Joe Trippi, Byron York, Joe Concha, Robert Spencer and Harmeet Dhillon joined WMAL on Thursday!
Mornings on the Mall
Thursday, August 24, 2017
Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese
5am – A/B/C President Trump Threatened to Shut Down the Government (Financial Times) A bombastic Donald Trump returned to the campaign trail on Tuesday, vowing to shut down the government if Congress did not pay for his proposed border wall and accusing his critics of trying to erase history. Would you be behind shutting down the government in order to get the wall paid for?
5am – D White House Sets Rules for Military Transgender Ban (The Wall Street Journal) The White House is expected to send guidance to the Pentagon in coming days on how to implement a new administration ban on transgender people in the military, issuing a policy that will allow Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to consider a service member’s ability to deploy in deciding whether to kick them out of the military. The White House memo also directs the Pentagon to deny admittance to transgender individuals and to stop spending on medical treatment regimens for those currently serving, according to U.S. officials familiar with the document. The 2½-page memo gives Mr. Mattis six months to prepare to fully implement the new ban, according to these officials.
MTV is trying to bring active duty transgender service members to Sunday’s Video Music Awards, official says (CNN) MTV has reached out to the military in an effort to bring active duty transgender military service members to Sunday’s MTV Video Music Awards, a US defense official told CNN. It’s an invitation that is likely to draw attention to transgender service members, an issue that has become politically charged in the wake of President Donald Trump’s July tweets that appeared to call for the reinstatement of a ban on transgender persons serving in the military. Pentagon Spokesman Lt. Col. Paul Haverstick told CNN Wednesday that “MTV has requested service member participation for this year’s VMAs.” “At this time the Department of Defense is reviewing the parameters of the request,” Haverstick said. Active duty military members face restrictions in participating in high-profile national public events, particularly those with a political bent.
5am – E Iran Caught Shipping Soldiers to Syria on Commercial Flights in Violation of Nuclear Deal (Washington Free Beacon) New photographs obtained by congressional leaders show Iran shipping militant soldiers to Syria on commercial airline flights, a move that violates the landmark nuclear agreement and has sparked calls from U.S. lawmakers for a formal investigation by the Trump administration, the Washington Free Beacon has learned. Photographs published by a Washington, D.C., think-tank and provided to Congress show Iran using its flagship commercial carrier, Iran Air, to ferry militants to Syria, where they have joined the fight against U.S. forces in the region.
Iran warns inspectors not to share info with Nikki Haley (The Washington Examiner) U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley met officials at a key nuclear inspections agency Wednesday, drawing a rebuke from Iranian officials. Haley met with the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, Austria to discuss “monitoring and verification efforts and Iran’s compliance with the nuclear deal,” according to a summary of the meeting. But Iranian officials argued that the meeting undermined “the independence and credibility” of the inspectors and warned the IAEA not to share extra information about the regime’s nuclear program.
Diplomats in Cuba suffered traumatic brain injuries, records show (The Hill) U.S. and Canadian diplomats in Cuba suffered mild traumatic brain injury and likely damage to their central nervous system in an incident that has been linked to a sonic attack. Medical records said doctors had discovered signs of the damage after patients complained about hearing loss, nausea, headaches and balance problems, CBS News reported. More than 10 U.S. and 5 Canadian diplomats in Havana began experiencing “a variety of physical symptoms” in the fall of 2016, according to the State Department. The symptoms have been traced to a sonic attack — a deliberate use of a sonic device operating outside of the audible range — on diplomatic residences in Havana. Cuban authorities have vowed to investigate the injuries amid pressure from Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Some diplomatic tours of duty have also been cut short as a result of the incident.
6am – A/B 47% say media blocking Trump’s agenda, helped Obama (Washington Examiner) The public appears to agree with President Trump that the media is out to get him and stop his agenda. A new Rasmussen Reports survey on the day Trump was railing against the media found that 47 percent believe the media is blocking his administration from scoring successes.
CNN: Everyone Who Voted For Trump Is A ‘White Supremacist By Default’ (The Daily Caller) CNN used the voices of a few professors and activists to assert anyone who voted for President Donald Trump is a white supremacist in a news report Wednesday, and to blame these “ordinary” people for the violence in Charlottesville. Trump voters helped advance white supremacy by giving them room to operate, CNN reported based on the assertions of others in a piece headlined, “‘White Supremacists by default’: How ordinary people made Charlottesville possible.” “It’s easy to focus on the angry white men in paramilitary gear who looked like they were mobilizing for a race war in the Virginia college town,” CNN reported. “But it’s the ordinary people — the voters who elected a reality TV star with a record of making racially insensitive comments, the people who move out of the neighborhood when people of color move in, the family members who ignore a relative’s anti-Semitism — who give these type of men room to operate.” CNN put the weight of the assertion on the views of what they described as “activists, historians and victims of extremism,” but made no visible effort to question their assertions or provide a counter point of view. Fordham University professor Mark Naison’s, for example, is quoted prominently in the piece accusing tens of millions of Americans of being white supremacists. “We are a country with a few million passionate white supremacists — and tens of millions of white supremacists by default,” Naison told CNN. He’s a political activist and history professor. He compared all Trump voters to “nice people” who facilitated the horrific violence of the Holocaust and the genocide in Rwanda by looking the other way.
Wall Street Journal Editor Admonishes Reporters Over Trump Coverage (The New York Times) Gerard Baker, the editor in chief of The Wall Street Journal, has faced unease and frustration in his newsroom over his stewardship of the newspaper’s coverage of President Trump, which some journalists there say has lacked toughness and verve. Some staff members expressed similar concerns on Wednesday after Mr. Baker, in a series of blunt late-night emails, criticized his staff over their coverage of Mr. Trump’s Tuesday rally in Phoenix, describing their reporting as overly opinionated. “Sorry. This is commentary dressed up as news reporting,” Mr. Baker wrote at 12:01 a.m. on Wednesday morning to a group of Journal reporters and editors, in response to a draft of the rally article that was intended for the newspaper’s final edition. He added in a follow-up, “Could we please just stick to reporting what he said rather than packaging it in exegesis and selective criticism?”
6am – C Metro report: Maintenance records for tunnel ventilation fans possibly falsified, prompts call for investigation (WTOP) An internal Metro review found that some crucial maintenance records for tunnel ventilation fans were possibly falsified, prompting a call for an investigation into the transit agency’s maintenance documentation practices. Metro’s office of Quality Assurance, Internal Compliance & Oversight discovered that four reports between 2014 and 2016 predated the creation of the form that was used to document the purported maintenance. “QICO identified several instances of maintenance record modification,” said the internal report dated June 9. The internal review comes after Metro has fired maintenance staff for falsifying other types of maintenance records. The review also found that other records indicate that some preventive maintenance may have been skipped. And some reports had illegible comments from inspectors or lacked comments detailing the results of the tests and inspections. Last year, Metro fired or disciplined nearly half of its separate track inspection department over what it said were falsified track inspection reports.
6am – D The American Civil Liberties Union is doing damage control after Twitter leftists denounced the group for sharing a picture of a white baby holding an American flag. (The Daily Caller) In a tweet sent Wednesday afternoon, the ACLU captioned a photo of a Caucasian, blonde-haired child wearing a free speech onesie and waving a flag, “This is the future that ACLU members want.” Leftists were furious over the post because they believed it endorsed white supremacy. The backlash to the innocuous tweet prompted the ACLU to tweet a correction where the group admitted the original message was somehow white supremacist. “When your Twitter followers keep you in check and remind you that white supremacy is everywhere,” the left-wing organization responded. The group sent another tweet clarifying that it only wanted promote a future where babies wore ACLU onesies. The civil liberties group has come under fire recently from the Left for defending the free speech rights of conservative provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos and alt-right groups. The backlash against the ACLU for representing the organizers of the alt-right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia that led to violence forced the group to backtrack a bit from its pro-free speech stance. Last week, it announced in response to that wave of outrage that it would no longer immediately defend groups that bring guns to demonstrations.
Slave Auction Block in Fredericksburg May Be Removed From Street Corner (WMAL) A slave auction block has been at the corner of William and Charles streets in Fredericksburg, Virginia since the 1800s, but it may be moved. At Tuesday night’s meeting, resident Ronnette Cooper said she can’t walk past the slave auction block without wondering if her ancestors were sold from that location. “I came here in ’95, and I saw it and it shocked me, and it put a pain in my heart. And honestly I wanted to take a sledge hammer to it at that point,” Cooper said during public comment. Cooper added that the recent events in Charlottesville stirred up that pain again. She would like to see the auction block removed. As a history teacher, she said the historical significance is not lost on her, which is why she wants a plaque to be put on the spot to explain that the block was there, and it represents a horrific time in American history. Resident Clint Van Zandt proposed putting a plaque on the site and moving the slave auction to a nearby museum. “It’s not a statue. It’s not Robert E. Lee on horseback. It is a relic. It is an artifact of history, and the question is, “Where should that artifact remain?”‘ Van Zandt told WMAL. Van Zandt thinks the entire community should be involved in any decision that’s made about the slave auction block. The council’s only black member, Chuck Frye Jr., and the mayor will meet to talk about the auction block’s future according to Van Zandt.
6am – E Legal ruling in: Facebook ‘friends’ aren’t necessarily real friends (Miami Herald) Facebook “friends” aren’t always real friends — at least legally. That was the finding Wednesday of an appeals court on a specific Facebook-related legal question: Whether a Miami judge needed to recuse herself because one of the attorneys involved in a case in her court is a Facebook “friend.” The answer, in a 10-page opinion that takes a remarkably nuanced look at social media, is: No. The ruling notes that Facebook data mining and algorithms lead to people accepting friend requests from people they barely know, or are acquainted with purely from professional circles. “Electronic social media is evolving at an exponential rate,” Third District Court of Appeal Judge Thomas Logue wrote in the unanimous opinion. “Acceptance as a Facebook ‘friend’ may well once have given the impression of close friendship and affiliation. Currently, however, the degree of intimacy among Facebook ‘friends’ varies greatly.” The legal fight over Facebook friendship isn’t over. An appeals court in Palm Beach earlier ruled to the contrary — meaning the Florida Supreme Court could very well decide the true legal meaning of social-media friendship.
6am – F Trump, McConnell portray themselves as ‘united’ after rift (Fox News) President Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are both trying to portray themselves as united on a political agenda despite their recent rift as Congress prepares to return to Washington. The public statements on Wednesday came after signs of serious tension: Trump recently said he’s “very disappointed in Mitch,” after McConnell said the president had “excessive expectations” about the legislative process. But with Congress set to return from the August recess soon – and Republicans hoping to make deals on tax reform, health care and a spending bill – both are signaling that they hope to work with each other on a political agenda. “President Donald J. Trump and Senator Mitch McConnell remain united on many shared priorities, including middle class tax relief, strengthening the military, constructing a southern border wall, and other important issues,” said Sarah Sanders, the White House press secretary, in a Wednesday statement. Sanders said Trump and McConnell will join together for “previously scheduled meetings following the August recess.” Earlier Wednesday, McConnell insisted he and Trump are “committed” to working together. “We have a lot of work ahead of us, and we are committed to advancing our shared agenda together and anyone who suggests otherwise is clearly not part of the conversation,” McConnell added. McConnell said he and Trump are working together to pass tax reform and infrastructure legislation, prevent a government default, fund the government, pass defense authorization and appropriations bills, pass healthcare legislation and “continue our progress” for veterans. After McConnell’s “excessive expectations” comment earlier this month, Trump fired back at McConnell over the Senate failing to pass legislation repealing and replacing ObamaCare.
7am – A Taylor Swift ends intrigue, announces new album in November (The Associated Press) Yes, Taylor Swift fans, Wednesday was a lucky one for you. The pop star who whipped her army of Swifties into a frenzy with video snippets of slithery snake parts on social media posted the title of her new album, “Reputation,” and announced online it will be out Nov. 10. The first single, she said in a series of posts, will drop Thursday night. And she threw in the album’s cover art for good measure: a black-and-white photo of herself — head and shoulders, in slouchy sweater, hair swept back — against a backdrop of newsprint reading, simply, “Taylor Swift” over and over again. Swift, who is followed by millions on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, wiped her feeds clean Friday and replaced the black void Monday with the first of three reptilian videos, each offering just a tad more of a snake, from tail to squirmy middle and finally its beady red eyes and ominous fangs lunging briefly at the camera.
Did Tom Cruise Use a Fake Butt in the Movie Valkyrie?: Twitter Is Suddenly Obsessed (People) Tom Cruise’s tush is attracting Kardashian-level attention in at least one inquisitive corner of the internet. An observant fan with the Twitter handle @iluvbutts247 posted a screenshot of the actor’s rear from the film Valkyrie on Monday, speculating about whether Cruise employed a prosthetic gluteus maximus in the scene. “Hello, please, i present the theory that for one single shot in Valkyrie (2008), at 5:12, tom cruise wears a fake butt. observe,” he captioned the photo below: Fans have since bubbled over with hundreds of hypotheses (not to mention Sir Mix-a-Lot jokes), from padding to CGI to a stunt double to a butt-enhancing angle. Of course, Cruise typically does his own stunts. “Is it a stunt scene? stunt actors wear fake butts for padding (wldt put it past Cruise all the time but this one looks hilariously outsized),” one user offered. Even the film’s director, Christopher McQuarrie, reportedly got in on the fun, but refused to help fans get to the bottom of the mystery. “At 12k retweets and climbing, why would I ever add clarity to this thread?” he asked, according to Page Six. He has since deleted the tweet.
Rapper Cancels Shows After Staring At Eclipse Boasts… (Spin) Young conscious hip-hop star Joey Bada$$ chose to be rebellious during Monday’s solar eclipse, and the decision might’ve been a costly one. After tweeting that he was gazing at the sun without protective eyewear during the eclipse—the one thing every news outlet stressed that you shouldn’t do—Joey announced on Twitter that he canceled his Cleveland, Chicago, and Toronto opening performances for Logic’s Everybody’s tour.
Mark Cuban would beat Trump if presidential election was held today: Poll (Washington Examiner) President Trump would lose a hypothetical matchup against fellow billionaire businessman Mark Cuban if the 2020 presidential election was held today. Public Policy Polling released an Aug. 18 to 21 survey Wednesday that found 42 percent of registered voters would pick Cuban for commander in chief compared to Trump’s 38 percent support. The advantage has slipped from Trump’s grasp, as he was leading the NBA Dallas Mavericks owner in February 41 percent to 40 percent. Cuban isn’t counting out a run for the highest elected office. He told Business Insider on Wednesday that he would run — likely as a Democrat or independent — if he had answers to issues plaguing the country. “These are always entertaining,” Cuban wrote in an email. “As I have said before, I would only run if I can come up with solutions for healthcare, the plight of working families, and reducing the stress levels of our country. It’s possible. When I have something to offer, I will.” The top-performers in a potential election against Trump are Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and former Vice President Joe Biden. Both men received support from 51 percent of respondents compared to the sub-40 percent who backed Trump. The poll was conducted among 887 registered voters nationwide and had a 3.3-percentage-point margin of error.
7am – B/C INTERVIEW – JOE TRIPPI – Democratic Strategist and Fox News Contributor
TOPIC: Analyze the state of the Democratic Party
– Obama, Hillary are dividing the Democratic Party’s fundraising
– Clinton Calls Trump a ‘Creep’ for Debate Behavior in Election Memoir
– 2018 midterms: Dems target 80 House seats; Republicans respond by going on offense
7am – D INTERVIEW – BYRON YORK – Chief Political Correspondent, The Washington Examiner
TOPIC: Recent article
– Republicans skeptical about origin of Trump dossier
– Thoughts on the Mitch McConnell–President Trump feud
7am – E Amazon-Whole Foods merger gets green light from U.S. government (CNN Money) The U.S. government won’t try to stop Amazon’s $13.7 billion takeover of Whole Foods, a deal that has massive implications for both e-commerce and how we shop for food. The Federal Trade Commission announced Wednesday that it’s looked into whether the merger would hurt competition and has decided to drop its investigation. “We have decided not to pursue this matter further,” the FTC said in a statement. No other government agencies need to give their okay. “As far as antitrust approval, it’s done,” said James Cooper, an economics professor at George Mason University and former FTC official. Earlier Wednesday, Whole Foods (WFM) shareholders voted to approve the takeover, which has sailed along since it was announced in June. Amazon said on Wednesday the deal is on track to be completed. Its initial announcement said it expects the deal to close in the second half of 2017. Meanwhile, many traditional brick-and-mortar stores are scrambling. Shares of supermarkets, including Kroger (KR) and SuperValu (SVU), plummeted on news of the acquisition. Few doubt Amazon’s loud entry into the grocery space will change the game. The company already has its own delivery serviced called AmazonFresh and has been experimenting with a “click and collect” system in which customers buy their groceries online and then pick them up in person. But some things will stay the same — at least for now. Amazon has said Whole Foods stores will continue to operate under the same name as a separate unit of the company, and that Whole Foods CEO John Mackey will keep leading the brand from its headquarters in Austin, Texas.
8am – A INTERVIEW – JOE CONCHA – Media reporter/columnist for The Hill
TOPIC: Media has become unhinged over Charlottesville/Trump/statues
– ESPN’s Robert Lee move displays political correctness at its worst (The Hill/Joe Concha) — From the “you have to be kidding me” files, ESPN is removing a play-by-play announcer named Robert Lee from a University of Virginia football game in September because he has the same name as Confederate general Robert E. Lee. ESPN’s Lee is an Asian-American. He’ll be transferred to call a Youngstown State-Pitt game instead, which won’t be televised. The University of Virginia is located in Charlottesville, which was the scene of white supremacist violence that left one woman dead on August 12. That violence was inspired by the city’s decision to remove a Robert E. Lee statue. So in applying the same infinite, pandering wisdom that TV Land displayed in 2015 when it took “The Dukes of Hazard” off the air because the characters owned a car called “The General Lee,” ESPN must have decided that its viewers would applaud its move to take Lee off the game.
– Wall Street Journal Editor Admonishes Reporters Over Trump Coverage. (NY Times) — Gerard Baker, the editor in chief of The Wall Street Journal, has faced unease and frustration in his newsroom over his stewardship of the newspaper’s coverage of President Trump, which some journalists there say has lacked toughness and verve. Some staff members expressed similar concerns on Wednesday after Mr. Baker, in a series of blunt late-night emails, criticized his staff over their coverage of Mr. Trump’s Tuesday rally in Phoenix, describing their reporting as overly opinionated. “Sorry. This is commentary dressed up as news reporting,” Mr. Baker wrote at 12:01 a.m. on Wednesday morning to a group of Journal reporters and editors, in response to a draft of the rally article that was intended for the newspaper’s final edition. He added in a follow-up, “Could we please just stick to reporting what he said rather than packaging it in exegesis and selective criticism?”
8am – B/C INTERVIEW – ROBERT SPENCER – Jihad Watch director and author of new book “The Complete Infidel’s Guide to Free Speech (and Its Enemies)”
TOPIC: “The Complete Infidel’s Guide to Free Speech (and Its Enemies)” (new book)
– PayPal Restores Jihad Watch and AFDI Accounts Following Backlash from Supporters
8am – D INTERVIEW – HARMEET DHILLON – attorney for the the fired Google engineer
TOPIC: James Damore (fired Google engineer)
– Fired Google engineer hires prominent GOP lawyer to explore class-action suit
– Lawyers for fired Google employee ask for others to come forward with other “illegal” employment practices
– Attorney Harmeet Dhillon represented the Berkeley College Republicans in their free speech case against the University of California, Berkeley over failing to allow Ann Coulter to speak on campus on equal terms, slammed the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) for ignoring the case.”
8am – E Metro report: Maintenance records for tunnel ventilation fans possibly falsified, prompts call for investigation (WTOP) An internal Metro review found that some crucial maintenance records for tunnel ventilation fans were possibly falsified, prompting a call for an investigation into the transit agency’s maintenance documentation practices. Metro’s office of Quality Assurance, Internal Compliance & Oversight discovered that four reports between 2014 and 2016 predated the creation of the form that was used to document the purported maintenance. “QICO identified several instances of maintenance record modification,” said the internal report dated June 9. The internal review comes after Metro has fired maintenance staff for falsifying other types of maintenance records. The review also found that other records indicate that some preventive maintenance may have been skipped. And some reports had illegible comments from inspectors or lacked comments detailing the results of the tests and inspections. Last year, Metro fired or disciplined nearly half of its separate track inspection department over what it said were falsified track inspection reports
