Host and we are back from that brief house pro former session and for the rest of todays show on washington journal. We will be taking your calls, getting your thoughts about whats on your mind. Republicans can call 2027488001. Democrats had 7488000 and publicans can call 2027488002. Rick, you have been waiting patiently from traverse city, michigan. Caller i want to comment i am a gun owner. I have grown up around guns but i have some real concerns that perhaps the message was not getting through to the congressman that there are some real issues that need to be addressed. Need believe that they their own security. Security is provided at their own town halls. Oftentimes the representatives dont want to have a town hall because they dont want to face the issues. To give them additional security, i think appropriate security is fine. I think we missed the bigger picture. Even those of us that are gun owners think that a reasonable period of time is valid. Its harder to get drivers license than it is to purchase a gun. Very few people need an ar15 or 300round magazines to go deer hunting. As a matter of fact, i dont think ive ever seen any of those in the field. So with that i just think we need to make sure that congress doesnt once again insulate themselves from what the rest of the public may deal with on a daytoday basis. Those are my comments. Host all right. And bill is calling in from marietta, georgia, on our democratic line. Bill, whats on your mind today . Caller good morning. Hope you have a good weekend, my detroit young lady. Listen, hey, i have two pionts. The n. R. A. Guy, the guy thats a gun owner and talks about one gun for killing a deer. A lot of guys sport shoot, they go out for competition and everything else. The gentleman from the washington examiner, he wants to allow congressmen to have and carry guns anyplace but no one else can in the country. And usually if a guy is going to do something to hurt you, hes not going to walk up to you and pull a gun on you. Hes going to have the gun out and youre not going to be able to reach for your gun or anything else other than reach for your bottom of your pants to stop from, you know have a good weekend. You understand what im saying. Host ok. And programming note, this weekend cspan cities tour continues as book tv and American History tv travels to hyde park, new york, as we explore the citys history and literary life. Town superadvisor eileen talks about the historics many sites. Hyde park is located in the beautiful hudson valley. 90 miles from new york city. Located right on the edge of hudson river in duchess county. We have many attractions. We are the home of Franklin Roosevelt as well as the first president ial library. Were also the home of the cullnear institute of America Culinary Institute of america so those are very important highlights for anyone visiting hyde park. We have the vanderbilt historic site, which is a beautiful hudson river estate. We are home to Eleanor Roosevelts and hyde park history is a living history. You know, its something growing up here, which i did, its part of our daily lives. And so we honor our history frequently through parades and through visits to the local homes, its just part of the ethos of being a hyde parker. Host and make sure to tune in to the weekend this weekend to book tv and American History tv as we travel to hyde park, new york, and to watch the video of hyde park and all the cities we visited on our cspan cities tour. You can go to cspan. Org citiestour. We are taking your calls today for the rest of the show. Taking in whats on your mind. Ruben is calling on our democratic line from fort lauderdale. Hi, ruben. Caller good morning. Host and what did you want to talk about today . Caller yes. I dont think its a good idea for because the democrats and the republicans, they are not getting along together. Right on television. Host so what do you think, then, members of congress to do should should do to feel safer, ruben . Caller need to go to work. Thats what they need to do, go to work and we wont have this problem. Host ok. And, again, last night was the congressional baseball game. Thats what members of congress were practicing for when that attack happened on wednesday. And many of todays front pages it talked about the unity that was exhibited at that game. The front page of the Boston Herald said team u. S. A. republicans and dems join on field for wounded fellow congressman. The sentiment also expressed in some of our front pages today including from the Chicago Tribune which said democrats go to bat for congressman scalise, showing folks there putting those who were wounded in the attack going on the field and getting applause there. And the denver post said a good time to pray, the shooting captures both sides of the gun debate but last night was about baseball and unity at the ballfield here in washington, d. C. David is calling from todd, north carolina. Hi, david. Caller hey. Bear with me for a minute. You are taking comments on twitter of a minute long and then people are deleting video comments on the facebook platform. What i think the representatives need to do is page where we can put our consensus to what we think we should have to live under in laws and all the line items to illustrate a contrast between what the representatives are doing despite our best interest with all this bolesering of fake economies trying to bolstering of fake economies trying to keep it rather than those trying to hold their assets securely. Need to have a better platform. Not to replace the obstructionist system but to give us a contrast. Host ok. And the cspan does not delete comments made by our viewers on our social media pages. Sandra is calling from michigan on our republican line. Hi, sandra. Caller hi, there. Host and whats on your mind today . Caller well, im calling because i noticed how many empty chairs there are in the house and senate frequently. And id like to point out that i sent my legislators to washington in other words to legislate, not to play baseball. I dont have anything against baseball. Im glad that they could pray together and have unity on the ballfield but they need to have unity in the house and the senate, and they need to go work and they need to have less recesses and less breaks and more work. The rest of us go to work. Those of us who are employed work every day, monday through friday, not leaving on thursday night and coming back on maybe monday and working for a couple days and then heading back home. I really would like to see our senate and house forgo this august recess or whatever it is, however long they go home. Theres very serious things to be decided in our nation. Weve got security threats. We got health care problems. Weve got tax stuff. Instead of just arguing and ranker going on in the house and the senate, they need to start getting along on the floor and talking and legislating and backing the agenda of the president that we elected. Host sandra, let me ask you this. A lot of times that lawmakers spend on those recesses, they are back in their home districts. Theyre Holding Office hours and town halls and meeting with their constituents. Do you think thats an important aspect of their job too . Caller well, it is and it isnt. When it turns out to be the town halls that weve seen recently, they end up to be news media theyre just arguing and people are yelling and people from other districts are coming in. I dont see that its as fruitful. I think they need to take the platform that they were elected and the agenda they were elected to go to washington with. Even the ones on the other side of the aisle. When the majority of the people in the electoral vote says this is the agenda were going with, i think the democrats need to make a decision to say, ok, lets give them a chance. Weve had eight years. Lets give them their four and lets not be obstructionist. Host ok. Norm is on the democratic line from bell port, new york. Hi, norm. Caller hello. Im calling up on a totally different topic. Today the president is scheduled to be in miami to i guess shut down a lot of the openings to cuba that the Obama Administration had done and i really think its the very wrong move on the part of the president to do that because ive been to cuba on many of these peopletopeople trips. And ive seen how the changes are happening very positively for the cuban people. They e president stress have terrible human rights abuses. Theres a very small majority of the cuban people that would really be affected by that because these would be the dissidents that are against the cuban government. Most of the cuban people are benefiting from having more contact with the american visitors. It really is unbelievable the changes just in the last three to five years. Theyre getting internet access. They have wifi. You see people looks like the parks in the United States. Everybodys texting each other now. Its just beyond belief. This is totally nonexistent five years ago. Host more on the president s announcement today in miami of his cuban policy, which will be carried here on cspan at 1 00. But the New York Times reports President Trump on friday will move to halt the historic reapproachment between the United States and cuba, set in motion by former president obama, delivering a speech in miami in which he plans to announce hes clamping down on travel and commercial ties with the island nation to force the government of raul castro to change its oppressive ways. The plan includes stiffer rules for american travelers visiting cuba and a sweeping prohibition against transactions with companies controlled by the military which runs vast segments of the hotel and tourism sector. Again, cspan will have live coverage of the president s announcement, of his new cuba reforms here on cspan at 1 00. And next we have melanie. Shes calling in from phoenix on our independent line. Whats on your mind, melanie . Caller hi. Good morning. Yes, i just wanted to say about the gun debate issue. First, i wanted to send my thoughts and prayers to representative scalise and his family and, of course, all those affected in the shooting. I wanted to do a girl thing and tell you you have a beautiful dress on. I love it. And then on the question of whether congress should carry a gun or not, i think this has not been mentioned but i might have missed it. I do believe they should be able to carry. I think we tend to forget there are a lot of veterans excuse me part of the military in congress who are trained, including navy seals and who several members have been combat. I believe stripping of them of their rights is not the right thing to do. I think one of the comments earlier about what about the people not carrying . Just to bear in mind, i was Law Enforcement and in the military. It takes a lot of practice and you need to know what youre doing. However, part of what makes them being a target is knowing there are no weapons there. An ardent target or a stronger defense is not knowing who is carrying and who is not. Bear in mind the congressional members may be carrying and they dont say whether they are or not, that does tend to make it a little bit stronger and give them that act for the defense. I just wanted to pass that on. Thats my thoughts. Thank you for listening to me today. Host ok. And another programming note, cspans newsmakers, which airs sunday at 10 00 a. M. And 6 00 p. M. Interviewed the top democrat on the House Veterans Affairs committee this week, congressman tim walz of minnesota, and he was asked if President Trump is delivering on his Campaign Promises to veterans. Heres his response. Mr. Walz i think hes done pretty well, ton onest with you. Theres been communication. We have talked with them. I think obviously he overstated where the v. A. Did many things right before. It was not the most corrupt, inept agency in the federal government. And i think there were a lot of things that hurt employees that were there. I do not deny, he continues to focus on it. We continue to have communications with them. He certainly made the, you know, the focus and the leadership did on moving some v. A. Bills. Certainly theyre politically popular but they needed to be done too. Some of it political posturing. 50 million for a white house phone i didnt want to be facetious. I asked for what that telephone number was. If you call it was supposed to be operational on day one. All of us, you cannot do that. We already have a hotline, a bill i authored, that gets millions of calls, is answered. Certainly had some of its problems. Were continuing. So some of it is a little bit hyperbole. A little bit is show. I cannot deny they continued to focus on it. Host thats cspans newsmakers with congressman tim walz. You can check that sunday at 10 00 a. M. And 6 00 p. M. You can see it on cspan. Org and on cspan radio through our free radio app. And you can check that out this weekend. A call from maryland on our democratic mind. Whats on your mind today . Caller yes, hi, good morning. I want to make two broad comments. The first one i know everyone is talking about the possibility of them carry guns in the capitol. I dont think they should have special treatment. If they are allowed to carry guns, then everybody in the capitol should be allowed to carry guns in. Thats number one. The issue with guns and the fact its taking over the news, this is what people with in day. Lives every people lost multiple members of their family. Thats not news. I will add my own two cents to cspan. I know weve been talking so much whats been going on with the rhetoric. I think its very important for cspan to truly consider having two opposition views at a time. A lot of times people see information and nobody really challenges them. Sometimes people call in with misinformation and theres nobody really to really challenge that information. I would suggest a timed call so everybody has a fair amount of time to hear their views where some people dont feel like some people can talk forever and some people are not given enough chance to talk enough. That will be my two cents. I dont think a law make sher should get paid 80,000 and given money for added security. I dont have added security when i go to work. Trust me, my job is not as secured as well. Host ok. Arlene is calling from cleveland on our republican line. Good morning, arlene. Caller hi. How are you today . Host good. Whats on your mind . Caller you know, i was a mentor at schools for 15 years, and i belonged to the Foster Grandparent Program and the kids call me granny jones. Our kids are in bad trouble. Theres nobody home. Society is made up of people, the kind of people you raise in your home determines the kind of society. When you took the father out of the home, broke up the family structure, we dont the kids have no place to go. Anytime you see young people dying at early ages, they have no selfworth. They havent been taught anything. When i was coming up, the last thing we wanted to do im from the 1950s was to die. I remember being at my girlfriends house at 14 and say, i wonder who i will be living with when im 90. It never occurred to me. This is sad. Im here to tell you how many kids has asks me, granny, can i come home with you . Because theres nobody at home. Thank you very much for your time. Bye. Host ok. In some other headlines today from the hill, it reports that the Justice Department is issuing a warning about Anonymous Sources. The Justice Department issued a statement thursday night warning the media and other americans against believing Anonymous Sources and warning that the Justice Department doesnt confirm statements from unnamed officials. Americans should exercise caution before accepting whats true any stories attributed to anonymous officials, particularly when they dont identify the country, let alone the branch or agency of government in which the alleged sources supposedly are affiliated. Deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein wrote thursday in that memo. The president has been very vocal about unnamed sources cited in news reports. Although sometimes those unnamed sources are white house officials. Diane is calling from knoxville, tennessee, on our independent line. Hi, die avepblet caller hi, kimberly. Nice to see you. I want to go back to the shooting. I think were missing the point. He guy was he was disgruntled because of the laws and things that the republicans are pushing on us. Now, go back to obama. Mitch mcconnell said their goal was to make him a oneterm president. They were on vacation for the whole eight years of that mans presidency. When trump started running for violence all of this started happening. People being spat on in the face, being beat on at rallies, being hauled off in handcuffs. The man was trying to send a message. Republicans, you need to start thinking about the people, not yourself, but the people here in this country. Were not going anywhere. Its not one group of people country. Its all of our country. And we need to do that. We need to show that action. Be for your fellow man, not just for yourself. And a lot of this balance and stuff violence and stuff will go away. If you suppress people, how can they get their message across . And id like to thank you. And one other thing. Gretta and john, they show their partiality every time they are hosting cspan. I wish they would put their party, leave it back in the back when they come out to host the show, because Everybody Knows theyre republicans. Stark republicans. I dont need to see it when im watching cspan. Host james is calling from mississippi on our democratic line. Hello, james. Caller he had, good morning. I think hi, good morning. I think the main argument well, first of all, i believe the terrorists are winning. And im not talking about terrorists from other countries or religion and stuff. Its the terrorism that incorporates suspicion among the american people. They have got us terrified. Im talking about the people on the right. Probably the people on the left. But suspicion, thats the thing. We suspect everybody. We dont trust anybody. So we have to make sure we have guns to protect us against those people. They say we need to capture the minds of the terrorists. We need to capture the mind of all the terrorist victims, and im talking about all the eople that are suspicious of just suspicious. And christianity i