The Australian government was thrown into turmoil Friday after losing its one-seat majority with the nation’s deputy prime minister kicked out of parliament over his dual citizenship. Barnaby Joyce was among seven politicians embroiled in a crisis after falling afoul of a previously obscure constitutional rule that bars dual citizens from sitting in parliament. The High…
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Lots of country stars have been putting their spin on the national anthem lately, but Brad Paisley’s may be the most electric performance yet … literally. The Grammy-winner took to the field at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles to perform “The Star Spangled Banner” before game two of…
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JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Third-ranked Georgia continues to show why it is a legitimate contender for one of the four playoff spots. The Bulldogs (8-0, 5-0 SEC) dominated the rival Gators from beginning to end, winning 42-7 on Saturday, sacking quarterback Feleipe Franks five times and outgaining Florida in total offense 390 to 249. Georgia senior running…
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Representative Diane Black (R-TN-06) will join Mike Huckabee on his new show airing Saturday night at 7pm in Nashville on Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN). The topic of conversation is slated to be the problems with Obamacare and the ways to fix health care to actually reduce costs for Tennesseans. The last two weeks have been marked with important victories for Ms. Black, who was singled out by President Trump for the work she did to help pass the Budget, which sets up the next large agenda item: tax reform. Representative Diane Black is currently working double-duty as the first woman to Chair the powerful House Budget Committee while at the same time running to replace Governor Bill Haslam, who is term-limited.
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One arrest was made at the “White Lives Matter” rally in Shelbyville today, reports WTVC NewsChannel 9. “Reporters on the scene said the man was protesting on the white nationalist side of the rally. The man’s father has since reached out to Fox 17 News and said his son was a counter-protester,” according to NewsChannel 9. Around 200 to 300 white nationalists were demonstrating at the event, and the number of counter demonstrators was nearly double that, according to WTVC. There were no reports of counter demonstrators getting out of line. Some stood with signs reading “Black Lives Matter,” “Refugees Welcome” and “No Hate in Our State.” Others cursed at the white nationalists, who chanted “Blood and Soil” and other slogans. The Shelbyville event, which started mid-morning, is wrapping up, but a similar white nationalist rally is planned for Murfreesboro this afternoon. The rallies were organized by the League of the South and allied groups. Law enforcement in both Shelbyville and Murfreesboro had planned in advance to be out in force to prevent the rallies from spiraling out of control as happened in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August. Many in Middle Tennessee have denounced the white nationalist groups in recent days, including government…
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Tight security prevailed in Murfreesboro as an estimated 200 protesters waited to go through tightened security to attend a permitted White Lives Rally of the League of the South. The rally, scheduled for 1 pm, has not begun as of 1:20 pm. Rutherford county sheriffs dept officers and Murfreesboro police appeared to outnumber the protesters. They formed a protective barrier within a manmade moat of fences that separated protesters from the League of the South. DEVELOPING…
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Veteran deal-makers in Hong Kong donned their distinctive red vests for the last time Friday as the city’s historic share trading hall closed for business for the final time. As electronic and internet services burgeoned, the vast majority of stockbrokers drifted away from the once raucous hall to base themselves in corporate offices, leaving just a…
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Kenneth Branagh joined the galaxy of screen icons to leave their mark on Hollywood on Thursday as he plunged his hands and feet into cement at the TCL Chinese Theater. The Northern Irishman was hailed as the new Laurence Olivier at the start of a 35-year career that has seen him move from Shakespearean stage actor…
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President Donald Trump took to Twitter on Friday to welcome to politics a 26-year-old entertainer who made a political statement earlier this year with her “Make America Great Again” dress at the Grammys. “She has many fans,” the president tweeted. Villa responded by thanking the president and calling him her “ultimate warrior.” During a Friday appearance…
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MURFREESBORO, Tennessee–The owner of the two Chick-fil-A franchise locations in Murfreesboro provided hundreds of first responders and their immediate family free meals on Friday, one day in advance of controversial “White Lives Matter” permitted rally that will be held in the square on Saturday. “We wanted to take the opportunity to thank all the first responders in our community before they had to work a long weekend,” Taylor Warren, assistant to Chick-fil-A franchisee owner Beau Noblitt told The Tennessee Star on Friday. “We were allowing the first responders and their immediate family members to come in and have a free meal on us all day Friday, from 6 am to 10 pm at our two stores on Old Fort Parkway and Memorial Blvd,” Warren explained. “Between both of the stores, we provided at least a couple hundred of free meals. We decided on Monday to do something the day before the rally started. Later on Monday we posted a video on our Facebook page about our free meals for first responders on Friday. From there it spread like wildfire,” she noted. “It’s probably one of our most viewed Facebook posts since I’ve been here,” Warren added. “A native of Knoxville,…
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The University of Tennessee-Knoxville will hold a pro-abortion event Monday called “Abortion is Normal.” The event was organized by the Women’s Coordinating Council, a feminist student organization, and is supported by the Department of Sociology and the Women, Gender and Sexuality Program. Planned Parenthood of Middle and East Tennessee is promoting the event. Amelia Bonow, a founder of the #ShoutYourAbortion movement, and Poppy Liu, who documented her abortion story in a short film, are the guest speakers. At Middle Tennessee State University on Thursday, the Planned Parenthood-affiliated student group Generation Action hosted a screening of Liu’s film and a discussion with the filmmaker. Bonow’s movement was launched two years ago in response to efforts to defund Planned Parenthood after news broke of a baby body part trafficking scandal. Bonow wrote a column for Salon.com in which she spoke of her own abortion experience. “My abortion made me happy,” she wrote. “It’s perfectly reasonable to feel happy that you were not forced to become a mother. Your life belongs to nobody but you; don’t ever let someone make you feel any other way.” Pro-lifers responded with messages with a #ShoutYourAdoption hashtag and calls to Shout Your Baby. At Monday’s event, Liu, whose film is called…
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A senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute conservative think tank has criticized Nashville Mayor Megan Barry’s $5.2 billion mass transit proposal for Davidson County. “Building a system like this makes no sense in a city like Nashville,” wrote Aaron Renn, who specializes in urban issues and economic development. Barry’s plan calls for a light rail system along five corridors, an underground tunnel downtown and upgraded buses. The project would be funded with federal grants, bonds, fare revenues and tax surcharges. Barry is asking Metro Council to place a referendum on the ballot in May to raise taxes. A half percent sales tax surcharge would start in July 2018, increasing to 1 percent in 2023. There also would be surcharges on the hotel/motel tax, local rental car tax, and business and excise tax. Renn says the “reasons are obvious” why the plan wouldn’t work. “Nashville is a very sprawling city with highly dispersed origins and destinations of traffic,” he said. “It lacks the gigantic downtown employment centers of New York or Chicago that are well-suited to transit.” Nashville is a city built around the car and is not among “a very limited quantity of districts designed in a transit oriented way,” Renn wrote,…
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The world’s largest economy continued to expand at a robust pace in third quarter despite being battered by multiple hurricanes, the US Commerce Department reported Friday. Hitting President Donald Trump’s growth target for the second quarter in a row, US GDP grew at three percent for the July-September period, official figures showed. Though only a preliminary…
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MURFREESBORO, Tennessee–Local volunteers helped board up retail stories in Murfreesboro’s square on Friday in advance of today’s “White Lives Matter” permitted rally by the League of the South. “We live here in the Murfreesboro area and just heard what was going on and just wanted to see if we could help these businesses out,” Manny Saiz, one of the volunteers, who works as a video producer, told The Tennessee Star. “We have these two stores for sure,” Chris Bohon, another volunteer, who works sales for a marketing department for a manufactured homes company, told The Star when asked how many stores he and Diaz planned on boarding up. “A lot of them are having L and L contracting doing some, some of the owners are doing theirs. We just basically went around and were seeing who was overwhelmed,” Bohon added. “We came here last night with our church, River Oaks Community Church, and we prayed over everything. We saw a couple of the places were boarded up. We know it’s overwhelming,” he noted. “They need to be working with their insurance companies, their landlord and their clients, and some of them are just not going to have the ability to…
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Gary Cohn, President Donald Trump’s chief economic adviser, is looking to leave the White House after congress passes the president’s tax reform plan, Bloomberg news reported Wednesday. Cohn, who served as the chief operating officer at Goldman Sachs before joining the Trump administration, is considering exiting the White House, two sources told Bloomberg. Sources also told…
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A string of abortion clinics across the country continues to violate the law and jeopardize the health and lives of women by failing to keep clinics clean and train staff adequately, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. A slew of Whole Woman’s Health (WWH) abortion clinics miserably failed inspection reports between 2011 and…
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President Donald Trump says he is “very close” to picking a person for the most important economic post in the United States, the head of the Federal Reserve. Current Chair Janet Yellen’s term expires early next year and she is one of at least five candidates for the job. Besides Yellen, the candidates include Fed board…
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President Donald Trump and the Republican majority in Congress are moving full throttle on tax reform, hoping to save American families thousands of dollars by lifting nonsensical burdens on businesses and the middle class. While all of the details aren’t yet public, the Republican tax bill is expected to deliver President Trump’s promise of a shrunken…
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Tennessee Southern Baptist leaders this week denounced the “White Lives Matter” rallies planned for today in Murfreesboro and Shelbyville, reports Baptist Press. A group of ethnically diverse Baptist leaders gathered in Franklin Wednesday to make a public statement about the rallies organized by the League of the South and allied groups. “We don’t call press conferences very often but we believe it is impossible to stand silently by while the white supremacy movement plans to invade our state and perpetrate its evil Saturday (Oct. 28) in Shelbyville and Murfreesboro,” said Randy C. Davis, president and executive director of the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board. The League of the South has said it is demonstrating “to call attention to the continuing influx of African immigrants/refugees into middle Tennessee, and to protest the recent black-on-white church shooting in Antioch.” Davis said that “we are not making making a political statement today. That is not our intent. We are, however, prayerful that our governmental leaders will write laws that both offer security to America and are fair to all who seek shelter within her borders.” Davis challenged the idea that evangelicals are racists, saying that evangelical churches “are full of compassionate, loving people who are quite…
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VERSE OF THE DAY Be blessed and be a blessing October 28, Saturday Proverbs 14:16-18 A wise man is cautious and turns away from evil, But a fool is arrogant and careless. A quick-tempered man acts foolishly, And a man of evil devices is hated. The naive inherit foolishness, But the sensible are crowned with knowledge. Proverbs 10:23-25 Doing wrong is like play to a fool, but a man of understanding has wisdom. What the sinful man is afraid of will come upon him, and what is wanted by the man who is right with God will be given to him. When the storm passes, the sinful man is no more, but the man who is right with God has a place to stand forever.
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Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) was at it again on Friday. The junior senator from Tennessee, whose poll ratings in his home state are so low President Trump recently tweeted “he couldn’t get elected dog catcher,” is fanning the flames of a potential 2020 GOP Republican Presidential primary challenge to President Trump. The Associated Press, reporting from Gatlinburg, Tennessee, has the story: Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee did not rule out a run in 2020 against President Donald Trump when asked about it by reporters Friday, saying he’s focused on the next 14 months of his term and isn’t thinking that far ahead. The noncommittal response came as Corker doubled down this week on criticism of Trump, calling him “utterly untruthful” and responsible for “the debasement of our nation.” “You know, I don’t know what I’m doing next Sunday,” the senator responded when reporters asked about a potential presidential bid. Corker said it was far too soon to say if he would want a strong Republican primary challenge of Trump, whether by him or someone else. “I think that if you even begin thinking those things, everything you do becomes viewed through a different lens,” Corker said generally about presidential ambitions.
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Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts vowed resiliency after an emotional defeat while the Houston Astros try to carry over World Series momentum as baseball’s championship showdown shifts to Texas. The Astros rallied from a three-run deficit for an 11-inning 7-6 road victory to level Major League Baseball’s best-of-seven final at 1-1 entering Friday’s game three…
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George Michael’s chart-topping 1990 album “Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1” returned straight to number one in the British charts on Friday, 10 months after the British pop star’s death at the age of 53. The remastered record sold over 56,000 copies to come first in the charts in the largest first-week sales for a re-released album…
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Kenny Rogers Dolly Parton Kenny Rogers welcomed Dolly Parton onstage to sing their final duet Wednesday night, Oct. 25, at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena. The performance was part of an all-star tribute concert to Kenny, titled “All in for the Gambler: Kenny Rogers’ Farewell Concert Celebration.” Reba McEntire, the Judds, Lady Antebellum, Little Big Town and Lionel…
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The element of surprise and Reagan-era nostalgia rendered the Netflix series “Stranger Things” a breakout when it arrived last year complete with monsters, mad scientists and mullets. For those viewers who happened upon the quirky little show while combing through their congested Netflix queue, it felt as if they’d finally made a diamond-in-the-rough discovery. The show,…
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For the first time in nearly a decade, the House and the Senate has passed a budget – albeit without much help from Democrats. The move sets the stage for a massive tax reform package, the largest since President Ronald Reagan’s overhaul in 1986. President Trump took the opportunity to offer his thanks for a job well done this morning to Tennessee’s own Representative Diane Black (R-TN-06), who serves as the powerful House Budget Committee Chair. Diane Black of Tennessee, the highly respected House Budget Committee Chairwoman, did a GREAT job in passing Budget, setting up big Tax Cuts — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 27, 2017 To which, Ms. Black replied: Thank you for your support @realDonaldTrump! Great working with you — big tax cuts next! #MAGA https://t.co/AV7RX4CgS1 — Diane Black (@DianeBlackTN) October 27, 2017 Representative Black – who is running to replace the termed-out Governor Bill Haslam – released a short statement reiterating her strong support of President Trump’s agenda, and her commitment to bringing the same kind of ‘America First’ principles to Tennessee, should she be elected. It reads: This morning, President Trump praised Diane Black for her work on the budget and paving the way for tax cuts…
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Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act is up for an eight-year extension. And it’s high time to curb this government power. This is the section of U.S. law that allows feds to spy on Internet and telephone communications absent any open court warrant, so long as the surveillance is deemed necessary for the protection of…
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“Sanctuary” policies haven’t kept federal immigration authorities from doing their job, but there have been numerous cases of local jurisdictions refusing to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer requests. In some cases, those released have been charged with murder and other crimes. Sanctuary jurisdictions are cities or counties that have formal policies that prohibit local…
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Murfreesboro and Shelbyville are bracing for Saturday’s “White Lives Matter” rallies that have already drawn widespread attention. Officials have issued public safety plans and people are organizing counter protests to challenge the messages of the League of the South and other similar extremist groups. Tensions heading into the Middle Tennessee rallies are high given the violent clashes in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August between white supremacists and radical leftist counter demonstrators. The League of the South describes itself on its website as a “Southern Nationalist organization that seeks the survival, well being, and independence of the Southern people.” The group’s leader, Michael Hill, says the group is demonstrating “to call attention to the continuing influx of African immigrants/refugees into middle Tennessee, and to protest the recent black-on-white church shooting in Antioch.” The group has allied itself with the Nationalist Front, National Socialist Movement (NSM) and the Traditionalist Workers Party (TWP). The Murfreesboro Police Department and Rutherford County Sheriff’s Department released a joint statement Wednesday about the rally set to be held in the city’s downtown public square Saturday afternoon. The statement said the departments “will partner with federal, state, and other local law enforcement agencies to ensure the constitutional rights and safety of citizens.” The…
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A Pennsylvania election official confirmed Wednesday that noncitizen immigrants illegally voted in elections hundreds of times since 2000, casting doubt on the state’s ability to screen out ineligible voters on its election roles. Jonathan Marks, commissioner for Pennsylvania’s Bureau of Commissions, Elections and Legislation, told a state legislative committee that an agency analysis found 544 improper…
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The U.S. Department of Justice will lift a gag order on an informant in a case that ties Hillary Clinton to the Kremlin over a controversial uranium deal. The order means the person can talk to Congress about the U.S.-based energy company Tenex, a subsidiary of Russian state-owned nuclear energy company Rosatom. The informant had been…
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Two American mariners and their canine companions have been rescued after drifting off course and spending months stranded in the Pacific Ocean, the US Navy said Thursday. Jennifer Appel, Tasha Fuiaba and the two pooches had originally set sail from their home state of Hawaii this spring. They planned a voyage of more than 2,000 miles…
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by Jeffery A Rendall We’re still two months away from Christmas yet it’s never too early to anticipate the good times ahead when we’ll observe the sacred traditions that stimulate positive memories from the past. For me, one such ritual is revisiting the Christmas classic “It’s a Wonderful Life,” the tale of everyman George Bailey (played by Jimmy Stewart) and his look back at his own life alongside guardian angel Clarence who was sent to Bedford Falls to help the small town good-guy realize that he’d really led a very consequential and worthwhile existence. There’s a part of the legendary movie that reminds me a little of what’s going on with elements of the Republican donor establishment these days. In one famous scene, Mr. Potter, the film’s greedy old scrooge-like miser invites Bailey into his office to try and sweet-talk the man into abandoning his business, thus obtaining through addition what Potter couldn’t earn through beating his rival at his own game. Unsurprisingly, Bailey informs Potter he won’t be bought. How does George Bailey and Mr. Potter relate to today’s noxious DC swamp? Some GOP establishment groups are bringing in Steve Bannon to headline their events, in essence to “hire”…
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The government apologized Thursday for illegally targeting tea party groups for intrusive scrutiny and agreed to settlements with hundreds of organizations snared in the targeting, bringing to a close one of the more embarrassing episodes of the Obama administration. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said the IRS owed the groups an apology after years of poor treatment…
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The 917 Society’s efforts to promote the U.S. Constitution were featured in a story Thursday by Dennis Ferrier on Nashville’s Fox 17 News. A nonpartisan nonprofit based in the Nashville area, the 917 Society aims to get a free copy of the Constitution to every eighth grader in Tennessee. “This is the one thing that binds us together no matter what we believe,” Joni Bryan, founder and executive director of the 917 Society, told Fox 17. Bryan has been mailing or delivering hundreds of copies of the Constitution to schools across the state. The copies include an oath of citizenship to make the Constitution more personally meaningful to the students receiving them. Ann Marie Crozier, a history teacher at Richview Middle School in Clarksville, is using the 917 Society booklets with her students. Crozier said students have taken better care of the Constitutions than is typical for materials associated with classroom activities. “We are not finding these in the trash can. We’re not finding them on the floor,” she told Fox 17. “I have one child that dropped hers on the floor and was real excited to get it back.” Thirteen-year-old Nicholas Newman, who was interviewed in Crozier’s classroom, said the…
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Shares of pharmacy chains and drug distribution companies tumbled Thursday as President Donald Trump outlined his plans for addressing the US opioid crisis. Shares of McKesson, AmerisourceBergen and Cardinal Health fell by 5.2 percent, 4.2 percent and 3.4 percent, each sliding as Trump declared the matter a “public health emergency” and promised legal action against “bad…
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The Family Research Council’s Action PAC on Thursday endorsed state Sen. Mark Green (R-Clarksville) for Congress. Green is running for the 7th Congressional District seat being vacated by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN-7), who is running for the Senate seat being vacated by retiring Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN). The Washington, D.C., pro-family advocacy group has many members and supporters in Tennessee. “These formidable times require bold leaders of unwavering conviction,” Lt. General (Ret.) Jerry Boykin, executive vice president of the Family Research Council and its Action PAC, said in a campaign news release. “From speaking with Mark Green, consulting with those who know him, and observing his professional record in the Tennessee Senate, we believe he will be just such a leader in the United States Congress.” Boykin said the council’s Action PAC believes that if elected, Green would “continue to advocate for limited government and strong family values.” Earlier this month, Green picked up an endorsement from the Club for Growth, a fiscal conservative advocacy group. He also has been endorsed by former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, who won the 2012 Tennessee Republican presidential primary. Green is a physician, veteran and businessman first elected to the state Senate in 2012.…
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Speaking to the 7th and 8th Congressional District Coalition in Paris, Tennessee on Thursday evening, The Tennessee Star CEO and Editor-in-chief Michael Patrick Leahy asked the long time Tea Party activists in the audience to sign up as Constitution Mentors for the next generation. Leahy noted that most Tea Party activists are now 50 or older. “We launched this movement back in February 2009, more than eight years ago. We’ve all gotten older,” Leahy, who is also a Breitbart contributor based in Nashville, told the audience. “It’s time for us to pass the torch of constitutional liberty on to the next generation, and one way to do that is for you to sign up and become a Constitution Mentor as part of the Polk Foundation’s Tennessee Star Constitution Project,” Leahy noted. “My boss at Breitbart and good friend, former White House chief strategist and Breitbart executive chairman Steve Bannon, has been saying for some time that we’re not going to Make America Great Again overnight. It’s going to take another ten, twenty years. I think he’s right, it may even take thirty years to preserve and protect our constitutional republic.” “But as Steve points out, we didn’t get here overnight. It’s…
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VERSE OF THE DAY Be blessed and be a blessing October 27, Friday 1 Peter 2:9 But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.
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Microsoft on Thursday delivered stronger-than-expected earnings for the past quarter, lifted by gains in cloud computing and other business services. For its first fiscal quarter to September 30, the tech giant said profit was up 16 percent from a year ago to $6.6 billion. Revenue meanwhile rose 12 percent to $24.5 billion for the one-time tech…
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Darius Rucker is turning heads at CBS Sunday Morning, The New Yorker, USA Today, and Today Show with his new album, WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME.
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Retiring Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) seems to be taking a P.T. Barnum approach to his legacy, as the famous promoter is attributed to responding to a negative story by saying, “I don’t care what the newspapers say about me as long as they spell my name right.” Since the surprise election of President Donald Trump in November 2016, the junior Senator has arguably had more air time than his previous decade in office, combined – and nearly all of it is dedicated to criticizing Trump, his policies, and his agenda. It would be easy to imagine Mr. Corker’s social calendar is as packed as it has ever been. He is the new face for the NeverTrump Republican Establishment and their Democrat allies. Mr. Corker’s latest appearance on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe’ is a classic, by-the-numbers hit, as reported by Politico: Retiring Sen. Bob Corker said Thursday that it’s “ridiculous” to believe he has become increasingly outspoken against President Donald Trump because he was passed over as secretary of state. Corker, who interviewed for the position, said Rex Tillerson “was an inspired choice” to lead the State Department. And then, switching to the 3rd-person, added: “I don’t think Rex Tillerson has a closer friend on Capitol…
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The Harvey Weinstein have led to many celebrities’ speaking out against predators within their industry and others coming forward to reveal . One major issue attached to this Hollywood scandal is the celebrities who were at least partially aware of Weinstein’s behavior and did nothing to help. Matt Damon recently admitted in a “Good Morning America”…
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Eric Church’s new video, “Round Here Buzz,” tells the story of a man and woman who have lost touch after ending their high school romance. The story is told through scenes recounting that young love, cut in with scenes from their modern lives. Music plays a central role in the entire…
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State Rep. Charles Sargent (R-Franklin), the powerful chairman of the House Finance Committee, announced on Thursday that he will not seek re-election. “It has been my honor and pleasure to serve the citizens of the 61st District for the last 21 years. I would not trade that experience but circumstances change,” Sargent told the Williamson Herald, which noted: Due to recent circumstances, Sargent’s health has become his top priority. “I have dealt with skin cancer on and off for many years,” he said. “I have recently been diagnosed with a related condition that requires my attention. My health is the most important matter right now. I want to focus on my health, my wife Nancy, and our children and grandchildren.” However, Sargent stated that this is not the end of his community involvement. “I think I still have a lot to offer to Williamson County and the State of Tennessee, just not in the House of Representatives,” he said. “I am confident that different opportunities and challenges will present themselves.” Sargent’s announcement put the spotlight on conservative activist Rebecca Burke, a member of the Republican State Executive Committee, who is the only announced candidate for the Republican nomination in…
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NORMAN, Okla. — Oklahoma quarterback Baker Mayfield and Texas Tech coach Kliff Kingsbury have had their share of disagreements — some publicly — since Mayfield walked-on with the Red Raiders five years ago. But entering Mayfield’s final meeting against Texas Tech on Saturday in Norman, tensions have cooled and Mayfield has embraced his time in Lubbock,…
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The first fundraising reports from the GOP primary battle between Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett and State Representative Jimmy Matlock, who are seeking the seat in Congress being vacated by longtime Congressman Jimmy Duncan, are in. They confirm what most political insiders have expected. The first person in over a half century to serve in Congress from the Knoxville area who is not named Duncan will be an epic battle. As noted in The Tennessee Star earlier this week, Burchett surprised some observers with a strong report of $140,801.61 raised and $113,676.31 cash on hand. Burchett is a strong grassroots and populist campaigner, and he comes from the vote-rich Knox County portion of the district where he has had great success in previous elections to the State Legislature and to the County Mayor office, despite a track record of anemic fundraising. The primary questions about Burchett as a congressional candidate focused on whether or not he would raise the funds needed to win a contested congressional race. His first haul will quiet skeptics, particularly since many of his larger donors to date still have “room” within the campaign donation limits to give more. There are also plenty of other donors…
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A brief video clip showing a Maryland student kicking the chair out from underneath a fellow classmate who is not standing for the Pledge of Allegiance shows what a national political debate looks like in high school form. A Winter Hills High School student in Westminster, Md., is seen wearing an American flag hoodie, cowboy boots…
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Clinton campaign lawyer Marc Elias completely denied his involvement in the anti-Trump dossier that has made up a majority of the Russian collusion allegations in a report released Tuesday, but complained about the “proof” in late August on Twitter. Elias shared a Washington Post op-ed on Twitter Aug. 30, entitled, “What more proof of a secret…
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US District Judge Curtis Collier ordered the fraud trial of several Pilot Flying J ex-employees be delayed one week from October 31 to November 6, the Knowville News Sentinel reported Tuesday: A federal judge is delaying for a week the upcoming trial of the four former Pilot Flying J employees charged in a scam to defraud unsophisticated trucking firms. U.S. District Judge Curtis Collier on Tuesday ordered the trial of former Pilot Flying J president Mark Hazelwood and three others delayed from Oct. 31 to Nov. 6, according to an entry in the federal court system’s database. The trial will be held in Chattanooga, where Collier is based. Unusually, the cause for the delay was not made available in the public record. The entry revealing the trial delay is labeled as a “notice of hearing,” but no such hearing notice appeared on the publicly available docket. The entry does not indicate that a hearing was held, only that the trial date was being changed. There is no request for a delay filed in the public database nor is there an order explaining the delay. However, the Knoxville News Sentinel noted that the judge mentioned his wife was having health issues that could…
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