Trevor Matich, Joe diGenova, Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, Chris Horner and guest host Scottie Nell Hughes joined WMAL on Monday!

Mornings on the Mall

Monday, December 14, 2015

Hosts: Brian Wilson and guest host Scottie Hughes

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

5am – A/B/C 2016 News:

• Ted Cruz Fires Back at Donald Trump’s ‘Maniac’ Swipe With…a Blast-From-the-Past Music Video. On the heels of Donald Trump’s comment during a “Fox News Sunday” interview that fellow Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz is “a little bit of a maniac,” Cruz took to Twitter Sunday afternoon and delivered his rebuttal. “In honor of my friend @realDonaldTrump and good-hearted #Maniacs everywhere,” Cruz wrote before adding a music video. He chose, of course, “Maniac” from the iconic ’80s flick “Flashdance” — an MTV staple back in the day that may just see a few additional clicks this evening. During the interview that aired Sunday, Trump said he didn’t believe Cruz is qualified for the presidency. “I don’t think he has the right temperament,” Trump said. “I don’t think he’s got the right judgment. You look at the way he’s dealt with the Senate where he goes in there, frankly, you know, like a little bit of a maniac. You’re never going to get things done that way.”

• Carson doubles down on threat to leave the GOP. (The Hill) — Ben Carson doubled down on his stance that he will leave the GOP if party elite are planning to mount a floor fight at the nominating convention. “Well, one of the reasons that I got into this is because I heard the frustration in the people who are so tired of back-room deals, of subterfuge, of dishonesty,” Carson said on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday. “And, you know, if that is the case, then you know I’m out of here. The Washington Post reported last week that top officials met to discuss the party’s strategy in the event that GOP front-runner Donald Trump sweeps through the primaries. Carson said he spoke with Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Reince Priebus, who reassured him that there was no behind-the-scenes scheming.
• Stage set for final GOP debate of 2015. (CNN) — Washington (CNN) Nine candidates will appear in prime-time Tuesday night for the final Republican presidential primary debate of 2015, a critical event that will help shape the contest heading into the Iowa caucuses. Businessman Donald Trump, the front-runner for the nomination, will again be center stage flanked by retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson on his right and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz on his left, CNN announced Sunday. The six remaining participants in the prime-time contest will be Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, businesswoman Carly Fiorina, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul. Four candidates — former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham and former New York Gov. George Pataki — will appear in the first debate on Tuesday evening.
• Ted Koppel: ‘Donald Trump Is, in Effect, the Recruiter in Chief for ISIS.’ On Meet the Press this morning, veteran news anchor Ted Koppel said Donald Trump is doing ISIS’ recruitment work for them with his comments about a total Muslim entry ban. Chuck Todd talked with his panel about Trump’s proposal, bringing up how most of The Donald’s appeal is due to support from people who have felt like social and cultural outcasts in modern America. Koppel said, “They think they’re being tough on ISIS and Trump thinks he’s being tough on ISIS.” But in truth, he argued, “Donald Trump is, in effect, the recruiter in chief for ISIS.”
• Cruz surges to 10-point lead in Iowa poll. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has jumped businessman Donald Trump for a big lead in the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucus, according to a new Des Moines Register/Bloomberg poll released Saturday. Cruz paces the field with 31 percent support, followed by Trump at 21 percent, and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson at 13 percent. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Texas) places fourth with 10 percent.
• Fox News Poll: Cruz, Trump ahead in Iowa, Clinton holds caucus lead. Ted Cruz and Donald Trump are the top two candidates Iowa Republican caucus-goers say are the most qualified to handle the top two issues facing the country — the economy and national security. That gives them front-runner status in a new Fox News poll of Iowa likely caucus-goers. The poll, released Sunday, also finds Hillary Clinton leads Bernie Sanders by double-digits among Democrats in the Hawkeye State.          

5am – D         Obama: Paris climate agreement could be a “turning point for the world” – More than seven years ago, Barack Obama told campaign supporters that one day, Americans would be able to tell their children that “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.” Saturday* evening—just hours after international leaders agreed to a historic deal to fight global warming—Obama told the nation that the accord could represent “a turning point for the world” and would help humanity “delay or avoid some of the worst consequences of climate change.”

5am – E         People who are experts at swearing ‘have BIGGER vocabularies than clean-tongued folk.’ People who frequently swear are more likely to have a bigger vocabulary than their clean-tongued peers, research revealed. A colourful tongue does not mean the talker is lazy or uneducated, a study published in the Language Sciences journal found. Instead, those who are more confident using taboo words are more articulate in other areas The experiment asked participants to say as many swear words as they could think of in 60 seconds. They were then asked to do the same with animals. Those who knew the most swear words were more likely to name the most animals as well, the research found.

6am – A/B/C Verizon teams up with LG for two new kid-friendly wearables. The GizmoPal 2 and GizmoGadget are available just in time for the holidays. LG and Verizon have announced the launch of two wearables that are specifically designed for your little tykes. The GizmoPal, which came out a year ago, has received a refresh. Additionally, LG has designed a new wearable – the GizmoGadget (pictured above) – that is more like mum and dad’s smartwatch; with a touch screen, two-way calling, and more.

6am – D         INTERVIEW – TREVOR MATICH — Redskins elite long snapper and WMAL’Redskins analyst

• RECAP: Sunday, December 13, 1:00 PM on FOX, Soldier Field, Chicago, Washington Redskins @ Chicago Bears
• Redskins Hang On To Beat Bears, 24-21. CHICAGO, IL- The Washington Redskins survived a couple close calls to beat the Chicago Bears and maintain a hold on first place in the NFC East, 24-21.

6am – E         Entertainment News

• The aliens are back in the first #IndependenceDay: Resurgence trailer. “I see them in my dreams,” says Bill Pullman in the first Independence Day: Resurgence trailer. “They’re coming back.” ‘Independence Day 2’: Call it ‘Resurgence’ After an initial leak, 20th Century Fox released the official teaser footage for Roland Emmerich’s highly anticipated alien invasion sequel on Sunday. Years after the aliens first came to Earth and blew up the White House, Jeff Goldblum’s David Levinson and Pullman’s now former President Whitmore are witnessing another wave. “I spent 20 years trying to get us ready for this,” says Levinson. “We used their technology to strengthen our planet, but it won’t be enough.”
• Chuck Todd Asked Presidential Candidates Who Their Favorite Fictional President Is
• Eva Longoria and Jose Antonio Baston are engaged: Congrats to Eva Longoria! The 40-year-old Desperate Housewives alum and Telenovela star is engaged to boyfriend Jose Antonio Baston. The proposal took place during a trip to Dubai. Longoria revealed the happy news on her Instagram page on Sunday, alongside a pic of the two kissing in the desert, with the actress showcasing what appears to be a large ruby ring. “Ummmm so this happened….#Engaged #Dubai #Happiness,” she wrote.

 

7am – A         INTERVIEW – JOE DIGENOVA – legal analyst and former U.S. Attorney to the District of Columbia

• CLINTON & BERGDAHL: Hillary Clinton misled Congress on Bowe Bergdahl swap. When Republican members of Congress learned in November 2011 that the Obama administration was contemplating a swap — Taliban terrorists for captured ArmySgt. Bowe Bergdahl — they wrote to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of their fears. Mrs. Clinton wrote back that they had nothing to worry about. The White House would follow the law requiring a 30-day heads-up.
• CLINTON & BENGHAZI: State Department Can’t Find Emails For Hillary’s IT Guy. The State Department says it cannot find copies or backups of emails from the account of Bryan Pagliano, the State Department IT staffer who was paid by Hillary Clinton to maintain her private email server while she served as secretary of state. Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley revealed the finding in a letter sent Friday to Sec. of State John Kerry which was obtained by Politico.
• New Clinton Email Shows Pentagon Had Forces Ready To Respond To Benghazi Attack. American military forces were available for a rescue operation not long after the U.S. diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya, came under attack by terrorists Sept. 11, 2012, according to an email to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s closest aides.
• Sister of fallen Benghazi soldier slams Hillary Clinton for denying that she blamed the video to the Benghazi families.
• San Bernardino Attack: Whistleblower: Feds Shut Down Investigation That Could Have Prevented San Bernardino Attack. A former Department of Homeland Security agent says that an investigation he was conducting into a fundamentalist Islamic group operating in the U.S. may have helped stop San Bernardino jihadi Syed Farook had the government not shut down his probe. During an interview with Fox News’ Megyn Kelly on Thursday, Philip Haney said that in 2012 as an agent with U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s National Targeting Center, he opened an investigation into a Sunni Islamic group called, Tablighi Jamaat, a subset of the fundamentalist Deobandi movement.

7am – B         2016 News: Trump, Polls, Carson, etc

7am – C         Elementary school teachers ate pot-laced brownies left in lounge. HIGHLAND TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — Authorities say three suburban Detroit teachers got sick after eating marijuana-laced brownies put out in a school lounge. Oakland County sheriff’s officials said Friday that deputies were called Wednesday to Spring Mills Elementary School in Highland Township on a tainted food complaint. A teacher became ill the day before and later tested positive for marijuana at a hospital. Police say two other teachers felt sick but didn’t seek medical treatment. The deputies recovered the remaining brownies. Tests revealed they contained the active ingredient in marijuana.

7am – D         INTERVIEW — LT. COL TONY SHAFFER – a CIA trained former senior intelligence officer and the New York Times bestselling author of ” Operation Dark Heart: Spycraft and Special Operations on the Frontlines of Afghanistan – And The Path to Victory.”   His latest book is The Last Line. He is a senior fellow with both the London Center for Policy Research and the Center for Advanced Defense Studies

• ISIS: Obama to visit Pentagon to review ISIS strategy. Washington (CNN) President Barack Obama will visit the Pentagon on Monday to review the military campaign against ISIS with national security advisers, his first visit since attacks in San Bernardino and Paris. White House press secretary Josh Earnest cautioned on Friday that no major policy shifts would come as a result of the meeting but that it is more of an “update.”
• CLINTON & BERGDAHL: Hillary Clinton misled Congress on Bowe Bergdahl swap. When Republican members of Congress learned in November 2011 that the Obama administration was contemplating a swap — Taliban terrorists for captured ArmySgt. Bowe Bergdahl — they wrote to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of their fears. Mrs. Clinton wrote back that they had nothing to worry about. The White House would follow the law requiring a 30-day heads-up.
• SAN BERNARDINO: Obama Told NSC And FBI To ‘Downplay’ Terrorist Angle Of San Bernardino. (Daily Caller) — The FBI has taken heat for failing to immediately classify the San Bernardino shootings as terrorism, but a new report shows that FBI reluctance could have been due to external pressure from the White House. A source told Jack Murphy of SOFREP that the FBI instantly believed the shooting, which left 14 dead, to be a clear act of terrorism. The White House, however, didn’t feel the same way and quickly moved in to squash the terror classification. This source added that as soon as the shooting took place, Obama convened a meeting with the National Security Council and the heads of other federal enforcement agencies to discuss a public relations strategy. Part of the reason for trying to avoid the designation of the shootings as terrorism is because it threatens to upset the Obama administration’s strategy in Syria. A case of Islamic terrorism in the U.S. would put additional pressure on the administration to play a much more active role in the conflict.
• Tashfeen Malik reportedly passed background checks despite questionable social media posts. Tashfeen Malik, who along with her husband killed 14 people in Southern California, reportedly passed three background checks by American officials before she moved from Pakistan to the United States and none of them found her social media posts about jihad.

7am – E         Christmas News:

• “Asteroid to pass Earth on Christmas Eve” – A large asteroid is approaching the Earth-moon system and will provide a good opportunity for radar observations in the days ahead. Asteroid 163899 – also known as 2003 SD220 – will come closest to Earth on Christmas Eve (December 24, 2015). It’ll pass at a safe distance, and there’s no need to worry about reports claiming it will skim the Earth, or cause earthquakes. At its closest, asteroid 2003 SD220 will be some 6,787,600 miles (11 million km) from our planet’s surface. That’s more than 28 times the Earth-moon distance! It’s so far away that only professional and advanced amateur astronomers are likely to capture optical images of this space rock.
• Family in Alaska is letting anyone on the Internet control their Christmas lights. An Alaska family has bravely turned over control of their Christmas lights to people on the Internet, who with the click of a button, are able to turn areas on and off at all hours of the day and night. For the sixth year in a row, Ken Woods, an information technology employee in Fairbanks, has nailed a live camera to a tree outside his home. He has then rigged a dozen different controls, allowing anyone who visits his website to turn a certain area of his lights on or off at all hours of the day.”The very first year we did it, we did one string of lights on the tree,” Woods told ABC News. “It was cool, but then we added a Web camera pointing at the tree and then [the reaction] blew up. A week into it, my wife turned to me and said, ‘Next year, these are going outside.’ It was super annoying in the middle of the night.”

8am – A         INTERVIEW – CHRIS HORNER – Senior Fellow, Center for Energy and Environment. Competitive Enterprise Institute and author of Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud and Deception to Keep You Misinformed and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism

• Was in Paris for the The UN’s COP21 Climate Change Conference
• Obama: Paris climate agreement could be a “turning point for the world”
• Horner was labeled a “climate criminal” while he was in Paris: “As a youth I spent many days roaming the streets of Paris’s 8th Arrondissement, where my father lived at the time.       Revisiting the old neighborhood this week I was treated to “Wanted” posters bearing my picture. First posted in the 8th, these and posters of six others soon appeared all around the city. We “Magnificent Seven” are all, apparently, “climate criminals.” The crime, of course, is holding views and offering speech that is intolerable to the global warming industry.”

8am – B         Christmas Gifts:

• Feds open investigation into hoverboards. The federal government has launched an investigation into one of the year’s hottest holiday toys after receiving multiple reports of it catching fire and causing injury. The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is warning consumers to beware of hoverboards. The agency said it’s received 10 reports of hoverboards catching fire from consumers in nine states and 29 reports of people having been treated at an emergency room after falling off the self-balancing, two-wheel, motorized board. Of the 29 emergency room visits, CPSC Spokeswoman Patty Davis said 13 were for fractures, six were for strains or sprains, four were for contusions or abrasions, two for lacerations, one for a closed head injury and three for an injury to an ankle, wrist or shoulder. The three largest U.S. airlines — Delta, United and American — have banned hoverboards from all flights over concerns that the lithium ion batteries used to power them could potentially spark a fire on board.
• Teen Grinches plunder D.C. warehouse full of toys for poor kids … Nats want to help. (WTOP) — Police: Grinches steal toys from Salvation Army Angel Tree warehouse. WASHINGTON – Police say real-life Grinches broke into the Salvation Army’s Angel Tree warehouse and stole presents just days before the gifts were to be delivered to thousands of low-income children in the D.C. region. “This could not have come at a worse time,” says Ken Forsythe, spokesman for the Salvation Army National Capital Area. Around 9 a.m. Saturday, some Salvation Army employees arrived at the warehouse on 8th Street in Southeast and discovered two teenagers inside. D.C. police Lt. Sean Conboy said a teen boy and a teen girl were arrested on burglary charges. Conboy said police were looking for three other suspects. Portable electronics, toys, clothes, bicycles, and a Salvation Army laptop were among the items stolen. The Angle Tree gifts would have been distributed on Thursday to about 6,000 children.

8am – C         Washington’s cherry blossom trees bloom in ‘heat wave’ (Capital News Service) — WASHINGTON — D.C. in December brings to mind snowy days, the National Christmas Tree lighting — and cherry blossoms? Yes, they’re in bloom. National Park Service spokesman Mike Litterst attributed the phenomenon to a species of tree called the autumn flowering cherry in the area, which have the potential to blossom during warm periods in late November and early December.“It doesn’t necessarily happen every year, but an early patch of warm weather will bring them out,” Litterst said. “It is sporadic, but totally natural.” The average December high temperature in the nation’s capital is 47 degrees and the average low is 33, but the last week has seen two days above 60 with temperatures this weekend expected to reach 70, according to The Weather Channel.

8am – D         2016 News Recap

8am – E         Entertainment News:

• Ed Sheeran ‘quits’ social media. Singer Ed Sheeran has announced he is “taking a break” from social media as he is “seeing the world through a screen and not my eyes”. Writing on his Instagram account, the singer explained he was “taking the opportunity of not having to be anywhere… to travel the world”. He also confirmed to fans that his third album is “on its way” and “is the best thing I have made thus far”. Sheeran has 16 million Twitter and 5.5 million Instagram followers.
• Kurt Russell: ‘Absolutely Insane’ to Think Gun Control Will Stop Terrorists. Actor Kurt Russell put gun control activists on blast during a recent interview. “If you think gun control is going to change the terrorists’ point of view, I think you’re, like, out of your mind,” Russell said to anti-gun Hollywood reporter Jeffery Wells while promoting his new film, “The Hateful Eight.” “I think it’s absolutely insane.”
• Dethroned: “Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You Is Not The Top Holiday Song This Year” – Finally! For first time since 1994, Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You is NOT the song that holiday shoppers are most likely to hear at stores. Customers who have been hoping to hear something new while doing their holiday shopping have finally gotten their wish because the queen of Christmas has been dethroned after a 20-year run. For the first time since it was released in 1994, Mariah Carey’s version of All I Want For Christmas Is You is no longer the most-played song of the holiday season at stores and retail chains. Carey was knocked from No 1 by The Shins’ cover of Paul McCartney’s Wonderful Christmastime.