Day: November 19, 2018

Bob Corker: ‘Everything Points to the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia’ Ordering Khashoggi’s Killing

Tennessee Star Staff

Retiring lame duck Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), chairman of Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a tweet on Saturday that “Everything points to the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, MBs, ordering @washingtonpost journalist Jamal #Khashoggi’s killing.” Everything points to the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, MbS, ordering @washingtonpost journalist Jamal #Khashoggi‘s killing. The Trump administration should make a credible determination of responsibility before MbS executes the men who apparently carried out his orders. — Senator Bob Corker (@SenBobCorker) November 17, 2018 “The Trump administration should make a credible determination of responsibility before MbS executes the men who apparently carried out his orders,” Corker continued. The murder of Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Istanbul, Turkey last month has created a difficult foreign policy problem for the Trump administration, which has relied upon strengthened relationships with Saudi Arabia to hold the threat posed by Iran to stability in the Middle East in check. Corker’s tweet on Saturday expressed a view similar to the one taken by the Washington Post editorial board, which opined on Saturday that “Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, is brazenly seeking to lie his way out of accountability for the murder of…

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Senator Lamar Alexander Tells The Tennessee Star Report He Will Make a Decision on Whether to Run for Re-Election ‘By the End of This Year’

Julie Carr

In an exclusive interview Monday morning with Steve Gill and Michael Patrick Leahy on The Tennessee Star Report – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) said that he will make a decision on whether to run for a fourth term in the United States Senate before the end of this year, 2018. First elected to the United States Senate from Tennessee in 2002, the 78-year-old Alexander was re-elected in 2008 and 2014. He faced a tough Republican primary challenge in 2014 from former State Rep. Joe Carr (R-Lascassas). Alexander defeated Carr by a 49 percent to 40 percent margin in the primary, then sailed to any easy victory in the general election. Tennessee Star Political Editor Steve Gill asked Alexander the big question about his political future towards the close of the Monday morning interview. You can hear that question and Sen. Alexander’s answer, a transcript of which appears below, beginning at the 9:00 mark in the audio file at the end of this story: Gill: About 7:01 pm on election night everybody started turning their attention towards 2020, I’d argue it’s before that, but whether it’s…

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Average Cost of Thanksgiving Dinner Drops to Lowest Price Since 2010

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by Hanna Bogorowski   The American Farm Bureau Federation’s annual survey on the price of traditional Thanksgiving foods revealed a drop in the average price of dinner for families. “Since 2015, the average cost of Thanksgiving dinner has declined steadily and is now at the lowest level since 2010,” AFBF Chief Economist Dr. John Newton said in a statement. The survey, which counted up the cost of classic Thanksgiving foods like turkey, sweet potatoes, bread rolls, cranberries, pumpkin pie mix and more, indicates that the average cost of this year’s meal for 10 is $48.90. That’s less than $5 per person, and a 22 cent decrease from the previous year’s average of $49.12. Thanksgiving dinner’s staple, the turkey, also costs slightly less this year, coming in at $21.71 for a 16-pound turkey and down three percent from 2017. Something to be thankful for: the real cost of a 2018 Thanksgiving dinner is lowest since 2010 and 26% lower than 1986 https://t.co/boMgeAN1yb — Mark J. Perry (@Mark_J_Perry) November 15, 2018 The AFBF survey revealed that this is the lowest price one can buy a turkey since 2014. ‘Thanks to an ample supply, turkey remains affordable for consumers, which helps keep the overall cost of the…

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Commentary: The U.S. Constitution Allows For The Appointment Of Temporarily ‘Acting’ Officials Without Senate Confirmation

Gregory Watson

In its Article II, Section 2, Clause 2, the United States Constitution provides that the President of the United States: …by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States whose Appointments are not otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law…” This means that, by a simple majority vote of the 100-member U.S. Senate, the President may nominate — and the Senate may confirm — various appointees within the Executive branch and within the Judicial branch of the federal government. In the aftermath of the November 6, 2018, general election — and the Republican Party enjoying a net gain of three seats in the U.S. Senate — President Donald Trump should experience less difficulty, during the upcoming 116th Congress (2019-2020), with how his nominees are received in the nation’s highest legislative body, than had been the case during the 115th Congress. But not every appointment requires action by the U.S. Senate — regardless of whether that body is officially in session or is in recess between sessions. The Constitution’s Article II, Section 2, Clause 3, reads…

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Commentary: A Profile in Absurdity as Jim Acosta the First Amendment Hero

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by Mark Pulliam   The latest theatrics involving Jim Acosta, the left-wing political activist posing as a CNN reporter, perfectly illustrate the reasons why ordinary Americans despise the Beltway swamp: anti-Trump propaganda masquerading as journalism, rude and arrogant “reporters” engaged in 24/7 “resistance,” a federal judiciary so thoroughly dominated by liberal opinion that even Republican-appointed judges parrot the views of their ideological captors, and vain lawyers so eager for praise by the Acela Corridor establishment that they are willing to betray principle and common sense to receive accolades from fashionable elites. The underlying facts are by now well-known: The insufferable Acosta, surely the most obnoxious “correspondent” ever to hold a White House press pass—a dubious distinction in a competition that includes Sam Donaldson (ABC) and the late Helen Thomas (UPI), among others—had his credentials suspended after a particularly abrasive encounter with President Trump at a November 7 presser. In a widely publicized incident, Acosta harangued at length, refused to relinquish the microphone when directed to do so, and pushed away a young female intern who was trying to pass the mic to another reporter. White House press passes have always been viewed as discretionary and subject to regulation, in order…

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Hollywood Actors Threaten Boycott of Georgia After Kemp Victory

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by Ethan Barton   Several Hollywood actors have called for a boycott of Georgia’s film industry after Republican Brian Kemp officially won the state’s gubernatorial contest. There are over 20 productions shooting in Georgia. Is the entertainment industry willing to support the economy of a totally corrupt state that suppresses democracy; where the winner isn’t the best choice for the people but the best schemer or crook? — Alyssa Milano (@Alyssa_Milano) November 17, 2018 https://twitter.com/perlmutations/status/1063829163398828037?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw The hashtag #boycottgeorgia began to trend after Stacey Abrams, a former Democratic state representative and romance novelist, announced Friday that she would no longer challenge the Georgia Secretary of State’s election results. While Abrams acknowledged Kemp would be the winner of the election, she refused to call her speech a “concession” because a “concession means to acknowledge an action is right, true, or proper.” Before Kemp was certified as the official victor, actors were already threatening to boycott working in Georgia, a state with a large film industry that’s been dubbed the Hollywood of the South. Brian Kemp is a corrupt, homophobic, unapologetic disenfranchiser of African American voters. If he seizes power, Hollywood needs to use it’s leverage and pull out of Georgia. Studios need to put their money…

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Trump: Probably Won’t Sit for Interview in Russia Investigation

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  U.S. President Donald Trump is declaring that he “probably” won’t sit for an in-person interview with special counsel Robert Mueller probing links between his 2016 campaign and Russia, suggesting that his written answers to the prosecutor’s questions will be his final response. Trump told Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace that in recent days he gave “very, very complete answers to questions I shouldn’t have been asked. Probably this is the end.” In an interview at the White House taped Friday and broadcast Sunday, Trump said his lawyers are completing answers to Mueller’s two dozen or so questions, but that, “They’re writing what I tell them. It wasn’t a big deal.” https://youtu.be/g8ohzFy6eP0 Trump’s lawyers are expected to turn over his written responses in the coming days, although Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani said last week some of the questions created “more issues for us legally than others.” Giuliani described some of the questions as “unnecessary,” some were “possible traps” and that “we might consider some as irrelevant.” The questions concerned events leading up to the November 2016 national election, not the two-plus months while Trump was the president-elect, or of events during Trump’s presidency, where Mueller is investigating whether Trump…

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Democratic 2020 Candidate Wants Government-Sponsored Social Credit System Comparable to China’s

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by Peter Hasson   New York entrepreneur and Democratic 2020 candidate Andrew Yang wants to implement a system in which a government-run mobile app rewards Americans with “digital social credits’ (DSCs) for good behavior. Americans would receive DSCs under Yang’s system for things such as “participating in a town fair,” “fixing a neighbor’s appliance” or “tutoring a student,” his presidential campaign website explains. “As individuals rack up DSCs, they would have both a permanent balance they’ve earned over their lifetime and a current balance. They could cash the points in for experiences, purchases with participating vendors, support for causes, and transfer points to others for special occasions,” Yang states on his website. “As their permanent balance gets higher, they might qualify for various perks like throwing a pitch at a local ballgame, an audience with their local Congressperson or meeting their state’s most civic-minded athlete or celebrity.” “The most socially detached would be the most likely to ignore all of this,” he added. “But many people love rewards and feeling valued.” Yang’s social credit plan bears some similarities to the social credit system implemented by China’s authoritarian government. Every citizen in China is assigned a social credit score that determines whether they…

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Commentary: The Democrats Chaos Strategy Almost Worked in Florida

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by George Rasley   Ana Ceballos, reporting for my hometown newspaper The Naples Daily News, posted a bombshell article detailing the Democrats’ potentially criminal strategy to use chaos and the margin of litigation to steal Florida’s close election for U.S. Senator, Governor and Commissioner of Agriculture. Ms. Ceballos reports that a day after Florida’s election left top state races too close to call, a Democratic party leader directed staffers and volunteers to share altered election forms with voters to fix signature problems on absentee ballots after the state’s deadline. The altered forms surfaced in Broward, Santa Rosa, Citrus and Okaloosa counties and were reported to federal prosecutors to review for possible election fraud as Florida counties complete a required recount in three top races, reported Ceballos. But, says Ceballos, an email obtained by the USA TODAY NETWORK-Florida shows that Florida Democrats were organizing a broader statewide effort beyond those counties to give voters the altered forms to fix improper absentee ballots after the Nov. 5 deadline. Democratic party leaders provided staffers with copies of a form, known as a “cure affidavit,” that had been modified to include an inaccurate Nov. 8 deadline. One Palm Beach Democrat said in an interview the…

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Ron DeSantis Wins Florida Gubernatorial Election After Andrew Gillum Concedes Again

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Ron DeSantis

by Molly Prince   Former Republican Rep. Ron DeSantis defeated Democratic Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum on Saturday after an incredibly heated Florida gubernatorial race that remained contested for longer than a week after polls closed. Gillum ended the race via a message on Facebook, congratulating DeSantis for winning the governorship and giving a final concession. However, the results of the race will likely not be certified by the state until Tuesday. “My wife R. Jai and I wanted to take a moment to congratulate Mr. DeSantis on becoming the next governor of the great state of Florida,” Gillum said. “This has been the journey of our lives.” Gillum’s announcement follows an automatic recount that ended Thursday and showed him gaining just one net vote in the process, making the margin against DeSantis officially 33,683 votes, or 0.41 percentage points. DeSantis initially declared victory after Gillum conceded on the evening of Election Day. Gillum, however, withdrew his concession on Nov. 10 after the voting margin narrowed in the Democrats’ favor as absentee and provisional ballots were tallied. DeSantis has represented Florida’s 6th Congressional District since 2013 and was a founding member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus. He has also been a frequent…

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