Trump Is Bringing In A Trojan Horse (Hour 1)

Live from the Civic Media World Headquarters in Madison, Wisconsin, it's the Todd Alba Show.

And now, pursuing truth wherever it may lead, here's your host, Todd Alba.

Across

Wisconsin on the Civic Media Radio Network and streaming worldwide on the Civic Media app,

Good afternoon, everybody.

I'm Todd Allbaugh, along with our producer and engineer, the fantastic Mr. Aaron Zommers on the board.

It is six past the hour of two o'clock.

Welcome in on this Wednesday, May 14th, 2025.

It is a great day to be a Wisconsinite, and it is... Hump day!

There you go.

Hump day, made it halfway through the week of school and work.

Although colleges, some colleges are already pretty much wrapping things up, but public schools still going until into June.

So a bit of time left there.

It is a beautiful day here in downtown Madison on State Street at the World Headquarters of Civic Media.

Blue skies right now, temperatures in the 70s.

Watch out though, some parts of, particularly, and this is why I say Central Wisconsin, that's a very wide swath to cut, basically from the Madison area.

up through the cross and was on Stevens Point and Wisconsin Rapids up to Eau Claire and just north of that area, that whole middle part of the state, maybe not central, but the middle part of the state, some chances of high winds and hail and some strong storms into tomorrow.

So so be aware of that and just keep an eye to the sky as they say.

But today get out there is absolutely fan dangtastic.

Beautiful show on tap for today in hour number two.

Timely, timely indeed.

The what's the worst today allergies or sunburn.

You could get both on a day like today, at least here in Madison.

So that's coming up.

Also have a couple of fun stories for you.

And some polling.

as well.

We'll talk about here and there throughout the show.

But first, we bring him on every Wednesday.

He is a former Republican, like myself.

He is a Wisconsinite, like myself, grew up a beautiful Aver Falls area, that part of the state, a graduate of the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire, and now a senior advisor to the Lincoln Project.

He joins us from the Tony suburbs of Washington, D.C., Trigvie Olson.

How are you, Trigvie?

I'm good Todd.

How are you?

I am well.

I am well our friend and colleague pack quite low who normally joins us on Wednesdays Is off on vacation this week, so he'll be back next shocking Well after after a week of the new shows he said that's it I need a break.

I'm out of here.

I Got to give a huge shout out here Todd at the top of the show to Tony Zimmerman loyal listener

Yes, and trig these first follower on substack

Tony

I'm honored That you're that you're gonna read whatever it is.

I write on the substack machine I had to sign up, but I am I am glad that you are that you are one of my 36 people following me if any of the rest of you are interested follow me on substack I can't Tell you what I'm gonna talk about, but I'm sure it will be interesting Green Bay Packers

You have no idea whatsoever what you might talk about, but it'll be there on substack.

No.

All right.

It will be right there.

I am not.

Todd

isn't even.

Todd and Zomers are not even following me on substack.

I will.

I

will.

Tony is.

He just did.

Zomers just

did.

Thank

you, Zomers.

And for those that don't know what substack is, it's just yet another kind of social media platform where it's more just columns and articles that people write and post on there.

There's not a lot of I'm called searching for hope.

Oh, I like

that.

Trigby Olsen searching for hope.

Well, because it's can I can I divulge something personal here for

a minute?

So you're the platform is your

who as you know, Ula and cause older sister was still born at 38 weeks.

And we were living in Lithuania and her name was VILTA.

And VILTA means hope in Lithuanian and actually hope for the future.

And so I thought, what a better tribute to.

Could be a better tribute than naming my substack after that

other tributes that

are probably better But but they'll see at her gravesite if you ever go to Vilnius Lithuania in Vilnius They have these beautiful angels that this artist put up all over town.

They're marble angels

And my wife and I threw a mutual friend.

He had heard about us losing our daughter and he had lost a daughter.

He offered to make one for her.

And so the picture that they'll see on my substack is this angel and it's the angel that sits over her grave site.

And it was so moving because here we were going throughout this really hard time, feeling like you're all alone, you know, obviously losing your first child, horrible experience.

And here this nice man who didn't even know us, who was famous.

came and said, I'd like to make an angel if you're interested for your great sake.

Wow.

That's super cool.

Yep.

Which it

reminds me all the time.

People are good.

I know we forget that sometimes, but most people are good.

Well, and we didn't even necessarily plan this, but it fits right into where I want to go.

I spent a large portion on our time together with you, trick me today.

Yesterday, we had our friend and ongoing contributor Kira Saban on the show, who is a positivity psychology coach.

And we're doing a three part series with her yesterday, the next Tuesday, the following Tuesday on building.

our own communities.

How do we just interact with our communities and our lives aside from politics in a positive way?

And today I want to have this conversation.

I know we've touched on it before, but I want to have this conversation with you a little bit on how we, because the summer is here, we're going to be kayaking and golfing and going to bratfest and all kinds of stuff we get together.

We interact generally speaking more with people over the summer.

And inevitably politics comes up.

And so I'd like to have you walk us through a little bit of how we might have those conversations with our friends, our neighbors, those we run into.

And what you just said about someone who has lost a child, somebody like me can never know or really truly appreciate your experience because I've never walked through that.

And I think at a much lesser degree, politics, you know,

much a lesser degree than the losing a child.

But you and I both left the Republican Party for different reasons at different times.

And I think one of the things that concerns me as someone who is privileged enough to have a platform on the air every day across Wisconsin is how am I talking to people?

How is this show listening or not listening or talking with and to people?

And I just am a big believer as someone or someone who's actually left my party.

Republican Party and walked away and burned bridges quite frankly Which is fine.

I did it for the right reasons.

I don't regret that but being yelled at and and condemned and told I was stupid and part of the problem and I'm voting for a bozo Those were not the reasons that I left the party and and I know you have your own experience And so I want to get into that a little bit later this hour if we can

Somebody called you a bozo time.

I was cleaning it up for radio

Oh, OK.

Because honestly, if somebody used the term bozo, if you use the term bozo, it's pretty clear who the bozo is.

Exactly.

But let's begin with a little reaction to politics of the day.

And I want to get your reaction to this one tricky, because this is it started as a thing that as soon as I heard it, I texted our friend, Matt Flynn, and I said, what in the heck is going on here?

And he was outraged.

And a lot of the big networks kind of didn't give it a lot of air time the first couple of days, but it's taken on new life here.

And we're talking about Donald Trump, who tweeted out on his true social here earlier this week, saying that the Boeing 747 is being given to the United States Air Force Department of Defense.

And then in capital letters, not to me exclamation point.

It is a gift from a nation, Qatar.

that we have successfully defended for many years.

It'll be used by our government as a temporary Air Force One until such time as new Boeing's, which are very late on delivery time arrive.

And it goes on from there.

I don't want to read the whole thing and just kind of nauseates me, but to put it in a nutshell for those that might not have heard so far, there have to be a pretty big nutshell.

Yes.

So.

United States of America has two Boeing 747s that serve as Air Force One whenever the President of the United States is on board.

Any aircraft he's on is called Air Force One.

And so there are two identical ones for security purposes.

And during Trump's first term, they were 40 years old.

And so they ordered a new pair.

And he wanted the livery or the paint job change from the Jackie Kennedy

Robin egg blue to basically his own colors on his private plane, a dark blue and red and silver.

And then Biden came in and he said, no, we're going to keep it the same.

And now these planes have been delayed.

There's been delays.

And now Trump has got a new deal with the nation of Qatar or gutter.

And it's a they call it literally a palace in the sky, a four hundred million dollar aircraft.

And Trump wants to accept this and use it as Air Force One while he's president.

And then it would be given to the Trump presidential library foundation for his own private use after he leaves office.

Experts say it would take at least two years and three quarters of a million dollars or seven, three quarters of a billion dollars, 750 million dollars to retrofit this, not to mention all the security risks on this.

and taxpayers are gonna pay for it.

And Trig V, what I said earlier this week was, think of your, we all know a guy in our towns across Wisconsin who puts all of his money into a UTV or soups up his truck and his lawn looks like crap or he doesn't pay in his house or his kids don't have clothes and we think what a jerk this guy is.

And to me, Trig V, this is kind of the ultimate jerk move.

I think this is a story that has wings, Todd.

Number one.

This is, I mean, to defend this, you have to constrict yourself because it's so obvious what's going on here, right?

He wants the plane for himself.

And Air Force One, I can tell you having lived overseas and having been in places where Air Force One lands.

Air Force One.

is a symbol of the United States.

But Donald Trump, it's not about the United States.

I hate to break it to all these people who voted for him.

It's not about you.

Donald Trump is a guy.

He's the guy kind of as you described, who everybody knows in the bar, who it's all about him.

And the idea that he's president of the United States, he's taken this gift from Qatar, which is one of the worst sort of autocratic, nasty countries in terms of how they treat people.

their own people.

I mean, it's just obviously outrageous.

It's obviously all about him.

You know, he even wants to have it called Trump Force One, not Air Force One.

You're just a priest.

Are you serious?

I haven't heard that part

yet.

And so, I just think, you know, clearly his response is, it's not me, it's the Department of Defense, like, but, you know,

If you believe that, I've got some land down and believes I'd be happy to sell you, right?

Right.

Or the dairy farmer in Wisconsin's got some stuff out in the barn he'd like to sell you.

It just, I don't know.

I just think the amount of graph and other things that appear to be going on, and this is just, but this is right out in the open.

And that's the thing.

I mean,

And I would guess that what's happening is all the people in the White House, they know that he...

can't accept this, that

people are going, this is

a bridge too far.

This is Fonzie jumping the shark, right?

Right there in

Wisconsin

on whatever lake.

But he, no

one wants to tell him, no one

wants to tell him that because he wants to have the fanciest plane in the world.

He doesn't want the United States of America and the president to have the fanciest plane.

He wants it.

And oh, by the way, where the hell?

Oh, sorry.

Where the heck is Elon and Doge?

Yeah, that's right.

Where are they?

If this kind of spending is going to take place.

He was there.

All you fiscal conservatives, call.

Trump made him put on.

Scotty, Walker, please call in.

Scott, I'll be nice to you.

Let's debate this.

More on the other side of the all-ball show at the Civic Media ready and

over.

Welcome back to the Tunnel Bowl show of the Civic Media Ready to Work.

And it's now 22 past the hour of two o'clock of this Wednesday, May 14th, 2025.

Little Steve Miller Band.

Trigby educated me Trigby Olsen senior advisor at the Lincoln Project over the break.

I'm embarrassed to admit it, but tell them Trigby what I did not know.

Let's see if we have a listener.

Does anybody know who they can text or call in if they know who taught Steve Miller how to play guitar?

This is an

interesting back to Wisconsin connection to this.

Yes.

Who taught Steve Miller of the Steve Miller band to play guitar?

8-5-5-7-5-2-4-8-4-2-8-5-5-7-5-2-4-8-4-2 or text us on the Civic Media app Troy listening in Mount Horrib because Trigby said if you believe Donald Trump on this plain stuff I have some land in Belize to tell you Troy says Trigby is so well traveled he may actually have land in Belize

All

right, so talking about this Trump plane

He's going to accept a $400 million plane as Air Force One Trigme tells me now he wants it

called Trump

one Trump force one I had heard that part and experts say there's no way that Trump's gonna be able to use it this year like he wants to without it not being safe and and gone going through all the security Arrangements, this is an interesting note

Qatar's alleged involvement in the September 11, 2001 attack centers on claims that it provided a safe haven and support for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed KSM, a key al-Qaeda operative of the principal architect of the attacks.

Between 1993 and 1996, KSM resided in Qatar, where he worked as a project engineer for the Ministry of Electricity and Water.

And it says he has said to have used Qatar as a base to plan activities, including early stages of what became the 9-11 attacks.

And it goes on from there.

Source of that information, Gronk on Twitter.

Rock

not

rock rock whatever's called on the rock You just say it's the AI thing on Twitter.

So I mean even Elon even Elon's own AI stuff is it speaks

out against him all the time and people Yeah, with real

facts.

Yeah a five five seven five two four eight four two Let's go quickly to Rick in a walkie-sha Rick.

Thanks for calling.

What's a

How you doing there

doing well when you got four is Rick

Well, Steve Miller was taught to play guitar a lot by Les Paul from Waukesha.

Absolutely,

well done.

Nicely done.

How about that?

Well, you have

a

great day.

All right, thanks, Rick.

I appreciate it.

Thank

you.

A couple people texted in with the right answer.

Ronnie and Horicon, listening on AUK.

Lyle and Waukesha and Jim and Appleton.

Carrie and Tosa.

I guess I'm the only one that didn't know this.

But that's a pretty cool fact.

That's like a Wisconsin fact that I thought it's part of your Wisconsin core base of knowledge.

You're supposed to know.

I'm supposed to have that.

I know.

All right.

Let's listen to this, Trigby.

So here was the Trumpster when questioned about this jet and what he equated it to.

Mr. President, what do you say to people who view that luxury jet as a personal gift to you?

Why not leave it

behind?

Your ABC fake news, right?

Why not?

It's only ABC.

Well, a few of you would.

Let me tell you.

You should be embarrassed to ask in that question.

They're giving us a free jet.

I could say, no, no, no, don't give us.

I want to pay you a billion or 400 million or whatever it is.

Or I could say, thank you very much.

You know?

There was an old golfer named Sam Snead.

Did you ever hear him?

He won 82 tournaments.

He was a great golfer.

And he had a motto, when they give you a putt, you say, thank you very much.

You pick up your ball and you walk to the next hole.

A lot of people are stupid.

They say, no, no, I insist on putting it.

Then they put it and they miss it.

And their partner gets angry at them.

You know what?

Remember that?

Sam Snead, when they give you a putt, you pick it up and you walk to the next hole and you say, thank you very much.

Are you serious?

So Trump is equating, accepting a $400 million plane for Qatar, who housed terrorists that helped plan 9-11 to a gimme on the golf course?

Of course.

Of course.

It's about golf.

This man thinks about nothing else.

Golf and money.

Right.

I think we have, uh, uh, Trump has landed a guitar, by the way, and, uh, after being in, uh, uh, Saudi Arabia, the E.A.U., now he's a guitar to, uh, to, uh, to, uh, I think we have some live footage here, Zobbers, this now from the arrival of Donald Trump on

guitar.

Make way here he comes ring bill bank of Trump.

Are you gonna love this

guy?

That's not the arrival of Donald Trump in guitar.

It's not

no actually it's from the movie Aladdin But trick me this is what it's become a cartoon Donald Trump has become a car.

It's still over the top.

It's so preposterous.

It's a cartoon

Here's the thing.

I mean this is honestly, I wish we'd get some Trump people to call in but we're not getting anybody to call in I I would just say to my friend who's in Madison who used to work for Scott and is listening and occasionally when I get on Scotty

You don't need to call me after this.

Just have Scott call in and explain this to me.

Why can he not?

Let's go quickly.

How about Robin

Boss?

Mark.

Mark in per second.

Mark got 45 seconds.

It's yours.

Go ahead.

Well, consider it's a complete constitutional violation.

I mean, presidents are not supposed to accept anything.

Period.

I mean, the whole purpose of the presidential salary was to avoid corruption.

I mean, the founders were really concerned about corruption, you know, corrupting influences of foreign money coming in and influencing the president of the United States.

Donald Trump is nothing more than a walking, talking, fear of what the anti-Federalists were afraid of when Hamilton described in Federalist 67.

So, you know, the president's not going to be a man surrounded by minions and mistresses and have his own cup of murderous genus areas.

And Hamilton described...

what a president could be in 75, I think, interests his own enrichment at the expense of his constituents.

Thanks, Mark, really appreciate it.

No, he wants some, he wants some a-nashery around him, a palace in the sky.

But as Trump once said, hey, when you're president, they let you do it.

Come on back, trivia on the other side, more of your phone calls.

It's the All Balls show on a Wednesday on the Civic Media

Radio

Network.

The Trump 2.0, nothing more than a grift, ladies and gentlemen.

It's how much money can Donald Trump and the Trump family occur?

A crew?

over Trump 2.0.

Welcome back to the title of the show and the Civic Media Radio Network.

It is 35 minutes now past the hour of two o'clock joining us as he does every Wednesday from the nation's capital, a former Republican like myself, a Wisconsinite like myself, and now the senior advisor at the Lincoln Project, Trig V. Olsen, talking about this Trump's mitties trip.

His first state visit the one to the Pope wasn't officially a state visit.

It was just a funeral visit So this is a state visit to Saudi Arabia the EAU now Qatar or gutter however you want to pronounce it and He's in Qatar and and they announced hey, and by the way, he's taken all these CEOs with him Elon he made a lawn put on a suit trip.

You see that he had to suit up

No,

yeah, he made him he cleans up pretty well when Trump tells him to

And so he's got the CEO Boeing with him.

Trump does on this trip where they landed Qatar, where he's going to get this $400 million jet to serve as his new Air Force One.

And they announced that, guess what?

Qatar is going to invest $200 billion with Boeing in fighter jets.

Not to mention the fact all of the kickbacks in Syria, where now Trump is going to lift the sanctions on Syria, another

Leader even after Assad has gone this new guy is in charge is connected to terrorism and killing American troops and but guess what Trump wants to build a new Trump Tower in Syria So the whole thing making America great again, Todd.

Yeah, right, right The thing that stinks to high heaven and trig me I just think that there are people not the not the died in the wool, you know Kool-Aid drinking manga folks

But I think there are people in Wisconsin that may have voted for Donald Trump in November, and they're not going to be cool with this.

Well, they should ask themselves if this was Joe Biden taking a $400 million plane for his presidential library, how would they be responding if they were making Biden Force One?

Or quite frankly, if Hunter Biden had been running around doing the crypto deals that

the Trump family is doing, Jared Kushner just got a $3.5 billion investment from one of the Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds.

$3.5 billion.

That's a nice little nest egg if you can get it.

And some people

are trying,

some people.

And

yet, Hunter Biden's laptop, Hunter Biden's laptop.

I'm telling you the airplane thing though, I suspect for at least some.

There is going to be an awakening and it will be a reminder every time he gets on that airplane of the fact that they've been being played For fools and and the truth is okay fool me once shame on you fool me twice shame on me like at some point You would think that there will be a realization that they're that they're being played for fools that they did here they really don't care

about him, about people like them, they don't really, he doesn't really care about making America great again.

And you can only do the, oh, what about the Libs thing so often?

We're talking Ben Shapiro and Laura Loomer for God's sakes.

Our God came out against this.

Yeah.

John Thune, like Rand Paul.

Right.

This is so obvious what it is that it becomes very, very hard.

for people to explain it away and you see that with who are the people that are being quiet.

You know, have we heard our, I haven't, you know, before the election, Scott Walker was yapping all the time about Donald Trump and the economy and people had moved on from January 6th.

Come and talk about the plane or what about the Looney lady up the dial?

Like, is she talking about the plane today?

No.

Ask yourself this, would the Looney lady up the dial be talking about the plane if Joe Biden was getting a $400 million

plane?

She would talk about nothing else.

Yeah, it'd be ad nauseam on conservative radio.

Of course, some Republicans might folks say, well, you know, Ronald Reagan, they got the presidential museum or the old Air Force ones.

Yes, after it was decommissioned and no one flew on it.

It's a museum piece.

This is completely different because Trump's going to use it as his personal plane after he leaves office.

Let's go to the phone line.

And the

Statue of Liberty.

Right.

He's literally comparing it to the Statue of Liberty.

Last time I checked, that's in a harbor in New York City where everybody gets to enjoy.

Well, she better be careful because she's an immigrant from France.

So I'm not so sure.

Well, that is true.

She could get deported.

I'm not sure she's safe or not.

Christy Nome might shoot her.

Right.

Give her the old sick dog treatment.

By the way, can I say something about that, though?

Quick.

Okay, like all these people on the left that went bananas about Kristi Noem shooting her dog, I get it.

I saw the movie Old Yeller 2, but like, I mean, it's not how I would choose to put my dog down.

I don't think most rational people would put their dog down that way.

You take them to the vet when they're really old and you're sad about it, but I mean.

Come on.

That's a

tangent.

Now the plane be outraged about the plane.

All right eight five five

four two forty four two.

Let's go to Fred and cottage girl Fred.

Thanks for holding.

What's a you?

Hey guys afternoon afternoon.

What do you have for us for

afternoon Fred?

That airplane is gonna be the biggest security breach ever.

Amen.

I agree.

Everything's gonna be bugged on that thing.

I can't believe it.

That

That's one of the issues taking that and gripped her himself.

My god.

Yeah Appreciate it.

Anyway, it's

yeah, go

ahead.

Have a good afternoon guys.

Yeah, thanks to you too Fred.

Yeah, thank you very much Another thing that's been underreported or under talked about is there's no way according to every expert I've heard to listen to There's no way that you can retrofit a private plane

to Air Force ones.

There are things that are highly, highly top-top secret classified in terms of anti-aircraft missile defense systems and radars and all this stuff.

And there's no way that's going to happen in under a year and a half, two years.

And Trump wants on this thing in this fiscal year, eight, five, five, seven, five.

Well,

so the reason with.

with the reason it's taking Boeing so long for it to make the new Air Force One.

Well, you have to understand about Air Force One.

And I know this from going through the one on the Reagan Library.

They're set up in the case of a nuclear war, right?

Like that becomes the command and control of the United States government.

It

has to

be able to fly around if the world is literally ending.

Right.

And this one that Trump's going to accept from Qatar does not have the in-air refueling capability.

Well, it has none of that.

Right.

It's not a military aircraft.

It's

a it's a total ego trip.

Did you ever fly on

Air Force One when you work

for McCain?

No.

Oh, never flown on Air Force.

Oh, it is

on my

to do it's on my bucket list of things that I'd like to do.

Although I think that one's never going to happen.

I missed my opportunity.

855-752-4842.

Let's go to Joe listening on WMDX in Madison.

Joe, thanks for calling.

What's a.

Hey guys, thanks so much and I really appreciate the discussion.

It should be just a small moment, a little tiny correction on the question of Kristi Noemann, the dog, shooting of the dog.

That dog was actually quite a young dog.

It was only about six months old.

Yes.

So the question was not like as an old dog euthanization.

So she wasn't putting an

old dog down?

No!

She was

mad

because it wasn't retrieving the game well.

She was ticked off.

She couldn't

train it.

She couldn't train it so she shot it.

Well,

oh, well, that's not appropriate.

Yeah.

Yeah.

See, now there's

the whole

facts.

Thank you, Joe.

Yeah.

Thanks.

I have.

She should not have shot that dog.

Yeah.

No, no, it's not.

Yeah.

Well, there's a big difference between a 13 year old dog and a, you know, six month old puppy that she just didn't have the patience to train.

But in any way, jumping to this issue of the plane, I want to echo what you guys have just been talking about and offer folks.

There's an article at a place called defensenews.com that looks into this even more.

The sole question, not just about the emoluments question, but the security and how this is going to be, if it could be upgraded.

It is just a fascinating subject.

This plane is 13 years old.

It is not some new plane that just got off the line.

It's been used by the royal family for the last 10, 13 years.

And it is not anywhere near what you would need.

And there is no idea what they've put in there in terms of tracking or espionage or creating a kill switch or all these sorts of things.

And one of the problems people mentioned is that if you're going to do this retrofitting, you're going to have to take it

almost down to the studs of the plane and rebuild.

So you're talking about all that cable, all that wire being looked at, and they were mentioning that the people that do this have to have a very high security clearance.

It can't just be, you know, Joe down in the, you know, from, I don't know, from wherever.

And you see people who have been cleared for this kind of work, and that's hard to find.

And they also mentioned that, and I'm curious about this, Congress hasn't appropriated any money to do this, as I understand it.

If it's gonna cost this much,

Isn't it on Congress to say, all right, we're going to pacer this in some way?

Anyway, I'm so glad you're looking at this and the question of security.

I mean, not only when you talked about it being a command and control center in a terrible event of a World War III sort of situation, the shielding that would have to happen.

You're talking about having to have it be shielded from what, electromagnetic pulse, all of that sort of thing.

Anyway, I really appreciate you guys focusing on the second part of this question that is as crucial as emoluments and just as puzzling as to why we are going to go forward with this.

It's going to be talk about a Trojan horse.

Oh, it's a gift.

Big deal, you know?

I appreciate

it, Joe.

As always, we appreciate it.

Great information, Joe.

Appreciate it.

A tricky mutual friend of ours texted and said, Christy, no one killed the dog because it wouldn't stop barking.

Make sure Trigby understands that.

It's true.

But anyway, I I get it.

But like anyway, but the on the on the plane stuff I Joe is spot on as always is as Matt Flynn likes to say that.

It's not just the emoluments clause in the Constitution.

It's not just that this is it looks bad and it's probably against the law although Pam Bondi, you know She got her people to sign off on it.

Of course.

She does a rubber stamp, but this is really for me at least

It comes down to people to understand that there are all sorts of military folks.

There are the press flies on Air Force One.

There's all kinds of other people that fly with the President of the United States.

And I think if he accepts this and flies with it without it being completely retrofitted, you're putting every single person's life that flies on Air Force One at risk every time you go in the air.

Probably not.

Sorry.

Probably not.

You probably don't care about it.

I apologize for that little slip up, but the reality is.

You caught yourself.

You caught yourself.

It was fine.

The

reality is, the reality is he doesn't care.

Right.

John or West Bend says.

He

wants the plane because he wants that plane.

The best.

John or West Bend listening to the AUK says Trump just wants his plane because of all the gold plating.

and being in a flying palace.

I think he loves.

Look what he's done to the White House.

Somebody posted that that's actually plastic molding that you buy at Home Depot and they spray painted it gold and put up on the on the walls in the White House.

It's pretty funny.

All right, well, let's let's change gear.

I just think if there were if if Barack and Michelle Obama had done that, the screaming and the outrage.

And this is the thing.

It gets to the bigger point that you started with, Todd.

People have got to start putting themselves in other people's shoes.

Right.

And I think that's a real key.

And that's a great segue into what we want to talk about next is we had Kira Saban, our Life Psychology positivity coach, was on yesterday talking about how we can, what things we can't change.

And again, just remind listeners, Kyra reminded us that our friends, our family, people around us, their physical, their emotional well-being, also their passion and purpose, and self-worth.

Those are things only we can control.

But what are the things that we can control?

So we don't want to just project on other people.

What can we control?

How can we have positive conversations around politics?

We'll discuss that with Trigly next.

It's the Todd Allball Show for a Wednesday right here across Wisconsin on the Civic Medium.

Ready Network.

What is this?

An offering to Poseidon.

The Greeks are praying for a safe return home.

I hope the sea god spits in their offering.

Let's them all drown at the bottom of the sea.

This is a gift.

We shall take it to the temple of Poseidon.

I think we should burn it.

Burn it, my prince.

It's a gift

to the gods.

Welcome back to the Taliban show on the Civic Media Ready Network.

Eight minutes now before the hour of three o'clock.

What do you dial up there, Zomers?

That's the scene in the 2004 film, Troy.

when the Trojan horse is sitting

outside.

Oh, I see.

I know we're moving on past the topic, but I thought it was

appropriate.

I like that.

The Katari plane.

More on that later.

We are joined every Wednesday at this time by our friend and ongoing contributor, Trig V. Olsen, Senior Advisor at the Lincoln Project.

He joins us via StreamYard.

From Washington, D.C., you can find him in all sorts of platforms now on Substack.

One of our listeners asked if you have to subscribe.

No, you don't have to subscribe to pay any money on Trig V. Substack.

Just check it out.

And then Cameron Appleton says, just Trig V. have an only fans page.

No, no, you do not.

I should get one.

No, no, don't do that.

Don't do that.

Alright, by the way, by the way, uh, speaking of successful professional media platforms, remember, you know, Trigme, you've hung out with us before.

Are you

suggesting that my sub-stack's not a successful media

platform?

No,

I'm

talking about the only fan stuff, and that's... Oh, okay.

No, no, no, sorry.

No, you've hung out with our old friend, Kristen Brie, who has the, uh, yeah, the, uh, she writes from the walkie-journal Sentinel right now.

And she also has her as goes Wisconsin social media platform.

And as they say, she's now on another network and she's doing fantastic.

Oh, yeah.

She's not the lady up the dial.

I was talking about Kristen.

I hope.

No, no, you were talking about conservative radio earlier.

No, I bring it up because, uh, I'm going to be seeing her tonight.

We've been promoting this all.

week on the show because it is May Mental Health Awareness Month here in May.

And tonight, Kristen's in town.

She is going to be hosting, moderating a fireside chat with Wisconsin.

Football legend and also well NFL successful star Monte Ball is going to be in town tonight.

Of course, he had a very successful career at Wisconsin and the NFL went through addiction and recovery and now he has a foundation to help others and Kristen is going to be moderating that tonight.

You can joy.

I'm going to be there and there I'm just looked.

There's still tickets left.

They're going fast though.

It is at Cooper's Tavern on the Capitol Square from six until 8 30 tonight and you could go to a journey.

M-H-C dot O-R-G, that's Journey, M is a Mary, H is the Henry, C is a cat, dot O-R-G.

And then you click on Join Us, and then Mental Health Awareness Month.

Zommer's put it up on the screen for those watching on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and the like.

So go to JourneyMHC.org.

And you can buy tickets for that great event tonight with the Monte Ball and Kristen.

And it should be a really, really interesting time.

And the money goes to the foundation to help others with mental health awareness and addiction.

So hope you join us tonight.

Trigvie, I want to spend a couple of minutes here before we let you go.

We're going to do this longer, but we'll do it next week.

We had another couple of weeks here in Mental Health Awareness Month.

But I want you to touch on again, because a lot of this are going to be seeing friends and neighbors over the summer.

And politics is bound to come up and walk us through again in your experience having dealt with authoritarian governments in Eastern Europe, but also working for guys like John McCain and Mitch McConnell in your past.

How do we have conversations with those that we care about but who politically disagree with us without yelling at each other?

I mean, the first thing they have to recognize is, you know, the the conversation isn't.

about what you think.

It's about what the other person thinks and how do you understand better what it is that's causing them to think that way and where does cognitive dissidents lie between who they are as you know them as a person and what they're supporting and advocating for politically.

And the truth of the matter is you don't shame someone out of their beliefs.

You can only have people look back at their beliefs with shame.

So

And you also have to understand that you're not going to likely change somebody in one conversation, right?

It has to be an ongoing communication over time and help them see within themselves the error of their thinking that's led them to those choices.

And a lot of times the choices are just out of habit, but, you know, fact bombing people, trying to, you know, make them get them defensive.

You know, it's not it's not going to get you anywhere.

I totally agree.

And again, we'll spend more time on this maybe next week.

But you went through a very personal thing, losing a child, which is a whole other level of you and I both left our former parties.

But I'm not sure what your whole experience was, but I don't think it was much different than mine.

Like I didn't leave the Republican Party because people said George W. Bush was a terrible person or or anybody else.

It was because I witnessed something firsthand.

I understand my experience was unique that was different than what I believed in my heart.

I didn't believe that I could not support a party that was actively working to disenfranchise fellow Wisconsinites from voting.

I just wasn't going to go there.

And I said, that's not what I believe in.

That's not the party that I joined.

And that was the main reason I walked away.

What was it for you?

You know, I mean, at the end of the day, I knew that everything that I had said to people fighting against autocrats around the world would have just been balderdash if I didn't stay true to what I knew to be the case with...

with Trump.

But I mean, really, the point where I left the wagon was, you know, when Donald Trump said John McCain's not a war hero, you could say a lot of things about John McCain and John would say a lot of things about himself.

He understood that he was a very complicated person and at times not a really nice person.

But say whatever you want.

But to suggest that John McCain, who spent six years in the Hanoi Hilton, wasn't a true patriot and a hero.

somebody who stood for a cause greater than himself throughout his life.

I was just like, that's ridiculous.

And, you know, the willingness of people who would profess to be good Christians and wrap themselves in all these kinds of trappings of how they see themselves.

It's sad to watch that because they're really just taking 30 pieces of silver and probably should live not.

Creech.

Yeah, absolutely.

Trivie, always a pleasure.

We'll see you next week by friend.

Have a great weekend.

We'll talk to you soon.

Stay tuned.

All

right, have fun playing this or that, Todd.

All right, Trivie Olson, see you.

Live from the Civic Media World Headquarters in Madison, Wisconsin, it's the Todd Alba Show.

And now, pursuing truth wherever it may lead, here's your host, Todd Alba.

Across Wisconsin on the Civic Media Radio Network and streaming worldwide on the Civic Media app,

Good afternoon, everybody.

I'm Tom Allbaugh, the outstanding producer, Mr. Aaron Zommers, on the board.

It is six past the hour of three o'clock.

Welcome into hour number two of the big program.

It is Wednesday, May 14th, 2025.

It is a great day to be a Wisconsinite, and it is pump day.

There you go.

Made it halfway through the week.

Cannot wait.

Later on, I said earlier on the show, later on, I'm going to be hanging out at Cooper's Tavern.

Tonight with the Montae Ball, a fireside discussion moderated by our friend Kristen Brie.

All proceeds going to mental health awareness and Montae's foundation and Journey as well.

So really, really a great cause.

I'm looking forward to a lightning of fun, but also an informative evening tonight at Cooper's Tavern.

I look forward to hearing about it.

Also, Cooper's Tavern is just really delicious.

Also Cooper's Tavern.

They have a they have all come out.

How many taps do they have there?

It's crazy.

A bunch.

I don't know.

I don't

know.

And the cool thing is they have unique beers from different places that you might not always have them.

And there's going to be mocktails as well, which is pretty cool.

So looking forward to that tonight.

Many thanks to Trig V. Olson, Senior Advisor at the Lincoln Project for being here, as he always is.

Each and every week he'll rejoin us next Wednesday.

And Mr. Krightlow will be back from Portugal.

Is that where he is?

I think so.

No, it is.

I know.

You knew that

I just didn't know if it was an undisclosed location.

Oh, I don't it's not any more I thought he had talked about

it probably

did I don't know uh pack retlos European vacation

I'm pretty sure if we say he is in Portugal there like nobody who's trying to find him is gonna be able to find him I just hope he gets back in

I just hope he gets back in I

think he will

I'm only half mean less than half joking, but

It's a scary, kind of scary thing, right?

Here's the thing, he's a white man.

For now, that's enough to get let back in.

Yeah, you're probably sad

that you're probably right.

Coming up, speaking of white men, a different kind, Ron Johnson, U.S.

Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, according to Politico.com, threatening to tank the GOP mega bill.

As Trump calls it, the big, beautiful bill.

And he's been here before.

We'll talk a little bit about that.

Also, uh, Trump's legacy of the federal court system, young Americans, as long as you're a young American, the support for free speech in the United States amongst young Americans on the decline.

We'll discuss that a little bit.

I'll be interested to hear your take on that.

And of course, your phone calls as well.

855-752-4842.

855-752-4842.

But right now, it is nine minutes past the hour of three.

Time once again for What's Worse.

Let's

go.

Time once again for

what's worse.

Nothing to give away, no prize, money involved, but it is your chance to have your voice heard across all 11 news talk sports stations around the state of Wisconsin.

Well, that's kind of true as I'm not sure if the brewers have the brewers concluded yet because the brewers were on the brewers stations here.

I do not know.

Let me let me look it up live on the air.

This is the hot, hot breaking news here.

Hey, Milwaukee Brewer's got a win.

They're in the bottom of the eighth.

Why does it say win on my says two minutes ago?

It says Brewers win on their on the Twitter feed.

Well, I guess the thing that I'm looking at is outdated.

Or maybe the Brewers are just projecting a win, which, you know, they could use that right now.

Brewers are wrapping up against the Guardians this afternoon.

And it looks like, yes, the Brewers indeed have one.

And so all those stations that we're listening to.

The Brewer Game, welcome back to the talk network across Wisconsin.

Brewers will go at it again on Friday.

They have tomorrow off and then we'll be back home at Amfam Field, 635 pregame show.

The Minnesota Twins are in town against the Brew Crew.

So there you go.

So anyway, what's worse, your chance to have your voice heard across the state of Wisconsin.

Here is the category today and on a day like today.

in Madison right now, mostly sunny skies.

Could be some rough weather for parts of Wisconsin tonight into tomorrow, so be aware of that.

But you have the allergies going on, right?

All the trees leaving out.

Do you say leaving out or budding out or blossoming out?

I don't

know.

I would probably say blossoming

or blooming.

All right, very good.

And you got the flowers and all that, which is fantastic.

But for people of allergies, no fun at all.

And then with weather like this, you've got sunburn.

So the category today, what's worse, allergies or sunburn, eight, five, five, seven, five, two, four, eight, four, two, eight, five, five, seven, five, two, four, eight, four, two.

You can also text us on the Civic Media app.

If you don't have it, you'll want to download it because on Friday we're going to continue our free Friday ticket giveaway big time show.

And it's, we're giving away a four pack of tickets.

on this show alone, as well as on the other network shows, your chance to, and that's the great thing about it.

You can listen all day to Crite Low in the morning, Jane McNair from nine until 11 along with Greg Bach, then you got the Tom Hartman show, then us, then Maggie Dawn, then Pete Schwabba.

And on each of these shows, you can listen and text in during, we'll give you a word for that particular show.

And just from those entries alone on that show, we pick a winner on Fridays.

And those winners get a game with four tickets to the.

Civic media seats will call the clubs.

They're very nice seats in the club section of Ampham field.

So the point is, you got to have your app ready to go.

Go to your app store, type in civic CIVIC.

It'll come up, takes less than a minute to download.

It is free.

It's what CBS's Gale King calls a deal.

The civic media apps on Texas or call us on days.

What's worse, allergies.

or sunburn 8 5 5 7 5 2 4 8 4 2 let's go to the phone lines brian listing on w a uk in milwaukee brian allergies or sunburn what's worse

hey guys uh from experience i'm going to say allergies just because they're trickier in my point of view to prevent or treat you know because once once allergies get into your system right there's the eyes

the nasal sprays, you know, and all that, at least with sunburn prevention, you can at least put on sunscreen.

And if you do get sunburn, then you at least can use yellow treatment or you know, wear a hat or something like that.

But once the allergies get in your system, you're miserable.

And it's not just for a few days.

And a lot of people are dealing with allergies right now.

And they're lasting like a week and a half, two weeks just for one dot of allergies.

Does yours depend on on whether or not

Like the year to year because I my allergies have gotten worse, but like so far knock on wood They haven't been that bad this year

You know what's what's funny is it's like pre-covid.

I never used to have allergy problems really maybe sometimes with my parents and it was only when I would you know visit my parents and

You know, you could tell there was dander in the air and stuff like that, but now I'm on this purifier at home.

I live with her.

She tries to, you know, keep the pet dander down, but it seems like since COVID, my eyes would water all the time and then I'm sneezing all the time.

And now it's at the point where I literally have to take a Zertuck.

I use phone haze and I use eye drops for my allergies.

They're that bad.

And it just seems like they keep, if everyone tells me this, if they just keep getting worse.

Yeah, interesting.

Well, take care of yourself, Brian.

Hope for you.

Thanks.

Appreciate the call.

Appreciate the listenership.

855-752-4842.

855-752-4842.

What's worse?

Today's category, allergies or sunburn.

On the text line, Chris listening in beautiful Rock County in Janesville on WMDX says, until I turned 48, I would have said sunburn is worse.

Now that I somehow have allergies,

I'm going to get a sunburn at four, but 48 seemed to be the key there.

Okay.

Uh, interesting.

Uh, Christie listening up a beautiful WCFW in Eau Claire.

I'll be up there next week for my youngest niece's graduation.

Christine Eau Claire says sunburn hurts, but goes away.

Allergies are all summer long.

So allergies are worse.

You can feel sick.

for months.

Yeah, that's that's the thing at Lingers, right?

Matt in Madison, or pardon me, Matt Middleton, listening on WMDX says sunburn is far worse, worse, as you can end up looking like some of those hideous gold digger women who frequent Mar-a-Lago or even orange like the man himself, gross.

I watch I'm laughing because I think it was last night at NBC.

They had like a Joan Rivers.

Do you know who that is?

Yeah Joan Rivers for those who might not know was a comedian a groundbreaker what really she was one of the first big women I mean she in comedy and she ended up co-host or was the permanent guest host of the tonight show when Johnny Carson would go on vacation and then was the first woman to have a late night show of her own and it took 18 years

until Chelsea Handler was the next woman to to host a late night show.

It's a pioneer in entertainment.

Anyway, she was she was she passed away like 10 years ago.

So they had this tribute to her last night on NBC.

I watched a little bit of it and some of her jokes.

Oh my gosh.

I mean, really raunchy and really funny.

And she was going after, you know, you know, cougars and gold diggers and women had, you know, plastic surgery and everything.

And.

We make fun about women's body parts that I can't say on the air, but we're really funny.

Joe, I'd forgotten how funny Joan Rivers was is well was Greg and Genesee Depot on the subject at hand.

What's worse says sunburn is the worst Tyler listed in Columbia County on WM DX sunburn is the worst I live in my IT world closet and light burns I'll go back to my cave now.

Oh, that's true, right?

People that work indoors all the time.

It's certainly harder

Megan, listening in beautiful Sun Prairie here in Dane County, hometown, well, not the hometown.

It's right down the street from Luke Mather's house on WMDX, says allergies are worse, especially food allergies and sensitivities.

Stomachs are difficult to diagnose when there's a problem.

Well, that's kind of a whole, I guess we can clarify.

but that's a whole different kind of allergy, food allergies.

I think the category refers to seasonal pollen type of allergies.

Allergies or sunburn, 855-752-4842, 855-752-4842.

Zombers, what's worse?

I think I'm gonna have to go with the call we got earlier from Brian in Milwaukee and the text are saying that allergies are worse because you can feel sick for months.

I lately, the last few years have not had nearly as bad a seasonal allergies as I did.

But when I was younger, it was debilitating

for

in the spring and the fall where like I'd go and help my dad with something outside.

Well, just kidding.

Nope.

I'm going to have to sit in the truck the entire time because I can't breathe.

Sneezing all the time, running nose, all that kind of stuff.

Like I said, might have gotten worse as I've gotten older, except so far this year, I'm a little.

Stuffed up a little more nasal than normal right now, but not as bad as I have been in other years I would say that Sun are pardon me the allergies are worse because as other callers have said Sunburn kind of lasts for two three days the worst part of it if you really get burned again use some I don't call it lotion, but

Some of them are suntan lotion

or

some kind of blocker sunscreen.

So that's the word thank you use sunscreen folks That's the key use sunscreen and you won't have the sunburn, but

it's easier to prevent for most people some people burn super easily But for most people it's easier to prevent sunburn

usually yeah, so I'm gonna say that Allergies are worse if you still want to dial in we'll take a couple more calls eight five five seven five two four eight four two eight five five seven five two four eight four two Bob in sock city says sunburn is worse

can't get cancer from allergies.

Well said, Bob.

Well said.

We'll come back and talk a little Ron Johnson.

He's threatening to tank the big, beautiful bill.

Stay with us as the All Balls show in Pacific Media.

having fun doing it.

Welcome back to the town of all show and the civic media ready to work.

Twenty two minutes now past the hour three o'clock.

Glad to have you along on this hump day.

Beautiful skies right now here in Madison downtown Madison on State Street.

Some big white fluffy clouds may turn into storm clouds later on.

So in all seriousness, the weather could get rough later on tonight and tomorrow.

So be aware of that particularly.

And I'm talking a really rough.

why I say central Wisconsin, basically take far western Wisconsin and far eastern off the board and it's everything else.

So it's kind of a wide swath, some unstable weather coming in, but keep an eye to the sky here.

But right now it's absolutely beautiful.

Here's the thing pursuing truth was what we say.

Sometimes time makes a mistake.

I fast up to it, I own up to it.

So in the, here's what's happened.

The attorneys we always talk about are listening to the show and the sensors, the civic media attorney sensors have called in and called me.

I did not give accurate information on the big free ticket Friday brewery giveaway earlier this hour and I need to correct myself.

Yes,

we must issue a correction.

I'm first of all, first.

and most importantly, this is a statewide contest.

It is a statewide contest.

Yes, that's the most important thing.

Now, here's the deal.

We will, we're running this on Fridays for the rest of the Brewer's season.

And you could have a chance to win on the Pat Critello show.

Mornings at Pat Critello.

which airs across most of the network, also on Mino and the Mayor, which airs in Green Bay and Oshkosh, on John and Gordy, which airs here in Madison, on Matt Naran Air, with Jayden and Greg from nine until 11 across the network.

The Tom Hartman show has an opportunity to win.

We do.

And then the Maggie Dawn show from four until six.

So those are the those are the.

correct time slots.

And the other thing is that we'll have one four pack winner each Friday, not for each show.

I misspoke on that.

Right.

And so what you get is not five chances to win a set of tickets.

You get five or sorry, this is difficult to phrase.

You don't get five chances to win four tickets each show.

You get up to five chances per day.

for one set of tickets.

You made it much more difficult

than it

needed to be.

You get so you get five chances to win a set of tickets.

That's the bottom line.

I really I really need to start going to the meetings.

So no, this is but this is great.

This is great.

It's still you get there.

There are four tickets in the beautiful club level seats up for grabs each Friday and you can enter.

So that the bottom line is the more you listen to civic media on Fridays the greater the chance is That you can enter which increases your chances to win that one set of four tickets.

Yes Friday.

Yes,

I get it right now

All

right,

that's good.

We got the paperwork out of the way.

855-752-4842.

We got Jack and Merrimack.

Thank goodness, Jack.

Get us back on track here.

You wanted to weigh in on what's worse, allergies or sunburn.

Jack, what's worse?

Well, I was a

professional lifeguard for six years.

and

know

all about sunburn that you could possibly imagine.

I also had allergies.

I was about the time I was 11 or 12 years old, but 10 years ago I connected with a doctor who was an allergy specialist and he started me on the series of shots.

Today

I'm about 95% allergy free.

You know, you can cure allergies to a certain extent.

Um, I still have a, I was a swimmer for a long time too,

and I

still have an allergy to chlorine water and they don't have a cure for that one.

Really?

Now, Jack is a former lifeguard.

Uh, what do you feel is the best sunscreen to use to protect, uh, protect people outside?

Well, you know, um,

almost anything that's got an SPF of about 30 or so I would say.

My preference was back in the day for a thing called Bullfrog, which doesn't exist anymore.

I guess you can find some old bottles still full on eBay I've run across once or twice.

But regarding sunburn, I have a regular six month appointment with a dermatologist and

About every other appointment, he burns some stuff off of my face or other body parts that were exposed, shall we say, that are probably the direct result of all those sunburns.

So I would definitely say sunburn is more dangerous, although people can have very dangerous allergies too.

I wouldn't

doubt

that.

That's a great point, Jack.

The consequences of long-term exposure and sunburn like that, those could be life-threatening, some of the face cancers and that sort of thing.

I mean, if you don't catch those early enough.

And so prevention is the key, right, Jack?

Slather on the SPF 35 or 40 or even 50 and, you know,

or wear a brimmed hat, something like that, if you could be outside.

All of the above, actually.

And if you already have a lot of exposure, preventive maintenance is a real critical

thing,