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Thinkwing Radio with Mike Honig (@ThinkwingRadio), a listener call-in show  airing live every Monday night from 9-10 PM (CT) on KPFT-FM 90.1 (Houston). My engineer is Bob Gartner.

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For the purposes of this show, I operate on two mottoes:

• You’re entitled to your own opinion, but not your own facts;
  

  Houston Mayor Annise Parker [L] with Mike, just before the show. (Dec. 7, 2015)

• An educated electorate is a prerequisite for a democracy.

SIGNOFF QUOTE[s]:

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1. Make sure you are registered to vote?
   1. Registration for the primaries ended today, Feb. 5, 2018. You can still register for general elections.
      1. Early Voting Ends This Week
      2. Hours of Operation
      3. Mon February 26 – Fri March 2: 7:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.
      4. Primaries will take place on Tuesday March 6, 2018
   2. Make sure you are registered:
      1. HarrisVotes.com
      2. VoteTexas.gov
2. Georgia conservatives threaten Delta tax break after airline cuts ties with NRA, By Bart Jansen, USA TODAY Published 3:34 p.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018 | Updated 4:28 p.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018
   1. Conservatives in Georgia’s Senate have a message for Delta Air Lines: Renew your relationship with the National Rifle Association or you will pay the price.
   2. The state House had approved a tax break that could provide a $40 million benefit to the airline, but members of the Senate vowed to fight the deal after Delta dropped its discounted fares Saturday for members of the NRA.
   3. Gov. Casey Cagle, a Republican, vowed Monday to kill any tax break for Delta, which is headquartered in Atlanta, unless the airline revived its discount program.
   4. “Corporations cannot attack conservatives and expect us not to fight back,” Cagle said.
   5. State Sen. Rick Jaffares, a Republican, said that the break was worth $40 million but that he would lead the charge against it “to let Delta know their attack on the NRA and our 2nd Amendment is unacceptable.”
   6. Delta announced Saturday that it was joining at least 10 companies in ending its discount arrangement with the NRA, and asked the gun rights group to remove its logo from the group’s website. Other groups that cut ties include MetLife and Hertz.
   7. The airline decided at its annual meeting to end the contract to reflect its neutral position in the national debate over gun control and notified the NRA on Saturday. The decision came after the shooting rampage Feb. 14 at a Florida high school that left 17 people dead.
3. 3.   Florida deputy denies he was a ‘coward’ during school shooting, John Bacon, USA TODAY Published 1:06 p.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018 | Updated 4:38 p.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018
   1. The lawyer for Broward County Deputy Scot Peterson said his client has been unfairly described as a “coward” for following protocol when he didn’t race into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School during a gunman’s deadly rampage.
   2. DiRuzzo said Peterson believed the shooting was taking place outside the school and followed protocol for such an incident. That included taking up a “tactical position” outside the building and initiating a Code Red lockdown.
4. Trump rips officers over Florida shooting: ‘I really believe I’d run in there even if I didn’t have a weapon’, David Jackson, USA TODAY Published 11:32 a.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018 | Updated 5:13 p.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018
   1. “I really believe I’d run in there even if I didn’t have a weapon, and I think most of the people in this room would have done that, too,” Trump told a group of state governors gathered at the White House for talks on multiple issues.
5. What the Supreme Court ruling means for DACA and almost 700,000 undocumented immigrants – The U.S. Supreme Court declined Monday to hear the Trump administration’s appeal of a DACA ruling. The ruling requires the government to keep the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program going. [USA Today], By Alan Gomez, USA TODAY Published 12:48 p.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018 | Updated 1:39 p.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018
   1. … Supreme Court on Monday dramatically changed the debate over the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program and the fate of nearly 700,000 undocumented immigrants who are part of it.
   2. … By refusing to hear a California case, the high court ensured that DACA will survive at least through the fall, giving DACA enrollees a temporary reprieve from deportation and Congress more time to craft a permanent solution for them.
   3. …Andrew Pincus, a Supreme Court litigator at the Mayer Brown law firm, said appeals courts would likely rule on several DACA-related lawsuits sometime over the summer. That means the issue would not come back before the Supreme Court until its next term, which begins in October.
   4. …Congressional leaders had been struggling to meet the March 5 deadline to pass a law to protect the DACA enrollees.
   5. …Greisa Martinez, policy and advocacy director for United We Dream, a coalition of young undocumented immigrants, said they will follow through on a planned day of protests in Washington, on March 5 to urge Congress to continue negotiating a DACA deal.
   6. “We’ve waited for too long on institutions of power to decide our fate,” Martinez said. “Congress has yet to do its job. We will remind Congress about what is at stake.”
   7. The battle in the courts started last month when U.S. District Judge William Alsup in California ruled that the Trump administration wrongly ended DACA.
   8. California, the University of California system, and several California cities requested that Alsup order the Trump administration to resume DACA. Alsup agreed, arguing that the decision was likely “arbitrary and capricious” and based on a flawed legal premise.
   9. The Department of Justice appealed that ruling straight to the Supreme Court, a rare move that would bypass the regular order of appeals. The Supreme Court did not rule on Alsup’s ruling, it merely said the case should proceed through regular channels.
   10. That means the case now goes back to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in California. That court, which has ruled against other Trump administration programs targeting immigrants, including its attempts to institute a travel ban targeting majority-Muslim countries, could rule this summer.
   11. Meanwhile, a separate judge in New York has also ruled against the Trump administration’s decision to end DACA. That case will go through the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York.
   12. Once those courts rule, the Department of Justice could appeal to the Supreme Court.
6. How common is sexual misconduct in Hollywood?– A USA TODAY survey of 843 women in the entertainment industry found 94% say they’ve experienced harassment or assault. By Maria Puente and Cara Kelly, USA TODAY
   1. 94% of the 843 women surveyed by USA TODAY who work in the entertainment industry say they’ve experienced some form of sexual harassment or assault.
   2. Worse, more than one-fifth of respondents (21%) say they have been forced to do something sexual at least once.
7. Ranchers set to fight back against vegetarian ‘fake meat’ – The Impossible Burger is part of a wave of plant-based burgers that appeals to meat lovers. By Jaden Urbi, CNBC Published 2:26 p.m. ET Feb. 25, 2018 | Updated 8:31 a.m. ET Feb. 26, 2018
   1. Companies like Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat are combining plant-based ingredients and science, rather than animals, to create fake-meat burgers and other products that taste like the real thing.
   2. Now U.S. Cattlemen’s Association is looking to draw a line in the sand.
   3. The association launched what could be the first salvo in a long battle against plant-based foods. Earlier this month, the association filed a 15-page petition with the U.S. Department of Agriculture calling for an official definition for the term “beef,” and more broadly, “meat.”
   4. “While at this time alternative protein sources are not a direct threat to the beef industry, we do see improper labeling of these products as misleading,” said Lia Biondo, the association’s policy and outreach director. “Our goal is to head off the problem before it becomes a larger issue.”
8. America’s Cultural Revolution, by Catherine Rampell
   1. Last month in Shanghai, Chinese venture capitalist Eric X. Li made a provocative suggestion. The United States, he said, was going through its own “Cultural Revolution.” …
   2. Li said he saw several parallels between the violence and chaos in China decades ago and the animosity coursing through the United States today. In both cases, the countries turned inward, focusing more on defining the soul of their nations than on issues beyond their borders.
   3. He said that both countries were also “torn apart by ideological struggles,” with kinships, friendships and business relationships being severed by political differences.
   4. “Virtually all types of institutions, be it political, educational, or business, are exhausting their internal energy in dealing with contentious, and seemingly irreconcilable, differences in basic identities and values — what it means to be American,” he said in a subsequent email exchange. “In such an environment, identity trumps reason, ideology overwhelms politics, and moral convictions replace intellectual discourse.”
9. 7 Reforms After Trump, by Keith Boykin (@keithboykin) 12/3/17, 19:31
   1. Repeal Shelby v Holder (LEGISLATE: Renew Voting Rights Act)
   2. Repeal Citizens United (LEGISLATE/AMENDMENT: Limit Money in Politics, abolish anonymous money in politics)
   3. Abolish electoral college (or can it be saved?)
   4. Apply anti-nepotism law to White House (It was WRITTEN for White House [Robert Kennedy serving with JFK])
   5. POTUS candidates must release tax returns (LEGISLATE/AMENDMENT: for how many years)
   6. Presidents may not self-pardon (AMENDMENT OR LEGISLATION: or pardon executive appointees?)
   7. Special counsel has power to indict president
      1.  ADD:
         1. 2/3 Senate vote to confirm SCOTUS appointment

TOPICS FROM PREVIOUS WEEKS:

1. What do belts around Proxima Centauri mean for exoplanet research?, By John Wenz  |  Published: Friday, November 03, 2017 [http://www.astronomy.com]
2. TV Talk:
   1. “The Good Place”
   2. “The Orville”
   3. “Adam Ruins Everything”

LINKS:

 SOURCES WHICH MAY BE RELEVANT TO OTHER DISCUSSION:

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