Good morning, Kentucky and and welcome in. It is Kentucky and it's Morning News with Nick Coffee on news radio eight forty WHAS five five here on a Thursday, June the twelfth.
The full crew is assembled.
We've got Scott Fitzgerald, the one and only mister John Alden, and John Shannon, who will have your first news update coming up around five thirty. How many days have I been in the new role here? This makes I believe the ninth show if I can count, it is I can count. It's early in the morning star I can't count. So one of the many differences in this than what I did for nearly a decade on seven ninety doing
sports is interaction and engagement, which I get it. That's really not what this is to the extent that what it is on sports talk. But we do have something I need to start really pushing, which is a way to mix in some interaction from listeners that listen to us via the iHeartRadio app, which I'll give you another plug here. You can listen to us anytime anywhere on the ahet Radio app. Also listen live at WHAS dot com. But we have within the Aheart Radio app a feature
called the talkback feature. So if you listen on the app and you you know, you pull it up and you see the station with that beautiful logo eight forty whas, you'll see a microphone, and on that microphone, if you click the microphone, it'll then prompt you to record something. I think you have up to thirty seconds to send something in and when you do that, it goes directly to us here within this portal, this talkback portal. I guess that's the best way to describe it. And then
we can we can listen to feedback. And I don't mean necessarily feedback on the show, which again what I used to say on seven ninety questions, complaints, compliments, insults, whatever you have, feel free to send them our way. But I know that's not necessarily what this is to the same to the same level. But if we're talking about something, which again we've got four hours with you,
there's a lot of things to come up. You have some thoughts, you want to share your perspective, there's always a chance, you know, we can mix in that, and we're going to try to do that here and there. I don't know exactly to the level of of you know how often you'll hear feedback from from you know, listeners that want to share thoughts on what's going on. But it is an option, and I feel like that's the best way we can include some engagement within the show that that really hasn't been there.
Well, I shouldn't say that. I don't know.
Maybe there has been some engagement. I know, Scott, you've got a lot of people who've been loyal listeners of you, to you and all sort of just this station for a long long time. That that will give you feedback in different ways on social media, and I hope they still do that.
I have the same thing on my end.
As far as folks who reach out via Facebook, X Slash, Twitter, that kind of thing. But this is this is the This is an easy way for us to just, you know, you record something. It comes to us. We are told we have to listen to it before we have play it, which you do. I feel like it's a no brainer. I feel like it's something you would just assume that.
You have to do. But I don't know.
I'm sure there have been some that maybe listened to the first half of the thirty second clip and then realized they didn't get to the end of it, and you know what, they had to hit the dump button and all that.
What it replaces is we used to have folks. When I first started this gig long long ago, I think it was with Bob's Cohler. They you could tell folks would be up drinking all night and we get the weirdest calls. Dude. And now when I saw that and I started using that, I go back and listen to some of this. You can tell people that clearly. I mean, it's the term drunk dialing. We had drunk texting, drunk dialing, and there's people that are all night and one guy
used to call me, oh, liquid courage, Yeah exactly. One guy used to call me every morning, like right around five to ten, and my man had been hitting a bottle.
Clearly.
Well, at this time, there was no way to interact with with any type of radio other than picking up the phone and hoping that somebody answers it. Now it's an insanely different world. And yeah, you mentioned drunk dialing. I'm gonna I'm gonna miss my well, I almost lied. I don't want to lie. I'll miss it to an extent. I'm also going to enjoy the weekends where I can
spend time with my family. But when I would do postgame shows for Louisville football and basketball, especially football if it was a I mean, football is a four hour game if it's at four hour event, So it wouldn't be a shocker that maybe seventy five percent of the callers on some nights on a Friday, especially a Friday, but sometimes even a Saturday, that they you could tell they were a little sauced as we as we would get the postgame show started, and that that always left
the door open for us to go in a lot of different directions and it made it kind of fun.
But yeah, but that talk back feature you're talking about is very cool, Nick in a lot of ways because if you're a lot of people are out and about driving, and I mentioned you off the year where we get real busys when we have storm damage or we have a bad like sixty five gets shut down and folks can access through.
That, Yeah, I know they could be a resource for us, and this is the easiest, most convenient way for that to happen. So again, questions, compliance, compliments, insults. Again, We're not afraid of compliments. Although trust me, we're not going to just I'm winking at Scott. We're not just going to play the compliments that come in on the show. But all right, let's get another update. In fact, it's our first update within the show here of traffic and weather.
We'll talk to Roy O'Neil coming up at five forty five. Scott Fitzgerald's got sports coming your way in fifteen minutes, and we hope you stick with us. It is Kentucky This Morning News on News Radio eight forty whas.
Oh my god, I feel like I'm like it. This is like the last song after the Friday night dance at the basketball game, and you're scrambling trying to find somebody to awkwardly dance with.
I love how within milliseconds. Maybe there's certain songs that is as soon as Scott hears yeah enough to know what the song is, and it usually doesn't take long.
You go to a place. Oh, Gally, John is an ace with the music I got you you.
You have an ear for this more than I've ever at least with the people we have here at our station and pick up on play.
Yet, before he realized what song it was, I knew what it was, dude, I mean he was he was reacting before we had Mike Song because he just this is this is.
His shraumaty No, I was traumatized in high school by this. I was the guy looking for somebody to dance with. Nobody dances anymore, right, did they still have school dances?
Somebody? Right?
I don't think we sound like dinosaurs.
They have.
They gotta have some kind of dance, right like that Prom? Well yeah, but Prom's not even prom anymore. The guys go over here, the girls go over here, and then nobody talks to each other until the end of the night.
If I was a fly on the wall at a let's say, a football homecoming dance, if those still exists, I would just imagine it's everybody on their phones. It's pretty much abody, just like you know, sending snapchats to each other while in the gymnasium together just twenty feet apart.
Like I can see that. What did we spend on myself?
We spent man, I'm getting old. I'm just I'm criticizing the younger generation. Back in my day, we we actually we didn't dance either. I think my generation might have killed the dancing, Scott, because we just hovered around, and when we did dance, it was more of like a a hug with enough distance because the teachers were going to make sure we weren't getting too close to each other. And then we would just kind of awkwardly, very slowly sway and.
Then that was it. One you had one of you had nasty breath, so you were trying to I was it was too much cologne? That was really?
Yes?
What was your go to?
John?
Do you remember?
I don't remember what the brand was. It might have been just like an air apostle or something.
All right, that works.
Well.
I don't do clone anymore though, because of that. Really, so don't do a period.
So you really So this was a real experience, Okay, So it wasn't like you just Yeah, I was the guy with too much clone like you were told you were the guy with too.
Much and in front of man, did you wear it?
Nick?
I didn't. Yeah.
In fact, I would wear cologne, believe it or not. You guys, Scott, you may remember this. John, you have to be too young. Michael Jordan had a cologne. Yeah, and I'm not sure if it smelt like sewage or if it smelled great, but it was Michael Jordan's cologne. So we wore it and I don't remember if it again, I don't remember if it smelled great, but if it was the I mean, Jordan was Jordan in the nineties, that just if you know, you know, But I didn't
realize this, you know, before five twenty am. We're we're going back in time and revisiting opening up some old wounds with Scott being left alone on the dance floor and John being the guy with too much cologne.
Do you know bon Jovi was gonna take us in cologne. Axe kind of replaced cologne, and now Axe is out the door. Old spices back in, dude, really to my son, almost like body washed.
They I used old spice deodorant, and I'm sure they've got all the different type of fragrance men's products, but old spice is solid.
That used to be. Yeah, I see, I'm I'm I'm to degree. Okay, I got to go with degree. But you guys were talking about cologne and now, just for old times sake, it's still in the stores. I smelled it when I was and it brought back so many flashbacks. It was poloed your car and gray flannel. Never heard of them, never heard of it, Vanetio.
Though it sounds like we've got we've got different uh, different generations. Yeah, different generations represented within within Kentucky. And it's morning news, so good stuff. And I you know, I hope eventually you guys can move move past being the too much cologne guy and Scott, I hope you can move the trump. I mean that's now, it's now it makes sense why you really had a tough time just being able to control what this song does to you.
And it's because it takes you back to that moment where you were on the dance floor nowadays though, I mean too he's he's he's spoken for us and married man ladies. But if he at the dance floor now, you'd have some takers.
I believe that you've lost half yourself. But according to my wife, I look a little, a little what they not emaciated? I can't remember. My wife actually told me one day, look alone, raggedy.
So you've lost so much weight. You're getting insults now from my wife. Wow, maybe it's a sun of endearment.
Thanks for the encouragement. I appreciate that yeah, yea.
So she's noticing you're losing weight. Yeah, good stuff. All right, We've got sports coming your way here in about five minutes. We've got another update of traffic and weather coming up right now. Ten minutes away, we will have our first news update with John Shannon. It is Kentucky This Morning News here on news radioate forty whas.
Thank you, John.
It is five point thirty five here Kentucky This Morning News with Nick Coffee on News Radio eight forty whas. Coming up in ten minutes, we will chat with Rory O'Neill and we'll continue to discuss what we've discussed all week with Rory, and that is the ice demonstrations that
are going on. We'll get an update on how things are going in Los Angeles, but also it's starting to become somewhat of us I'd say, a gradual build to where other cities are are also having these these protests, and I don't think anything has been quite as is.
What's the best word to use here.
Clearly Los Angeles one of the biggest cities in the world, certainly in our country here, and to have curfew for two straight nights, I mean that, lets you know, sort of how things are going there. I don't think we've got to that point just yet. But again, we'll get
the latest from Rory coming up here shortly. Also we will also see Yeah, there's another story I wanted to touch on with Rory, and that is a new national poll that takes a look at basically everything from President Trump to vaccines and other things to just I guess, a new national poll that gives us a feel as far as the temperature with with President Trump as he's back in office for the second time. Still clearly very
early in that tenure. All right, So JCPS is proposing new start times for school this upcoming this upcoming school year twenty twenty five, twenty six. Right now, they're exploring a couple of different options. It sounds like, and I guess I'll start with this, fellas, do you all remember what time you started school at different levels of school?
Seven forty five?
I think?
So, did you go to Catholic school growing up? No? I was public school, same here, public school. We're all public school.
I think I was in three different school systems though elementary I was in Indiana, middle school, I was in the Catholic school system here in Kentucky and then high school I was in Bullet County. You got around I know, I remember my start time in high school was seven ten, Okay, so wow, I would assume that is around the time that I started high school, but I really don't remember. I know that we got out of school around like two twenty five. I think that's whenever school let out.
Does that sound right, John, we got out of too ten?
Okay?
Yeah, I think we got out a little bit later. But of course I'm a lot older than John is. But I also went to TU Bullet County Public School. So again I don't When I look at these proposed start times, I don't know if it's a big difference from what I was used to, and I guess, yeah,
let's see. So right now, the the option currently, one of the options they're looking at is to shift high schools and Ramsey Middle School to later start times, as research shows that later starts can improve teen sleep, behavior and grades. But it would require more bus drivers, and obviously that's an issue they've had for a while now, is having enough bus drivers. So if it does help with those specific things, then I'd say it's worth looking into.
Right improving teen sleep, behavior grades. Those are things very important. I think everybody involved, parents, students, teachers, administrators would all agree that, you know, if you've got better behavior and better grades, then that's what you want. But a change in schedule could really just disrupt the routine for a lot of people.
A high school kid, though, would you ever appreciated the later start. I don't know.
I remember being I was not my high school years as far as the mornings. I mean, I remember just being a zombie like kind of sleep walking. Once I was old enough to start driving, it was a little bit different, but I feel like I was just on I wasn't really awake when I got to school sometimes. I mean I rode the bus briefly, and I remember falling asleep on the bus in the mornings. And then other times I would just be kind of, you know, out of it. So maybe I would have enjoyed a
little bit more sleep. But I love getting out of school sorely too, Like I wouldn't trade that for anything. And as the older you go in school, the earlier you start, but of course the later or the earlier that you get out and that was that was always worth it.
Do you remember what time it was when you all let out of school every day when.
We were three thirty.
Okay, yeah, because I think that's what it more so used to be.
But I could be wrong, not maybe not everywhere, but I think as as the years have passed, at least from what I can tell, it's only gotten to where at the high school level, it seems like it's only gotten to where you start earlier and you get out earlier.
Well, because my daughter is a teacher, and what I was telling him was is we had two fifteen minute recess periods, one in the morning, one in the afternoon, and then after we ate lunch, they let us go out and we had a nice playground when they let us go outside for like a half hour forty five minutes, and it was a beautiful thing, especially when it gets really cold up in Michigan, because you come in and you're not jumping around the classroom because you're too don
and tired to be doing it. And I think I shared that with my daughter, and she's like, I would love to have a half hour forty five minutes at lunchtime just to put myself sure together. And I guess they don't do it anymore, and that's why we got out sold.
And one thing you got to keep in mind, you've got to have a level of staggering just because bus drivers I would assume you're not just I mean you, you know, especially when you've got such a shortage of
bus drivers. The option that I mentioned where they start high schools in Ramsey Middle School earlier, the challenges would be they would need for at least seven hundred and fifteen bus drivers, and the district currently has six hundred and twenty, So you need to add roughly one hundred bus drivers, which to me sounds like a tough task to add that many. But maybe I'm wrong, But yeah, I know for a lot of parents. I'm a parent myself.
When you think of a change like this, first thing that comes to mind for me is, all right, does this impact my ability to get them to school or get somebody to get them to school to where I can still get to work on time. You're you know, you're always you're always balancing it. Yeah, all right, we'll talk to Rory O'Neil coming up here in just four minutes. It is Kentucky and his morning news on news radio
A forty whas it is five forty six. Here Kentucky and his Morning News with Nick Coffee on News Radio eight forty whas it's time to welcome in our friend Rory O'Neal of NBC News.
Rory.
A second straight night where Los Angeles had a curfew, it seems as if that's that's helping the situation at this point.
Yeah, that does seem to be doing the trick in order for a police to maintain law and order there
in downtown Los Angeles. Again, that curfew applies to just that one small area about one square mile in the downtown area near those federal buildings which have been the scene of these protests and guess they started last Friday night and have been growing sin But now with a strong police presence, obviously the National Guard that we've talked about before, and the US Marines who are out protecting ICE agents in the field, it seems like things maybe
getting under better control in LA but perhaps unraveling in other cities across the country.
We'll get to that in just a moment. But when it comes to a curfew, I could be wrong, but I imagine that doesn't happen that often in a city like Los Angeles. There's a lot of folks that they don't you know, I'm sure they're aware of what's going on, but it really hits them when it impacts them in sort of their their day to day lives, and a
curfew can certainly do that. Do we know sort of what the noise has been in Los Angeles as far as just how much it's inconvenienced the residence and one of the biggest cities in the world.
Yeah, well, I think again, the area is so small that I think they said it affects something like one hundred thousand residents directly, which granted is an awful lot of people. Sure it's of what fourteen million or something, so it's and again out of five hundred square miles, it's one square mile that has this curfew in effect. But I think the bigger concern of that part of the city is to protect the one on one freeway, which, as we've seen in the video, runs right through there.
You know, when there are demonstrations in La this is a frequent spot where it happens, and this has been a tactic that's been in growing popularity of marchers just disrupting traffic, and that's an easy spot to do it, which is why now there's been such a strong presence to make sure the freeway can stay open for obvious reasons.
Roo and Neil VC News is our guest joining us here on news Radio eight forty. Whas you mentioned the other cities, obviously Seattle and Spokane, there's been a lot of coverage about the protest going on there Las Vegas. I know there was a raid in Omaha yesterday that led to employees of a meat packing facility blocking ice cars as they were trying to leave after one of the raids took place.
Is it correct to.
Say that right now a lot of cities are doing whatever they can to put some things in place to prevent it gets to a level of what we've seen in Los Angeles. I know, again you're probably seeing this in a lot of the bigger cities, but it hasn't gotten to anything close to what we've seen in LA and I assume that's what they're trying to keep from happening.
Yeah, I think there was a dumpster fire in one city, so a relatively small thing. What a half dozen arrests in Tucson as well. You mentioned Omaha where there was that raid by ice of the meat processing facility and some sympathetic protests after that as well. So we're seeing this in spots, and again to your point, nothing is widespread.
New York did have a couple hundred arrests earlier this week at protests that were happening there, but that's a day that ends in a why for New York, right, So there's always something going on there, And the concern is that we're going to see more of these events happening as we get closer to Saturday's military parade, which coincides with President Trump's birthday. So they're having these no Kings events at about eighteen hundred places all across the country.
So I think these are all sort of overlapping. If it's a ven diagram, the two circles are almost one, I think of what's going on here.
We'll certainly talk about that tomorrow. As far as the big Saturday that, of course a lot of cities are preparing for, as you mentioned. But one thing I wanted to get to real quickly here is the new National poll that takes a look at pretty much everything from President Trump, and it gives us, I guess a little bit of a look at the temperature of how the nation feels with a lot of things early on here
in President Trump's second tenure. What do we know about just the current temperature that Americans have for the for the president right now?
Yeah, Nick, you and I are going to bring up these Quinnipiac polls a lot. They come out just about once a month, and don't look at just what happens one day, look at the trend, because that's where you can see attitudes change. Sure, specifically on President Trump, this Quinnipiac pole finds that thirty eight percent of voters approve of the way Donald Trump is doing the job, fifty four percent disapprove. That's essentially flat from where was with
the poll that was conducted back in April. A little bit worse, but sort of within the margin of error. On the One Big Beautiful Bill, fifty three percent oppose the legislation, twenty seven percent support, but there's a big twenty percent who have no opinion, meaning they don't know what it's about and what's in it or why it's beautiful. And more specifically, on Medicaid, that's nearly half of voters forty seven percent think federal funding for Medicaid should actually
go up, forty percent say should stay the same. Only ten percent think federal funding for Medicaid should go down. And it's those funding cuts for Medicaid that are paying for a lot of the big beautiful bills, So that could be a disconnect there.
Rory, thank you as always for the time. Enjoyed the conversation. Have a great day. We'll talk soon, my friend.
Thanks Nick.
All right, that's Rory and Neil of the NBC News.
We've got another update of traffic and weather coming your way, and another update of sports with Scott Fitzgerald. It's I was almost converted. I was.
I nearly said the name of my previous radio show, but I resisted. This is Zecky. It's boring news with Nick Coffee on News Radio eight forty whas