September 27 – The “Crazies” Claim Boehner’s Scalp; The “Thug” to Meet the “Weakling” at the UN Over Syria; The One Year Anniversary of the Disappearance of 43 Mexican Students

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the resignation of the Speaker of the House a day after he hosted Pope Francis and discuss how the first constitutional office written into the constitution has become an untenable job for a Republican lawmaker who tries to work with other branches of government to get things done for the American people. A veteran senior staffer who spent 28 years in Congress, Mike Lofgren joins. He is the author of “The Party is Over: How Republicans Went Crazy, Democrats Became Useless and the Middle Class Got Shafter”, and we will discuss the Tea Party’s so-called Freedom Caucus in the House which Congressman Peter King calls “the crazies” and how GOP primary voters at the Values Summit cheered when presidential candidate Marco Rubio announced John Boehner’s resignation.

Part 2

Then we examine the continuing growth of ISIS with 30,000 foreign recruits pouring into Syria at the same time that divisions have erupted among U.S. Military Intelligence analysts who feel that their assessments are being sanitized by the top brass to make it appear that U.S. efforts to degrade and destroy ISIS are more successful than the reality on the ground indicates. Richard Barrett, who was the Coordinator of the al Qaeda and Taliban Monitoring Team at the United Nations in New York joins us to discuss what might be achieved in tomorrow’s meeting about Syria between President Obama and Vladimir Putin, given that Obama thinks Putin is a thug and Putin thinks Obama is a weakling.

Part 3

Then finally on the one year anniversary of the disappearance of 43 students in Mexico we go to Mexico City to speak with Ryan Devereaux who covers national security and criminal justice for The Intercept where his latest article is “Disappearances in Mexico, One Year Later: New Theories but Few Answers”. We discuss yesterday’s demonstration by tens of thousands that was led by the parents of the missing students protesting the government’s official findings from an inquiry that few Mexicans believe explains what really happened to the missing students.