Jonna Spilbor, Spencer Brown and Christian Toto joined WMAL on Friday!

Mornings on the Mall

Friday, July 21, 2017

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

5am – A/B   IQ costs Oregon parents their kids. (The Oregonian) — The nursery in Amy Fabbrini and Eric Ziegler’s home is filled with unread children’s books and unworn baby clothes. A Winnie the Pooh blanket lies untouched inside a crib where a child has never slept. For nearly four years, the Redmond couple has been fighting to prove to the state of Oregon that they are intellectually capable of raising their children. The Department of Human Services has removed both of their boys, saying the parents are too mentally limited to be good parents. Fabbrini, 31, and Ziegler, 38, lost custody of their older son, Christopher, shortly after he was born. Five months ago, the state took their second child, newborn Hunter, directly from the hospital. Both are now in foster care.  “I love kids, I was raised around kids, my mom was a preschool teacher for 20-plus years, and so I’ve always been around kids,” Fabbrini said. “That’s my passion. I love to do things with kids, and that’s what I want to do in the future, something that has to do with kids.” No abuse or neglect has been found, but each parent has a degree of limited cognitive abilities. Rather than build a network of support around them, the state child welfare agency has moved to terminate the couple’s parental rights and make the boys available for adoption.

5am –C   Linkin Park frontman Chester Bennington commits suicide. Linkin Park singer Chester Bennington committed suicide Thursday morning, according to TMZ. He was 41. Law enforcement insiders told the site Bennington hanged himself at a private home in Palos Verdes Estates in Los Angeles County. The Los Angeles County coroner confirmed that he was found dead at his home. Bennington’s tragic death Thursday also marks what would have been his close friend Chris Cornell‘s 53rd birthday. The Audioslave frontman took his own life earlier this spring. Bennington penned an emotional letter to Cornell on the day of his death, and performed Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” at the funeral services in late May. Bennington is survived by his wife, Talinda Ann Bentley, and his six children, three with Bentley and three from two previous relationships.

5am – D         More people are renting than at any other point in the past 50 years. In 2016, 36.6 percent of household heads rented their home, close to the 1965 number of 37 percent, according to a new report by the Pew Research Center based on data from the Census Bureau. Each month the Census Bureau surveys a nationally representative sample of households.

5am – E         Latest healthcare news:

• REPEAL VOTE FORCED? Rep. Tom Garrett announced his intent to file a discharge petition that would put that clean Obamacare repeal bill before the House. Garrett said, “I commend both the President and Republican leadership for working to replace the monstrosity that is Obamacare. However, we have seen discussions for replacement continue to stall and we must change our approach to reforming healthcare.”
• MAJORITY SAY THE GOV’T IS RESPONSIBLE FOR HEALTH CARE. A new poll suggests the country may be shifting toward the political left on the issue, with 62 percent saying it’s the federal government’s responsibility to make sure that all Americans have health care coverage, while 37 percent say it is not.
• SENATE HEALTH BILLS: There are a lot of health care bills and a lot of CBO scores floating around lately, and it’s getting confusing for everybody. Here’s what’s what: Majority Leader Mitch McConnell released the first version of his repeal-and-replace bill in June. He didn’t have the votes to pass it, so he started working on a revised proposal. In that process, Republicans actually sent in two sets of revisions for CBO to analyze. Today’s bill is one of those two options — the less ambitious one. It’s very similar to the initial bill, but with more money to stabilize insurance markets and some tax changes, too. That’s why today’s CBO numbers might sound familiar.  GOP leaders released the other option — the one with Cruz’s “consumer choice” proposal — last week. But CBO probably won’t have time to score Cruz’s proposal before the Senate votes. If and when senators actually votes on a health care bill, they could vote on either of these options — the one released today, or the one with Cruz’s proposal. It’s also possible both bills could get a vote. It’s also possible neither of them will get a vote. No one knows what they’re going to vote on, only that they will vote. There’s a third option: an updated version of the 2015 bill that repealed most of the Affordable Care Act without attempting to replace it. That’s the bill CBO scored yesterday, saying it would create about 32 million newly uninsured people.

6am – A/B/C Chris Hemsworth Thinks the Next James Bond Should Be a Woman. And He Has Someone In Mind. Can Agent 007 be a woman? Chris Hemsworth sure thinks so — and he has a particular actress in mind: his Snow White and the Huntsman co-star Charlize Theron. “She embodies every sort of ounce of strength and nobility and dignity and integrity that that character should have,” the actor told W Magazine. “She’s smart as hell. She’s physically able…Watching her in those fight scenes, doing it in high heels, by the way, and an eight-foot long gown was even more impressive.”

6am – D/E     Rumored DNC motto ripped straight from Papa John’s Pizza. (Washington Examiner) – Democrats have been having a rough go of things lately. They lost the White House in November 2016 to a historically unpopular candidate, and they’ve lost every single special election since then. It may come as an unpleasant surprise to the party’s supporters, then, to learn that the Democrats’ rumored message for the 2018 midterms is the following: “A Better Deal: Better Skills, Better Jobs, Better Wages.” Sweet fancy Moses. That’s basically the Papa John’s Pizza slogan (“Better ingredients. Better pizza. Papa John’s”), but in reverse. Amazingly enough, the Democrats’ message is reportedly “the result of months of polling and internal deliberations among the House Democratic caucus,” according to vox.com’s Jeff Stein.

6am – F         O.J. Simpson will be released in October after serving his minimum term for armed robbery and assault with a weapon. (AP) – “I basically have spent a conflict-free life,” the disgraced former NFL star said during his televised hearing on Thursday. O.J. Simpson was granted parole Thursday after more than eight years in prison for a Las Vegas hotel heist, successfully making his case in a nationally televised hearing that reflected America’s enduring fascination with the former football star. The board decided unanimously that the 70-year-old former football, TV and movie star will be released in October after serving his minimum term for armed robbery and assault with a weapon. Simpson, 70, could be a free man as early as Oct. 1. By then, he will have served the minimum of his nine- to 33-year armed-robbery sentence for a bungled attempt to snatch sports memorabilia and other mementos he claimed had been stolen from him.

7am – A         Maxine Waters: I’ll Run For President If Millennials Want Me To. (Daily Caller) — WASHINGTON — California Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters, a favorite among liberal progressives, told The Daily Caller Thursday that this weekend’s scheduled appearance in New Hampshire has nothing to do with potentially running for president in 2020. But she said that she would run for president if millennials want her to. “I’m just going up to do a county Democratic thing. That’s all,” she said. When TheDC pressed further, Waters, an outspoken critic of President Donald Trump, said laughing, “I’m not running for anything but my own seat. I don’t have any presidential aspirations. If the millennials want me to do it, I’d do it, though.” The California Democrat, who is in her 14th term representing a large swath of south central Los Angeles, has previously called for Trump’s impeachment. “Mr. Speaker, my position against this president and his administration is clear. I oppose this president. I do not honor this president. I do not respect this president,” Waters said during a floor speech.

7am – B/C     INTERVIEW — SPENCER BROWN – Spokesman, Young America’s Foundation

• Berkeley blocks Ben Shapiro lecture slated for September. After a spring marked by controversies involving free speech rights, the University of California, Berkeley has blocked a student-led effort to host popular conservative author Ben Shapiro for a campus lecture this fall. In a statement sent to the Washington Examiner on Wednesday evening, Young America’s Foundation announced that administrators informed the Berkeley College Republicans in an email this week they were “unable to identify an available campus venue” to host the lecture, which was slated for Sept. 14. The administrators, identified by YAF as Dean of Students Joseph Greenwell and Student Organization Coordinator Millicent Morris Chaney, claimed the lecture was spiked “despite extensive efforts.” “Ben Shapiro is welcome on our campus, and we are committed to supporting his, and your, rights to free speech,” the administrators contended in their message to students, which was sent Tuesday. YAF is skeptical. “Berkeley’s inability to find a lecture hall more than two months in advance is laughable,” the Foundation declared in its statement, noting the university’s insistence that it can only host Shapiro “when events are held at a time and location that allow for the provision of any required security measures.”

7am – D         INTERVIEW – JONNA SPILBOR – attorney and legal analyst

• O.J. Simpson will be released in October after serving his minimum term for armed robbery and assault with a weapon

7am – E         Elon Musk says he has ‘verbal govt approval’ for D.C.-to-New York Hyperloop. (Washington Post) – Transportation pioneer Elon Musk has been known to talk big and sometimes overpromise. But the Tesla chief and rocket builder took it up a notch Thursday, offering a tantalizing but so-far-undocumented announcement that his tunnel-boring company had received a verbal government green light to build a super-high-speed pod-and-tube transportation system, which he calls Hyperloop, for travel between Washington and New York. “Just received verbal govt approval for The Boring Company to build an underground NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop. NY-DC in 29 mins,” he wrote on Twitter. Questioners on Twitter asked one of the obvious ones: Who gave the permission? Musk did not offer details. But the Trump administration did not knock the notion down. Musk appeared to do a little moderating as the day wore on. “Still a lot of work needed to receive formal approval, but am optimistic that will occur rapidly,” he wrote in a later tweet. Hours later, he followed with another tweet: “If you want this to happen fast, please let your local & federal elected representatives know. Makes a big difference if they hear from you.” Even if official federal permission is forthcoming, the need for local ones is a potential major complication. Leif Dormsjo, director of the District’s Department of Transportation, said, “I’m completely unaware of any request to the District government to permit or review anything related to an Elon Musk project.” “This is news to City Hall,” said a spokesman for New York Mayor Bill de Blasio (D). Musk has had “no contact” with city officials, a spokesman for Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney said.

8am – A         INTERVIEW — CHRISTIAN TOTO — Film Critic and Host of “The Hollywood in Toto” podcast  (available on iTunes)

• TOPICS: Dunkirk, Spiderman, summer flicks and HBO’s controversial “Confederate: series
• What other summer films should we look out for? Any big summer flicks this summer?
• NEW MOVIE: “DUNKIRK”: Why are people obsessed with Dunkirk? What is it about?
• The Guardian: Dunkirk review – Christopher Nolan’s apocalyptic war epic is his best film so far
• Not Enough ‘Women’, ‘People of Color’ in ‘Dunkirk,’ USA Today Complains: USA Today’s reviewer couldn’t resist giving it a little rap on the knuckles about its shameful lack of diversity and equality: “The trio of timelines can be jarring as you figure out how they all fit, and the fact that there are only a couple of women and no lead actors of color may rub some the wrong way.” Yes, it’s true that Dunkirk’s leading roles are indeed dominated by white European males. But one possible reason for this is that Dunkirk was an actual historical event which director Christopher Nolan has gone to considerable trouble to recreate as accurately as possible.
• ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’ Not Woke Enough for SJW Critics. (Christian Toto) –  Marvel’s newest superhero film features an aggressively diverse cast of characters. Critics still have a bone to pick with the movie. The new “Spider-Man: Homecoming” is so woke it stings. Only it isn’t enough. Anyone shocked?

8am – B         TRUMP’S LEGAL TEAM NEWS:

• Spokesman for Trump’s legal team resigns just two months after starting. (Politico) –  The spokesman for President Donald Trump’s legal team has resigned within two months of being on the job, according to people familiar with the matter. Mark Corallo, the spokesman, had grown frustrated with the operation and the warring factions and lawyers, these people said. Corallo also was concerned about whether he was being told the truth about various matters, one of these people said.
• Trump reshuffling legal team (CNN) President Donald Trump is reshuffling his legal team as special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation moves full steam ahead. Marc Kasowitz, Trump’s longtime personal attorney who has been the lead lawyer on the Russia investigation, will see his role recede, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter. Instead, attorney John Dowd, along with Jay Sekulow, will now be the President’s primary personal attorneys for the investigation, according to the two sources with knowledge of the situation. Dowd will take the lead.

8am – C         Usher reportedly paid $1.1M to woman he allegedly infected with herpes. (NY Daily News) – Usher paid out $1.1 million to settle a lawsuit with a stylist who claimed the pop star infected her with herpes, court papers show. The documents were first published Wednesday by Radar Online, but they appear to date to late 2012. The 38-year-old “Confessions” singer, whose real name is Usher Raymond IV, was diagnosed with herpes in 2009 or 2010, according to the court papers.  But nonetheless, he had unprotected sex with the claimant without confessing that he was carrying the virus, the papers add.  The law is clear in California: It is illegal to knowingly or recklessly transmit an STD.

8am – D/E     Texas school district approves paddling misbehaving students.

Officials at a Texas school district have approved a controversial new disciplinary practice on students: paddling. The Three Rivers Independent School board of trustees in South Texas approved the policy Tuesday, which would allow for paddles to be used as corporal punishment against misbehaving students. Corporal punishment is defined by the Texas Classroom Teachers Association (TCTA) as “deliberate infliction of physical pain by hitting, paddling, spanking, slapping or any other physical force used as a means of discipline.”

• VIRGINIA: Virginia Corporal Punishment in Public Schools Laws. The use of physical force, such as spanking or paddling, as a means of discipline is referred to as “corporal punishment.” Most states, including Virginia, now prohibit the use of corporal punishment in public schools.
• MARYLAND: Is corporal punishment illegal in Maryland? To be clear, Maryland does not permit physical discipline, such as paddling or spanking, in public schools. This is in line with a majority of states that have also banned corporal punishment in public schools.
• DC: The use of corporal punishment in Washington, D.C. public schools was prohibited in 1977.