Rep. Andy Harris, Susan Ferrechio and VA Del. Tim Hugo joined WMAL on Thursday morning!

Mornings on the Mall

Thursday, November 21, 2017

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

5am – A/B/C   VOTERS THINK THE ECONOMY IS DOING GREAT, BUT GIVE OBAMA THE CREDIT: A total of 63 percent of American voters say in a poll released today the nation’s economy is “excellent” or “good,” while 34 percent say it is “not so good” or “poor,” the highest positive rating for the economy since the Quinnipiac University Poll began asking the question in 2001. A total of 76 percent of voters describe their own financial situation as “excellent” or “good,” as 23 percent say “not so good” or “poor,” the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe- ack) University Poll finds. President Barack Obama is mostly responsible for the state of the economy, 45 percent of voters, including 29 percent of Republicans, say, while 43 percent say President Donald Trump is responsible.

DO DEMOCRATS HAVE THE MOMENTUM GOING IN TO THE MID-TERMS? Democrats’ already wide advantage over Republicans in a hypothetical Congressional matchup has grown, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS. At the same time, enthusiasm about voting next year has increased among Democrats nationwide following an unexpected win in Alabama’s Senate special election and a strong showing in Virginia’s state government elections last month.

5am – D/E     Congress Approves Final Tax Reform Bill, Handing Trump Year-End Victory

6am – A         TERROR ATTACK DOWN UNDER: At least 14 injured after vehicle rams into busy Melbourne street; two arrested. A vehicle plowed into a busy sidewalk in the Australian city of Melbourne on Thursday, injuring at least 14 people, authorities said. The driver and another man have been arrested. Police said it was a “deliberate act.” Commander Russell Barrett, of Victoria Police, told a news conference that several of the injured were in critical condition. He said the motive for the attack wasn’t yet known. When asked if police had ruled out terrorism, Barrett said: “At this stage it’s early days in the investigation and the motivation is unknown.”

6am – B         WALMART IS TESTING OUT SOME NEW CONCEPTS (Recode) — A new Walmart subsidiary, called Code Eight, has recently started testing a personal shopping service for “busy NYC moms,” according to multiple sources, with the goal of letting them get product recommendations and make purchases simply through text messaging. Walmart’s startup incubator, Store No. 8, is also working on another under-the-radar project, dubbed Project Kepler. This effort aims to reimagine the in-store shopping experience with the help of technologies like computer vision. Multiple people familiar with the project tell Recode that one goal of the initiative is the creation of physical stores that would operate without checkout lines or cashiers — in a similar fashion to Amazon’s futuristic Amazon Go store, which was announced a year ago but has yet to open to the public.

6am – C         Ring in 2018 with WMAL at the Hilton McLean Tysons Corner! Join WMAL’s Chris Plante, Larry O’Connor, Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese at the WMAL New Year’s Eve all-inclusive gala!

6am – D         INTERVIEW — CONGRESSMAN ANDY HARRIS – R-MD (M.D.)

• Congress Approves Final Tax Reform Bill, Handing Trump Year-End Victory
• Hogan pledges to protect Md. residents from higher state taxes due to GOP tax bill

6am – E         MILLENNIALS ARE LEAVING DC: The most recent city data show that while the median age of those moving into the District is about 26, the median age of those migrating out is 29. Of the 59,000 people who left the District in 2012, about 44 percent ranged from 20 to 34 years old. Those leaving were likely to be college-educated and have an income above $50,000.

These Cities Have Already Reached ‘Peak Millennial’ as Young People Begin to Leave (Time) — Millennials flocked to U.S. cities over the past decade, but in some places, the migration appears to be reversing. After years of growth, the population of millennials in Boston and Los Angeles has fallen since 2015, with more young people leaving the cities than arriving last year, according to the latest Census data. And millennial growth has slowed in large hubs like Chicago, New York and Washington, D.C. Dowell Myers, professor of demography at the University of Southern California, first suggested in 2015 that cities would begin to see declines in millennials. With the largest birth group turning 27 this year, Myers says it’s only a matter of time before millennials head to the suburbs for more space. To see which cities have reached “peak millennial” — a term Myers coined —we analyzed a decade of Census data through 2016.

6am – F         Disney World’s Trump robot has been the object of ridicule. People think Disney repurposed a Hillary Clinton robot to look like Donald Trump. Strap in for a new political conspiracy theory involving Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, and … Disney World?  The most magical place on Earth delivered a sneak peek of its newly refurbished Hall of Presidents exhibit Monday with a new addition: Donald Trump. Yes, there is a now a creepy, talking robot version of Donald Trump at Disney World. While there were plenty of jokes to be had about how awful the Trump robot looked, a few people started to point out that it looked strikingly similar to Trump’s election opponent, Hillary Clinton. Or Jon Voight, but also Hillary Clinton.

7am – A         CUFFING SEASON: Looking for love? Online dating hits “peak season” the day after Christmas, Match says. Dating during the holidays? Peak dating season is almost here, according to Match. (USA Today) – While many people are painfully aware of their single status during the holidays, relief could be on the way.  According to online dating service Match, peak dating season begins Dec. 26 and runs through Valentine’s Day, with the dating site seeing 50 million messages sent and 1 million dates taking place during peak season. In the midst of peak season, online dating’s busiest day of the year falls on Sunday, Jan. 7.  While jumping back into the dating pool around the holidays not seem like an ideal situation, Laurel House, Match’s dating expert and authorScrewing the Rules:The No-Games Guide Love, said there’s no wrong time to get back into the dating pool.

7am – B/C     INTERVIEW — SUSAN FERRECHIO – is the chief congressional correspondent for the Washington Examiner

• GOP still has ‘no specific direction’ on spending bill with shutdown looming. (Washington Examiner by Susan Ferrechio and Al Weaver) — House Republicans Wednesday set a tentative plan to take up a short-term spending bill that would keep the government funded until Jan. 19, but planned to strip out a year-long defense funding measure that faced a Senate filibuster, and was likely to set up a separate vote on a new disaster relief package. Republicans met in the Capitol basement shortly after returning from a celebratory meeting at the White House, where they cheered passage of a major tax overhaul.

7am – D         SPORTS NEWS:

• Former NBA player’s No. 1 goal right now is the return of his stolen toilet (Washington Post) – If you’re in the Dallas area and someone tries to sell you a used toilet from the back of a van or on Craigslist, please call the police. The commode probably belongs to former Mavericks big man Charlie Villanueva, who tweeted out a photo of the crime scene Tuesday night. We’ve blacked out the offending profanity Villanueva used in his tweet but, given the nature of the crime, you can probably guess what it is. Villanueva said some other things were taken as well and expressed his displeasure that Dallas police were taking so long to respond (to be fair, the department has experienced a “perfect storm” of manpower issues).
• LaVar Ball says he’s starting a Big Baller basketball league for nation’s top players who don’t want to go to college, says he will pay up to $10K a month (ESPN) — LaVar Ball said Wednesday that he is launching a basketball league for nationally ranked players who have graduated from high school but don’t want to go to college. Ball said his Junior Basketball Association — which he said is fully funded by his Big Baller Brand — plans to pay the lowest-ranked player a salary of $3,000 a month and the best player $10,000 a month. Ball is looking for 80 players to fill 10 teams that will seek to play at NBA arenas in Los Angeles, Dallas, Brooklyn and Atlanta. “Getting these players is going to be easy,” Ball told ESPN. “This is giving guys a chance to get a jump start on their career, to be seen by pro scouts; and we’re going to pay them, because someone has to pay these kids.” The new Junior Basketball Association logo features the outline of Lonzo Ball. Big Baller Brand

7am – E         Ring in 2018 with WMAL at the Hilton McLean Tysons Corner! Join WMAL’s Chris Plante, Larry O’Connor, Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese at the WMAL New Year’s Eve all-inclusive gala!

8am – A         IMMIGRATION NEWS:

• ‘People here live in fear’: MS-13 menaces a community seven miles from the White House
• BORDER WALL: “I may be going [to the U.S.-Mexico border] very shortly to look at [border wall prototypes] in their final form. We’ll be building the wall,” President Trump says
• COST OF LEGALIZING DREAMERS: Nearly one-in-five amnestied aliens could go on food stamps if Congress approves a DACA amnesty, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.

8am – B/C     INTERVIEW — VA DEL. TIM HUGO – discussed the latest on the VA recounts.

• Democrat wins by one vote, leaving Virginia House with 50-50 tie.  This proves it: Your vote really does count. Democrats edged out Republicans by one vote in the Virginia House of Delegates on Tuesday after a rollercoaster recount flipped a red seat to blue and created a 50-50 tie between the two parties. Democrat Shelly Simonds is the apparent winner in the race for the 94th District, beating incumbent Republican David Yancey.

8am – D         MUELLER / FBI:

• Mueller, FBI face crisis in public confidence. Fifty-four percent say special counsel Robert Mueller has conflicts of interest that prevent him from doing an unbiased job, also according to this month’s Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll. So, given this finding, the silence from the special counsel on the subject has become downright deafening.
• Rep. Jim Jordan spars with CNN host about most of Mueller’s team being anti-Trump
• Prosecutors ask FBI agents for info on Uranium One deal. On the orders of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Justice Department prosecutors have begun asking FBI agents to explain the evidence they found in a now dormant criminal investigation into a controversial uranium deal that critics have linked to Bill and Hillary Clinton, multiple law enforcement officials told NBC News. The interviews with FBI agents are part of the Justice Department’s effort to fulfill a promise an assistant attorney general made to Congress last month to examine whether a special counsel was warranted to look into what has become known as the Uranium One deal, a senior Justice Department official said. At issue is a 2010 transaction in which the Obama Administration allowed the sale of U.S. uranium mining facilities to Russia’s state atomic energy company. Hillary Clinton was secretary of state at the time, and the State Department was one of nine agencies that agreed to approve the deal after finding no threat to U.S. national security.
• Fox: McCabe’s Testimony Conflicts With Others; More Subpoenas Expected. Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe’s seven-hour behind-closed-doors testimony Tuesday conflicted with testimony of other witnesses, and more subpoenas will be issued next week to FBI and Justice Department employees, Fox News’ James Rosen reported Wednesday. Rosen said House Intelligence Committee staff would not confirm who was to receive those new subpoenas, but it likely will be DOJ official Bruce G. Ohr and FBI General Counsel James A. Baker. A subpoena against Baker, who is the Justice Department’s top lawyer might cause a “constitutional clash” between the legislative and executive branches, Fox noted. “It’s hard to know who’s telling us the truth,” a House investigator told Fox. “I don’t believe adequate answers were given,” Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., told Fox News Channel’s “The Story with Martha McCallum.” “So many unanswered questions. Questions which have not been resolved.” King said he still has no answer what role the “Trump dossier” played in commencing the probe into possible collusion between then-candidate Donald Trump’s team and the Russian government to influence the 2016 election.

8am – E         THE POST FILM:

• In his new drama The Post (in New York, L.A. and D.C. theaters Friday, nationwide Jan. 12), Spielberg tackles the newsroom of The Washington Post and their public 1971 tussle with Richard Nixon’s White House to print the Pentagon Papers and reveal a massive cover-up about involvement in the Vietnam War.

• Tom Hanks Would Not Visit Trump’s White House For Private Screening Of His New Film. Tom Hanks would turn down a request to visit the White House for a private screening of his new film The Post, suggesting he’s unhappy with the state of the nation under Donald Trump. The actor made the comments in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, in which he defended the press and highlighted his concerns over inappropriate comments the president had made, as well as the increasingly vocal  rhetoric of neo-Nazis in the U.S. Asked if he would accept an invitation from the president to attend a private screening of his film, Hanks replied: “That’s an interesting question. I don’t think I would.” “Because I think that at some point—look, I didn’t think things were going to be this way last November. I would not have been able to imagine that we would be living in a country where neo-Nazis are doing torchlight parades in Charlottesville and jokes about Pocahontas are being made in front of the Navajo code talkers,” he continued. “And individually we have to decide when we take to the ramparts. You don’t take to the ramparts necessarily right away, but you do have to start weighing things. You may think: ‘You know what? I think now is the time.’ This is the moment where, in some ways, our personal choices are going to have to reflect our opinions. We have to start voting, actually, before the election. So, I would probably vote not to go,” he said.