Sarah Westwood, Matt Schlapp, Francesca Chambers and Randy Adams joined WMAL on Thursday!

Mornings on the Mall

Thursday, September 14, 2017

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

5am – A/B/C   Congress sends resolution on Charlottesville to Trump that calls on him to speak out against white supremacy; Update: Trump will sign. (HotAir) – Pretty nervy of Ryan and McConnell. I thought the way they’d satisfy Democrats eager to censure Trump for his Charlottesville “very fine people on both sides” comments would be to pass a resolution that condemned the white nationalists and omitted any direct reference to POTUS. The resolution would refer to him *indirectly*, I assumed, by pointedly disagreeing with him that both sides bore blame, etc. But it wouldn’t challenge him directly. No way would a Republican-led Congress put a Republican president on the spot that way. It goes on to offer condolences for Heather Heyer and the two Virginia police officers whose chopper crashed and calls on Jeff Sessions and the DOJ to “investigate thoroughly all acts of violence, intimidation, and domestic terrorism by White supremacists, White nationalists, neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan, and associated groups.” There’s not a word in there about Antifa. Calling on Trump to denounce white supremacy is a strong signal from the GOP majority that they think his efforts so far have been lackluster, which would be noteworthy even if that was all there is to this.

5am – D/E     40% OF AMERICAN ADULTS SLEEP W/A TEDDY BEAR. Though many might never admit it publicly, a new survey finds that four in ten adult Americans still sleep with a teddy bear at night. And many of those bears are the same bears kept from childhood.

6am – A/B/C Democrats say they have deal with Trump on young immigrants. WASHINGTON (AP) — The top House and Senate Democrats said Wednesday they had reached agreement with President Donald Trump to protect thousands of younger immigrants from deportation and fund some border security enhancements — not including Trump’s long-sought border wall. The agreement, the latest instance of Trump ditching his own party to make common cause with the opposition, was announced by Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi following a White House dinner that Republican lawmakers weren’t invited to attend. It would enshrine protections for the nearly 800,000 immigrants brought illegally to this country as kids who had benefited from former President Barack Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program, which provided temporary work permits and shielded recipients from deportation. Trump ended the program earlier this month and gave Congress six months to come up with a legislative fix before the statuses of the so-called “Dreamers” begin to expire. “We agreed to enshrine the protections of DACA into law quickly, and to work out a package of border security, excluding the wall, that’s acceptable to both sides,” Pelosi and Schumer said in a joint statement. White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders partially disputed their characterization, saying over Twitter that “excluding the wall was certainly not agreed to.”

6am – D/E     CLINTON’S INSUFFERABLE BOOK TOUR:

• Clinton laments how Benghazi tragedy hurt her politically
• Hillary Clinton: “As a woman becomes more professionally successful, she is seen as less likable”
• Hillary Clinton on former FBI Director James Comey getting involved in the 2016 election: “It stopped my momentum”
• Hillary Clinton says it’s time to abolish the Electoral College
• Hillary Clinton: Ivanka Trump should be “judged and held accountable” for president’s agenda
• Hillary Clinton won’t forgive those who now say they regret not voting in the 2016 election Hillary Clinton responds to Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ criticism: “I honestly don’t pay much attention to what she says.”
• Hillary Clinton won’t forgive people who regret not voting in 2016
• Hillary Clinton Comparing Herself To An Incestuous Mass Murderer Is A Real Head-Scratcher

6am – F         MSNBC Anchor Recalls Night Trump Won: I Was ‘About To Throw Up’.

MSNBC’s Katy Tur describes her experience on election night in 2016 in a new book, revealing the emotions she felt when it became clear Donald Trump would win. In an MSNBC excerpt from her new book “Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History, she begins by saying “I’m about to throw up.” When Tur was told by a colleague that Trump was planning victory rallies, she writes, “My head is a helium balloon. Breathe. The panic mounts. More rallies? I am nearly falling over. More taunting crowds, more around-the-clock live shots, more airports, more earsplitting Pavarotti . . . I can’t. I just can’t.” Tur also talks frankly about her experience covering Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign, extending some sympathy to Trump voters, but also slamming the President. “Look, I get it. You can’t tell a joke without worrying you’ll lose your job. Your twenty-something can’t find work. Your town is boarded up. Patriotism gets called racism. Your food is full of chemicals. Your body is full of pills. You call tech support and reach someone in India,” Tur writes. However, she counters, “I don’t get why protesting a broken political system also means you need to protest the very notion of objective truth.”

‘My body freezes — my heart stops’: Journalist Katy Tur describes receiving an unwelcome kiss from Trump while covering 2016 campaign. In her new book about her time on the presidential campaign trail covering Donald Trump, MSNBC host Katy Tur described receiving an unwelcome greeting from the president: a kiss on the cheek. The incident happened before one of Trump’s appearances on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “Before I know what’s happening, his hands are on my shoulders and his lips are on my cheek,” Tur wrote. “My eyes widen. My body freezes. My heart stops.” The next thing that crossed her mind, she wrote, was: “F—. I hope the cameras didn’t see that. My bosses are never going to take me seriously. I didn’t have time to duck!” Following a 2015 interview with Trump, Tur recalled in “Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History,” the candidate told Tur, “You’ll never be president!”

7am – A         INTERVIEW – SARAH WESTWOOD – White House Correspondent at Washington Examiner

• Press Sec. says Pres. Trump will be in the Naples and Fort Myers area when he visits Florida tomorrow in the aftermath of Hurricane
• OMB’s Mulvaney Says Trump’s Focused on 15% Tax Rate  
• President Trump met with top Democrats to discuss DACA, Wednesday night.
• Donald J. Trump‏ @realDonaldTrump 39s39 seconds ago: Am leaving now for Florida to see our GREAT first responders and to thank the U.S. Coast Guard, FEMA etc. A real disaster, much work to do!
• Donald J. Trump‏@realDonaldTrump 30m30 minutes ago: …They have been in our country for many years through no fault of their own – brought in by parents at young age. Plus BIG border security
• Donald J. Trump‏ @realDonaldTrump 37m37 minutes ago: Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really!..
• Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump 45m45 minutes ago: The WALL, which is already under construction in the form of new renovation of old and existing fences and walls, will continue to be built.
• Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump 54m54 minutes ago: No deal was made last night on DACA. Massive border security would have to be agreed to in exchange for consent. Would be subject to vote.

7am – B         Jimmy Kimmel Asks Sean Spicer What’s Trump’s Obsession With Size — and ‘Have You Ever Seen the President Naked?’ (People) — After so many months of President Trump obsessing over his crowd sizes, Jimmy Kimmel went there Wednesday night with Trump’s former White House press secretary Sean Spicer.  “Why is he so concerned with size?” Kimmel asked Spicer, quickly following up with a jaw-dropping, “Have you ever seen the president naked?” Spicer, in his first late-night appearance since stepping down in July, replied with a simple, “No.”  But Kimmel wasn’t letting him off the hook, recalling Spicer’s first post-inauguration appearance in the White House press briefing room–an appearance that spawned the term “alternative facts” to explain how Spicer could, with a straight face, repeat Trump’s assertion that his was the biggest inauguration crowd in history.  “You are charged with going in front of the press and saying the inauguration crowd is the biggest crowd ever,” Kimmel said. “Yes, I’m aware,” replied 45-year-old Spicer.  “I appreciate the reminder how it went down.” Careful still today not to contradict Trump, Spicer self-deprecatingly admitted to just one regret about that unfortunate outing: the baggy suit he wore on-camera. “If it was up to you would [crowd size] have even been a topic?” Kimmel asked. “You know, if it was up to me I probably would have worn a different suit,” Spicer joked, later explaining: “It’s my job to speak on his behalf. So if you’re not speaking in the way that he wants, obviously he wanted to make sure he corrected that … He’s the president, he decides. That’s what you signed up to do.”

7am – C         DC plagued by record amount of rats… A downside to D.C.’s population growth? The growing number of rats. (Washington Post) — Nate Brown got married in a small town in Spain on July 1. When he returned home to the District, ahead of his wife, Ana, he realized he had a problem as soon as he entered his house in the Park View neighborhood. “It ate through all our food,” he said. “Literally, all of it.” The culprit, Brown knew, was a rat. Like many northeastern cities, the District has long struggled with rodents. But the problem has reached record levels in the nation’s capital, driven by a combination of factors. The city’s booming human population, along with hundreds of new restaurants and bars, means more trash. Recent mild winters mean fewer rats die from frigid temperatures. And construction across D.C. has disrupted subterranean burrows, sending the creatures scurrying onto sidewalks, into residential yards and, as Brown knows, into homes. Complaints to the city’s 311 phone line concerning rats are at a four-year high. There have been 3,286 calls this fiscal year, up 64 percent from fiscal year 2015, according to data from the Health Department.

7am – D         INTERVIEW – MATT SCHLAPP – chairman of the American Conservative Union – discussed Trump’s tax reform push, DACA deal and his wife Mercedes going to the White House.

7am – E         Lin-Manuel Miranda pushes for federal arts funding. WASHINGTON –Broadway phenom Lin-Manuel Miranda starred in a new kind of show Wednesday: Washington politics. The New Yorker held court in the halls of congress battling for arts and humanities government funding. “The arts aren’t left or right. The humanities aren’t left or right,” Miranda told a bipartisan group of New York lawmakers, according to source in one meeting with lawmakers. The “Hamilton” musical creator darted to his Capitol meetings — including one with Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Thad Cochran — while singing aboard the underground congressional subway in a members’ only cart. He got the special seating thanks to his hometown Rep. Adriano Espaillat and was joined by his father, Luis Miranda, a New York political consultant. He posted videos of himself belting show tunes on what would normally be a subdued Capitol commute for hardened Capitol Hill staffers and lawmakers.

Nancy Pelosi repeatedly slurs, flubs name of ‘Hamilton’ playwright. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi spoke for less than six minutes from a prepared text, but she couldn’t get through her remarks without repeatedly slurring and flubbing the name of a liberal playwright being honored by the U.S. Capitol Historical Society. Lin-Manuel Miranda, the author of the hit Broadway musical “Hamilton,” was at the Capitol on Tuesday to receive the Freedom Award. As Pelosi spoke, she repeatedly had trouble saying his name, and while closing her remarks, called him Lin-Manuel “Madonna.”

8am – A         INTERVIEW – Francesca Chambers – White House Correspondent at Daily Mail – discussed Trump’s Florida trip, tax reform push and DACA dinner last night

8am – B         COLLEGE NEWS:

• UPDATE: UVA remove shroud protesters put on Jefferson #statue
• Berkeley bans shields, smoke canisters for Ben Shapiro’s UC Berkeley speech
• Melissa Harris-Perry slams her bosses at Wake Forest for ‘totalitarian emails’

8am – C         DIVORCE NEWS:

• Anthony Scaramucci wants a paternity test for his newborn son. Anthony Scaramucci’s divorce is turning nasty, because he believes the newborn son whose birth he missed during his historically-brief tenure in the White House is not his – and he is demanding a paternity test. A source tells Page Six The Mooch believes estranged wife Deidre Ball could have been impregnated by someone else while he was away building his now famously-failed political career for President Donald Trump.
• Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin Appear Together in Divorce Court. Top Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her estranged husband, disgraced former congressman Anthony Weiner, appeared before a judge on Wednesday for their first hearing in divorce court. (People) – Top Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her estranged husband, disgraced former congressman Anthony Weiner, appeared before a judge on Wednesday for their first hearing in divorce court. The former couple, who share a 5-year-old son, wore solemn faces as they were pictured leaving court, where they reportedly asked for privacy in their divorce case. “Because there’s a child involved, we’d like to keep these proceedings secret to the extent your honor will allow,” said Abedin’s attorney, Amy Donehower, according to the Huffington Post.

8am – D         INTERVIEW – RANDY ADAMS – Chief Technology Officer of DRIAV (pronounced “drive”)

ABOUT RANDY:

• Randy helped invent the Adobe PDF

• He was one of Steve Job’s top software engineers for many years and

• Helped found Yahoo, and was one of its first board members … he’s a tech legend in Silicon Valley

• RANDY is an executive for a Silicon Valley-based tech firm and he is working with car companies and insurance industry in answering the question on insurance liability for self-driving cars. WHO IS AT FAULT WHEN A SELF-DRIVING CAR IS IN AN ACCIDENT??  RANDY is working on a black box-like technology and is creating the system to manage the problem of liability.

NEWS:

• House last week passed a bill that helped move forward self-driving standards nationwide
• The Senate is holding hearings this week (Thune/Commerce)
• NHTSA (National Highway Transportation Safety Board) released a report yesterday that placed some of the blame on Tesla’s self-driving car for the Florida crash a couple years ago. Driver Errors, Overreliance on Automation, Lack of Safeguards, Led to Fatal Tesla Crash. The National Transportation Safety Board determined Tuesday that a truck driver’s failure to yield the right of way and a car driver’s inattention due to overreliance on vehicle automation are the probable cause of the fatal May 7, 2016, crash near Williston, Florida. The NTSB also determined the operational design of the Tesla’s vehicle automation permitted the car driver’s overreliance on the automation, noting its design allowed prolonged disengagement from the driving task and enabled the driver to use it in ways inconsistent with manufacturer guidance and warnings. As a result of its investigation the NTSB issued seven new safety recommendations and reiterated two previously issued safety recommendations.

8am – E         TRUMP REACTS TO DACA DEAL NEWS:

• JUST IN: Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer say “President Trump’s tweets are not inconsistent with the agreement reached last night” over DACA

• Donald J. Trump‏ @realDonaldTrump 45m45 minutes ago: The WALL, which is already under construction in the form of new renovation of old and existing fences and walls, will continue to be built.
• Donald J. Trump‏ @realDonaldTrump 54m54 minutes ago: No deal was made last night on DACA. Massive border security would have to be agreed to in exchange for consent. Would be subject to vote.