Capt. Chuck Nash, Dr. Stephen Farnsworth, Kevin O’Leary, Byron York and Jake Tapper joined WMAL on Thursday!

Mornings on the Mall

Thursday, January 14, 2016

Hosts: Brian Wilson and Larry O’Connor

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

 

5am – A/B/C INTERVIEW: CAPTAIN CHUCK NASH – former U.S. Navy Captain, Fox News military analyst and naval aviator – discussed Iran’s release of U.S. sailors.

• John Kerry Thanks Iran for Releasing Kidnapped U.S. Sailors. Secretary of State John Kerry – who served in Vietnam – thanked Iran this morning for releasing the U.S. sailors that they detained yesterday. “I want to express my gratitude to Iranian authorities for their cooperation ‎in swiftly resolving this matter,” Kerry said in a short statement. He added that he was particularly attuned to the situation reminding the nation that he was “a former sailor myself” and understood the importance of Naval power. Kerry signaled that the incident was not a sign of provocation, but rather a symbol of how the two countries could work together after Iranian nuclear deal.

5am – D         Jeb Bush on Rubio’s boots: ‘I don’t have a height issue’ Washington (CNN) – Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said Wednesday he doesn’t need the kind of boots his Republican primary challenger Marco Rubio is wearing. An ad from Bush’s Super PAC ad poked fun Rubio’s boots that he wore recently in New Hampshire. The footwear has been ridiculed by Rubio’s other primary challengers, though it has been praised by fashion magazines including Esquire and GQ. MSNBC “Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough asked Bush on Wednesday if he had any platform shoes to help him appear taller. “I’ve got my cowboy boots on, big Joe,” Bush responded. “Do they make you three inches taller or are they just normal cowboy boots,” Scarborough asked the 6’3″ former governor. Some have argued that Rubio’s boots were a ploy for the 5’10” senator to get a leg up. “I don’t have a height issue,” Bush replied. Bush defended the Super PAC ad which also attacked Rubio’s Senate record, saying America needs a president who will show up and provide solutions.

5am – E         ‘Mid-life crisis’ myth? Alberta study finds people in 40s happier than they were at 18. (Canadian Press) — EDMONTON — No need to buy that Porsche if you’re pushing 40. New research from the University of Alberta suggests there’s no such thing as a mid-life crisis. It’s more like mid-life bliss. The “Up, Not Down” study was published in the academic journal Developmental Psychology. It debunks the long-held belief that happiness declines between a person’s teens and early 40s — or mid-life. Lead researcher and psychology professor Nancy Galambos says she found the opposite — that people in her study were happier in their early 40s than when they were in their late teens and early 20s. “I think it’s because life is more difficult for younger people than for people in middle age,” Galambos explains. She says some young adults are depressed, have trouble finding work and sorting out their lives.

6am – A         Powerball News:

• Winning Powerball Tickets Sold in at Least 3 States for Nearly $1.6B Jackpot. The winning Powerball numbers were drawn Wednesday night: 8, 27, 34, 4, 19 and the Powerball of 10. California lotto officials tweeted almost immediately after that a winning ticket was sold in the state. Later, California Lottery spokesperson Russ Lopez said there were two more winning tickets sold, one in Tennessee and one in Florida.
• Maryland lottery says three $1 million Powerball tickets sold. Three $1-million Powerball tickets were sold in Frederick, Capitol Heights and Bladensburg. The Maryland Lottery announced late Wednesday that three $1-million Powerball tickets were sold in the state. Wednesday night’s Powerball drawing was for a record $1.5 billion. The California lottery says a winning jackpot ticket was sold in suburban Los Angeles. The winning numbers were 4-8-19-27-34 and Powerball 10. In Maryland, there were three $1 million second-tier winners, 24 $50,000 third-tier winners and one $100,000 third-tier winner who purchased the Power Play option, said Erica Palmisano, assistant director of communications for Maryland Lottery and Gaming. The $1-million winning tickets were sold at Wawa, 5440 Urbana Pike, Frederick; Walker Hill Amoco, on Walker Mill Road, Capitol Heights; and 7-Eleven, 4907 Annapolis Road, Bladensburg.
• Clinton: I’d use Powerball winnings to fund campaign. Hillary Clinton told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on Wednesday that she had joined the frenzy and purchased a Powerball ticket. What will she do if she wins? “I’ll fund my campaign,” she said laughing. Clinton’s chances of winning are slim: There are 292.2 million possible combinations in Powerball, making the odds daunting. Clinton’s second White House run is already extraordinarily well-funded: Her campaign announced on Jan. 1 that it had raised $55 million in the last three months of 2015, bringing her total haul for the year to $112 million.
• Trump: I would give Powerball winnings to veterans. Donald Trump criticizes Hillary Clinton for saying that she would use Powerball lottery winnings to fund her campaign.

6am – B         Fox Debate Preview:

• Fox Business Network GOP debate preview: The participants qualifying for the prime-time, 9 p.m. ET debate are: Billionaire businessman Donald Trump; Texas Sen. Ted Cruz; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio; retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson; New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie; former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; and Ohio Gov. John Kasich.The participants qualifying for the earlier, 6 p.m. ET debate are: Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (not participating); former HP CEO Carly Fiorina; former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee; and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.
• Pro-Jeb Bush super PAC shuts down. The pro-Jeb Bush super PAC Vamos for Jeb 2016 is shuttering its doors. The group, which was formed by political website Elephant News founder Claire Hardwick, sent a letter to the Federal Election Commission Tuesday announcing its decision to disband. “The committee has not raised nor dispersed any funds and would like to accordingly terminate and be discontinued,” wrote Andrea Wong, the treasurer for the super PAC. “Up to this point the only activity done were social media pages on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook which have been deactivated.” Hardwick said that she launched the group in March with Wong, who is American with a Nicaraguan background, and they wanted to show how Bush has support among Hispanics.

6am – C         Al Jazeera America to shut down in April. Al Jazeera America, which went on the air in 2013 — and is partly funded by the ruling family of Qatar — announced Wednesday it is shutting down at the end of April, citing the “economic landscape of the media environment.” The network said in a statement that “Al Jazeera America will cease operation by April 30, 2016,” explaining that “while Al Jazeera America built a loyal audience across the U.S. and increasingly was recognized as an important new voice in television news, the economic landscape of the media environment has driven its strategic decision to wind down its operations and conclude its service.” Al Jazeera’s prime-time ratings recently ranged from 20,000 to 30,000 viewers, according to Nielsen data. Upon taking over the network in May 2015, Anstey downplayed the network’s ratings woes, saying it would “take time to build viewership.”

6am – D/E     Nikki Haley exposes GOP fracture with Trump slam. (CNN)The state of the Republican Party is split. A rebuke flung by GOP elites to the party’s “angriest” voices — code for Donald Trump — in the official response to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address Tuesday night only served to highlight differences opened by a boisterous presidential campaign. South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley spoke to a national television audience and delivered the most visible and explicit shot yet by party grandees against what many see as the presidential front-runner’s disastrously divisive rhetoric.

 

7am – A         INTERVIEW — DR. STEPHEN FARNSWORTH – Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, VA @drsfarnsworth

• Washington Post: Lawmakers returned to Richmond Wednesday to kick off the 2016 legislative session and to hear Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s State of the Commonwealth speech. But any intention to play nice will probably be tempered by national politics when presidential hopefuls visit Virginia ahead of Super Tuesday on March 1. “Virginia is at the center of the electoral-college calculations of both parties that won’t be lost on lawmakers in Richmond who want to terrify voters about the other party,” said Stephen J. Farnsworth, a political scientist at the University of Mary Washington. “Expect a lot of heat but not a lot of illumination in 2016.” McAuliffe, a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, spent the weekend in Iowa campaigning for his good friend and ally Hillary Clinton in her White House bid.

7am – B/C     Drone owner files federal lawsuit after neighbor downs craft with shotgun. (Washington Times) — A Kentucky man who had his $1,500 hobbyist drone shot out of the sky last year by an agitated neighbor has filed a federal lawsuit in hope of having the courts define the rights of aircraft operators versus property owners with respect to unmanned aerial vehicles. Attorneys for the drone owner, David Boggs, filed a complaint for declaratory judgment and damages in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky on Monday, nearly six months after the man’s camera-equipped, remote-controlled aircraft was brought down by a shotgun-wielding neighbor, William Merideth. Police initially cited Mr. Merideth with charges of criminal mischief and wanton endangerment for admittedly firing three blasts from his shotgun after he spotted the drone above his property last July, but Bullitt County Judge Rebecca Ward later dismissed those charges after concluding there had been an invasion of privacy and that Mr. Merideth was in the right. Mr. Merideth, who has since dubbed himself the “drone slayer” and has marketed T-shirts with that slogan, claimed the drone had been hovering no more than 10 feet above his home when he grabbed for his gun and shot thrice, causing the aircraft to come crashing down. Data provided by Mr. Boggs, however, including flight path information, suggested the drone was closer to 200 feet off the ground at the time of the incident. In court documents filed this week, attorneys for the drone operator argue that the courts should capitalize on the incident and use it to decide if a drone is actually capable of committing a trespass in accordance with existing law.

7am – D         Powerball News:

• Winning Powerball Tickets Sold in at Least 3 States for Nearly $1.6B Jackpot. The winning Powerball numbers were drawn Wednesday night: 8, 27, 34, 4, 19 and the Powerball of 10. California lotto officials tweeted almost immediately after that a winning ticket was sold in the state. Later, California Lottery spokesperson Russ Lopez said there were two more winning tickets sold, one in Tennessee and one in Florida.

7am – E         INTERVIEW — KEVIN O’LEARY “Mr. Wonderful” — Shark Taank Investor and author of “COLD HARD TRUTH On Family, Kids and Money” – gave his advice on what to do with the Powerball money.

8am – A         INTERVIEW — BYRON YORK – Chief Political Correspondent for the Washington Examiner @ByronYork

• Byron interviewed Donald Trump in Iowa
• Nikki Haley exposes GOP fracture with Trump slam.
• Fox Business Network GOP debate preview: The participants qualifying for the prime-time, 9 p.m. ET debate are: Billionaire businessman Donald Trump; Texas Sen. Ted Cruz; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio; retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson; New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie; former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; and Ohio Gov. John Kasich. The participants qualifying for the earlier, 6 p.m. ET debate are: Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (not participating); former HP CEO Carly Fiorina; former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee; and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.

8am – B         Entertainment News:

• Alan Rickman, star of stage and “Harry Potter,” dies at 69. LONDON – British actor Alan Rickman, whose career ranged from Britain’s Royal Shakespeare Company to the “Harry Potter” films, has died. He was 69. Rickman’s family said Thursday that the actor had died after a battle with cancer. His breakout role was as the scheming Vicomte de Valmont in an acclaimed 1985 RSC production of “Les Liaisons Dangereuses.” Film roles included “Truly, Madly, Deeply,” ”Love Actually” and the Potter films, in which he played the ambiguous Dark Arts teacher Severus Snape.
• The Jar Jar Binks actor says he won’t return to the ‘Star Wars’ movies because ‘I’ve done my damage.’ “Star Wars” fans are quick to rally against the prequel trilogy, and Jar Jar Binks often faces the brunt of that ridicule. But behind the computer-generated character is a man: actor Ahmed Best. And he was living out his “Star Wars” dream until he became, in his words, “the most hated” character in “Star Wars,” and then dealt with the “painful” backlash. In a Skype interview with Jamie Stangroom for his “These Are the Actors You’re Looking For” YouTube series, Best said he wouldn’t reprise the role, even if he were asked by Disney, which now owns Lucasfilm. “No, I think I’ve done my damage,” he said. “Yeah. I’m good with where I stand in the ‘Star Wars’ universe. I don’t need to do that.” He added: “I’m not really interested in coming back. I did what I did, and I thought it was great, I thought it was fun, and now it’s time to move on.”

8am – C         Starbucks News:

• Starbucks plans to make China its biggest market as it opens 1,400 new outlets in three years. American coffee chain shrugging off China slowdown. Starbucks announced plans yesterday to make China its biggest market outside of the USA by 2019, with almost 1,400 new shops set to open by 2019. The world’s largest coffee chain appears to be shrugging off the slowdown that has hit global retailers in the world’s second-largest economy, financial commentators have said. Starbucks executives want to increase the number of stores in China from 2,000 to 3,400 by 2019. They will be creating 10,000 jobs every year until then, making China its the largest market outside the United States, said a company statement released on Tuesday. The Seattle-born coffee chain claimed they have not experienced the slump in China plaguing American eateries such as KFC and Pizza Hut. bout 500 Starbucks shops plan to open in China this year alone.
• Witness says there were 3 explosions, likely in Starbucks cafe in Jakarta, Indonesia. JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Attackers set off suicide bombs and exchanged gunfire outside a Starbucks cafe in Indonesia’s capital in a brazen assault Thursday that police said “imitated” the recent Paris attacks and was probably linked to the Islamic State group. All five attackers and a Canadian and an Indonesian died in the midmorning explosions and gunfire that were watched by office workers from high-rise buildings on Thamarin Street in Jakarta, not far from the presidential palace and the U.S. Embassy, police said. Another 19 people were injured.

8am – D         INTERVIEW — JAKE TAPPER – CNN host of “The Lead” and “State of the Union”

• Donald Trump will be on State of the Union. Tapper is heading to Iowa.
• Nikki Haley exposes GOP fracture with Trump slam
• Tonight’s GOP debate? Who needs this debate the most tonight?

8am – E         John Kerry Thanks Iran for Releasing Kidnapped U.S. Sailors. Secretary of State John Kerry – who served in Vietnam – thanked Iran this morning for releasing the U.S. sailors that they detained yesterday. “I want to express my gratitude to Iranian authorities for their cooperation ‎in swiftly resolving this matter,” Kerry said in a short statement.