Professional Educator Carrie Calls the Tennessee Star Report Concerned That Davidson County Is Pitting Taxpayers Against Teachers

On Friday’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – hosts Leahy and Cunningham took a call from Carrie, a Davidson County elementary teacher who voiced her concern with Davidson County looking to inadvertently pit teachers against taxpayers by raising taxes to additionally fund public education.

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Firestone Mechanics’ Program Designed to Fill a Gap, Officials Say

  Maplewood High in Nashville is the only school in the nation with its own Firestone Service Center, and company officials say they had a constructive purpose in mind when they created it. Firestone spokeswoman Emily Weaver addressed Firestone’s intentions in an email Friday with The Tennessee Star. “One of the biggest challenges facing today’s workforce is the technical skills gap, partly created by a lack of accessible education opportunities for youth. To combat this challenge, Bridgestone Americas and Firestone Complete Auto Care are currently creating new pathways for students to explore automotive career paths through the centers at Maplewood High School in Nashville and East High School Community Learning Center in Akron, Ohio.” “With these institutions, Bridgestone and Firestone Complete Auto Care have developed a program that allows students to acquire specialized skills through enhanced automotive curriculum and the opportunity to shadow alongside highly skilled Bridgestone and Firestone Complete Auto Care employees. The goal is to provide students with the skills they need to not only be employable, but to be prepared for their personal and professional journeys. As a part of this, Bridgestone seeks to enrich the lives of those interested in an automotive career through training programs…

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Desperate David Briley Punches Down, Criticizes Nashville Tea Party’s Opposition to Property Tax Increase

On Friday’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy and special guest Ben Cunnigham – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Leahy and Cunningham talked about Cunningham’s recent Tweets stating that he would hold John Cooper accountable to his implied commitments to the reallocation of Davidson County funds and not raising property taxes.

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Nashville Minority Students Who Disrupt Class Don’t Get Traditional Punishment

  Traditional methods of punishing public school students who act out in class oppress blacks and Latinos, according to a New York City-based education official who defends a much softer way of teaching them discipline. That person, Kesi Foster, said as much in a scholarly journal in 2015. And that’s the same soft approach members of the Metro Nashville Public School System use for their own minority students. As The Tennessee Star reported this week, Nashville officials use this method, Positive and Safe Schools Advancing Greater Equity, or PASSAGE for short. But, as of Friday, those same Nashville officials had yet to describe precisely how they discipline minority students under this program. Metro Nashville Schools’ spokeswoman Dawn Rutledge had yet to respond to our requests for comment. Members of the Metro Nashville School Board also had yet to respond. Much of the material available online about PASSAGE is long on jargon and short on specifics. But the same scholarly journal Foster wrote for, Voices in Urban Education, seems to give some insight as to how school officials in other cities administer PASSAGE. Christopher Marti, a Denver-based middle school science teacher, seems to say he and colleagues take a more politically…

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Attorney for Steve Gill Releases Statement

  COLUMBIA, Tennessee — On Friday afternoon S. Jason Whatley, attorney at law, released the following statement on behalf of his client Steve Gill: On behalf of my client, Steve Gill, I wish to express his sincere thanks to all of his family, friends, and listeners who have prayed for and supported him during this very difficult time. Steve has often spoken of freedom on his show, but these last 10 days have given him a new appreciation for that ideal and for the blessings of friends and family. There is another side to this story, a very different one than that portrayed by others. When the time is right, the public will hear these facts. For now, though, Steve is resting, healing, and restarting after what has arguably been the most trying time of his life. Steve asks for your continued prayers as he contemplates these events and, more importantly, looks forward to his next chapter. S. Jason Whatley Attorney at Law  

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Steve Glover Says Nashville Will Become the Next Detroit Without His Conservative Voice as Metro Council Member At Large

In a discussion Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Leahy spoke to in-studio guest and Metro Council at-large candidate, Steve Glover about the need for a more conservative fiscal budget in Nashville. He also noted that it is crucial that Nashville maintain a conservative voice at the table.

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Commentary: Reasons Why America Should Question Its Trade Relationship with China

China is alleged to harvest the organs of thousands of political dissidents it keeps in concentration camps, it threatens Hong Kong and Taiwan daily, it appears to be funding and assisting the North Korean nuclear missile program and is using the hundreds of billions of dollars of trade deficits to build a first-rate navy to defeat the U.S. as every year’s trade deficit pays for more than two years of China’s military spending.

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Audit: Tennessee Taxpayers Lose Huge Sum After Nursing Home Inflates Expenses

  Tennessee taxpayers lost more than $3 million after a corporate-run nursing facility billed the state that much money for expenses not covered under Medicaid. This, according to a new audit Tennessee Comptrollers released this week. That corporation, AltaCare, is based out of Alpharetta, Georgia, according to Comptrollers. “The audit found that AltaCare included $3,224,767.49 of nonallowable home office expenses on the cost reports it submitted to the State of Tennessee,” Comptrollers wrote. “Cost reports are used to calculate a nursing facility’s Medicaid reimbursement rate and should only include expenses that are reasonable, allowable, and in accordance with state and federal rules, regulations, and reimbursement principles. Auditors determined that AltaCare’s home office cost reports submitted in 2014, 2015, and 2016 each contained nonallowable amounts. These included legal expenses, unsupported expenses, late fees, penalties, expenses not related to AltaCare, and donations.” Auditors also found that certain personal expenses of AltaCare’s director, Doug Mittleider, were also included on the 2015 cost report. These included expenses for his wife’s flight from Sanborn, New York to France, church donations, a veterinarian expense, a guitar center purchase, and other unspecified personal expenses, according to Comptrollers. “Because the home office cost reports include amounts allocated to…

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Briley One-Ups Cooper in Attacks on ICE as Nashville Mayoral Run Off Election Approaches

  The choice in the Nashville mayoral race is between incumbent Mayor David Briley, who is soft on immigration — and Metro Councilman John Cooper, who is soft on immigration. Michael Patrick Leahy on Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report weighed in on the mayoral debate: “So, the very, very, very, bad Mayor – David Briley – debated with the very, very bad Metro Council at large candidate for Mayor, John Cooper. And purportedly they were discussing issues. Except they really weren’t. They talked platitudes.” The report is broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am. Briley tweeted, “This week, @WSMV reported on Metro probation officers sharing Nashville residents’ personal information with ICE agents. Today, I’m ordering the Metro Auditor to conduct a full investigation of the department involved and these deeply troubling reports.” This week, @WSMV reported on Metro probation officers sharing Nashville residents’ personal information with ICE agents. Today, I'm ordering the Metro Auditor to conduct a full investigation of the department involved and these deeply troubling reports. pic.twitter.com/JKqGWCcCR6 — Mayor David Briley (@MayorBriley) August 29, 2019 One comment summed up the Nashville mayor’s responsibility — to protect the public: “If they are on…

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Mike the Teacher Calls in to The Tennessee Star Report and Blasts Metro Nashville Public Schools’ Bloated Administration

On Wednesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Leahy took a call from Mike the Teacher, who expressed his concern for the bloated central district school administration offices in Metro Nashville Public Schools, which he felt were draining the schools financially. He noted that math and science teachers should be paid more than those that teach ‘fluff’ subjects such as a physical education. Towards the end of the call, caller Mike expressed an urgency in allowing those kids who are not interested in school to be allowed to leave and enter into the workforce after eighth grade. Leahy: Hey, we have a special caller now, Mike the Teacher from Davidson County. We’re going to give him the last five minutes in the show. Had a great call. Mike, thanks for calling in. Good morning. Mike: Hey, good morning Michael. I really have three thoughts. Just thinking back on my previous call. With Metro Schools. Our central district office is so obscenely bloated. It’s just so bloated with high salary administrators and staffers who do absolutely nothing all day, and then they make a…

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Moderator of the Nashville Mayoral Debate Asks the Wrong Question About How to Improve Public Schools

On Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Leahy talked about the recent mayoral debate in Nashville and how moderator Rhori Johnson asked a completely irrelevant question to both candidates who responded with non-answers and dodged the real issues facing public education in Davidson County schools.

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France May Be Using Iran to Keep Israel ‘In Check,’ Says OANN’s Neil McCabe

On Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy and Doug Kellett – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Leahy and Kellet spoke with weekly special guest and Washington-based reporter for One America News Network, Neil McCabe about Macron’s strange move to sneak in the Iranian foreign minister at the G7 Summit over the weekend.

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Commentary: As a Physician, This Is Why I No Longer Believe Government Health Care Can Work

In my medical training, a fellow physician tried to convince me that my liberal leanings on health care were misguided. While I firmly believed that the government had an important role in providing access to medical care—particularly to the underserved—my colleague argued that the government’s role in, well, anything, should be practically nonexistent.

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