The Julie Mason (our first celebrity guest!) edition: The Day Lady Liberty Hung Her Head in Shame

Our guest this week is none other than Julie Mason, host of the Press Pool on Sirius XM’s POTUS (Channel 124, weekdays from 3-6 ET) and former White House correspondent for POLITICO, where she covered the Obama administration, Congress and more. Julie gives us the low down on dysfunction in the White House, attacks on the media, the Latino Factor in the coming midterm elections and that one time Bill O'Reilly called her a "loon."

Plus, we talk about children separated from their families at the border (Does the GOP suffer from a compassion gap?).

And  Reconstruction or Deconstruction? The House attempts to fix the budget by cutting Medicare and Social Security, welfare and federal retirement programs as well as veterans’ programs, student loan programs and agriculture. Really?

We end as usual with Out of Left Field, a hot take from each of us:

Chris Bell notes that scenes of families separated at the border under a cruel new Trump administration policy reminded him of another family separation, this one after the 2015 Memorial Day flood in Houston in which Bell family home and that of many neighbors took on water. The story of one family who had to send their two young children out of state because of the barely livable condition of their house moved Bell to tears. "And then to watch this administration with such an extraordinary lack of compassion ... "

Chris Tritico, whose family came to this country from Sicily through Ellis Island, where they read the words at the base of the statute, at the turn of the last century makes a similar point about current immigration policy: Despite some anti-Italian epithets and economic hardship, "My family never felt they weren't welcome in their new home." 

James Campbell reminds us that words indeed have meaning, pointing out that on a “Fox and Friends” discussion David Bossie — a former senior Trump campaign aide and president of the conservative group Citizens United — told Democratic strategist Joel Payne, who is black, that he was “You’re out of your cotton-picking mind!” Oh no he didn't.

Andi Georgsson tried to correct the record: in Episode 3 Andi tried to make the point that anyone on the GOP ticket who dared criticize Trump's misogyny risked losing at election time, even Republican women. Andi said Barbara Comstock of Virginia lost her primary this month. She did not, but rather ended up eking out a win in a race that should have been a slam dunk — all because Republican voters were indignant that she'd called on Trump to drop out of the presidential campaign after the Access Hollywood tape in which Trump bragged about grabbing women "by the pussy."