Breitbart White House correposndent Charlie Spiering, Independent Women’s Forum President Carrie Lukas, author and filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza, and Daily Mail political editor David Martosko joined WMAL on Thursday!

Mornings on the Mall

Thursday, August 2, 2018

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

 

5am – A/B/C Obama endorses dozens of Dems, snubs Ocasio-Cortez (Fox News) – Former President Barack Obama on Wednesday endorsed dozens of Democrats in races across the country, flexing his political muscle in the midterms and vowing to hit the stump for some of them before November.  Notably, the former president did not endorse liberal darling Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in her New York House race. The ‘democratic socialist’ has teamed up on the campaign trail with Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., but her high profile after defeating House Democratic Caucus Chairman Joe Crowley in the primary has raised concerns in some corners of the party.

5am – D Pence hails ‘tangible progress’ with North Korea as remains of presumed Korean War dead arrive in Hawaii (Fox News) – Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday the return of the remains of 55 Americans presumed dead from the Korean War was a sign of “tangible progress in our efforts to achieve peace on the Korean Peninsula.”  Pence spoke at a ceremony at Hawaii’s Hickam Air Force Base to mark the arrival of the remains on U.S. soil and the beginning of long process to identify them.

5am – E The Latest: Jurors hear about lavish spending by Manafort (U.S. News) – Jurors at Paul Manafort’s trial has heard details of the former Trump campaign chairman’s lavish spending — nearly all paid for either in cash or offshore wire transfers.  The defense has argued that the illegal conduct alleged by the government was carried out by Manafort’s associate, Rick Gates, without Manafort’s knowledge.  But a series of witnesses for the prosecution testified Wednesday that they didn’t know Gates and he wasn’t involved in paying them for the millions of dollars’ worth of clothing, expensive cars and home improvement work.

6am – A Trump urges end to probe ‘right now,’ setting off new storm (WTOP) – President Donald Trump bluntly declared on Wednesday his attorney general should terminate “right now” the federal probe into the campaign that took him to the White House, a newly fervent attack on the special counsel investigation that could imperil his presidency. Trump also assailed the trial, just underway, of his former campaign chairman by the special counsel’s team.  White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders scrambled to explain that Trump’s tweet was “not an order” and the president was not directing his attorney general to do anything.

6am – B/C New survey shows Fox News more trusted than MSNBC, CNN (Fox News) – Fox News was ranked the “most trusted” American TV news brand in the United States, and was second overall, behind only the British-based BBC, according to a new study.  The Research Intelligencer study, conducted via Brand Keys, analyzed 4,012 viewers who rated both broadcast and cable news organizations that they watch at least three times per week to determine how those brands resonated from a trust standpoint. Ninety percent of the viewers surveyed said they trusted the BCC, with 87 percent saying they trusted Fox News.       

6am – D/E New parents face the ‘social insecurity’ of our time, so let’s help (USA Today) – Upon signing the Social Security Act into law in 1935, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, “the civilization of the past hundred years, with its startling industrial changes, has tended more and more to make life insecure … we have tried to frame a law which will give some measure of protection to the average citizen and to his family.”  Over 80 years later, this still rings true.       

6am – F Trump ‘sanctuary cities’ executive order is unconstitutional, US appeals court rules (Fox News) – A U.S. appeals court ruled Wednesday it is unconstitutional for the Trump administration to threaten to withhold funding from “sanctuary cities” that aren’t cooperating with immigration officials.  “Absent congressional authorization, the administration may not redistribute or withhold properly appropriated funds in order to effectuate its own policy goals,” Chief Judge Sidney Thomas wrote for the majority.

7am – A INTERVIEW – Charlie Spiering – Breitbart News White House correspondent – discussed latest White House news    

7am – B Fox News movie: Margot Robbie joins Nicole Kidman and Charlize Theron (The Guardian) – Margot Robbie is reportedly in talks to join Nicole Kidman and Charlize Theron in Annapurna’s upcoming film about the Fox News sexual abuse scandal, according to the Hollywood Reporter.  Kidman is slated to play former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson, who blew the whistle on the company’s culture of sexism and harassment when she and more than two dozen other women accused chairman and CEO Roger Ailes, who died in 2017, of sexual harassment. Theron, who is also a co-producer, will play Megyn Kelly, another former Fox News anchor who said she experienced “explicit quid-pro-quo sexual harassment” at the hands of her former boss, Ailes.

7am – C Losing Earth: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change (New York Times Magazine) – The world has warmed more than one degree Celsius since the Industrial Revolution. The Paris climate agreement — the nonbinding, unenforceable and already unheeded treaty signed on Earth Day in 2016 — hoped to restrict warming to two degrees. The odds of succeeding, according to a recent study based on current emissions trends, are one in 20. If by some miracle we are able to limit warming to two degrees, we will only have to negotiate the extinction of the world’s tropical reefs, sea-level rise of several meters and the abandonment of the Persian Gulf. The climate scientist James Hansen has called two-degree warming “a prescription for long-term disaster.”       

7am – D/E INTERVIEW – Carrie Lukas – Independent Women’s Forum President – discussed push for a paid family leave bill 

8am – A INTERVIEW – Dinesh D’Souza – author and filmmaker of the new documentary “Death of a Nation” – discussed his new movie      

8am – B Comedians Speak Out:

• Chris Rock is sick of the ‘insufferable wokeness of comedy’ too (Daily Caller) – Chris Rock made it crystal clear on Wednesday that he’s also sick and tired of the “insufferable wokeness of comedy.”  “Seinfeld Is A Respite From The Insufferable Wokeness Of Comedy. Thank God for Jerry,” the 53-year-old comedian tweeted to his millions of followers, along with a link to an article in The Federalist titled “Seinfeld’s ‘Comedians In Cars’ Is A Welcome Respite From The Insufferable Wokeness Of Comedy.”  In the piece, it’s noted that Seinfeld was recently criticized by Vulture for not “responding” to the current political climate and changing his popular series to “woke” politics.
• Leslie Jones: “Stop being offended” by comedians (CBS News) – Leslie Jones says targeting comedians for their inappropriate comments is “just so dumb.” The “Saturday Night Live” star appeared on “The View” on Monday to complain about recent incidents of comedians’ remarks coming back to haunt them. Though Jones did not specifically address the recent controversies surrounding Roseanne Barr, James Gunn or Dan Harmon over tasteless jokes, she did say the trend was “so stupid.”

8am – C Fairfax Co. Oks new rules for Airbnb, other short-term rentals (WTOP) – After more than a year of study, Fairfax County, Virginia has approved new rules for people who rent out their homes through websites, such as Airbnb and FlipKey.  The new rules approved by the county board of supervisors Tuesday go into effect starting Oct. 1.  Under the new rules, owners and renters can rent out their primary residence for up to 60 nights per calendar year.  No more than six people will be able to stay in a rental at one time, and they all have to know each other and book under one contract.

8am – D INTERVIEW – David Martosko – Daily Mail U.S. political editor – discussed Trump calling for the end of the Mueller probe and CNN’s Jim Acosta getting heckled at Trump’s FL rally   

8am – E Hillary Clinton to produce women’s suffrage drama series with Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television (Variety) – Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television is developing a series on the women’s suffrage movement in the United States with former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton attached as an executive producer, Variety has confirmed.  The Amblin has optioned the rights to the Elaine Weiss book “The Woman’s Hour: The Great Fight to Win the Vote.” The book follows the activists who led the decades-long fight to grant women the right to vote and sheds light on how close the battle to ratify the 19th Amendment really was. The series will developed for premium cable or streaming platforms.