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. – host Leahy welcomed national political correspondent for One America News, Neil W. McCabe, to the newsmaker line to analyze Ron DeSantis’ speech at the National Conservatism Conference and discuss the forgiveness offered to liberals by the woke mainstream media.
Leahy: On the newsmaker line, the very best political correspondent in the country, still, Neil W. McCabe. Good morning, Neil.
McCabe: Michael, Crom very good to be with you.
Leahy: Of course, you are the very best political correspondent. Previously you were the national political editor for The Star News Network and The Tennessee Star. Now you’re based in Tallahassee, Florida. You are the Top Gov tracker, keeping track of what Governor Ron DeSantis is doing.
I see that he’s traveling around the country, going to go to Kansas next week, I guess, to campaign with the gubernatorial candidate there. Are you getting tired of flying around the country with Governor DeSantis?
McCabe: (Chuckles) It’s never a chore covering Ron DeSantis. He’s fantastic. We were down in Miami for One America News covering DeSantis at the National Conservatism Conference, and he spoke for a little over an hour, and a lot of people were saying it was kind of a Trumpian kind of speech.
I think he’s learned a lot from Trump, and he really fired people up. And all of his applause lines, Mike, were stuff about attacking the trans agenda, defending parents, reforming education, standing up to woke corporate influence in our politics, especially Disney, which he had a big battle with this year here in Florida.
And these are all the applause lines that got people on their feet cheering. And these are exactly the lines of attack that the sort of Republican establishment is avoiding as they try their best to ruin what could have been a great red wave.
Leahy: So you were down there in Miami at this event?
McCabe: Oh, yeah.
Leahy: What was the atmosphere like there surrounding DeSantis? Is there a big momentum supporting the guy?
McCabe: There’s a lot of good feeling towards DeSantis. I spoke to a well-known sort of national political commentator about the situation with Trump versus DeSantis, and he kind of summed up where I think the mood was at the conference.
And that is a lot of people, a lot of conservatives would hope to have with DeSantis, Trumpism without Trump. The problem is that you can’t just allow the Democrats to use the FBI to bounce a guy out of public life, because otherwise we’re just Venezuela.
Leahy: And of course, if they try and bounce Donald Trump out by putting all of the politicized resources of the FBI and the Department of Justice against him, who’s next? Obviously, they’ll go after DeSantis next, right?
McCabe: Oh, sure. And there are a lot of people who are complaining about cancel culture, even at this conference, who never mentioned One America News and how the Left went after our coverage. It’s like that old line, Mike. When they came for the gypsies, I did nothing.
And that’s kind of where people are at right now. We just can’t allow them to push Trump out of public life. Marco Rubio spoke at the conference. Marco Rubio just says, what happened at Mar-a-Lago with the FBI was an argument over proper storage of documents.
Leahy: Exactly.
McCabe: It’s like it was in a locked room, it wasn’t in a vault. And for that, this is where we’re at.
Leahy: So on Monday, the DeSantis campaign, shared a video of his opponent in the general election. He’s running to be re-elected governor on November 8th, which is seven weeks and six days from today. A former Republican, the very tanned Charlie Crist, is now running for governor. Also, he was a Republican governor.
A newly unearthed video the National Review is reporting shows Charlie Crist, the Democratic nominee for Florida governor, comparing himself to Jesus Christ and calling Republican governor Ron DeSantis “DeSatan.” What about that?
McCabe: Yes. In fact, we interviewed Christina Pushaw and she gave a speech. Christina is, she was the coms director for DeSantis. Now she’s at the DeSantis campaign. She is the director of rapid response. And she is just such a case study in genius. And she talked about this.
And this is the kind of stuff that the Democrats have always gotten away with, because the mainstream media just will not cover it. They will not dig it up. They will cyberstalk anyone. Some major league pitcher, right, they’ll cyberstalk him and find some tweet that he made when he was 15 years old.
Meanwhile, on the Democratic side, it’s a free pass. It’s a hall pass. I will mention that the White House correspondent for CNN, Kaitlan Collins, when she was at The Daily Caller, back when she was a conservative, she made some sort of un-woke tweets that were unearthed, and that was all forgiven. She wasn’t fired from CNN. In fact, she got a promotion.
Leahy: Apparently now CNN is getting rid of a few folks. Mini-me, Brian Stelter, gone from CNN, but of course, he’s gone to, now, Harvard. He’s at the Harvard Institute of Politics. By the way, has CNN called you, Neil, and asked to see if you’d be one of their correspondents?
McCabe: As you may or may not know, Mike, the last course I took to finish my bachelor’s degree was a local journalism course at continuing education at Harvard. So I always tell people I finished my studies at Harvard. Back in the ’70s they just let anybody from upstate New York in.
Leahy: (Laughs) Boom! That’s very good. (Laughter) So the phone is not ringing from CNN. They don’t want to bring you on as a conservative reporter.
McCabe: I don’t think I could stand it.
Leahy: No, I don’t think you could either.
Carmichael: The Washington Free Beacon reports that Harvard is now saying that it is an affront if you don’t use the other person’s proper pronouns. And as a student, you’ll be penalized if you don’t use the other person’s proper pronouns. So Brian Stelter has gotten to work quickly. (Leahy chuckles)
McCabe: Yes, there’s another thing he’s going to get to work quickly on, and that’s donuts. (Leahy laughs)
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
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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.
Photo “Ron DeSantis” by Ron DeSantis.Â
