Escutcheon, left:  Transdniestria
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Co-host: Larry Kudlow, CNBC senior advisor; & Cumulus Media radio
 
Hour One
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 1, Block A: Stephen Moore, chief economist, Heritage Foundation, in re:   "The idle rich"  rarely dare be idle.  Most rich households have at least two people working ,whereas most very poor households . The GOP has a dreadful record of seeming cold-hearted and unfeeling about poor people; it needs to go to tenements, churches, everywhere, and speak openly of wholesome policies.
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 1, Block B: Stephen Moore, chief economist, Heritage Foundation, in re: South Carolina was the only state in the Union that reduced unemployment benefits, so UE went down and employment went way up.  NYT: "Pressure rises for tax increase." – and not only in Connecticut, where Larry Kudlow is right now.  General Electric, Travellers Insurance and Aetna are all ready t move out of CT because taxes are gong up.  Similarly in Illinois.  . . .   Reduce personal income tax and corporate taxes (from 7.75 to 5.75%), which excited investors and brought in jobs to the state.  All 14 who are running toward GOP presidency are supply-siders.  Except Lindsay Graham, all will be tax-cutters.  Except Huckabee, who raised taxes while he was governor.   LK:  Today I spoke with the top policy-advisor to a frontrunner: exploring actual abolition of corporate taxes.
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 1, Block C: Carson Bruno, Hoover & , in re: Carson Bruno: Loretta Sanchez Likely to Face Off Against Kamala Harris in November 2016 (Loretta Sanchez is in her tenth term in Congress, has been on nat security and foreign policy committees.) Big problem in California is that the GOP does not have a bench capable of competing at the state level. Working on it – trying to bring in women and Asians – but not yet able, esp for federal campaigns. Rocky Chavez, Tom Delbacaro and  ___ Sondheim: all have potential but too-low profiles. First open Senate seat since 1992.  Sanchez vs Harris.  DiFi  retire in 2018? Gov's ofc also open in 2018.  . . .  The genius of the Democrats is identity politics.
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 1, Block D: Larry Kudlow, CNBC senior advisor; and Cumulus Media radio, in re: King Dollar: we're overtaxed and overregulated. Strong dollar givers power to companies, to consumers to buy, and confidence to global investors.  My view is that the Wall St, IMF, Treasury. on the campaign trail . . .  No - but: last week, courtesy of Ira Stoll and Seth Lipsky: Jeb Bush on a NH radio station see about the Chinese change: If the US dollar is being manipulated, see all the excess dollars being created that no one wants.  I fear that the current Fed and Treasury will not want a strong dollar.  Treasury has statutory play over the dollar. Reagan wanted a strong dollar to conquer inflation; Robert Rubin, too; they had it right; today's guys don't.
Strong Dollars Sets Stage 
for Big Leap Forward 
with Right Policy Mix   The strong May jobs report — including a 280,000 jump in nonfarm payrolls — reminds me of the big debate over the harmful effects of a strong dollar and falling oil prices. But where’s the harm? King Dollar, along with the supply benefits of the…
State Officials Had Secret Huddle on Health-Law Subsidies (http://www.wsj.com/articles/state-officials-had-secret-huddle-on-health-law-subsidies-1433202161 )  At a secret meeting in May, officials from more than a dozen states found few good options if the Supreme Court this month rules that Affordable Care Act subsidies that some residents get should be voided.  McCarthy: No Obamacare Bill Until After Supreme Court Ruling
Hour Two
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 2, Block A: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; author: Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives: From Stalinism to the New Cold War, & The Victims Return: Survivors of the Gulag after Stalin; in re: . . .  Putin gave four hours to Kerry in Sochi [more]ay 2015]: "Washington will do all it can to have Kiev abide by the Minsk 2 [Feb 2015] agreements, as Moscow will to have the rebels do the same. "  Kremlin understood that this was serious, but "Kerry has been sliced to pieces by the war party in Washington."
Defence minister elected Latvia's new president Lawmakers elected DM Raimonds Vejonis Latvia's new president at an extraordinary parliament session on Wednesday.   http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/natosource/norway-to-participate-in... / Norway has agreed to play a role in the Nato missile defence system, with Prime Minister Erna Solberg saying that as a "committed Nato member", the country's participation is "necessary."
The development of the system, which comprises an international network of radar stations and anti-ballistic missile barrages, has long angered Russia, which in March went so far as to threaten Denmark that its ships would become targets for nuclear strikes if they joined the system....
"It is necessary for us to participate in this. As a committed NATO member, we should also be committed to that part of the strategy," she [Solberg] told Norway's NTB newswire. "We have to go through this and look at what our contribution and participation should be related to this."
[NATO Secretary General Jens] Stoltenberg stressed that Norway's involvement need not stretch to hosting antiballistic missile bases."  There are many ways to contribute to such a missile defence system," he said. "I have discussed the possibilities for Norwegian contributions with the Norwegian government during my visit."
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 2, Block B: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; in re: All-out assault on Kerry at Sochi (attacked even by Biden/WH).
Ukraiian blockade of Transdniestria and new risk of war with Russia.  Saakashvili’s appointment to governorship of Odessa.  Meanwhile, Kiev continues to implode: Gay March, protests vs Poroshenko and Yatsyeniuk, while fighting in East escalates.
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 2, Block C: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; in re:   . . . Demsey said we need to get our ducks in a row before the crisis. What bigger crisis does Dempsey have I mind?? What could detonate such a war? We've focussed on Donbass, but Transdniestria may be obscure and tiny but it's a ticking timebomb. Fifteen hundred Russian soldiers - need to be armed, fed, clothed. A land rail transit was agreed by treaties that Kiev broke at the end of May, same time as appt of Saakashvili.  Russia probably will have to supplu Transdniestria by air bridge, meaning over Ukraine, meaning that maybe Kiev will shoot down a Russian plane.  Egad! If you want a ticking timebomb detonated anywhere in the word, send Saakashvili.  Ergo, Putin now has to react. During the Cold War, there were rules. Here there are no rules.    On a map: check Moldova, Rumania,  . .  Somebody very powerful does not want a peaceful end to this confrontation. Present Kiev regime cannot survive without war. The only one who can defeat the US war party is Pres Obama, and he doesn’t seem to want to.  At present, Putin is willing to make any accommodation he can to avoid hot war.
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 2, Block D: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; in re: TheNormandy Four. NATO –Russian Council was in constant Session to keep Russia informed to avoid misunderstanding. NATO: We'll never have bases in the former Soviet counties (that's been abrogated).  Nunn-Lugar, the wisest legislation in modern history: gave post-Soviet Russia money and expertise to safeguard its vast nuclear stockpiles. Made a lot of progress. Russians withdrew the end of 2014 (?)  Since every intl terrorist wants some of that material, we urge that Nunn-Lugar be reinstated right away, or something comparable.  Obama spoke of ending nukes, but failed to mention the treaty ________.   Missiles were aimed to fly very low and very fast, so no  one could figure out in time if it was a strike or not.  We urge that both sides restate and adhere to the treaty. Also, restore the Flex, future leaders program.
American Committee for East-West Accord   eastwestaccord.com
http://eastwestaccord.com/the-committees-initial-proposals/
The Committee’s Initial Proposals
In the near future, the Committee hopes to offer proposals designed to overcome the current confrontation over Ukraine and to achieve a stable cooperative East-West relationship, particularly between the United States, NATO and Russia. Meanwhile, at this perilous moment, in mid-2015, the Committee  urges that the governments most directly involved in the crisis take the following mutual steps:
—  The Obama Administration should formally join the “Normandy Four” (Berlin, Paris, Moscow, Kiev) which negotiated the Minsk Accords of February 2015. This agreement calls for a permanent ceasefire in Eastern Ukraine and for direct negotiations between Kiev and the Donbass leaders to end the Ukrainian civil war. The Minsk Accords are currently the best, and perhaps only, chance to end the crisis without a larger war. (An important step in this direction by the Obama Administration seems to have been Secretary of State Kerry’s meeting with Russian President Putin and Foreign Minister Lavrov, in May, in Sochi.)
—  The U.S., NATO and Russia should reactivate the NATO-Russian Council and put it in daily session until the acute confrontation ends. Established in May 2002 to ensure regular communications between the two sides and to prevent misperceptions that might lead to war, the Council has met only once during the past eighteen months. Its reactivation will provide a forum, in addition to the OSCE, for guarding against military dangers inherent in the worst East-West confrontation in many decades.
—  Washington and Moscow should restore the provisions of the 1991 Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, an essential and successful example of mutual cooperation adopted to eliminate or secure vulnerable nuclear stockpiles and materials inside Russia, but which was terminated at the end of 2014.
—  Both Moscow and Washington should take all necessary steps to preserve the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), negotiated by President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, which for the first (and only) time abolished an entire category of nuclear weapons, but which now is endangered.
—      As various U.S.-Russian cooperative agreements nurtured over decades are being jettisoned in what may be a new prolonged Cold War, Washington and Moscow should especially protect those involving educational and related exchange programs. In particular, FLEX — the Future Leaders Exchange Program, which originated with the Freedom Support Act sponsored by Senator Bill Bradley and passed by Congress in 1992 — should be reinstated. FLEX, which enabled some 8000 Russian teenagers to live and study for a year in the United States,  was canceled by Moscow in October 2014.
Hour Three
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 3, Block A: Pastor William Devlin, Infinity Bible Church, REDEEM!, Right to Worship NYC, in re: Two Sudanese Christian pastors arrested on seen counts, three of which are capital crimes. Held in Obdurman prison, an hour outside out of Khartoum.  On Wed 3 June, I travelled with pastors from Sudanese Council of Churches to visit the prison. We sat there with 50 others waiting to see other prisoners.  After about 30 minutes, I took some iPhone pictures, was escorted by a guard to a dirty, hot little room around the corner and questioned for over an hour; I’d committed a crime.  Then was taken by supervisor to an air-conditioned room, questioned by two men in military uniforms for half an hour. They deleted the pix from my phone. I explained that I was guest of the foreign minister, so I was released. Meanwhile, the other pastors visited the imprisoned pastors, said that an American was working to free them. The two imprisoned men said they were in good spirits. Now they've been transferred to a maximum-security prison in Khartoum North, the Cober Prison (used to be British Cooper Prison).  They were transferred either because of me, or because the transfer had been planned before I arrived – not clear.  Pres Bashir said he wants better relations with the West. If so,  need to let these innocent pastors go.  I spoke at the first-ever Sudanese Christians Leadership Conference – the majority of attendees had been incarcerated at some point it their pastoral ministry. They rejoice to be persecuted for Jesus Christ; will not leave their nation. The 2005 constitution guarantees liberties. The Louisville, Kentucky [pastors' group]  is advocating for the two imprisoned pastors. We hope they'll be reunited with their wives and children. 
The US Dept of State has a division focussed on religious freedom. Khartoum is on the "list of nations of concern because of violations of religious freedom." One church in Khartoum ws bulldozed. Pastors constantly harassed and arrested by the Sudanese security services. I say, If you want to be dropped from the US Watch List, you've gotta come in to the community of nations, not hector Christians. 
TheChristianPost.com
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 3, Block B:  Salena Zito, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review & Pirates fan, in re: We don't want another president who divides us even further.  Click here for link:    
WASHINGTON A 5-foot-8-inch plastic Jesus in tan robe and white shroud stood gallantly outside the House side of the U.S. Capitol last week.   Hundreds of school students crowded past him, along with members of Congress, lobbyists and dozens of heavily armed Capitol Police pacing around in SWAT formation.  The statue was so lifelike that, if you didn't look closely, you might think he was real. Yet, if many passersby noticed plastic Jesus, it wasn't readily apparent.
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 3, Block C:   Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re: Problems at Stratolaunch  In the heat of competition: Stratolaunch and Orbital ATK have quietly parted ways as problems have developed in building Stratolaunch’s giant first stage aircraft.
The company went with a radical engineering idea — using a giant airplane as their first stage — which might turn out great but could just as easily become a disaster and failure. Such ideas are by their nature filled with many unknowns.
In a sense, this story validates SpaceX’s approach to developing new space technology, which is to take known engineering and to upgrade it while refining the production methods for building it to lower costs. With this approach, you lower risks by reducing the number of unknowns you have to deal with.
Parachute problems again for NASA’s flying saucer  In its second flight today NASA’s engineering vehicle for testing Mars landing technologies, dubbed a flying saucer by the press because of its shape, had a similar problem as in its first flight, with its parachutes failing to inflate properly during landing.  More here. This test was not only to check out landing technologies, it was to check out the redesigned parachute that had failed in the previous test last year.
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 3, Block D:  Francis Rose, Federal News Radio, in re: http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_28258331/va-puts-forward-new-plan-pay-aurora-hospital  With a funding deadline fast approaching, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs on Friday proposed a two-tier plan to cover the cost of the troubled, $1.73 billion hospital project in Aurora.
Under the first part of the deal, the VA would reroute about $150 million from its 2015 budget and use that money to keep construction going until the end of the federal fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30.
The short-term funding is critical because the VA and its prime contractor, Kiewit-Turner, nearly have exhausted all available money for the project. Without a new cash infusion, the project would shut down in a matter of weeks — if not days.
Hour Four
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 4, Block A:  Bill McGurn, WSJ Main Street, in re:  Hillary’s Other Bill Problem
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 4, Block B:  Paul Gregory, Hoover, in re:  Vladimir Putin stakes his claim to leadership on approval ratings that would be the envy of any democratic politician. Skeptics, however, question the meaning of approval ratings when a dictator appoints all political positions and ensures that rivals are distrusted by the electorate. A dictator who controls the media and devotes enormous resources to propaganda can manipulate approval ratings with extraordinary measures, offsetting fundamentals that would otherwise push the favorability rating down. But what does someone like Putin do when he runs out of diversions during a period of prolonged economic stagnation? We’ll perhaps know the answer soon.   [more]
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 4, Block C: David Hawkings, Roll Call, in re: Congress has decisively lost to the president in the year’s most consequential balance-of-powers dispute before the Supreme Court.  The president must have exclusive power formally to recognize the government of another nation, the court declared Monday in a 6-3 decision both sides predicted would shift influence over American foreign policy away from the Capitol and push more of it toward the White House. Read more of this post
Tuesday  9 June 2015  / Hour 4, Block D: Peter Berkowitz, Hoover, in re:  "College Board's Reckless Spin on US History," Real Clear Politics, June 2 / http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2015/06/02/college_boards_reckless_spin_on_us_history.html
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