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Mornings on the Mall

Friday July 14, 2017

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

5am – A/B/C HuffPost goes out in search of Middle America. Seeking a new direction, the site launches a 23-city bus tour to ‘listen to America.’ What is the Left missing about America? Having made its name as a home for liberals and the blog posts of coastal elites, the recently renamed HuffPost is seeking to reinforce its new, less partisan image with a seven-week bus tour through Middle America to “listen and learn what it means to be American today,” the site will announce on Thursday. Starting in September, a traveling party of rotating HuffPost staff members led by editor-in-chief Lydia Polgreen will visit more than 20 cities, eschewing the coasts for the likes of Fort Wayne, Indiana, Oxford, Mississippi and Odessa, Texas. At each city, the site will host events, roll out planned stories with local media outlets, send out reporters to write about the communities and collect stories from residents “in their own words.”  It’s a unique project for a media organization that made its name as the crusading home for progressives, even attaching a note to each story during the election about then-candidate Donald Trump calling him a “xenophobe,” “racist” and “misogynist.” (The tag was removed on Election Day.) Founder Arianna Huffington created The Huffington Post in 2004 to be a liberal version of the Drudge Report. But Huffington left her namesake site last year to found a new health-and-wellness start-up, leaving the renamed HuffPost in the hands of Polgreen, formerly of The New York Times, and chief executive Jared Grusd, who are reshaping the site’s identity. “This would be identity defining for HuffPost,” said Polgreen in an interview. “We are in a moment for [determining] our own identity and the role we play in the overall news ecosystem and what the next iteration of that looks like. And this felt like a great way to go out and … report out the story of who we should be in the world.”  Though many of the cities the group is visiting voted for Hillary Clinton in last year’s election, all but two of the states went to Trump. But Polgreen says they’re not visiting “Trump country,” pointing to a reason for each city or state on the tour like an interesting community college system in Fort Wayne or Detroit’s large Arab-American population. Hillary Frey, HuffPost’s director of editorial strategy who came up with the bus tour idea, also pointed out that logistically it didn’t make sense to go to the corners of the country where the distance from one city to the next would be too far. “We were basically looking at a pretty eclectic mix of communities that represent a lot of different facets of American life,” Polgreen said. “All of these ideological divisions [in the media] are confusing right now and for me it’s less about left or right — it’s who are you more oriented toward, more oriented to the interest of the wealthy and powerful or are you orientated toward the people who are not in the top 20 percent.”

5am – D  White House: The Only Collusion In 2016 Was Between DNC, Ukrainian Gov’t (TPM) Deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Wednesday deflected questions about any potential Trump campaign collusion in the 2016 election by accusing the Democratic National Committee of colluding with the Ukrainian government, though the situations have marked differences. “If there’s been any evidence of collusion in 2016 that’s come out at all or been discussed that’s actually happened it would be between the DNC and the Ukrainian government,” Sanders said Wednesday in an off-camera, audio-only White House briefing. She cited an unnamed New York Times reporter who Sanders claimed tweeted that “Ukrainian actions to coordinate with the DNC was actually successful” and “directly targeted members of the Trump campaign in an attempt to undermine it.” Sanders appeared to be referring to a Politico published in January about Alexandra Chalupa, a Ukrainian-American consultant for the DNC. Politico reported, citing unnamed sources with direct knowledge of the situation, that Chalupa met with officials in Ukraine’s Washington, D.C. embassy about Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort’s ties to Ukraine and any connections between then-candidate Donald Trump and Russia. Chalupa told then-DNC communications director Luis Miranda in an email later released by Wikileaks that she wanted to share sensitive information about Manafort “offline” with Miranda and Lauren Dillon, the committee’s research director, including “a big Trump component.” An unnamed DNC official told Politico that Chalupa conducted her research into Manafort, Trump and Russia independently, and that the committee her findings in its own dossiers on Trump and his connections to Russia. Donald Trump Jr., the President’s eldest son, was by contrast about the prospect of receiving supposedly compromising information on Hillary Clinton from a lawyer described as a “Russian government attorney” who offered the information as part of a Russian government effort to aid his father’s campaign. “If it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer,” Trump Jr. replied in a he released Tuesda

5am- E Senate Republicans one vote away from Obamacare repeal failure (Politico) Senate Republican leaders are praying that their fragile whip count holds over the weekend, as just one more “no” vote would doom the party’s Obamacare repeal effort from even coming up for debate. Two GOP senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky, said Thursday afternoon they will oppose a procedural vote next week to bring the bill to the floor. GOP leaders are putting immense pressure on about half a dozen other Republican senators not to join them and topple the entire effort. Another “no” is enough to kill the bill, and would also likely lead to mass defections. The Trump administration is also lobbying intensely for the bill, the latest version of which was released Thursday. Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Seema Verma spent Thursday trying to convince centrist senators to reconsider their opposition to prior drafts of the bill. Republicans are also hoping Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) can convince Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) to back the measure after Lee said it was “unclear” if this version is better than the last. Majority Whip John Cornyn acknowledged GOP leaders don’t have the minimum 50 votes right now but insisted, “We’re making good progress.” He said he and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell were not making “state-specific” promises to wavering senators and were instead merely trying to convince them that the bill is better than Obamacare. “We’re not through yet,” Cornyn said of his and McConnell’s work. “The only thing more difficult than peace between Israel and the Palestinians is healthcare,” President Donald Trump told reporters in a conversation released Thursday by the White House. Paul said he pitched Trump Thursday afternoon on separating the repeal and replace aspects of the Obamacare bill, but the president wasn’t interested. “He still wants to try to pass what they’ve got,” Paul said.

6am – A/B/C Are Young Men Choosing Video Games Over Work? Men are less productive and are working less hours and the reason may have less to do with the changing nature of jobs than we think. It could — at least in part — be down to computer games. Men at the beginning of their careers could be spending more time trying to reach the next level on a video game than the next level at work. The amount of time young working age men spend playing video games has shot up, new research has revealed. At the same time, the number of hours they spend at work has fallen. US researchers wondered if young men were spending so much time playing games, they were neglecting their work or not putting in the hard yards to get a promotion. Or if the game playing was a symptom of a lack of available work. They also looked at how much time, proportional to other activities, video games sucked up. Between 2004 and 2007, men between 21 and 30 years old played two hours of video games per week. But that has now risen to 3.4 hours per week according to the American Time Use Survey. Men are working less and gaming more. Men aged between 21 and 30 years old saw their working hours decline by 12 per cent annually from 2000 to 2015, compared with an 8 per cent decline for older men, reported America’s CBS. The decline on work hours exceed that for women. Closer to home, the 2016 Digital Australia report found Australian gamers might be even more addicted than their US counterparts racking up 100 minutes on average a day staring at the small screen — that’s 11 hours a week. Female gamers spent less time online. A 2016 report also found Australians were working between one and two hours less per week than a decade before. Professor Erik Hurst, an economics expert at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and one of the authors of the paper said there had been a “huge shift” towards men playing computer games, more than any other activity. In the US working hours for young men have fallen. Advances in gaming, particularly social gaming, had boosted their popularity. “When you weren’t working in the 1980s, it had to be a very lonely experience,” Prof Hurst said. “But now if you aren’t working, you can interact with people online, some people you know and some people you don’t know.” Video games were indeed playing a part in the decline in work hours for young men, he said. But there were other reasons, especially for less-educated men with fewer professional skills where employment opportunities have dwindled. Sparkles Wilson A transgender inmate at Lackawanna County Prison will resume hormone therapy treatment after a federal judge denied a motion that challenged an order mandating the medications. U.S. District Judge Robert D. Mariani issued an emergency order late Friday directing the treatment for Steven Fritz, also known as Sparkles Wilson, based on evidence that she faces psychiatric trauma and physical harm if it is not provided. Edward Zaloga, D.O., owner of the prison’s medical provider, Correctional Care Inc., initially defied the order and sought an emergency stay of its enforcement. Zaloga maintained the treatment may have side effects that could harm Fritz, 44, of Scranton. Fritz’s attorneys, Curt Parkins and Matthew Comerford of Scranton, filed a lawsuit Friday that alleges the prison and Zaloga are violating Fritz’s civil rights to be free from cruel and unusual punishment for refusing to administer her Estrace and Premarin, two forms of estrogen, prescribed to aid her in her transition from a biological male to a female. The lawsuit says Fritz had developed female features, including enlarged breasts. The deprivation of the hormones caused her body to revert back to a more masculine form, causing her mental anguish and physical harm. In addition to restoring treatment, the suit seeks more than $1 million in compensatory and punitive damages. Zaloga’s attorney, Joseph “Jody” Healey of Scranton, said Zaloga will comply with the order, but still has serious concerns about the potentially “catastrophic” side effects of the medications, which can include the development of blood clots, an embolism and deep vein thrombosis. The use of Premarin and Estrace on males is considered “off label,” which means a drug is being prescribed for uses other than what the FDA approved.

6am – D INTERVIEW – -DR. ROBERT “BOB” MOFFIT – Senior Fellow, Heritage Foundation, former deputy assistant secretary for legislation at HHS, author of best seller “Why ObamaCare is Wrong for America”

TOPIC: What’s in the GOP Obamacare repeal bill:

• Senate Republicans release new Obamacare repeal bill
• Senate Republicans one vote away from Obamacare repeal failure
• Two GOP senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky, said Thursday afternoon they will oppose a procedural vote next week to bring the bill to the floor. GOP leaders are putting immense pressure on about half a dozen other Republican senators not to join them and topple the entire effort. Another “no” is enough to kill the bill, and would also likely lead to mass defections.
• With the prospects for passing the current Senate Republican health care bill still in jeopardy, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, and Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana, are working with their GOP colleagues on an alternative approach to replacing Obamacare: keeping much of the federal taxes in place and sending that money to the states to control.

6am – E Transgender News: House rejects attempt to ban transgender surgery for troops The Republican-led House narrowly rejected a measure on Thursday that sought to strike an Obama-era practice of requiring the Pentagon to pay for gender transition surgeries and hormone therapy. Democrats described the proposal as bigoted, unconstitutional and cowardly and they won support from 24 GOP lawmakers to scuttle the amendment to the annual defense policy bill, 214-209. The amendment crafted by Rep. Vicky Hartzler, R-Mo., would have forbid money from being spent by the military’s health care system for medical treatment related to gender transition. Hartzler portrayed her proposal as a good government plan aimed at assuring military dollars are spent only on critical national defense needs. Hartzler estimated transition surgeries, which she said most private insurance plans don’t even cover, could cost the military $1.3 billion over the next 10 years. Troops who have the surgery require months of recovery, she added, which means they’re unavailable to do their jobs. But House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi called the amendment an attack on the health and dignity of thousands of U.S. service members, and Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the No. 2 Democrat in the House, said Hartzler intended to “politically denigrate” transgender troops.

6am – F A man got trapped inside an ATM, and kept dispensing hand written notes until somebody freed him. (Fox News) Man stuck in ATM sends note for help through receipt slot. Shocked customers at a Texas ATM got more than cash from the money machine when a technician trapped behind it slipped notes through the receipt slot begging for help, police said. Corpus Christi police said the unnamed man, who is a contractor, got stuck in an ATM room at a local Bank of America while attempting to change the lock on the machine, according to Fox 8. “He left his phone in his truck, he’s installing a new lock on the door, and he gets locked inside the building where the ATM is,” Officer Richard Olden of Corpus Christi Police told KRISTV. People were going to the ATM to get money when the man stuck inside slid notes through the receipt slot saying: “Please Help. I’m stuck in here, and I don’t have my phone. Please call my boss.” Officer Olden said at first people thought the note was a joke, but somebody eventually took it seriously and called authorities. “We come out here, and sure enough we can hear a little voice coming from the machine,” Olden said. “So we are thinking this is a joke. It’s got to be a joke.” Olden said the man was rescued and was unharmed. “Everyone is okay, but you will never see this in your life, that somebody was stuck in the ATM, it was just crazy,” Olden said.

7am – A  INTERVIEW – LAURA VOZELLA — covers Virginia politics for The Washington Post.

TOPIC: Latest on Gillespie’s gubernatorial campaign and Stewart to enter Senate race

• Gillespie’s primary scare has White House, others urging ‘Trump world’ hires. Aligning with Trump strategists could be a stomach-churner for Gillespie, whose résumé reads establishment Republican: counselor to President George W. Bush, former Republican National Committee chairman, lobbyist. Gillespie got behind Trump only after he had sewn up the 2016 nomination. Now, Gillespie studiously avoids discussing the president.
• Corey Stewart announces ‘vicious, ruthless’ 2018 bid for Kaine’s seat
• Washington (CNN)Republican Corey Stewart announced Thursday a “vicious, ruthless” bid to unseat Sen. Tim Kaine in the 2018 midterms. “I am going to run the most vicious, ruthless campaign to dethrone Tim Kaine,” Stewart said on Facebook Live outside his Virginia home. “We’re not holding back any punches. I’m going to go after him very, very hard.” Stewart, who serves as the Prince William County Board of Supervisors chair, narrowly lost the Republican nomination for governor to former Republican National Committee chairman Ed Gillespie by one percentage point last month. His campaign website, also launched Thursday, currently boasts more than 17,000 supporters.

 7am – B House Dems plot to force Republicans to cast Russia votes (Politico) House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and other senior Democrats on Friday will announce a new, coordinated strategy to force Republicans to cast votes on issues related to President Donald Trump’s and his campaign aides’ alleged ties to Russia. Pelosi and senior Democrats on several key House committees will hold a news conference to announce the strategy, which is to introduce a series of so-called resolutions of inquiry, according to a Democratic leadership aide. Resolutions of inquiry are a rarely used tactic for forcing House votes. The resolutions are introduced in the House and request information from the executive branch. The resolutions are referred to committees, and if the committees do not take up the resolutions within 14 legislative days, any member can request a vote on the House floor. Democrats used the technique earlier this year to force committee votes requesting Trump’s tax returns. One such measure was defeated by Republicans in a February vote in the House Judiciary Committee. New resolutions of inquiry are set to be introduced in six House committees: Transportation and Infrastructure, Foreign Affairs, Homeland Security, Judiciary, Financial Services, and Ways and Means. The Foreign Affairs resolution will deal with Russia sanctions, the aide said, while the Financial Services one will deal with Trump’s and his family’s finances.

 7am – C  FEC Has Kept Documents About Democrats Secret For Years (Daily Caller) The FEC — which includes three commissioners each from Democratic and Republican parties — has withheld records related to 17 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests filed more than three years ago, according to an agency document obtained by TheDCNF. Of the 17, 10 have been pending for nearly four years, another will be five this year and the oldest turned six in June. The requested documents span a variety of topics, ranging from communications regarding former FEC official Lois Lerner, the central figure in the IRS targeting scandal, to internal communications and commission policy documents.

Four unfulfilled requests, including the oldest, seek records related to FEC commissioners’ travel. These documents are especially relevant because of a recent report showing the Democratic members of the commission have taken at least 50 trips funded by foreign groups, governments and U.S. taxpayers since 2002. Additionally, foreign groups funded overseas travel for Democratic FEC Commissioner Ellen Weintraub who recently proposed a plan to defend against foreign influence in U.S. elections following allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential contest, TheDCNF previously revealed. None of the current Republican commissioners have taken such trips. Weintraub also took a tax-paid $9,200 trip to Indonesia that an FEC itinerary showed included a five-day gap between official events.

 7am – D Trump in France In a news conference, Trump saluted America’s “unbreakable” bond with France. He made the gushing comments during a news conference in Paris today as part of a trip to France for the Bastille Day celebrations. Trump says the two nations have “occasional disagreements” but that doesn’t disrupt a friendship that dates to the American Revolution. The four also posed for a picture at the restaurant against the backdrop of Paris.The world leaders seemed to have genuine chemistry. Trump and Macron share a warm handshake during the press conference in Paris. Trump described the bond between the two nations as ‘unbreakable’. Trump also saluted France’s commitment to fighting terrorism and reducing bureaucracy, a goal he shares.

The American president also touched upon one of those areas of disagreement: climate change. Trump says the United State was committed to protecting the environment despite his recent decision to withdraw from a global agreement to combat climate change. There was a tense moment where President Donald Trump was asked if he would repeat his criticism of Paris, which he frequently attributed to a friend named Jim. The US president has said previously that Jim used to visit Paris frequently but doesn’t anymore because of the threat from Islamic terrorism. Trump often indicated he agreed with that assessment. President Donald Trump was captured complimenting the French president’s wife’s appearance Thursday as he toured a famous Paris landmark. Video footage posted on the French government’s official Facebook page showed Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron and their wives chatting after their tour of the museums at Les Invalides. As they were saying their good-byes, Trump turned to Brigitte Macron and gestured toward her body. “You know, you’re in such good shape,” Trump said, before repeating the observation to her husband. “Beautiful,” he added.

7am – E Congrats, D.C.! We’ve been named the second-sweatiest city in the country. Washington is one of the sweatiest cities in the country. Between all the hot air and layers upon layers of synthetic-fiber suits under festering armpits, we’re dripping. We don’t need a study to tell us this, but now we have one anyway! Here’s the top 10, according to Honeywell (they make fans — see how this works?) and the consulting agency Environmental Health and Engineering. Notice the lack of chill, West Coast locales on this list — have we mentioned we’re considering moving the Gang to San Diego? Ted Myatt, who led the study, explained how it was done in a news release: “To identify the sweatiest cities across the nation, we looked at data in a number of national records to determine the percentage of homes without central air conditioning, the popularity of public transportation and citywide bike sharing programs, as well as the cities with the ‘hottest’ professions. Similar to previous reports, information from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association and the U.S. Census Bureau were used to determine a city’s average summer temperatures and population density when identifying the 2017 Sweatiest Cities.” There are two reasons New York out-sweated us in this year’s list. First, it has more homes without air conditioners per capita. Second, it has more hand-wringing jobs such as financial advisers and air traffic controllers.

8am – A  INTERVIEW – RONNA ROMNEY MCDANIEL — the current chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, and former chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party.

Topic: Healthcare repeal fight and news of the day

• Senate Republicans release new Obamacare repeal bill
• Senate Republicans one vote away from Obamacare repeal failure
• Trump: ‘Republican Senators must come through’ on health care bill.  Trump, who is in France attending Bastille Day celebrations with French President Emmanuel Macron, wrote on Twitter Friday morning. “So impt Rep Senators, under leadership of @SenateMajLdr McConnell get healthcare plan approved. After 7yrs of O’Care disaster, must happen!”
• Washington Post: “Some in Trump’s orbit are pushing the Republican National Committee to bear the [legal] costs”
• Another question is who will pay the legal fees for the president and administration officials involved in the Russia inquiries. Some in Trump’s orbit are pushing the Republican National Committee to bear the costs, said three people with knowledge of the situation, including one who euphemistically described the debate as a “robust discussion.”
• Although the RNC does have a legal defense fund, it well predates the Russia investigations and is intended to be used for legal challenges facing the Republican Party, such as a potential election recount.

 7am – B NRA Protests The organizers of January’s Women’s March on Washington have planned another protest that starts Friday and ends Saturday. This one, described as a nonviolent mass demonstration, is aimed at the National Rifle Association. It’s a response to a video that the NRA put out in April called “The Violence of Lies,” which criticizes violent protests like the ones in D.C. on Inauguration Day. The “Women’s March from #NRA2DOJ” begins with a rally Friday at 10 a.m., at NRA headquarters in Fairfax. At noon, protesters plan to begin an 18-mile march to the Department of Justice, in D.C. They expect to arrive around midnight, where they will rally before dispersing. Saturday morning at 10, the group plans to return to the DOJ building for another rally and vigil. The D.C. police said drivers should expect single-lane closings related to the event starting Friday night. The demonstrators are expected to stay on sidewalks until they reach the Francis Scott Key Bridge, sometime between 7 and 10 p.m.

 8am – C Monkey Selfie Rights A 45-minute hearing before a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco attracted crowds of law students and curious citizens who often burst into laughter. The federal judges also chuckled at times at the novelty of the case, which involves a monkey in another country that is unaware of the fuss. Andrew Dhuey, attorney for British nature photographer David Slater, said “monkey see, monkey sue” is not good law under any federal act. Naruto is a free-living crested macaque who snapped perfectly framed selfies in 2011 that would make even the Kardashians proud. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sued Slater and the San Francisco-based self-publishing company Blurb, which published a book called “Wildlife Personalities” that includes the monkey selfies, for copyright infringement.  It sought a court order in 2015 allowing it to administer all proceeds from the photos taken in a wildlife reserve in Sulawesi, Indonesia to benefit the monkey.

8am – D INTERVIEW –  BRET BAIER – Fox News Channel

TOPIC: News of the day: healthcare fight, Trump responds to Don Jr controversy, Trump bromance in France.

• Senate Republicans release new Obamacare repeal bill
• Senate Republicans one vote away from Obamacare repeal failure
• Trump: ‘Republican Senators must come through’ on health care bill. Trump, who is in France attending Bastille Day celebrations with French President Emmanuel Macron, wrote on Twitter Friday morning. “So impt Rep Senators, under leadership of @SenateMajLdr McConnell get healthcare plan approved. After 7yrs of O’Care disaster, must happen!”
• Graham proposes an alternative healthcare proposal (CNN)With the prospects for passing the current Senate Republican health care bill still in jeopardy, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, and Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana, are working with their GOP colleagues on an alternative approach to replacing Obamacare: keeping much of the federal taxes in place and sending that money to the states to control. “Here is what will happen,” Graham said in an exclusive interview with CNN’s Kate Bolduan. “If you like Obamacare, you can re-impose the mandates at the state level. You can repair Obamacare if you think it needs to be repaired. You can replace it if you think it needs to be replaced. It’ll be up to the governors. They’ve got a better handle on it than any bureaucrat in Washington.”

 8am – E Paul Ryan ‘Modernizing’ the Capitol’s Dress Code Jenna Lifhits, a reporter for the Weekly Standard, attempted to fashion sleeves out of pieces of paper after she was denied entry to the House lobby while wearing her sleeveless dress. She was still not allowed in.  The reports from the women sparked a backlash on Twitter, where many on the left accused Ryan of crafting the rules, which they deemed sexist.  “Liberal reporters on Capitol Hill threw a fit this week over a ‘new’ and ‘sexist’ dress code in the House Speaker’s lobby,” The Blaze, a right-leaning website, wrote. “There was just one problem with their criticism, the formal, traditional dress code isn’t new at all.” House Speaker Paul Ryan announced Thursday that the House dress code will be “modernized” following recent uproar after several female reporters dressed in sleeveless clothes and open-toed shoes were turned away from the Speaker’s lobby, a chamber in the House where reporters often interview congress members. “It came to my attention that there was an issue about dress code,” Ryan began with a chuckle during his weekly press conference on Thursday morning. The speaker defended himself against accusations from some that he was involved in crafting the conservative code.  “The sergeant-at-arms was simply enforcing the same interpretation of the rules as under my predecessors — this is nothing new and certainly not something that I devised,” Ryan said.  He argued that “decorum” is important in the House, but that the dress code would be updated to reflect modern “appropriate business attire.” “A dress code in the chamber and in the lobby makes sense,” Ryan said. “But we also don’t need to bar otherwise accepted contemporary business attire. Look for a change on that soon.” The announcement came the day after Republican Representative Martha McSally denounced the code while speaking on the House floor on Wednesday. “Before I yield back, I want to point out I’m standing here in my professional attire, which happens to be a sleeveless dress and open-toed shoes,” she said.  Several female reporters tweeted in recent days that they were turned away from the House chamber. While the House floor rules, which also require men to wear ties, have long been in place, it seems that they have been enforced more consistently this summer.