Will Franken, NPS’ Mike Litterst of NPS, Todd Eberly, James Rosen, KT McFarland and Ken Cuccinelli joined WMAL on Wednesday!

Mornings on the Mall

Wednesday, March 09, 2016

Hosts: Brian Wilson and Larry O’Connor

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

5am – A SUPER TUESDAY 2

• Primary results: Bernie Sanders upsets Hillary Clinton in Michigan
  • DEMOCRATS: Washington (CNN) Bernie Sanders won the Michigan Democratic primary, CNN projects, in an upset that delivers a sharp blow to Hillary Clinton’s hopes of quickly securing her party’s nomination. Although Sanders did little to cut into Clinton’s overall lead of about 200 delegates, thanks to her win Tuesday in Mississippi, his performance in Michigan suggests Sanders could mount a stronger-than-expected challenge in looming primaries in a string of Rust Belt states, including Ohio, Illinois and Wisconsin. The big surprise of the night was in the Democratic race.
  • REPUBLICANS: On the Republican side, Donald Trump won the Hawaii caucuses, and won Republican primaries in Michigan and Mississippi. Sen. Ted Cruz won the Idaho Republican primary, according to a CNN projection.

5am – B/C Biden: Ronald Reagan couldn’t win GOP nomination in 2016. Vice President Biden argued Tuesday that even Ronald Reagan wouldn’t be able to win the Republican presidential nomination if the former president were alive today. “If Ronald Reagan were alive today … he could no more get the nomination of the Republican Party than I could get the nomination,” said Biden, a Democrat, according to a reporter traveling with the vice president in the Middle East. Biden said U.S. politics had become “petty and venal” and suggested “a nasty political environment” has emerged in recent years. He also bashed Republicans for redrawing congressional districts, saying it contributed to extreme positions.

5am – D Ken Cuccinelli nominated for Va. Supreme Court seat. RICHMOND, Va. — The Senate Courts of Justice Committee nominated former Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli for a state Supreme Court seat, according to Senate Republicans, who told CBS 6 that it goes to the Senate floor for a vote soon. The Republican-controlled state Senate and House will likely back the conservative politician’s nomination, though the GOP majority plan was to nominate Appeals Court Judge Rossie Alston, according to Daily Press reporter Travis Fain. Cuccinelli has been nominated to a seat currently filled by Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s recess appointment. McAuliffe’s appointment of Supreme Court Justice Jane Marum Roush, a former Fairfax Circuit Court judge, has lapsed. State Sen. Glen Sturtevant, R-Richmond, backed Cuccinelli. Sturtevant was the one key vote against Alston’s nomination. He was elected to the Senate in 2015, by a 1,088-vote win over his Democratic opponent Daniel Gecker. The Supreme Court seats are appointed by the General Assembly. The governor can not veto.

5am – E Turns out chocolate is actually good for your brain. Forget fish — it’s chocolate that’s brain food! Chocolate is good for your memory and other cognitive skills, according to researchers from the University of Maine and South Australia. Those who ate the sweet treat at least once a week were “positively associated with cognitive performance, across a range of cognitive domains,” according to findings published last month in the journal Appetite. More frequent chocolate consumption was “significantly associated” with better performance on a battery of tests and measures of mental acuity, including visual-spatial memory and organization, working memory, scanning and tracking, and abstract reasoning, the researchers note in the study.

6am – A/B/C Donald Trump Rolls Over Marco Rubio as Decisive Contests Near. Donald Trump shrugged off continuous attacks from his rivals, damaging stories in the press, and regular confusion over his own policy platform to end the week where he began: the front-runner for the Republican nomination. At the same time, Senator Marco Rubio, the candidate many in the establishment pegged as their champion, appears to be on life support. His rapid decline leaves Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, a hardline conservative loathed by many party insiders, as the GOP’S last best alternative to Trump.

6am – D INTERVIEW — WILL FRANKEN – contributor to The Federalist, a London-based comedian and lived as a transgender woman for a period of time

• William’s piece in The Federalist: What Life As A Transgender Woman Taught Me About Progressives. Liberals struggle to reconcile individual life choices with their collective, coercive political agenda.

6am – E INTERVIEW — MICHAEL “MIKE” LITTERST – Public Affairs Officer, National Park Service — discussed the revised prediction date and the Cherry Blossom Festival in general.

• National Park Service Revises Projected Peak Bloom Date for Cherry Blossoms Sustained, Unseasonably Warm Temperatures Move Peak Bloom to March 18-23. Washington – Driven by this week’s sustained, unseasonably warm temperatures, the projected peak bloom dates for the cherry blossoms has been revised to March 18-23. Although the National Park Service factored above average March temperatures into the original prediction date, potentially record-setting temperatures, averaging nearly 20 degrees above normal for the next week, have greatly accelerated the bloom watch. In response to the earlier peak bloom, the Tidal Basin Welcome Area, located near the paddle boats at Maine Avenue SW and Raoul Wallenberg Place SW, will now be open from March 18 – April 3 (it was previously scheduled from April 2-17).

7am – A INTERVIEW — TODD EBERLY – Associate Professor of Political Science and Public Policy, St. Mary’s College of Maryland

• Primary results: Bernie Sanders upsets Hillary Clinton in Michigan
• DEMOCRATS: Washington (CNN) Bernie Sanders won the Michigan Democratic primary, CNN projects, in an upset that delivers a sharp blow to Hillary Clinton’s hopes of quickly securing her party’s nomination. Although Sanders did little to cut into Clinton’s overall lead of about 200 delegates, thanks to her win Tuesday in Mississippi, his performance in Michigan suggests Sanders could mount a stronger-than-expected challenge in looming primaries in a string of Rust Belt states, including Ohio, Illinois and Wisconsin. The big surprise of the night was in the Democratic race.
• REPUBLICANS: On the Republican side, Donald Trump won the Hawaii caucuses, and won Republican primaries in Michigan and Mississippi. Sen. Ted Cruz won the Idaho Republican primary, according to a CNN projection.
• MARYLAND SENATE RACE POLL: Race to succeed Barbara Mikulski remains a toss up. (Baltimore Sun) — The race for Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski’s seat in the U.S. Senate remains a toss-up, making Maryland’s contest among the most competitive Democratic primaries in the nation, a poll released Tuesday has found. Rep. Donna F. Edwards of Prince George’s County and Chris Van Hollen of Montgomery County, the two leading candidates battling for the Democratic nomination, are within the margin of error, according to the Gonzales Research & Marketing Strategies poll. Tuesday’s survey was the third in as many months to find a razor-thin margin in the contest. Forty-two percent of respondents are supporting Van Hollen, 41 percent are backing Edwards and 15 percent are undecided.
• MARYLAND U.S. SENATE Democratic primary: Declared Democratic Candidates: 1) Freddy Donald Dickson, Jr., 2) Donna Edwards, U.S. Representative, 3) Ralph Jaffe, perennial candidate, 4) Theresa Scaldaferri, 5) Charles U. Smith, 6) Violet Staley, 7) Blaine Taylor, 8) Ed Tinus, Chris Van Hollen, U.S. Representative and 9 Lih Young
• Who are players on the Republican side of the Maryland senate race? Do They Have a Chance? MARYLAND U.S. SENATE REPUBLICAN PRIMARY: Declared candidates: 1) Chris Chaffee, candidate for MD-05 in 2010 and nominee for MD-05 in 2014, 2) Sean P. Connor, 3) Richard Douglas, attorney, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense and candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2012, 4) John Graziani, candidate for MD-04 in 2014, 5) Greg Holmes, candidate for MD-04 in 2012 and 2014 and Democratic State Senate candidate in 2006, 6) Joseph Hooe, small business owner, 7) Chrys Kefalas, Vice President of Executive Communications for the National Association of Manufacturers, 8_ Mark McNicholas , 9) Lynn Richardson, Anthony Seda, 10) Richard Shawver, candidate for U.S. Senate in 2006, 11) Kathy Szeliga, State Delegate, 12) Dave Wallace, businessman and nominee for MD-08 in 2014[80][73] and 13) Garry Thomas Yarrington
• MD GOVERNOR POLL: Hogan job approval surges to 70 percent. Gov. Larry Hogan’s job approval numbers continue to climb according to a poll released Tuesday by Annapolis-based Gonzales Research and Marketing Strategies. In the poll, 70 percent of the 809 registered voters said they approved of the the job the Republican was doing at roughly the two-thirds point of Hogan’s second General Assembly session with 18 percent saying they disapprove. The poll has a margin of error of 3.5 percent.

7am – B/C INTERVIEW — JAMES ROSEN — Beatles aficionado, the chief Washington correspondent of Fox News and the author of “Cheney One on One: A Candid Conversation with America’s Most Controversial Statesman”

Sir George Martin, the ‘fifth Beatle’ dies, aged 90. Record producer Sir George Martin, known as the “fifth Beatle”, has died, aged 90. His family thanked “everyone for their thoughts, prayers and messages of support” after his death at home on Tuesday, his manager said. Beatles drummer Ringo Starr broke the news on Twitter and led tributes, saying Sir George “will be missed”. Sir George signed The Beatles and produced more than 700 records.

7am – D INTERVIEW – KT MCFARLAND – Fox News National Security Analyst

• Netanyahu Denies Snubbing Obama, Blames Primary Season for No-Show. Israel on Tuesday refuted a White House claim that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “surprised” the Obama administration by cancelling a planned visit to Washington, saying that the White House knew Netanyahu was considering not coming. Netanyahu had been expected to visit later in March on a trip coinciding with a major pro-Israel group’s annual summit, but his office said he would not travel because he did not wish to come at the height of U.S. presidential primaries. The spat comes amid tense relations with President Barack Obama in the last year of his presidency, and shortly before Vice President Joe Biden was set to touch down in Israel. It was the latest episode in a fraught relationship between Netanyahu and Obama that has yet to recover from deep differences over last year’s U.S.-led international nuclear deal with Israel’s foe Iran.
• Obama May Back UN Resolution on Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. The White House is exploring the possibility of supporting a new resolution before the president’s term ends, according to the Wall Street Journal, whose report follows a Haaretz article on Israeli concerns for such a move. The White House is exploring the possibility of supporting a UN Security Council resolution that would set the principles for a permanent Israeli-Palestinian agreement. The resolution would be brought to a vote before the end of U.S. President Barack Obama’s term in office, the Wall Street Journal has reported. According to the report, published Monday, the White House is also examining other options, such as a speech by Obama on the American vision for a two-state solution, but that would be a mostly declarative move. A senior U.S. administration official told the Wall Street Journal that a final decision on the matter hasn’t yet been reached, and that the president is examining a number of options. He said that the timing for a move has not yet been determined either, adding that Obama wants to put the Israeli-Palestinian issue on a more promising track before his successor takes office in January.
• U.S. Vice President Biden Lands in Israel: The visit comes at a time of confusion over Netanyahu’s cancellation of a trip to Washington later this month.
• Iran conducts new missile tests defying US sanctions. Tehran (AFP) – Iran conducted multiple ballistic missile tests Tuesday in what it said was a display of “deterrent power,” defying US sanctions imposed earlier this year aimed at disrupting its missile programme. State media announced that short-, medium- and long-range precision guided missiles were fired from several sites to show the country’s “all-out readiness to confront threats” against its territorial integrity.

7am – E Obama picks SXSW over Nancy Reagan’s funeral.President Obama will skip former First Lady Nancy Reagan’s funeral on Friday so he can appear at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival in Texas, the White House said Tuesday. First Lady Michelle Obama will attend the funeral to represent the president and also be one of the SXSW keynote speakers Wednesday. In recent decades, presidents have not attended the funerals of former first ladies. When First Lady Betty Ford died in 2011, Rosalynn Carter, Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton and Nancy Reagan all attended. Ex-President George W. Bush went because wife Laura had other travel plans. But Obama and former President Bill Clinton did not attend the funeral. Ex-First Lady Hillary Clinton will also attend Nancy Reagan’s funeral, her campaign said. SXSW organizers said Obama will be interviewed at the conference on how tech companies can help solve the world’s problems. On Monday, he praised “the extraordinary love” Nancy Reagan had for husband Ronald, “and the extraordinary comfort and strength she provided him during really hard times.”

8am – A/B/C SUPER TUESDAY 2

• Primary results: Bernie Sanders upsets Hillary Clinton in Michigan
  • DEMOCRATS: Washington (CNN) Bernie Sanders won the Michigan Democratic primary, CNN projects, in an upset that delivers a sharp blow to Hillary Clinton’s hopes of quickly securing her party’s nomination. Although Sanders did little to cut into Clinton’s overall lead of about 200 delegates, thanks to her win Tuesday in Mississippi, his performance in Michigan suggests Sanders could mount a stronger-than-expected challenge in looming primaries in a string of Rust Belt states, including Ohio, Illinois and Wisconsin. The big surprise of the night was in the Democratic race.
  • REPUBLICANS: On the Republican side, Donald Trump won the Hawaii caucuses, and won Republican primaries in Michigan and Mississippi. Sen. Ted Cruz won the Idaho Republican primary, according to a CNN projection.

8am – D INTERVIEW — KEN CUCCINELLI – president of Senate Conservatives Fund and the former attorney general of Virginia

• Ken Cuccinelli nominated for Va. Supreme Court seat. RICHMOND, Va. — The Senate Courts of Justice Committee nominated former Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli for a state Supreme Court seat, according to Senate Republicans, who told CBS 6 that it goes to the Senate floor for a vote soon. The Republican-controlled state Senate and House will likely back the conservative politician’s nomination, though the GOP majority plan was to nominate Appeals Court Judge Rossie Alston, according to Daily Press reporter Travis Fain. Cuccinelli has been nominated to a seat currently filled by Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s recess appointment. McAuliffe’s appointment of Supreme Court Justice Jane Marum Roush, a former Fairfax Circuit Court judge, has lapsed.

8am – E Drivers will be at fault for dooring if new Va. bill becomes law. WASHINGTON — There could soon be a new law in Virginia that says drivers could be at fault if they open their car door and someone hits it. “Dooring” is when a driver opening their car door catches a cyclist, a motorcyclist or even a bus. The law aims to increase overall road safety. In the last five years, the Virginia Department of Transportation’s numbers show dooring caused 215 accidents in the commonwealth. A third of those people involved went to the hospital. “If you’re going to have people biking to and from work, you’ve got to make it safe for them to do so,” says state Sen. Chapman Petersen, a Democrat who represents Fairfax County. He says his bill establishes fault if there’s an accident. “So if somebody gets hurt, the insurance company or the person who caused the injury … they will pick up the claim,” he says.