year, federal spending increased, not decreased, it increased 220 billion dollars.
Like I only say, those who hate government the most should be trusted the least to run it competently.
All right, we're going to get to know a man and his music right after this break.
We're going to talk about today's history lesson and a little Frank Sinatra coming up next.
I'm Pat Critello.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
It's time once again for
Critello.
To all who come to this happy place, welcome.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Beatles.
That's one small step for man.
Well, I'm
not a
crook.
You believe in miracles yet?
You know, this depression is going to be so great.
We'll be the ones eating the cats and the dogs.
That's going to be fun.
Once again, it is time to take another revealing peek back into history.
The Sands is proud to present a wonderful new show.
A man and his music.
The music of Count Basie and his great band.
And
Of course it is.
Of course it is.
If we're going to talk about a man and his music.
You're gonna talk about one of the best albums 60 years ago today NBC aired the musical special Frank Sinatra a man in his music Which is also what he called his Las Vegas show at the time is introduced there by the great?
William Conrad who was a great radio actor and then later TV actor remember cannon from the 1970s Parker does not know I do that anyway, so the the TV special
Like this record begins with him singing a little come fly with me.
And I just count this among the many.
I've played this album.
This probably hits 6,000 by now.
The number of times I've played this.
The record is
Yeah to them.
Yeah, welcome to cookie talk everybody So yeah, let's let's go with you you report back and now that I know that you make those Consider yourself on notice if and when we ever get in the same room again that there should there should be a plate of those along with you, okay?
They sure do.
Well, especially if it's Count Basie and the orchestra, it's a most.
All right, well, anyway, let's carry out today's history lesson and another birthday boy, Lee Michaels, kind of a one hit wonder, but he is 80 years old today.
This is a big hit from 1971.
Lee Michaels, 80 years old today.
Actress Katherine Heigl is 47 today.
Actress Sarah Highland from Modern Family.
She is 35 years old today.
Kristen, if I told you we're going to play a little Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, would that make you happy?
Teamed with Jimmy Jam Harris, they were along with Prince responsible for the Minneapolis sound of the 80s and 90s.
They were songwriters and producers for Janet Jackson and a boatload of other artists.
First hitting pay dirt with Janet's breakthrough album, Control.
They met at the University of Minnesota when Lewis was in a band that Prince would later rename the time.
as
in
It was more, I mean you get a lot of like girls just want to have fun and other big 80s things but this was truly an empowering album to see that little little Janet Jackson was you know going to assert herself now and Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis helped make that possible.
Terry Lewis, 69 years old today.
Don Robinson, a founding member of EnVogue, is 57 today.
Well, Janet Jackson basically paved the way for EnVogue and plenty of other groups, you know, Salt and Pepper, TLC and others to come along.
Don Robinson, founding member of EnVogue, is 57 years old today.
Happy 68th birthday to Chris Hayes.
He was the lead guitarist for Huey Lewis in the news during their big years, born in Great Lakes, Illinois.
Chris Hayes co-wrote some of the band's biggest hits, including I Want a New Drug and the Power of Love.
The number one song this day in 1973 was by Ringo Starr.
Yeah, we mentioned last weekend, or last week, rather, was the 30th anniversary of the Beatles anthology mega series and mega album and coming out again.
So there you go.
Let's see a an already tragic weekend turned darker this week in 1963 when Lee Harvey Oswald was killed on live television by Jack Ruby at the Dallas police station on this day in 1966 Okay, this this is a sad
A sad note.
400 people in New York City died that day of respiratory failure and heart attacks on the smogiest day in the city's history.
That is a very dark thing, but I say it because I want you all to appreciate how far we've come since then with things like the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Environmental Protection Agency, and everything that a certain subset of this country is trying to shut down.
Just remember,
This was a normal day in New York City in 1966.
400 people dying that day.
Can we hear a little bit for progress since those terrible times?
Just short attention spans, America.
Shortest peak.
Keep, you gotta look, look at the whole history.
All right, did you know that until 1979, on this day, a duet between two women had never hit number one?
That changed on, what is this, November 24th, 1979, and the women to do it would be Donna Summer and Barbara
Streisand.
It was great.
I mean, even those of us who were only kids and not doing cocaine, it was a happy time for all of us.
All of us.
It was the happiness.
Anyway, let's see.
On this day in 1991, Freddie Mercury passed away from AIDS at the age of 45.
On this day in 1993,
The Brady Bill passed, establishing a five-day waiting period for U.S.
handgun sales.
You know, let's take that music out and let's do what I just did with Clean Air again on guns, okay?
Because in 1993, the Brady Bill established a five-day waiting period for handguns and it worked.
It worked.
It worked.
George W. Bush and the Republicans took control of Congress in the early 2000s, took it away, shootings, mass shootings have gone up ever since.
Again, Kristen, let's appreciate the things that worked and stop taking them for granted.
And let's remember that most Americans support responsible gun ownership.
overwhelmingly, overwhelmingly support things like waiting periods and universal background checks and red flag laws and all of that, which does nothing, nothing to diminish Second Amendment rights to keep in bare arms, responsibly in much the same way First, the First Amendment prevents things or, you know, protects all speech, but not like hate speech and things like that.
You gotta have some guardrails, kids.
You lose
go from
Yes.
Oh boy.
To what?
To what degree you can say the words without actually using the word that starts with BS.
I don't know.
Whatever it is.
I'm able to gab like this for three hours.
So I don't know.
Tony on YouTube says the Lorax has taught me that trees are overrated.
That's funny, Tony.
chipmunk, not
No.
All right, Up North News reporter Selena Heller will be joining us in the next hour talking to one of the actresses, Wisconsin based, from the movie Wicked for Good.
We'll also be talking to somebody from Fair, Wisconsin and in our eight o'clock hour, author Laura Bird.
I'm Pat Krightlow.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
That's great.
figure out how to
Oh, this last weekend, we had Lieutenant Governor Sarah Rodriguez, which was such a blast.
She's just such a solid individual and just to hear what her vision is.
if she were to be elected governor because you know she's running.
So much fun.
Just great conversation.
But guess who's coming up this weekend?
You know, offense,
I am I am super impressed.
So that was a that was a big part of the Kalamazoo fun this weekend.
So that was kind of an early Thanksgiving for us with one of our daughters here.
So we're looking to find out how far everybody else is traveling as well at 855-75 Civic 855-752-4842.
So yeah, Kristen and I will chat and then I imagine that'll be next Saturday at noon.
It did not
all sink into the interrogation that I had feared where I was going to have to.
Spill the beans on all of my past lives or anything like that.
So yeah, you did a great job.
Thank you very much for that.
Let's see on the text line here.
Jim and Appleton says good morning, Pat.
We are making big changes to our Thanksgiving this year because we are all working different shifts that day and a couple of sad emojis on there.
Yeah, that has to happen sometimes.
Jim and Brookfield says good morning, Pat.
I'm part of the bedroom to the kitchen crowd as well.
However, we will be having guests from Chicago.
Minneapolis and Washington D.C.
So company coming in as well.
So good.
So yeah, there's not everybody has to travel.
Some people are the hosts, which again, already you see that Jim and Brookfield kind of turn the question around.
If you're not the one traveling, how far are people traveling to come see you?
And I know you've you've definitely had that, Kristen, where you know, you've got kids, friends, family come see you from afar.
They all want to come to Green Bay.
Well, this is where the food is That is the number one
yeah, and they like my my boys like to cook I do not like to cook but my boys like to cook and they like to cook together So that is a it's an event for them.
It's not just about the food.
So Abe's coming up for Milwaukee I'm going to pick Lindsay up from Steven's point tomorrow and it's just gonna be
Just really nice.
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