Susan Ferrechio, Rep. Jim Jordan, Judicial Watch’s Tom Fitton and National Journal’s Josh Kraushaar joined WMAL on Friday!

Mornings on the Mall

Friday, July 27, 2018

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

 

5am – A/B/C Why Conservatives Find Life More Meaningful Than Liberals (The Atlantic) — Polarization has become so severe that what news you read, who you marry, and what kind of car you drive is connected to your political persuasion. And so is, it turns out, whether you see the point in literally anything. In a new study of people in 16 different countries, researchers from the University of Southern California and the University of Utah found that conservatives reported feeling there was more meaning and purpose in life than liberals did. The authors performed a series of five studies, all of which replicated each others’ findings. Conservatives found life more meaningful in data sets from several countries in the early 1980s, in a nationally representative data set of Americans in 2007, and in data collected between 2010 and 2017. In other data sets, conservatives found greater meaning in life when the measures were taken at the end of every day for two weeks. They were also more likely to feel that their lives had “a clear sense of purpose” at any given moment. In another analysis, the authors found social, rather than economic, conservatives were especially likely to find meaning in life. This was true even when controlling for their “religiosity,” which means it wasn’t just that conservatives had a more ardent belief in God.

5am – D         ROSENSTEIN IMPEACHMENT:

• Speaker Paul Ryan says he doesn’t back conservative GOP effort to impeach Rosenstein (NBC News) — WASHINGTON — Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday that he doesn’t support the effort by some of his conservative House colleagues to impeach Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is overseeing special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. “Do I support impeachment of Rosenstein? No, I do not,” Ryan, R-Wis., said at his weekly press conference as lawmakers packed up to leave Capitol Hill for a month-long recess. “I don’t think we should be cavalier with this process or term,” he said of impeachment, adding, “I don’t think this rises to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors.”
•  Meadows backs off impeaching Rosenstein after leadership talks (The Hill) — Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) says he is tabling his efforts to impeach Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein after having several meetings with Republican leadership, stating that he would instead pursue contempt if the Justice Department (DOJ) does not turn over documents Congress is seeking. While the impeachment option remains on the table, Meadows told reporters Thursday he now hopes it will be a contempt process rather than impeachment.

5am – E         DeVos’ $40 million yacht vandalized at Huron dock. HURON, Ohio — A boat owned by the family of U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos was vandalized over the weekend while moored at a Huron dock, according to the Huron Police Department. The Seaquest was moored at the Huron Boat Basin, 330 Main St., according to a police report. The captain of the 163-foot yacht, worth a reported $40 million, called police at about 6 a.m. Sunday, telling them that he and the crew realized at sunrise that someone had untied Seaquest from the dock, setting it adrift. The crew eventually got control of the yacht, but not before it struck the dock, causing an estimated $5,000 to $10,000 in damage from large scratches and scrapes, according to the police report. Officers were searching for surveillance video that may show who untied the yacht.

6am – A/B/C ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ DOES INTERVIEW WITH A PODCAST AND SHE HAS SEVERAL GEMS OF SOCIALIST WISDOM:

• Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: Trump’s Immigration Policy Is ‘On The Spectrum’ Of Ethnic Cleansing (Daily Caller) — Democratic Socialist congressional candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez agreed with a statement that President Trump’s immigration policies are similar to ethnic cleansing in a new podcast episode that was released on Tuesday. Ocasio-Cortez made a guest appearance on “In The Thick,” a podcast “about race, identity and politics [that] few people are discussing or want to discuss,” according to its website. “We also have to ask ourselves the question: How much is this black-box detention necessary? And you look at these facilities — we’re caging women and children, we’re jumping to criminalize people … ” Ocasio-Cortez stated.

6am – D         JIM JORDAN FOR SPEAKER:

• Rep. Jim Jordan announces his plan to run for Speaker of the House:  “Should the American people entrust us with the majority again in the 116th Congress, I plan to run for Speaker of the House to bring real change to the House of Representatives”
• “I support Kevin McCarthy. Everybody knows that, and I’m not going to be here,” Paul Ryan answered when asked if he’d support Rep. Jim Jordan to replace him as Speaker of the House
• Alex Moe @AlexNBCNews: While McCarthy hasn’t officially announced he is running for Speaker, he did say ystdy at an event in DC “I want the next Speaker to come from California. I just don’t want it to be Nancy, I want it to be me.”
• Alex Moe @AlexNBCNews: Kevin McCarthy tells NBC News when asked about Jim Jordan announcing a run for Speaker (which many believe McCarthy will also run for): “I’m spending the time keeping the majority”

6am – E         STUDY: Women Prefer Men Who Eat Meat (Daily Wire) — Sorry, vegetarian and vegan men, but women prefer your meat-eating brethren. At least according to a study conducted by researchers at the University of Padova (that’s in Italy). The study titled “Eating Meat Makes You Sexy: Conformity to Dietary Gender Norms and Practices” found that when women were presented with fake bios of men that either showed food preferences that included meat or yogurt, they preferred the men who ate meat. One experiment (out of three conducted by the researchers) asked 50 Italian women to rate the men’s bios as “attractive,” “sexy,” or even “I would date him.” Negative descriptors were also included. Vegetarian and vegan men’s bios, however, claimed their favorite foods were things like fruit, soup, tiramisu, and yogurt. Women — even vegetarian women — rated meat-loving men much higher. “We have found that, in the Italian context, females seem to prefer omnivorous over vegetarian males as possible mates, and that this discrimination is stronger among women holding negative attitudes toward vegetarians,” the researchers wrote.

6am – F         SOCIAL MEDIA NEWS:

• Facebook shares down more than 18 percent following revenue forecast (Washington Post) — Facebook shares plunged more than 19 percent Thursday after the company warned the day before that its sales growth would stall in the months ahead. The share price was on its way to the biggest single-day drop in the company’s history. And the sell-off is poised break another record, experts said. Facebook’s falling stock price has erased more than $110 billion in market value, which would be the largest one-day loss of any publicly traded company.
• Trump: Twitter ‘Shadow Banning’ Prominent Republicans: We Will Look Into It ‘At Once’ – One day after a prominent conservative called out Twitter for “shadow banning” people with conservative viewpoints, President Trump took up the cause: “Twitter ‘SHADOW BANNING’ prominent Republicans. Not good,” Trump tweeted at 7:45 on Thursday morning. “We will look into this discriminatory and illegal practice at once! Many complaints.”

 

7am – A         Interview – SUSAN FERRECHIO – chief congressional correspondent for the Washington Examiner – discussed the latest Congressional news:

Rosenstein impeachment push by GOP, Congress goes on recess, Jordan runs for speaker and the latest on the Kavanaugh nomination.

• HOUSE RECESS: Lawmakers packed up to leave Capitol Hill for a month-long recess.
• Ryan, McCarthy and Pelosi have a full slate of fundraisers planned for the summer recess, which begins Thursday (politico) — With control of the House up for grabs this fall — and their own political futures on the line — GOP and Democratic leaders will be frantically crisscrossing the country in August to raise money and rally the faithful. Speaker Paul Ryan, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, who have already raised tens of millions of dollars for their candidates and incumbents, have scheduled dozens of events during the five-week House recess, according to their offices. The trio will be raking in millions more while trying to cement their own positions, or in Ryan’s case, his legacy.
• ROSENSTEIN IMPEACHMENT: Speaker Paul Ryan says he doesn’t back conservative GOP effort to impeach Rosenstein (NBC News) — WASHINGTON — Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday that he doesn’t support the effort by some of his conservative House colleagues to impeach Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is overseeing special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. “Do I support impeachment of Rosenstein? No, I do not,” Ryan, R-Wis., said at his weekly press conference as lawmakers packed up to leave Capitol Hill for a month-long recess. “I don’t think we should be cavalier with this process or term,” he said of impeachment, adding, “I don’t think this rises to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors.”
• Meadows backs off impeaching Rosenstein after leadership talks (The Hill) — Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) says he is tabling his efforts to impeach Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein after having several meetings with Republican leadership, stating that he would instead pursue contempt if the Justice Department (DOJ) does not turn over documents Congress is seeking. While the impeachment option remains on the table, Meadows told reporters Thursday he now hopes it will be a contempt process rather than impeachment.
• LATEST ON KAVANAUGH: Manchin to sit down with Kavanaugh next week. (Politico) — Brett Kavanaugh will meet with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) next week, signaling the Supreme Court nominee is beginning to woo Democrats in his confirmation bid. Kavanaugh will meet with Manchin next Monday, according to a Manchin aide. Manchin is considered one of the Democrats most likely to back Kavanaugh, along with Sens. Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Donnelly of Indiana. Those three red-state Democrats voted to confirm Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch last year.
• JIM JORDAN FOR SPEAKER: Rep. Jim Jordan announces his plan to run for Speaker of the House:  “Should the American people entrust us with the majority again in the 116th Congress, I plan to run for Speaker of the House to bring real change to the House of Representatives”

7am – B/C     Interview – REP. JIM JORDAN – (R- Ohio) and a founding member of The Freedom Caucus – discussed his bid for House Speaker and the push for impeaching Rosenstein.

7am – D/E     Interview – TOM FITTON – President of Judicial Watch @JudicialWatch @TomFitton (in studio) – discussed Twitter’s shadowbanning, push for impeachment of Rosenstein and Mueller’s probe into Trump’s tweets.

• Trump: Twitter ‘Shadow Banning’ Prominent Republicans: We Will Look Into It ‘At Once’
• TOM FITTON: So I was tweeted out 5 times by @realDonaldTrump this week and I had been shadow banned by Twitter. Coincidence?
• Speaker Paul Ryan says he doesn’t back conservative GOP effort to impeach Rosenstein
• Meadows backs off impeaching Rosenstein after leadership
• Mueller investigating Trump tweets as part of obstruction probe

8am – A         Interview – JOSH KRAUSHAAR –  political editor for National Journal @HotlineJosh – discussed the latest of key upcoming elections.

• NBC News poll: Scott Walker, other GOP candidates in key Midwest states trail Democratic rivals. (NBC News) — WASHINGTON — New polls in three key Midwestern states show Republican Senate and gubernatorial candidates trailing their Democratic counterparts in hypothetical matchups — particularly GOP Gov. Scott Walker in Wisconsin, where only a third of voters say he deserves to be re-elected and where he trails his leading Democratic challenger by more than 10 points. According to new polling from NBC News and Marist, just 34 percent of Wisconsin’s registered voters say Walker should win re-election in the fall, while 61 percent say a new person should be given the chance to lead the state.

8am – B/C     YOKO ONO’S NEW SONG IS SO BAD ITS HILARIOUS:

• Newsweek’s Glowing Review: Yoko Ono’s New Music Video for ‘Warzone’ Is a Chilling Warning: Exclusive Premiere (Newsweek) –She has been demanding peace for half a century.  Most famously, she and her husband, the late John Lennon, staged two “Bed-Ins for Peace” in 1969. Yoko Ono isn’t stopping at 85. The pioneering artist’s new album, Warzone, includes a song with the same name—a reimagining of a 1996 track.  The arrangement is eerie and minimalistic, with machine-gun splatters accompanying macabre piano notes. Ono’s vocals become increasingly anguished as the song progresses: “If you hear me, please help us,” she sings at the end. Newsweek is exclusively premiering the music video, which features original drawings by Ono to accentuate the track’s sense of urgency. The dot drawings (also known as Ono’s Franklin Summer drawings) began in 1994.  The video itself, which pulses with a sense of dread and distress, was edited by Jonny Sanders.

8am – D         GDP: US Q2 GDP +4.1% (+4.2% expected). US economic growth accelerated slower than forecast in the second quarter, according to a preliminary report released by the Commerce Department on Friday. Gross domestic product ( GDP ), the total value of all goods and services produced domestically, rose at an annualized pace of 4.1%.  Economists had forecast 4.2% growth, the fastest pace since the third quarter of 2014. President Donald Trump had already hinted that it was a strong number, again breaking with tradition of US presidents not commenting on major economic data pre-release. “Somebody actually predicted today 5.3,” Trump said during a rally Thursday at a steel plant in Illinois.

8am – E         CANADA NEWS:

• Actor Seth Rogen will be a guest voice on public transit in Vancouver, British Columbia. The announcement comes after Rogen, a Vancouver native, offered to replace fellow actor Morgan Freeman, who lent his voice for a public announcement campaign for TransLink. The campaign was pulled after a CNN investigation reported a pattern of alleged harassment and inappropriate behavior toward women by Freeman.
• TRUDEAU’S BORDER CONTROL PLAN: PUT ILLEGALS INTO HOTELS (Daily Caller) — OTTAWA — Canada’s new border security minister has a plan for the growing number of illegal immigrants crowding Canadian cities and taking over homeless shelters: put them in hotels.