Mornings on the Mall 05.27.20 / Cal Thomas, Dr. Tom Jones, Newt Gingrich, Dr. Travis Gayles, NASA Deputy Administrator James Morhard

Mornings on the Mall 

Wednesday, May 27, 2020

Hosts; Vince Coglianese and Mary Walter

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

Guests: Cal Thomas, Dr. Tom Jones, Newt Gingrich, Dr. Travis Gayles, and NASA Deputy Administrator James Morhard

GUEST INTERVIEWS:

6:35 AM —  INTERVIEW – CAL THOMAS – Syndicated columnist and author of new book “America’s Expiration Date: The Fall of Empires and Superpowers . . . and the Future of the United States”

TOPICS: 

7:05 AM — INTERVIEW – DR. TOM JONES – astronaut, author of “Ask the Astronaut” and author of upcoming book “Space Shuttle Stories: 30 Years of Astronaut Experiences on America’s History-Making Spaceship”  / his website www.AstronautTomJones.com

TOPIC: PREVIEW HISTORIC LAUNCH ON MAY 27TH

7:35 AM — INTERVIEW – NEWT GINGRICH – Former Speaker of the House, host of “Newt’s World” podcast and author of book “Trump Vs. China: Facing America’s Greatest Threat”

TOPIC: Political news of the day / China / (Newt is also a big proponent of space exploration)

  • Newt’s new book, Trump & the American Future, available for preorder NOW on Amazon, out June 23rd”

8:05AM – Dr Travis Gayles, head of Montgomery County’s health department

TOPIC: Montgomery might lift some restrictions within a week https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/montgomery-officials-say-county-may-reopen-within-a-week/2020/05/20/cf12bf4a-9aa6-11ea-89fd-28fb313d1886_story.html

8:35 AM – INTERVIEW – NASA Deputy Administrator James Morhard

TOPIC: PREVIEW HISTORIC LAUNCH ON MAY 27TH:  

SHOW RUNDOWN:

5AM HOUR:

5A/B/C – 

Grenell declassifies slew of Russia probe files, as Ratcliffe takes helm as DNI

Richard Grenell has declassified a new batch of Russia probe documents on his way out as acting director of national intelligence, leaving the decision on whether to make those files public up to newly sworn-in Director John Ratcliffe. The documents include transcripts of phone calls that then-incoming National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and then-Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak had in December 2016, during the presidential transition period. Grenell said publicly last week that he was in the process of declassifying those files, after House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., asked that he do so. Fox News has learned that the declassification review of those transcripts is now complete, and it will be left up to Ratcliffe on whether to release them publicly. Fox News has learned that Grenell also completed the declassification review of other documents related to the origins of the Russia probe — including one that a senior intelligence official told Fox News was “very significant in understanding how intelligence was manipulated to support launching the Russia investigation.”

White House hints that under new intel chief, more Michael Flynn intel documents could be released “This president has overseen an ODNI that has given the American people a lot of information that I think they’re entitled to see, and one of the things the president has asked for is: Where are the 302s, the summaries of that interview with Michael Flynn?’ McEnany explained that 302s are summaries of a federal investigator’s interview with a citizen and that they are usually drafted promptly, when one’s recollection of the event is likely at its best. “But in the case of Michael Flynn, those 302s were lost, and in fact, edited afterwards by corrupt (FBI officials) Peter Strozk and Lisa Page. So there’s a lot of questions, and this president has encouraged transparency on this issue, and I think it’s a great thing.”

5D/E – WHITMER NEWS:

 

  • Michigan state Rep. Karen Whitsett (D-Detroit) has filed a federal lawsuit against Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) after the Democrat Party censured Whitsett over praising President Trump. The 13th Congressional District Democrat Party committee passed a resolution in April reprimanding Whitsett for being critical of Whitmer and appearing alongside Trump at the White House. The suit accuses Whitmer and the Democrats of “violations of free speech and defamation,” ML ive reported.

 

    • The owner of a Northern Michigan dock company says Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s husband wanted his boat placed in the water before the Memorial Day weekend as Whitmer urged residents not to rush to the region. […] “This morning, I was out working when the office called me, there was a gentleman on hold who wanted his boat in the water before the weekend,” Dowker posted. “Being Memorial weekend and the fact that we started working three weeks late means there is no chance this is going to happen.” “Well our office personnel had explained this to the man and he replied, ‘I am the husband to the governor, will this make a difference?'”

 

  • Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has not denied that her husband sought special treatment and attempted to persuade a Michigan dock company to allow him to take the family boat out for Memorial Day Weekend. Whitmer came under fire over Memorial Day Weekend following Facebook posts from Northshore Dock LLC and the company’s owner, Tad Dowker, which said that Whitmer’s husband Marc Mallory requested special treatment last week, according to the Detroit News. “Our practice is not to discuss the governor’s or her family’s personal calendar/schedules,” Whitmer’s press secretary, Tiffany Brown, told the Daily Caller News Foundation in a statement Tuesday. “And we’re not going to make it a practice of addressing every rumor that is spread online. “There’s been a lot of wild misinformation spreading online attacking the governor and her family, and the threats of violence against her personally are downright dangerous,” Brown added.

 

6AM HOUR:

6A/B/C – MAIL-IN VOTING/ TRUMP TWITTER

 

  • TRUMP: .@Twitter is now interfering in the 2020 Presidential Election. They are saying my statement on Mail-In Ballots, which will lead to massive corruption and fraud, is incorrect, based on fact-checking by Fake News CNN and the Amazon Washington Post…. ….Twitter is completely stifling FREE SPEECH, and I, as President, will not allow it to happen!
  • NADLER in 2004: At the hearing — in which lawmakers examined perceived voting problems in an Ohio election — a member of the public spoke in support of paper ballots, later citing research by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that she said showed hand-counted paper ballots to be “among the most reliable” voting methods. Nadler didn’t agree. “Paper ballots are extremely susceptible to fraud,” he said. “And at least with the old clunky voting machines that we have in New York, the deliberate fraud is way down compared to paper.

 

  • NYT: Twitter Refutes Inaccuracies in Trump’s Tweets for First Time Twitter added information to refute the inaccuracies in President Trump’s tweets for the first time on Tuesday, after years of pressure over its inaction on his false and threatening posts. The social media company added links late Tuesday to two of Mr. Trump’s tweets in which he had posted about mail-in ballots and falsely claimed that they would cause the November presidential election to be “rigged.” The links — which were in blue lettering at the bottom of the posts and punctuated by an exclamation mark — urged people to “get the facts” about voting by mail. Clicking on the links led to a CNN story that said Mr. Trump’s claims were unsubstantiated and to a list of bullet points that Twitter had compiled rebutting the inaccuracies.
  • Twitter exec in charge of effort to fact-check Trump has history of anti-Trump posts, called McConnell a ‘bag of farts’ Twitter’s “Head of Site Integrity” Yoel Roth boasts on his LinkedIn that he is in charge of “developing and enforcing Twitter’s rules,” like the one that led Twitter to slap a new warning label on two of President Trump’s tweets concerning mail-in balloting on Tuesday — posts that Twitter conspicuously deemed “misleading,” even though bipartisan panels of experts have agreed with the president that absentee balloting increases the risk of voter fraud. However, Roth’s own barrage of anti-Trump, politically charged tweets seemingly calls into question whether he should be creating rules for the president and other Twitter users, especially when Twitter is under fire for its alleged left-wing bias. Roth has previously referred to Trump and his team as “ACTUAL NAZIS,” mocked Trump supporters by saying that “we fly over those states that voted for a racist tangerine for a reason,” and called Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., a “personality-free bag of farts.” (Last August, Twitter suspended McConnell’s Twitter account, prompting the GOP to threaten to cut off advertising on the site until Twitter relented.) In September 2016, Roth tweeted, “I’ve never donated to a presidential campaign before, but I just gave $100 to Hillary for America. We can’t fu-k around anymore.”
  • JON LEVINE: This person is the “head of site integrity” at Twitter (SCREENGRABS)

6D – INTERVIEW – CAL THOMAS – Syndicated columnist and author of new book “America’s Expiration Date: The Fall of Empires and Superpowers . . . and the Future of the United States”

TOPICS: 

6E- Jimmy Fallon apologizes for wearing blackface in ‘SNL’ sketch 20 years ago “Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon issued an apology Tuesday for wearing blackface during a 2000 episode of “Saturday Night Live.” Fallon was facing backlash on social media after Twitter users put a spotlight on an old sketch when he impersonated comedian Chris Rock and had darkened his face with makeup, and the hashtag #JimmyFallonIsOverParty began trending on the platform. “In 2000, while on SNL, I made a terrible decision to do an impersonation of Chris Rock while in blackface. There is no excuse for this,” Fallon later tweeted. “I am very sorry for making this unquestionably offensive decision and thank all of you for holding me accountable.” Fallon was a cast member on “SNL” from 1998 to 2004.

6F- Rush is giving an update on his treatment and health. He said – this is the third wave of treatment. “It is kicking my ass.” Rush. We love you. Thank you for still coming in to work – despite feeling lousy. You are so strong and so loved. God Bless you.

7AM HOUR: 

7A – INTERVIEW – DR. TOM JONES – astronaut, author of “Ask the Astronaut” and author of upcoming book “Space Shuttle Stories: 30 Years of Astronaut Experiences on America’s History-Making Spaceship”  / his website www.AstronautTomJones.com

TOPIC: PREVIEW HISTORIC LAUNCH ON MAY 27TH:

7B/C – FACE MASKS:

 

  • Ralph Northam says face coverings will be required for everyone “inside at a public place, starting this Friday.” Exceptions for when “you’re eating or drinking at a restaurant, if you’re exercising, if you have a health condition … or children under age 10.”
  • BIDEN ON CNN: Trump not wearing a mask “reminds me of the guys that I grew up with playing ball. They would walk around with a ball in their hand but they didn’t like to hit very much.”
  • MSNBC REPORTER GETS CALLED OUT LIVE… REPORTER: “You can see here, nobody’s wearing [masks].” GUY ON STREET: “Including the Cameraman.” 

 

7D- INTERVIEW – NEWT GINGRICH – Former Speaker of the House, host of “Newt’s World” podcast and author of book “Trump Vs. China: Facing America’s Greatest Threat”

TOPIC: Political news of the day / China / (Newt is also a big proponent of space exploration)

7E – House Republicans sue Nancy Pelosi to block proxy voting rule House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, along with 20 other Republicans and four constituents, challenged the constitutionality of proxy voting in the chamber on Tuesday with a lawsuit aimed at Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The plaintiffs claim that the transition to proxy voting — spurred by the coronavirus pandemic — dilutes members’ votes, and by extension, their constituents’ collective representation.

8AM HOUR: 

8A – INTERVIEW – Dr Travis Gayles, head of Montgomery County’s health department

TOPIC: Montgomery might lift some restrictions within a week https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/montgomery-officials-say-county-may-reopen-within-a-week/2020/05/20/cf12bf4a-9aa6-11ea-89fd-28fb313d1886_story.html

  • Discuss what criteria Montgomery County is using to determine how long to stay closed and what factors they are using to determine when is best to open back up.  
  • Discuss how they are coordinating with the counties in when they decide it’s best to open back up. 
  • What areas in Montgomery Co. were hardest hit?  Are those areas lessening in cases and deaths? 
  • Are hospitalizations the key factor or are there other factors they are considering? 
  • What might be opened up if we do loosen restrictions next week?

8B/C – CHINA NEWS:

 

  • CHINESE NETIZENS CLAIM THAT AMERICANS ARE EATING DEAD CHINESE COVID PATIENTS “The US has been processing dead bodies from Covid-19 [Chinese coronavirus] diseases into hamburgers,” the page reportedly claimed, adding that the bodies “were very likely of being processed into frozen meat, fake beef or pork, or processed into cooked meat as hamburgers and hot dogs.” The page offered as evidence of this claim the unsubstantiated allegation that “cannibalism has existed in the U.S. before … and only a few dozen years ago, Americans ate blacks, Indians and Chinese.”https://www.breitbart.com/asia/2020/05/26/chinese-netizens-claim-americans-are-eating-coronavirus-dead/ 
  • YOUTUBE DELETING VIDEOS W/2 PHRASES THAT INSULT CHINA’S COMMUNIST PARTY  “This appears to be an error in our enforcement systems and we are investigating,” said a YouTube spokesperson. The company did not elaborate on how or why this error came to be, but said it was not the result of any change in its moderation policy. But if the deletions are the result of a simple mistake, then it’s one that’s gone unnoticed for six months. The Verge found evidence that comments were being deleted as early as October 2019, when the is sue was raised on YouTube’s official help pages and multiple users confirmed that they had experienced the same problem. https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/26/21270290/youtube-deleting-comments-censorship-chinese-communist-party-ccp 

 

8D – INTERVIEW – NASA Deputy Administrator James Morhard

TOPIC: PREVIEW HISTORIC LAUNCH ON MAY 27TH:  

 

  • SpaceX’s 1st astronaut launch breaking new ground for style CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — The first astronauts launched by SpaceX are breaking new ground for style with hip spacesuits, gull-wing Teslas and a sleek rocketship — all of it white with black trim. The color coordinating is thanks to Elon Musk, the driving force behind both SpaceX and Tesla, and a big fan of flash and science fiction. https://apnews.com/025ee5177966af18ed0a9898fe3d6e13

 

8E – Republican challenging AOC drops out of race, blames impact of Cuomo’s executive orders on political process The Republican challenger to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., dropped out of the race Monday, citing New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s executive orders amid the coronavirus pandemic and issues with qualifying for the state’s upcoming Republican primary election. “Governor Cuomo’s undemocratic Executive Orders overthrew New York’s electoral process. The right to access the ballot, freedom of association as a member of a political party, the exchange of ideas and free speech are so sacred that the Founding Fathers made it the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States,” Scherie Murray, a Jamaican immigrant and businesswoman, said in a statement. “As long as avowed socialists are legislators, you can rest assured I will use my platform to advocate for the kitchen table issues of the toughest, hardest working New Yorkers,” she added. “This is not the end for Scherie Murray because I will continue to work hard.”

 

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