Day: September 8, 2018

A Vote For Bredesen is a Vote for Obstructionists Like Schumer, TN GOP Says

Jason M. Reynolds
Phil Bredesen, Chuck Schumer

The Tennessee Republican Party has released a new ad, highlighting Phil Bredesen’s support for the most ardent Democratic obstructionists in the Senate. The ad will run on digital platforms statewide and is available here. “While Phil Bredesen claims he wants to end ‘partisan squabbling’ in Washington, the fact is that the worst offenders are in his own party,”  said Tennessee Republican Party Chairman Scott Golden. “President Trump is fulfilling his promise to the American people to nominate constitutionalist judges and justices, but Senate Democrats are throwing up partisan roadblocks at every turn. A vote for Phil Bredesen is a direct vote for these obstructionists.” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is leading the charge, telling CBS This Morning he’d oppose the President with “everything I’ve got.” His interview is available to watch here. In an off-the-cuff moment caught on video during a Labor Day parade in Brooklyn, Senate Minority Leader Schumer told a bystander who asked when President Trump would be impeached, “The sooner the better,” The Tennessee Star reported, citing Fox News. In an exclusive interview with Tennessee Star Political Editor Steve Gill, U.S. Senate hopeful Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN-07) called Bredesen out over one of his greatest vulnerabilities.…

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Tennessee Audit: School Cafeteria Manager Stole from Little Kids

Chris Butler
School Lunch

A school cafeteria manager in Sullivan County stole ice cream money from kindergartners and spent it on herself, according to an audit Tennessee Comptrollers released Friday. This woman, Deborah Beckman, did other things she wasn’t supposed to do, the audit said. Beckman, the cafeteria manager at Ketron Elementary School in Kingsport, took at least $758 someone donated to the school to pass out ice cream to the tiny tots at no charge, state auditors said. “Ms. Beckman stated that she used these funds to purchase personal groceries and pay a personal utility bill. Ms. Beckman also admitted that she made false entries in cafeteria records to understate the amounts donated,” Comptrollers wrote. Beckman committed other offenses, the audit said. “Although Ms. Beckman told investigators that she counted and reconciled collections and prepared a cafeteria deposit each day, she did not make daily deposits. The timing of cafeteria collections and Ms. Beckman’s deposits were consistent with a lapping scheme.” To do this, Comptrollers said Beckman diverted cash collections for her personal benefit and then concealed it by putting in its place either cafeteria cash collected on the next day or cash from personal or other unknown sources. “Cafeteria records were insufficient…

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Karl Dean Promises More Taxpayer Money for Memphis

Chris Butler
Karl Dean

If Tennessee Democratic gubernatorial candidate Karl Dean gets elected governor then he’ll invest more state taxpayer dollars in Memphis and the west Tennessee region. Dean made this promise while touring Memphis this week. This, even though leaders in that corner of the state don’t get much when they invest local taxpayer money in projects meant to attract new business. According to the Memphis Daily News, Dean wants the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development to set up an office in Memphis. There he said he will use state resources to focus on boosting women-and minority-owned businesses. “Dean is ‘very specific’ about building economic opportunities for women and ethnic groups, which he could do through executive order or legislative initiatives,” according to the paper. Dean, the paper went on, wants to do that by improving procurement programs to make it easier for women and minorities to compete for contracts. He also wants to recruit businesses to the Memphis Regional Megasite in Haywood County. In an opinion column last year, Beacon Center of Tennessee President Justin Owen said state officials have spent more than $140 million in taxpayer money to buy and develop the site to attract a large manufacturer to…

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Dumb and Dumber: Texas State Board of Education to ‘Reinterpret History’ of the Alamo with the Removal of Heroism

Julie Carr

On Friday’s Gill Report – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 1510 WLAC weekdays at 7:30 am – Star News Digital Media National Political Editor Steve Gill was disturbed by the recent decision of the Texas State Board of Educations decision to remove the word ‘heroic’ from the way the defenders of the Alamo were identified.  He goes on to discuss the liberal elites stranglehold on education and it’s blatant attempt to dumb down our kids while destroying the education system in the name of political correctness. “And this one takes us to Texas,” Gill said, “Where the State Board of Education and some of the other liberals in the education establishment there are wanting to change the teaching standards in Texas to remove the word ‘heroic’ from the way the offenders at the Alamo are identified.” He continued: Yeah, they’ve got this teaching curriculum and state board of education is wanting to remove the word ‘heroic’ because they think that that’s, it puts an image of these defenders that really shouldn’t be taught. They also don’t want to teach the Travis Letter, the commander of the Alamo that sent out the letter to the people of Texas and all Americans…

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Commentary: The Kavanaugh Hearing: A Democrat Campaign Circus

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Brett Kavanaugh

by CHQ Staff   Conservative may assume that the not so “presidential” aspirations of Democratic Senators Cory Booker of New Jersey and Kamala Harris of California turned Thursday’s confirmation hearing for Judge Brett Kavanaugh into a circus, with Harris and Booker vying for the role of chief clown, but it was an important moment in Democratic politics. Booker began the morning by announcing “I’m breaking Senate rules. This is my only chance to have a Spartacus moment. I’m willing to get kicked out of the Senate over this,” before claiming to release publicly “committee confidential” memos related to Kavanaugh’s time at the Bush White House. The only problem for those of us who would like to see Booker out of the Senate is that the material had already been cleared for release to the media, so charges leading to Booker’s expulsion from the Senate would not hold up. What’s more, reading through the material reveals that Kavanaugh came out strongly against racial or ethnic profiling in the George W. Bush administration’s post-9/11 airport security screening and law enforcement policies generally. FOX News reporter Shannon Bream later tweeted that Fox was told by Committee staffers that Sen. Booker knew BEFORE he made…

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Conservative Group Says Give Money to Blackburn, Other Proven Senate Candidates in Battleground States

Jason M. Reynolds
Marsha Blackburn

The Senate is broken and both parties are to blame, the Senate Conservatives Fund (SCF) says in a new fundraiser that touts support for battleground state candidates that includes U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN-07). “Despite controlling the Senate, the House and the White House, Senate Republicans have failed to keep their biggest promises,” SCF President Ken Cuccinelli II says. Blackburn is running for the Senate against Democratic challenger former Gov. Phil Bredesen. SCF is a national grassroots organization trying to “bring bold conservative leadAll Postsership to Washington by supporting candidates who will fight for the timeless conservative principles of limited government, strong national defense, and traditional family values,” its website says. Rolling off a list of grievances against Senate Republicans, the organization says: They failed to repeal Obamacare. They failed to build the border wall. They failed to stop sanctuary cities. They failed to defund Planned Parenthood. “It’s time to fix the Senate by electing battle-tested, Trump-approved conservatives in battleground races,” Cuccinelli says. Their fundraising page is available here. Cuccinelli says SCF will pay all processing fees and transfer your contributions directly to the candidates’ campaigns. President Trump has personally endorsed each of these candidates and urged all Americans to support…

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STUDY: Most Federal Employees Are Paid More Than Their Private-Sector Counterparts

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US Capitol

Compensation for federal, state, and local government employees cost U.S. taxpayers $1.9 trillion in 2016. This amounts to an average of $15,176 from every household in the United States. President Trump recently moved to rein in some of these costs by canceling pay raises for federal civilian employees, who received $331 billion in compensation during 2017. Some politicians and an association of federal employees have criticized Trump for this action, saying that federal workers are underpaid and deserve a raise. However, a broad range of studies have found that most federal civilian employees are paid better than comparable workers in the private-sector. Trump’s Action and Criticism of It When private-sector incomes rise, federal law generally requires across-the-board pay raises for most federal civilian employees. The law gives added raises to federal workers in certain localities if their compensation is lower than private-sector workers in those areas. The law also allows the president of the U.S. to overrule these raises, and President Trump recently did so, writing: We must maintain efforts to put our nation on a fiscally sustainable course, and federal agency budgets cannot sustain such increases. … Specifically, I have determined that for 2019, both across the board pay increases and locality pay increases will be set at…

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Former ‘Cosby’ Actor Geoffrey Owens Rebuffs ‘Job-Shaming,’ Reminds America of the Dignity of Work

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Geoffrey Owens

by Joseph Sunde   After a decades-long career in film, theater, and education, actor Geoffrey Owens decided to take a part-time job as a cashier at Trader Joe’s. When customers and news outlets began posting photos of the actor bagging groceries, the resulting comments included a mix of mockery and what Owens describes as “job-shaming.” Fortunately, according to Owens, “the shame part didn’t last very long.” “It hurt…I was really devastated,” Owens explained on Good Morning America, “but the period of devastation was so short.” Owens soon received countless messages of praise and celebration—many from fellow actors—encouraging him and affirming the value of his work. Owens, who first became known for his role on The Cosby Show, says that he originally took the job to provide stability between acting gigs. “I got to the point that I needed to take a job to pay my bills, to support my family. It was basically that,” Owens explained in an interview with CNN. “I wanted a job that had some flexibility, so that if I did stay in entertainment industry, I could continue to audition and do jobs if I could, and Trader Joe’s provided that.” It’s more than a little strange that such an event can gain…

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Papadopoulos Verdict: 14 Days in Jail, 200 Hours of Community Service, and a $9,500 Fine

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Robert Mueller, George Papadopoulous, Donald Trump

by Chuck Ross   Former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos was sentenced to 14 days jail in a federal court in Washington, D.C., on Friday. District Judge Randolph D. Moss also ordered a year of supervision, 200 hours of community service and a $9,500 fine for the 30-year-old former Trump aide. Special counsel Robert Mueller had requested a sentence of between zero and six months for Papadopoulos, who pleaded guilty on Oct. 5, 2017 to lying to the FBI. Papadopoulos becomes the first Trump associate sentenced in cases involving the special counsel’s office. Alex van der Zwaan, an attorney who worked with Paul Manafort, was sentenced to 30 days in jail on April 3 after pleading guilty to lying to the FBI about his pre-election work with the former Trump campaign chairman. Papadopoulos pleaded guilty on Oct. 5 to lying to the FBI in a Jan. 27, 2017 interview about the timing and extent of his contacts with a European professor named Joseph Mifsud. Papadopoulos falsely told the FBI that his contact with Mifsud occurred before he joined the Trump team in March 2016. While Papadopoulos lied about the timing of his interactions with Mifsud, he told FBI agents that he…

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First You Will See Him, Then You Will Not, as Democratic Senator Cory Booker Abruptly Cancels Memphis Rally

Jason M. Reynolds
Phil Bredesen, Cory Booker

Hours after the Tennessee Republican Party called attention to the planned appearance of #Resistance leader Senator Cory Booker (D-N.J.) at an election rally for Tennessee Democrats in Memphis, he abruptly decided to pull out of the event. You can view the Facebook page for the now defunct Shelby County Democratic Party Blue Wave Rally here. The Commercial Appeal said, “According to the event invitation page, the possible 2020 presidential candidate aimed to generate buzz in the Memphis area for the upcoming Nov. 6 election.” Shelby County Democratic Party (SCDP) chairman Corey Strong said that Booker is unable to attend because of a scheduling conflict. “We are disappointed that we are forced to cancel the event, but a suitable replacement lineup could not be found in time,” said Bryan McBride, communications co-chairman for the SCDP. McBride said the rally was called off due to Booker’s cancellation. Booker was one of three senators called out for being the most disruptive of Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court hearings. U.S. Senators Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) were among the most disruptive as well. They and other Democrats tried their best to shut the hearing down. Things got so bad U.S. Senator John Cornyn…

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