Karen Pence, Second Lady of the United States joined me this morning to discuss her campaign to support military spouses:

Audio:

09-20hhs-pence

Transcript:

HH: I am so pleased, honored to welcome the Second Lady of the United States, Karen Pence, to the program. Mrs. Pence, welcome, it’s great to have you on the show.

KP: Thank you, Hugh. It’s great to be with you this morning.

HH: I want to begin by thanking you. I saw a story in the Military Times, Karen Pence Opens Campaign To Help Support Military Spouses, and I immediately said let’s reach out to her and see how we can help. What are you up to? And thank you for doing it.

KP: Well, thanks, Hugh. You know, we just started to realize that our military spouses are kind of a unique population. And they contribute so much and play such a significant role in the defense of our country. And I think people don’t realize that. And more than anything, we just want to come alongside, and we want to say we are with you, we support you, we appreciate you.

HH: They have so many unique challenges. Often, their spouse disappears overnight. Often, they’re left to move on short notice. Often, they move often, and they cannot find work because of licensing, and I believe you’re focused on licensing specifically.

KP: Well, we are, and you know, it’s something that changes all the time. So right when you think oh, we’ve got the licensing going, you know, it’s a state issue. And state legislatures change all the time. But it is something that is tricky for our military spouses. We’re making a lot of headway with state legislatures, but then, for example, maybe a state will say yes, we will accept your license from another state when you move, because you’re a military spouse. But maybe they don’t get that information to that particular organization, and so when the military spouse moves and calls, and says you know, I have this career, and she calls her organization and says you know, can you accept my license, maybe the person answering the phone doesn’t know what they’re talking about. So it’s a matter of getting everybody informed and on the same page as well.

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The host tweeted this morning:

As @HawleyMO just made clear, voters outside the Manhattan-Beltway media bubble are outraged the by Democratic drive-by on #JudgeKavanaugh, very willing to listen respectfully and at length to Dr. Ford, but revulsion at ambush real. #Backfire

— Hugh Hewitt (@hughhewitt) September 19, 2018

He has that right – to a point.  Number one, everybody is willing to assume that Dr. Ford has suffered some sort of injury and that it has festered in her life for a long time.  Everybody is sympathetic and wants to help her.  But I think he understates by simply saying people are “outraged,” this is beyond that.  I think “Mad as hell,”might just cover it.  Some people are dealing with their anger using humor, but honestly sometimes the resentment runs so deep that the humor just does not give it adequate ventilation.

If you think about it, the very election of Donald Trump is an expression of the outrage.  People are so fed up with this kind of nonsense that they voted completely and totally outside-the-box.  And yet the rest of Washington does not seem to have received the message and all that does is add frustration to people’s already existing outrage.  Since people do not seem to be getting the message, I want to make a list of a few things that come to mind, I am sure you, the reader, have a few of your own.

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Audio:

09-19hhs-mcsally

Transcript:

HH: Joining me now is Congresswoman Martha McSally, the Republican nominee for that seat. Congresswoman McSally, good morning, great to have you, as always.

MM: Good morning, Hugh. How are you doing?

HH: I am great. I’ve got a lot to cover with you. I’ve got to start with the obvious headline of the morning. Dr. Ford deserves every opportunity to tell her story. You are yourself a survivor of sexual abuse. Am I correct about that?

MM: I am, yes. Yes.

HH: And so when I talked to Chairman Grassley yesterday, I stressed respect for the doctor if she appears, and graciousness, and that she have the opportunity to tell her story. But if she doesn’t appear, I don’t know that it would change a single vote. What’s your comment?

MM: Well, and I do agree. I mean, the allegations are serious, and she does have the right to be heard, and Brett Kavanaugh has the right to also be heard. And all of this, I think, needs to be weighed against the massive amounts of testimonies and background checks and experience of the candidate. So look, again, having been through this, I certainly don’t have a PhD in it, but I will tell you, also having been in the military and my own experiences as a commander and a leader there, dirtbags are usually pattern dirtbags. You know, they usually, you know, these types of things happen over and over and over again until somebody gets caught. And so this just seems to be a partial memory of something 36 years ago that wasn’t told to anyone at the time. Again, I think she’s sincere in her beliefs of what happened to her, and she should be able to tell her story, and that needs to then be weighed against, you know, Judge Kavanaugh’s response and the other weight of the evidence while we move forward to fill this important position with the Supreme Court session starting in early October.

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Audio:

09-19hhs-hawley

Transcript:

HH: I am joined by Josh Hawley. He is the attorney general of Missouri. He is running for the Senate against Claire McCaskill. He is ahead. He is going to win. But I do want to talk to you, Attorney General Hawley. Good morning, welcome, good to have you.

JH: Thanks for having me.

HH: You are a trained prosecutor. If Dr. Ford, the accuser of Brett Kavanaugh, does not appear at the hearing at which she is invited to appear on Monday, and you were a member of the Senate, would you then proceed to vote for Judge Kavanaugh?

JH: Well, I have to say, Hugh, that I just am incredibly, incredibly concerned about this whole process in terms of where the Democrats have left us here, having sat on this letter from Dr. Ford, which I understand that at least Senator Feinstein had for months, having now asked for a public hearing under oath, which the chairman has given them, delaying the vote, willing to allow both parties a chance to testify. Now, they’re saying no, no, no, no, no, now that’s not enough, we want something else. So I think look, as I have said before on this subject, Dr. Ford should be allowed the chance to testify. I think the chairman’s done the right thing by doing that. Judge Kavanaugh should be allowed the chance to do so. But if Dr. Ford does not want to, I do think it’s time to move on and to move this process forward. I hope that she will come forward, and whether that’s publicly or privately, I understand that Chairman Grassley’s offered a private session to protect her privacy if she prefers, or offered a session with staff if she prefers that. I hope that she’ll avail herself of one of those opportunities. But I blame Democrats for this. The games they have played with this nomination have been just unbelievable.

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