Cybersecurity expert Morgan Wright, Judicial Watch’s Tom Fitton, CNN’s Dylan Byers and guest host Vince Coglianese joined WMAL on Wednesday!

Mornings on the Mall

Wednesday, January 4, 2017

Hosts: Brian Wilson and Vince Coglianese

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

 

5am – A         Q & A with VINCE COGLIANESE, Daily Caller’s Editor-In-Chief

5am – B         Republican-led Congress denies D.C. delegate a vote. Again. (Washington Post) — On the first day of the 115th Congress, members buzzed Tuesday about the repeal of President Obama’s health-care law, tax reform and whether to gut the ethics office. All Eleanor Holmes Norton wanted to discuss was a vote. And a symbolic one at that. For the fourth consecutive session, Norton (D), the non­voting D.C. representative, formally asked the speaker of the House for the ability to vote on amendments and procedural issues. Again, she was thwarted.

5am – C         Lights Out for Washington Monument. (NBC Washington) — It is a prominent image in the skyline of Washington, D.C., but it was a dark blot as the lights at the Washington Monument went out Tuesday night. Pepco said the problem is not on their end. A spokesman for the National Park Service said they are trying to get the light back on. The spokeman said preliminary investigation indicated an issue with the automated program that controls the lights likely caused the outage at the Washington Monument. NPS electricians will confirm the possible problem Wednesday morning.

5am – D         Megyn Kelly will leave Fox News after 12 years to join NBC. Megyn Kelly, the popular cable news anchor who clashed with president-elect Donald Trump during his campaign, is leaving Fox News after 12 years to join rival NBC. The surprise appointment was announced Tuesday by NBC News Chairman Andy Lack, who personally handled the negotiation to lure Kelly away from the top-rated cable news channel. Kelly’s future had drawn heavy interest following management upheaval at Fox News last year. By poaching her from Fox News, NBC added an ascending news star to its anchor lineup and keeps her away from competitors CNN and ABC, which had expressed interest in signing her. “Megyn is an exceptional journalist and news anchor, who has had an extraordinary career,” Lack said in a memo sent to staffers. “She’s demonstrated tremendous skill and poise, and we’re lucky to have her.” Kelly, 46, is getting a daytime show, which could be scheduled after the “Today” show, where it can take advantage of the program’s lead-in. Kelly has also been promised a prime-time news magazine that will air on Sundays during the months when the network is not carrying “Sunday Night Football.” She will also be part of the network’s political and special event coverage. There is no provision for her to work for NBC’s cable news channel MSNBC.

5am – E         ASSANGE’S HANNITY INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS:

• Julian Assange: Russian government not the source of leaked emails
• Wikileaks’ Assange: ‘A 14-year-old kid could have hacked Podesta’ emails

6am – A/B/C Driverless Cars: Are You Ready To Give Up Control?

• Driverless cars get trade show treatment in Las Vegas. LAS VEGAS — A host of autonomous autos are hitting the road at this week’s Consumer Electronics Show. Ford Motor Co. is showing off a prototype driverless vehicle based on its Fusion hybrid. Fiat Chrysler will demonstrate a semi-autonomous minivan and discuss its alliance with Waymo, the Google spin-off company that’s been working for years on self-driving cars. Honda is expected to demonstrate a small electric autonomous prototype. And then there’s Hyundai, which started offering ride-alongs in its new computer-controlled Ioniq sedan to curious journalists on Tuesday, two days before the show’s official opening. “Everyone’s getting in because they have to,” said Mike Ramsey, automotive technology analyst for Gartner Inc. “If you want to be taken seriously, you’ve got to get into the game.” And yet Ramsey cautioned that fully autonomous cars are nowhere near ready to conquer the roads. Even if Ford fulfills its pledge at last year’s Consumer Electronics Show to start selling such a car by 2021, Ramsey said that the vehicle would probably sell for around $100,000, largely because of the expensive computers, sensors, and software needed to make it work.
• ‘Kids born today will never drive,’ says Robot Valley champion. Hired in July to run University of California (UC) San Diego’s new Contextual Robotics Institute, Danish-born Professor Henrik Christensen says in a recent interview with the San Diego Union-Tribune: “My own prediction is that kids born today will never get to drive a car.”

6am – D         Ivanka Trump Will Move into a House in Kalorama. (Washingtonian) – Washington Fine Properties co-owner William F.X. Moody tells Washingtonian that Ivanka Trump has completed a deal for a house in DC.  A team of Washington Fine Properties agents represented Trump. The firm also represented the house’s owner in the transaction. Moody would not disclose the house’s location, citing contractual obligations to the client not to share that information. However, multiple real-estate sources say Trump and husband Jared Kushner will move into 2449 Tracy Pl, NW, in Kalorama. That will put the couple less than two blocks from the Obamas, who will reportedly move here post-White House. The six-bedroom house at 2449 Tracy Place sold on December 22nd for $5.5 million, though it is unclear whether Trump and Kushner bought it, or will rent it from the recent buyer.

6am – E         House Republicans drop plan to gut ethics office. (USA Today) — WASHINGTON — After public denunciations from watchdogs and criticism from President-elect Donald Trump, House Republicans on Tuesday reversed course and dropped plans to gut an independent agency that polices potential ethical wrongdoing by lawmakers. The controversy over GOP plans to sharply curtail the powers of the Office of Congressional Ethics overshadowed the opening day of Congress, where Republicans control both chambers and soon will welcome a Republican president for the first time in eight years.

6am – F         Coal Fire, Not Just Iceberg, Doomed the Titanic, a Journalist Claims. (NY Times) — LONDON — Maybe it wasn’t just the iceberg. Ever since the Titanic sank more than 104 years ago, killing more than 1,500 men, women and children, mystery has swirled around the tragedy. No one doubts that the ship collided at high speed with an iceberg off the coast of Newfoundland. But a new documentary posits that the sinking of the ship — hailed at the time as the largest ever built, and praised for its professed unsinkability — may have been accelerated by a giant coal fire in its hull that appeared to have started as long as three weeks before it set off on its fateful journey to New York from Southampton, England. In the documentary, which was broadcast on Channel 4 in Britain on New Year’s Day, Senan Molony, an Irish journalist who has spent more than 30 years researching the Titanic, contends that the fire, in a three-story-high bunker next to one of the ship’s boiler rooms, damaged its hull, helping to seal its fate long before it slammed into the iceberg.

7am – A         INTERVIEW — MORGAN WRIGHT- Senior Fellow, Center for Digital Government, former executive at Cisco & Alcatel-Lucent and former senior advisor for the US Department of State Antiterrorism Assistance Program

• Hannity Interview: Wikileaks founder Assange: Russia wasn’t the source of DNC and Hillary hacked emails
• Wikileaks’ Assange: ‘A 14-year-old kid could have hacked Podesta’ emails

7am – B         Critter News:

• “Sir Hiss”: Anaconda found in Arlington County apartment toilet. WASHINGTON — An Arlington County animal control team was surprised when a call about a snake in an apartment’s toilet last week turned out to be a much larger reptile. On Dec. 27, Arlington County Animal Control received a call about a snake in a toilet at an apartment building in the South Arlington area on South 31st Street — not an uncommon occurrence, said Chelsea Lindsey, the agency’s communication specialist.  “Usually those calls are nothing we are too concerned about,” Lindsey said. “Normally we deal with smaller snakes [in toilets] like wild snake or ball pythons, but we discovered it wasn’t a python, it was a yellow anaconda.” The anaconda, which Lindsey estimates was between 4 and 5 feet long, stayed with Arlington County Animal Control for a few days until a specialist familiar with the species could take it away and care for it. Fully grown, yellow anacondas can be up to 13 feet long and weigh more than 100 pounds. No one was injured during the rescue. While the yellow anaconda is not venomous, the species can be dangerous when they reach full size and are not well socialized. During the rescue, the anaconda — which the animal control team named “Sir Hiss” — was scared of the situation, instead of aggressive.
• In Unpleasant Feat, Baltimore Tops List of Bed Bug-Infested Cities. (Baltimore Fishbowl) — Baltimore has another pest-related accomplishment to add to its resume, courtesy of the bug- and mouse-obsessed folks over at Orkin. The pest control professionals released a list today that says Charm City is the most bed bug-infested city in the country. Baltimore made a troublingly ambitious rise in the rankings since last year, when it placed 10th on a list of 50 cities. In 2016, we supplanted Chicago, which fell from first to third, and jumped Washington D.C, New York City, Los Angeles, Detroit and Philadelphia, among other cities in the top 10. “In the six years Orkin has released the bed bug city rankings, this is the first time Baltimore has made the top five,” the company said excitedly on its website.

7am – C         So Tony Kornheiser, Maury Povich and Gary Williams walk into a classic D.C. bar. Then they buy it.  (Washington Post) — Tony Kornheiser announced on his podcast Tuesday that an ownership group that includes himself, former Maryland basketball coach Gary Williams and TV host Maury Povich purchased Chad’s, the longtime Friendship Heights restaurant and bar. Kornheiser said the group plans to rename the former Chadwick’s, soliciting naming suggestions from his podcast listeners, among others. He also said he would like to put a studio in the Wisconsin Avenue hangout, where he could record his podcasts and potentially host other local podcasters. The news was strongly hinted at in a Washington Post piece earlier this week. (I’m trying to figure out how Kornheiser, Williams and Povich rank in celebrity status. I’m failing.) The restaurant, located a few blocks from the Maryland-D. C. border, has long been a favorite haunt for media personalities, including many veteran sportswriters and employees of the nearby Fox 5, where Povich once worked. It’s also long been a gathering spot for coaches from American University, where Williams once worked. Former WTEM host Rich Gilgallon is a former Chadwick’s bartender, and some of your favorite D.C. broadcasters have probably been there once or twice.

7am – D         INTERVIEW – TOM FITTON – President of Judicial Watch

• House Republicans drop plan to gut ethics office. (USA Today) — WASHINGTON — After public denunciations from watchdogs and criticism from President-elect Donald Trump, House Republicans on Tuesday reversed course and dropped plans to gut an independent agency that polices potential ethical wrongdoing by lawmakers.
• Judicial Watch Calls Upon House to Retain Congressional Ethics Office. (Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton today made the following statement regarding the proposed change to House rules that would eliminate its Office of Congressional Ethics: “It is shameful that House Republicans are trying to destroy the Office of Congressional Ethics, the most significant ethics reform in Congress when it was established nearly a decade ago.  This drive-by effort to eliminate the Office of Congressional Ethics, which provides appropriate independence and transparency to the House ethics process, is a poor way for the Republican majority to begin “draining the swamp.”  The American people will see this latest push to undermine congressional ethics enforcement as shady and corrupt.  The full House should seriously consider whether it wants to bear the brunt of public outrage and go through with the rule change this afternoon.”

7am – E         Wendy’s Owned A Twitter Troll So Hard They Deactivated Their Account. (Buzzfeed) — Last week, the Wendy’s Twitter account posted this tweet about how the company only uses fresh beef.

• Wendy’s @Wendys: Our beef is way too cool to ever be frozen. 😎 6:24 PM – 30 Dec 2016

On Monday, however, a Twitter user named @NHride decided to come at the fast food social media account, accusing it of using frozen beef and calling it a joke.

• Thuggy-D @NHride: @Wendys your beef is frozen and we all know it. y’all we laugh at your slogan “fresh, never frozen” right? Like you’re really a joke.”
• @Wendys: @NHride: sorry to hear you think that! But you’re wrong, we’ve only ever used fresh beef since we were founded in 1969″
• Thuggy-D @nHride: @wendys so you deliver it raw on a hot truck?
• Wendys @wendys: @NHride where do you store cold things that aren’t frozen?

That’s when the social media manager behind the Wendy’s account decided to totally own them.

• Thuggy-D @NhRide: @wendys y’all should give up. @mcdonalds got you guys beat with the dope ass breakfast
• Wendys: @NHride you dont have bring them into this just because you forgot refrigerators existed for a second there

In fact, it seems @NHride was owned so completely that they deactivated their account.

8am – A         Trump and Ford, GM News:

• Ford, Criticized by Trump, Cancels Plans to Build Mexican Plant. DETROIT — Donald J. Trump has promised to change the way American automakers do business. Less than three weeks before his inauguration as president, he has already knocked the companies on their heels. In a stunning reversal, Ford Motor, the nation’s second-largest automaker, said on Tuesday that it would scrap plans to build a small-car assembly plant in Mexico that Mr. Trump has repeatedly criticized. Just a few hours earlier, Mr. Trump threatened to impose tariffs on cars made in Mexico by General Motors, the nation’s largest automaker. His message forced the company to defend itself.
• Trump threat to GM: Make the Chevy Cruze in U.S. ‘or pay big border tax.’ General Motors is the latest target of President-elect Donald Trump’s Twitter cannon, with the Manhattan billionaire complaining that the American automaker is manufacturing cars in Mexico and importing them into the U.S. without penalty. “General Motors is sending Mexican made model of Chevy Cruze to U.S. car dealers-tax free across border. Make in U.S.A. or pay big border tax!” Trump wrote on Twitter Tuesday morning. Speaking later Tuesday morning to CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Trump’s senior adviser Kellyanne Conway said the president-elect likely authored the GM post personally: “I would imagine he sent out that tweet. I’ve watched him tweet many times.” The president-elect promised throughout the campaign to punish American companies that move jobs abroad by slapping them with a 35 percent tax on imported goods. He also railed against free trade agreements and was especially critical of NAFTA, which he said allowed companies to easily move jobs from the U.S. to Mexico. He would regularly claim in stump speeches that an unnamed factory-building friend of his referred to manufacturing in Mexico as “the eighth wonder of the world.”

8am – B         Entertainment News:

• Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: ‘The Bachelor’ Is Killing Romance in America. Abdul-Jabbar thinks ‘The Bachelor’ is bad for society. NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has a few issues with ABC’s reality dating competition, The Bachelor. In a new guest column for The Hollywood Reporter, Abdul-Jabbar accused the show of favoring certain contestants based on race or body type, and promoting unrealistic romantic standards. “You’re not even in the running for love unless you fit a very narrow ideal of Ken and Barbie doll physical beauty,” he wrote. “These shows promote the scorched-earth effects of raising females to be continually judged physically above all other attributes and then measured against impossible physical standards that has marginalized a majority of girls and women — and made billions for the beauty products, clothing, and cosmetic surgery industries.”
• President Obama to host a goodbye party at the White House on Friday. (Washington Post) — January 2017 will definitely see an onslaught of A-list tourists at the White House. But they’re not coming for the inauguration. President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama will host a goodbye party for close friends and major donors Friday, according to a person with knowledge of the marquee affair. The Obamas themselves confirmed during an interview with People Magazine last month that they’d have one final bash at the White House. The president told a young fan that they’d have a “grown up” party before packing their bags. Old standbys such as singer Usher and actor Samuel L. Jackson will most likely be there, according to another person with knowledge of the invitees.  Also currently practicing their sweet moves are media titan Oprah Winfrey, who snagged an exit interview with the first lady last month on her fellow invitee and bestie Gayle King’s network CBS; actor Bradley Cooper, who showed up to the French state dinner sans underpants; Beyoncé, who sang at both of Obama’s inaugurations, and her husband, rapper Jay Z. We’re also hearing that Stevie Wonder, who has performed at the White House, director J.J. Abrams and director George Lucas make the list.
• Star Wars spin-off film on young Han Solo ‘delayed seven months.’ (Daily Mail) — The release date of the next Star Wars origin film may have been pushed back. The forthcoming spin-off movie, Star Wars: Han Solo, will be about how Han, played by Harrison Ford, 74, in four of the original Star Wars movies, first came to be a smuggler and a thief. But this anthology film may not be released until December 13, 2018, even though the official release day is still May 25, 2018, according to fan site Making Star Wars. If the change takes place, it will likely be due to the success of both Star Wars: Episode VII, The Force Awakens and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, both of which had December release dates in 2015 and 2016 respectively, according to Screen Rant. The release date for the upcoming continuation of the original series, Star Wars: Episode VIII, has already been shifted from May to December in 2017, also reported by Screen Rant with the December release confirmed by IMDB.
• Woody Harrelson In Talks For Han Solo Movie. (Deadline) – Woody Harrelson is in early talks to play a key role in Disney’s Han Solo movie, the next Star Wars stand-alone film that stars Alden Ehrenreich in the origin story of one of the franchise’s most iconic characters. Phil Lord and Chris Miller are directing the pic, which already has brought aboard Donald Glover as young Lando Calrissian and Emilia Clarke. Deadline has confirmed the Harrelson talks; Disney declined comment. The untitled Han Solo movie is the second in the Star Wars stand-alone franchise that begin with last month’s bow of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, which has made $802 million worldwide already. The new pic has already staked out a May 25, 2018 release date.

8am – C         Lights Out for Washington Monument. (NBC Washington) — It is a prominent image in the skyline of Washington, D.C., but it was a dark blot as the lights at the Washington Monument went out Tuesday night. Pepco said the problem is not on their end. A spokesman for the National Park Service said they are trying to get the light back on.

8am – D         INTERVIEW – DYLAN BYERS – senior reporter for media and politics at CNN.

• Can Megyn Kelly succeed at NBC? (CNN/Dylan Byers) — NBC News succeeded in luring Megyn Kelly away from Fox News. Now comes the hard part. While Kelly and NBC celebrated Tuesday’s announcement, executives and insiders at rival networks have been left feeling baffled by the decision to have Kelly host shows in daytime and on Sunday nights — two extremely challenging arenas, both fraught with risk. “I’m jealous of NBC for hiring her because she’s a rock star, but the degree of difficulty here is extremely high,” one executive at another network said. “If she survives the trial by fire of daytime and Sunday nights, the bet is unbelievable. If not, she could end up fading into obscurity.” NBCUniversal News Group chairman Andy Lack announced Tuesday that Kelly would join the network later this year as host of both an hour-long daily daytime news program and a Sunday primetime newsmagazine. The timing of when both shows will premiere, and at exactly what times they will air, is still to be determined. Both daytime and Sunday nights present big challenges for NBC and Kelly. Previous TV news talents who have made the jump to daytime include Katie Couric, Anderson Cooper and Meredith Vieira. All three of their shows were canceled within a few years.

8am – E         DRAMA OVER SEN. JEFF SESSIONS NOMINATION:

• Liberal Groups Coordinate Against Jeff Sessions’ Nomination for Attorney General. (Breitbart) – Several liberal groups emerged on Tuesday to launch a coordinated slam against the confirmation of Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions for U.S Attorney General. The groups, including advocates for legal pot, higher status for gays and for additional race-related regulation, appears to be part of a coordinated campaign against him prior to Senate confirmation hearings on Jan. 10 and Jan. 11. A group representing the NAACP occupied a room in Sessions’ office in Mobile, Alabama. They sat on the floor, raised the militant black power fist and even tweeted their actions during the day.
• NAACP stages sit-in to protest Sessions for Atty General: Arrest us or withdraw your name
• Confirmation hearing for Trump’s AG pick Jeff Sessions set for Jan. 10-11 at Russell Senate Office Building, per Senate Judiciary Committee.