Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – Leahy was joined on the line by all-star panelist Crom Carmichael.
During the third hour, Carmichael reviewed President Trump’s press briefings held this week pointing out his plans to defund the World Health Organization and eventually of the World Trade Organization. He reflected on Monday’s briefing as particularly entertaining when the president turned the tables on journalists showing a short clip of their hypocritical coronavirus reporting.
Leahy: We are joined now on our newsmakers line by our good friend and the original all-star panelist Crom Carmichael. Good morning Crom.
Carmichael: Michael. How are you, sir?
Leahy: Well, I told Doug Kellet earlier in the five o’clock hour I believe I am beginning to suffer from studio fever. Its sort of like cabin fever but it’s when you come in and you work in the studio with your gloves and your mask and all of your friends that you normally have in studio with you and you can have a conversation with and look at them in the eye, you’ve got to talk to them on the phone. It’s a little different and not quite as fun, I think.
Carmichael: Well one thing you can say is your guests cannot claim that traffic was a problem. (Laughs)
Leahy: That is funny Crom. (Laughs) What is your home studio like? Is it your office, your living room? Where do you talk to us typically from?
Carmichael: I have a small office here that is actually Kathy’s office but I moved into here.
Leahy: Ah-ha!
Carmichael: And I take my computer which has batteries. I come in here and call in from Kathy’s office.
Leahy: There you go. I’ve been on this long list of things that have to change and are a little different. One is my workout regime has been typically to go to hot yoga in a studio where there are all these people that are breathing in the same air and I can’t do that anymore. Or the Orange Theory Fitness workout studio. Can’t do that anymore. So I’m kind of in the land of oh, not doing so well in terms of the exercise regime. Are you still able to do your exercise regime Crom? Or is that on hold?
Carmichael: What I do is I record the daily press conference. (Leahy chuckles) And then when I watch it I actually have a little routine that I do while watching the press conference and doing some exercises. It’s not optimal. Then I do a good bit of walking.
Leahy: That is a pretty good plan Crom. I might try that. Do your workout while you are watching the very lengthy press conferences from the president. Did you watch yesterday’s press conference by the way?
Carmichael: I did. I watched yesterday’s press conference but they kind of run together for me.
Leahy: They do.
Carmichael: The one that I thought was very interesting was when Trump played soundbites of the press (Leahy laughs) because they were criticizing him for doing exactly what they did. And he just merely ran some clips proving that. And Jonathan Carl went absolutely ballistic.
Leahy: So that was yesterday and it was funny. Jonathan Carl with ABC News which is what owned by Disney?
Carmichael: That was Monday. Because wasn’t yesterday’s was outside? Yesterday’s was outside.
Leahy: OK. You might be right.
Carmichael: Yeah. Jonathan Carl is from ABC. And all of the networks had been trying to say that Trump did not act soon enough. Trump did not act soon enough. We know for a fact that Trump acted on January 31 when he shut down travel from China. So what he did was he played a bunch of soundbites after January 31 of the media playing down the coronavirus (Leahy laughs) saying the flu is much worse and I don’t know why Trump’s making such a big deal out of the coronavirus and the flu will be much worse.
He played maybe six or seven clips. And Jonathan Carl was all mad, he asked who produced that? Who produced that? I want names. Trump said it was people in my communication office. We have well over 100 to pick from. If you’d like I could do some more and in fact, I might. (Laughter)
Leahy: That’s so funny!
Carmichael: What was so revealing was the press’s reaction. And Trump was actually really nice because he could of just really mauled them. Just could have mauled them for the way they reacted to that. He could of just said, do you think that you all are above the truth? (Leahy laughs) That’s a question Jonathan. Answer the question.
You don’t get a free pass. You are in the institution of the media the fourth estate you don’t get a free pass. If you make up fake news about me and I point it out that’s fair. And you’re one of the biggest fakers. And that’s more or less what he did when he called him a third rate reporter.
At any rate, I think that was just fabulous. I hope he does that some more. The two pieces of big news to me was, one, Trump announced yesterday that he is going to shut down funding for the World Health Organization and he’s launching an investigation. And that matters a lot.
And he said the World Trade Organization is next. He’s made it really clear that we’re not going to keep funding organizations that treat us badly and that respond more favorably to dictatorial governments. So we’re just not going to do that anymore. I thought that was a big statement.
Leahy: I agree. By the way Crom, you mentioned the travel ban on China that he put into effect on January 31. Immediately after that, the head of the World Health Organization condemned Trump’s travel ban as unnecessary. Remember that?
Carmichael: Yes. And so the World Health Organization is about to get a thorough investigation. And that guy that runs it will not last long. Fauci said nice things about that guy once but then he said, well I’m comparing him to his predecessor.
Leahy: Yikes! (Laughs)
Carmichael: Just because you have somebody who is bad and better than worse doesn’t mean that you should stick with bad. And so Trump is going to force some changes there. And he’s going to keep talking about it. And that will happen with a lot of international organizations.
Leahy: On Saturday our good friend Steve Bannon had a special edition of War Room Pandemic. We broadcasted that live at The Tennessee Star website via YouTube live-streaming. What he said was very interesting. Sometimes he foreshadows some of the actions of the president. I don’t think it’s necessarily because he talks. But he’s putting forth policy ideas that make sense. He said, not a penny more to the World Health Organization and here’s what Bannon said. Put Ben Carson in charge of it. I thought it was pretty interesting.
Carmichael: Now that, (Laughs) that would be fabulous. That would be fabulous. Whoever is going to be the next person in charge is somebody that Trump is going to approve or we’re not going to fund them.
Leahy: I’m all for that.
Carmichael: And the World Health Organization, one of the reporters and I don’t know who she works for but says, why don’t you punish China? And he says, how do you know we’re not punishing China? You don’t know we’re not punishing China? So, my guess is there’s another shoe to drop in regards to China. I don’t know if you saw the Sharyl Attkisson episode about the Batman of China?
Leahy: Yes.
Carmichael: It’s really quite frightening what he’s doing. They have over 300 bat viruses in that laboratory in Wuhan, China. Think about that. Because this is one. This is one. I believe that this is where this particular coronavirus-19 originated from. I think it originated from that lab and I don’t think it originated from those wet markets.
Leahy: We may never know with certainty because the Chinese government is refusing to cooperate with any investigation into the origins of this virus.
Carmichael: China may be confronting the world over this. Because this has been a worldwide catastrophe. There is not anybody who has not been affected. So China will have no allies when it comes to this.
Leahy: Except officials in the American Democratic Party in America AND the reporters in what I’m calling the Manchurian Media. ABC, CNN, NBC, and MSNBC.
Carmicheal: And Joe Biden of course.
Leahy: And Joe Biden of course!
Listen to the full second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
