Day: June 8, 2019

US, Mexico Reach Deal on Migration, Averting Tariffs

Tennessee Star Staff

  The United States and Mexico have reached a deal on migration to avert tariffs, but U.S. officials say President Trump retains the authority to impose tariffs if Mexico fails to live up to it. “I am pleased to inform you that The United States of America has reached a signed agreement with Mexico. The Tariffs scheduled to be implemented by the U.S. on Monday, against Mexico, are hereby indefinitely suspended,” President Donald Trump said Friday on Twitter. “Mexico, in turn, has agreed to take strong measures to stem the tide of Migration through Mexico, and to our Southern Border. This is being done to greatly reduce, or eliminate, Illegal Immigration coming from Mexico and into the United States,” Trump said. Speaking on the sidelines of the G20 finance ministers meeting in Japan, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told the Reuters news agency Saturday the U.S.-Mexico immigration deal met President Donald Trump’s objectives of fixing immigration problems on the southern U.S. border, but that tariffs could be imposed if Mexico does not meet U.S. expectations. “Our expectation is that Mexico will do what they’ve committed to do and our expectation is that we won’t need to put tariffs in place,…

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Rutherford County GOP Target of Apparent Bomb Scare

Chris Butler

  The Rutherford County Republican Party headquarters received a package Friday morning that party officials said was apparently a bomb, according to a Tennessee Republican Party press release. Officials contacted authorities and then evacuated the building on East Main Street in Murfreesboro. Murfreesboro Police Spokesman Larry Flowers said in a statement that authorities evacuated several other downtown businesses while they investigated the suspicious package. Later in the day, Flowers said authorities had rendered the package as safe. “Police K9 was brought in. Everything is safe, the scene is clear and employees have returned to work,” Flowers said. Flowers said someone found the package outside the building that housed the party headquarters. An employee took the box inside, opened it and saw what was a possible explosive device, Flowers said. “An all-clear was given and the evacuation was lifted after the device was rendered safe and the area cleared with the assistance of a Police K-9,” Flowers said in a statement. Murfreesboro Police and agents with the ATF U.S. Bomb Data Center are investigating, Flowers said. Flowers told The Tennessee Star Friday he had no other information to provide. The Nashville-based WKRN reported the package contained a note saying the following:…

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Commentary: A Sovereign People Need Data Sovereignty – Now

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by Ned Ryu   It’s time the American people woke up and understood what the big tech companies, many of which are now publishers and telecommunications companies masquerading as neutral platforms, are doing with their personal data. Respecting individual privacy is the most common concern you find in the media and elsewhere. But privacy is only part of the challenge before us—and a relatively small part at that. By feeding companies like Google, Amazon, and Facebook untold amounts of personally identifiable data, Americans—specifically American workers—are helping sow the seeds of their own demise. Many people don’t take the time to consider what happens to their data when they give it away. Where does it go? With whom is it being shared? How is it being used to accelerate the growth of new technologies, including artificial intelligence and automation? The data being given freely to these tech companies and the amount of personally identifiable data being collected put the National Security Agency’s efforts to shame. Like it or not, all of this data isn’t being used simply to inform algorithms that help you make better movie selections or put funny cat videos into your Facebook feed or remind you that you’re…

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NASA Will Allow Private Citizens at the International Space Station

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by Shelby Talcott   NASA announced its plan to open the International Space Station (ISS) as early as 2020 to private astronauts who want to see life on the other side of Earth’s atmosphere. Parts of the ISS will be opened for space tourism and commercial filming, according to The Washington Post. Private astronauts can use the ISS for “missions of up to 30 days,” NASA said in its announcement in New York on Friday. .@Space_Station is open for commercial business! Watch @Astro_Christina talk about the steps we're taking to make our orbiting laboratory accessible to all Americans. pic.twitter.com/xLp2CpMC2x — NASA (@NASA) June 7, 2019 “Commercial companies will play an important role both here … and around the moon, working with NASA to test technologies, train astronauts and develop a sustainable human presence,” said Christina Hoch, a resident of the ISS, in a video on Twitter. Russia has already let private citizens onto the station, so it won’t be the very first time a non-professional astronaut heads to space, WaPo reported. Companies have already reserved spots, including and Axiom Space of Houston and Bigelow Aerospace of North Las Vegas, The New York Times reported. Bigelow Aerospace plans to use SpaceX,…

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Analysis: Bernie Sanders’ Education Plan Is Rife with Deceit

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by James D. Agresti   Presidential candidate and U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders has unveiled a plan that he says will create “an education system that works for all people, not just the wealthy and powerful.” In it, he portrays the U.S. education system as grossly underfunded and racially biased, but the statements he makes to support these notions are misleading or explicitly false. Racial Segregation Sanders repeatedly blames the “re-segregation of our K–12 schools” for the poor academic performance of black and Latino students. He bases this claim on an article in the New York Times, which declares that “nonwhite and low-income students who attend integrated schools perform better academically,” but there is a “long history of white resistance to desegregation efforts,” and “school secession movements—in which parents seek to form their own, majority-white districts—are accelerating.” The Times article is primarily based on a report from the UCLA Civil Rights Project. Buried 21 pages deep in that report is the fact that “the share of intensely segregated white schools, that is, schools that enroll 90–100% white students, has declined from 38.9% in 1988 to 16% in 2016.” In plain language, “white” schools have become more integrated, which deflates the storylines…

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May Jobs Report: 75,000 Jobs Added, Unemployment Remains at 3.6 Percent

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by Mary Margaret Olohan   The U.S. economy added 75,000 jobs in May, while the unemployment rate remained at 3.6 percent, according to Department of Labor data released Friday. Economists predicted 180,000 jobs would be added and that wage growth would rise to about 3.2%, according to The Wall Street Journal. Jobs numbers for April were 263,000 jobs added, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report. After a decline in April, the number of persons unemployed for less than five weeks increased by 243,000 up to 2.1 million. The May jobs report comes on the heels of April’s job report that showed the lowest unemployment numbers in 50 years. The U.S. economy added 263,000 jobs in April, while the unemployment rate fell to 3.6 percent. Economists had predicted only 190,000 jobs added and a continued unemployment rate of 3.8 percent. Jobs growth has come back strong after February when just 33,000 jobs were added. The unemployment rate has held steady between 4 percent and 3.7 percent for more than a year before the April jobs report showed it drop to 3.6 percent. Prior to April’s report, the consistent unemployment rate suggested that workers are jumping back into the workforce…

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US Opens Mass Shelter in Texas for Migrant Children

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  The federal government is opening a new mass facility to hold migrant children in Texas and considering detaining hundreds of more youths on three military bases around the country, adding a total of 3,000 new beds to the overtaxed system. The new emergency facility in Carrizo Springs, Texas, will hold up to 1,600 teens in a complex that once housed oil field workers on government-leased land near the border, said Mark Weber, a spokesman for Office of Refugee Resettlement. The agency is also weighing using Army and Air Force bases in Georgia, Montana and Oklahoma to house an additional 1,400 kids in the coming weeks, amid the influx of children traveling to the U.S. alone. Most of the children have arrived in the U.S. without their families and are held in government custody while authorities determine if they can be released to relatives or family friends. Shelters not subject to child welfare rules All the new facilities will be considered temporary emergency shelters and thus not be subject to state child welfare licensing requirements, Weber said. In January, the government shut down a large detention camp in the Texas desert that was unlicensed and another unlicensed facility remains in…

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National Park Quietly Removed Warning That Glaciers ‘Will All Be Gone’ by 2020 After Years of Heavy Snowfall

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by Michael Bastasch   The National Park Service (NPS) quietly removed a visitor center sign saying the glaciers at Glacier National Park would disappear by 2020 due to climate change. As it turns out, higher-than-average snowfall in recent years upended computer model projections from the early 2000s that NPS based its claim glaciers “will all be gone by the year 2020,” federal officials said. “Glacier retreat in Glacier National Park speeds up and slows down with fluctuations in the local climate,” the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), which monitors Glacier National Park, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “Those signs were based on the observation prior to 2010 that glaciers were shrinking more quickly than a computer model predicted they would,” USGS said. “Subsequently, larger than average snowfall over several winters slowed down that retreat rate and the 2020 date used in the NPS display does not apply anymore.” NPS updated signs at the St. Mary Visitor Center glacier exhibit over the winter. Sign changes meant the display warning glaciers would all disappear by 2020 now says: “When they completely disappear, however, will depend on how and when we act.” The total area of Glacier National Park covered in its iconic…

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Commentary: Ralph Abernathy and His Stand to Put Americans First – in 1969

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by John M. Howting   The summer of 2019 marks the 50th anniversary of man walking on the moon. Before Neil Armstrong took “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” however, another significant event occurred: Rev. Ralph Abernathy’s protest outside of the Saturn V rocket at Cape Canaveral, Florida. On the afternoon of July 15, 1969, the day prior to the Apollo 11 launch, Abernathy rode up to the launch site in a mule-drawn carriage (to symbolize rural poverty) with 500 activists to protest. Abernathy delivered a speech. According to NASA’s archives: He deplored the condition of the nation’s poor, declaring that one-fifth of the nation lacked adequate food, clothing, shelter, and medical care. In the face of such suffering, he asserted that space flight represented an inhuman priority. During this stunt, Abernathy never once mentioned race. His message concerned misplaced priorities: putting space exploration ahead of domestic problems. Ralph Abernathy is an understated figure in the civil rights movement. A longtime friend and confidant to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., he succeeded King as head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. But Abernathy was nothing like the radicals we see today who fashion themselves as “civil rights leaders.” Jesse Jackson…

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Ilhan Omar to Join Black-Jewish Caucus Despite Repeated Allegations of Anti-Semitism

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by Molly Prince   The office of Democratic Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar revealed Thursday she will be joining the House’s newly formed Black-Jewish Caucus. A spokesman for Omar confirmed to Jewish Insider that Omar intends to join the bipartisan committee a day after the Minnesota congresswoman expressed her support for it on Twitter. “Last month, [Democratic Illinois Rep. Jan Schakowsky] and I joined together to talk about the common threat of white nationalism faced by Muslim, black and Jewish-Americans,” Omar said. “Glad to see colleagues follow through in working on the things that unite us and not divide us.” Omar, and fellow Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan became America’s first Muslim congresswomen and their time in office has been embroiled in allegations of anti-Semitism and anti-American sentiments. She appeared to side with the Islamic terrorist organization Hamas after the Palestinian terror organization launched nearly 600 rockets into Israel from across the Gaza border in a 24-hour period earlier in May. Hamas claimed responsibility for multiple Israeli deaths. Omar has defended her own anti-Israeli statements, such as ones invoking Allah to expose Israel’s “evil doings” as well as promoting age-old anti-Semitic canards such as that Jews’ support of Israel is…

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Commentary: Why We Should Resist the Urge to Label Others

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by Mitchell Nemeth   Labels allow us to paint others into a box where we can then apply our preconceived notions to them. Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson famously said: The moment when someone attaches you to a philosophy or a movement, then they assign all the baggage and all the rest of the philosophy that goes with it to you. And when you want to have a conversation, they will assert that they already know everything important there is to know about you because of that association. And that’s not the way to have a conversation. Labels are easy to use, and they allow us to skim past the complexity of an individual’s ideas and thoughts. Weaponizing Labels In political discourse, labeling is a simple way of describing complexity. Few persons are ideologically pure, and, by nature, we are complex beings. American political parties are generally representative of this phenomenon. While the modern Republican Party is broadly conservative, there are numerous libertarians, Christian conservatives, nationalists, and right-wing populists. On the whole, the Republican Party is conservative, but the label is a simple means of describing a much more complex truth. Republican Congressman Justin Amash and Republican Senator Rand Paul have…

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In Reversal, Biden Opposes Ban on Federal Money for Abortion

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  After two days of intense criticism, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden reversed course Thursday and declared that he no longer supports a long-standing congressional ban on using federal health care money to pay for abortions. “If I believe health care is a right, as I do, I can no longer support an amendment” that makes it harder for some women to access care, Biden said at a Democratic Party fundraiser in Atlanta. The former vice president’s reversal on the Hyde Amendment came after rivals and women’s rights groups blasted him for affirming through campaign aides that he still supported the decades-old budget provision. The dynamics had been certain to flare again at Democrats’ first primary debate in three weeks. Centrist risks Biden didn’t mention this week’s attacks, saying his decision was about health care, not politics. Yet the circumstances highlight the risks for a 76-year-old former vice president who’s running as more of a centrist in a party where some skeptical activists openly question whether he can be the party standard-bearer in 2020. And Biden’s explanation tacitly repeated his critics’ arguments that the Hyde Amendment is another abortion barrier that disproportionately affects poor women and women of color. “I’ve…

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Constituents Plan ‘Squash Amash’ Rally, Call for Congressman’s Resignation

Anthony Gockowski

  Pro-Trump Michiganders are a planning a “Squash Amash” rally for Flag Day outside of Rep. Justin Amash’s (R-MI-03) Grand Rapids office in response to his comments in support of impeaching the president. “Join us on Flag Day and President Trump’s birthday outside the Amash office in Grand Rapids and tell the conservative world we demand he step down from his elected position,” states an event description for the rally, which will be hosted by several pro-Trump groups in Michigan’s Third Congressional District. Protesters have also started an online petition demanding Amash’s resignation, which claims that Amash “has lost all credibility” and “no longer has the right to speak on our behalf.” “The actions and statements by Representative Amash have the effect of negating the will of the people of the 3rd District of Michigan in violation of his oath of office to represent the views and best interests of the people,” the petition continues. Diane Schindlbeck, an organizer of the rally, told MLive that she wants to “make sure he knows here in Michigan we support our president.” “Justin Amash, as one of the elected officials here in West Michigan, is not listening to his own voter base, and…

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Planned Parenthood Attacks Longtime Memphis Democratic Rep. DeBerry for Voting for Fetal Heartbeat Bill

Jason M. Reynolds

  Planned Parenthood doesn’t like that longtime State Rep. John DeBerry (D-TN-90) voted to support the heartbeat bill in the recent legislative session. Tennessee Advocates for Planned Parenthood took advertising out for three billboards in Memphis to attack DeBerry on his vote, WBBJ said. The Memphis Democrat ran unopposed in 2018. His seat is up for reelection in 2020. According to WMC,  Francie Hunt, Tennessee Advocates for Planned Parenthood executive director, said, “Today, we are kicking off a billboard campaign to help inform more people about his stance.” Norma Lester, Democratic Women of Shelby County president, told WMC, “There should never be a situation where Representative DeBerry has been allowed to be comfortable with what he has done.” DeBerry, the Democratic Leader Pro-Tempore, served as the Tennessee Black Caucus of State Legislators Chaplain in the 111th General Assembly, according to his legislative biography. He has served in the Legislature from the 99th through the 111th General Assemblies. Although the heartbeat bill passed in the House, it stalled in the Senate and was sent to summer study. The Senate version of the Heartbeat Bill, SB1236 sponsored by Senator Mark Pody (R-Lebanon) was sent to “summer study” by the Judiciary Committee on…

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