Month: July 2021

Andrew Cuomo’s Administration Continues to Undercount New York COVID Deaths

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New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration continues to undercount COVID-19 deaths in its own public reporting, months after it admitted to undercounting nursing home deaths from the virus by thousands.

New York’s state-managed tracker reported over 43,000 deaths from COVID-19 as of Wednesday morning, a figure more than 20% smaller than the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s tally of nearly 55,000 in the state, which is based on death certificates that list COVID-19 as a cause or contributing factor to an individual’s death.

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Dr. Manny Sethi and Healthy Tennessee Holding Free Health Fair on Saturday

Cooper Moran

Dr. Manny Sethi, the Vanderbilt orthopedic trauma surgeon who ran to represent Tennessee in the U.S. Senate, is hosting a free health fair and food distribution on Saturday in Murfreesboro through his non-profit, Healthy Tennessee.

“This is our first health fair after the COVID epidemic, and we could not be more excited to get back to Tennessee communities and share better health practices with everyone. We have held dozens of health fairs, summits, statewide seminars and symposiums from one end of the state to the other for a decade. We are focused on meeting people where they are to provide health care solutions and options,” Sethi, who serves as the organization’s president, said in an emailed statement.

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Senator Bill Hagerty Slams Biden for Waiving Iranian Sanctions

Cooper Moran
Senator Bill Hagerty

Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) slammed President Joe Biden on Tuesday for waiving sanctions on the Iranian oil trade — allowing the country to access frozen funds from South Korea and Japan.

Further, the administration chose to roll back the restrictions on the same day that the Department of Justice announced charges on a spy network linked to the Iranian leadership that sought to kidnap an American.

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Court Rules That Law Banning Handgun Sales to Americans Under 21 Is Unconstitutional

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Guy shooting hand gun at gun range

On Tuesday, a federal appeals court overturned a decades-long law that prohibited the sale of handguns to Americans under the age of 21, on the basis that it violated the Second Amendment, according to USA Today.

The law was first signed into law by Lyndon Johnson in 1968, and although it banned handguns for those under 21, it still allowed Americans as young as 18 to purchase rifles and shotguns. In the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Virginia, it was determined that the restriction for one type of gun based on a three-year age difference was arbitrary and had no merit.

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Facebook Files Petition Demanding FTC Chair Lina Khan Recuse Herself From Antitrust Case

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Lina Khan Facebook Headquarters

Facebook filed a petition Wednesday asking for Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan to recuse herself from the FTC’s antitrust case against the company.

The tech giant argued in the petition that Khan’s public statements, in which she suggested Facebook’s conduct constituted an antitrust offense, violated the company’s due process rights.

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Analysis: What It Would Look Like If China Had to Pay Reparations for COVID-19

Admin

The U.S. and other nations can hold the Chinese government accountable for the 2020 outbreak of coronavirus and ensuing global pandemic through a variety of legal, financial and diplomatic means.

Republican senators and Asian policy experts have proposed a range of options for punishing the Chinese government for its alleged negligence responding to the outbreak and overseeing the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where coronavirus potentially leaked from in late 2019. Since the World Health Organization declared coronavirus a pandemic in March 2o20, the virus has killed more than 4 million people worldwide, nations have experienced economic devastation and the prevalence of other health issues such as depression has increased.

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North Carolina GOP Adds A Ban on Teaching the U.S. ‘Should Be Violently Overthrown’ to Anti-CRT Bill

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Phil Berger in front of North Carolina State Capitol

North Carolina Republicans amended a bill Wednesday that would prevent educators from teaching critical race theory in the state’s public schools, adding five provisions, according to an updated copy of the legislation obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Republican Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger added five provisions to House Bill 324 following worries that North Carolina students would be taught CRT in schools, the AP reported.

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Commentary: Conservatives Shouldn’t Accept the Idea of ‘Systemic Racism’

Admin
Black Lives Matter protest

The official “Conservative Case Against Banning Critical Race Theory” appeared in the New York Times last week. Penned by a progressive Yale professor, two non-progressives, and the allegedly conservative David French, the article claims state efforts to ban CRT undermine a good, free-thinking education. Others have dissected this silly claim in detail, so it’s not worth rehashing all of that here. What readers should take away from the Times op-ed is an increasing willingness among respectable conservatives to grant the idea of “systemic racism.” They believe there is nothing wrong with accepting this core tenet of modern liberalism and that it’s absolutely true. 

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Federal Judge Rules Second Amendment Applies to 18-Year-Olds, Ruling May Impact Tennessee Constitutional Carry Law

Cooper Moran
Glock 19

A federal judge in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday overturned a Virginia federal judge’s ruling upholding the federal Gun Control Act of 1968.

The decision by the judge strikes down the law that prevents federally licensed firearms dealers from selling handguns or handgun ammunition to adults under the age of 21 — allowing 18-year-olds to purchase handguns.

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President and CEO of the Job Creators Network Alfredo Ortiz Slams Biden ‘Voting Rights’ Speech

Cooper Moran
Biden ‘Voting Rights’ Speech

Alfredo Ortiz, president and CEO of the Job Creators Network (JCN), released a statement on Tuesday criticizing President Joe Biden for his recent speech on “voting rights” in Philadelphia. 

“Biden’s fear-mongering that Republicans are trying to take over state elections in defiance of the will of the voters is ridiculous slander. What he calls voter ‘suppression’ and ‘subversion’ is really just commonsense voting integrity measures,” Ortiz said of the speech.

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State of Florida Appeals Social Media Law Injunction

Casey Owens

The law banning social media and big tech companies from “deplatforming” or “cancelling” political candidates on the internet was blocked by a federal judge a day before the law was to take effect.

U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle issued a 31-page order on June 30th outlining his decision to approve an injunction filed by tech companies, NetChoice and the Computer and Communications Industry Association.

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Norwegian Cruises Challenges Florida’s Vaccine Passport Ban

Grant Holcomb
People boarding a cruise ship

Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings (NCLH) has filed a lawsuit against Florida’s new law banning vaccine passports and they will abandon the state entirely if the law is not reversed.

“The result would be a devastating, unrecoverable loss for everyone—not only for NCLH’s business but also for tens of thousands of passengers, employees, and stakeholders who all benefit from NCLH resuming safe operations as planned,” the lawsuit says. “The only way NCLH could maintain its protocols and operations as currently planned is by abandoning Florida altogether.”

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Biden Awards Never Trumper, Former Arizona Senator Jeff Flake with Ambassador Position

Cooper Moran

Jeff Flake, a frequent critic of former President Donald Trump and former Arizona Senator, was awarded with a position in the Biden administration as the ambassador to Turkey.

Biden’s move to nominate the Republican lawmaker with a position in his administration comes after Flake endorsed and campaigned for Biden during the November 2020 election.

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Karen Fann: Audit Numbers Don’t Match Maricopa County’s Numbers

Rachel Alexander
Karen Fann Election Portrait

The audit of Maricopa County ballots cast in the 2020 election ordered by the Arizona Legislature finished last month, and State Senate President Karen Fann (R-Prescott) said Tuesday the ballot totals don’t match the county’s official results. She told KTAR News 92.3 FM’s The Mike Broomhead Show, “They haven’t released a number yet, if you will, however we do know that those numbers do not match with Maricopa County at this point.”

When asked about the degree of the discrepancy in the audit versus the official county tallies, Fann said, “I do not know. They have not told me the number;” adding that the auditors are “finishing up.”

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Mesa Public Schools Updates Dress Code Policy to be ‘More Equitable,’ Will Define ‘Hate Speech’ Based on Dictionary

Corinne Murdock

Mesa Public Schools (MPS) updated their dress code policy to make it more equitable and prohibit “hate speech.” Nowhere in their current policies does MPS define “hate speech.”

As reported by The Arizona Sun Times last month, MPS General Counsel Kacey Gregson said that students would have a right to express their political beliefs unless it could be perceived as “hate speech,” promoting violence, or immediately or potentially causing substantial interference with the learning environment.

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New Vaccine Incentive Program Coming for Ohio

The Center Square
Gov. Mike DeWine and vaccines

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine plans to double down on an incentive program to encourage more Ohioans to receive a COVID-19 vaccine as cases are on the rise in the Buckeye State.

Speaking to reporters at a ribbon cutting celebrating the completion of a highway project in Columbus, DeWine said he expects to announce a new program soon in an effort boost the state’s vaccination percentage, which ranks as one of the lowest in the nation.

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25-Year-Old East Lansing Mayor Resigns to Go Back to School

Peter D'Abrosca
Aaron Stephens - Mayor of East Lansing

The 25-year-old mayor of East Lansing, appointed to the position in 2020 during a year of turmoil for the city, is resigning in August in order to further his education.

“My program begins in late August, so I will be stepping down from my position as mayor, and as a member of the city council, because I will be unable to attend four regular and two discussion-only meetings before my term is over,” Mayor Aaron Stephens said in a Facebook post. 

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Some School Boards Oppose Virginia Transgender Policy Mandate; Enforcement, Consequences Unclear

Eric Burk

As culture war issues spread through public hearings at Virginia’s school board meetings, school boards are starting to oppose adopting new transgender policies mandated by state law. Amid complaints and demands from public speakers, the Pittsylvania County Schools (PCS) Board voted four to three on Tuesday to reject adopting the Virginia Department of Education’s (VDOE) Model Policies for the Treatment of Transgender Students in Virginia’s Public Schools.

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Ohio Communities Gain Control of Wind, Solar Projects

The Center Square
Three wind turbines

Local communities in Ohio got a little more power regarding renewable energy projects after Gov. Mike DeWine signed a bill into law that addresses wind and solar projects.

DeWine made Senate Bill 52 law and gave power to county boards on whether to allow or prevent certification of wind and solar projects. The legislation also establishes decommissioning requirements for certain wind and solar facilities.

“One of the most important things we can do as state legislators is to listen to the input of our fellow constituents,” Rep. Gary Click, R-Vickery, said Monday after DeWine signed the bill. “I can confidently tell you that Ohioans within Seneca County vehemently spoke out against a wind project being built within their communities – Senate Bill 52 being signed into law solidifies their right to local control over these types of projects.”

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RNC Reminds MLB All-Star Game Viewers That Democrats Got Game Pulled Out of Georgia

Chris Butler

The Republican National Committee (RNC) released a television ad during Tuesday night’s All-Star Game and told Atlanta residents that Democrats stole the game from their city, all to push a divisive political agenda. The ad features former Georgia State Rep. Melvin Everson. Everson, according to Ballotpedia, is a Republican who served in the legislature from 2005 to 2011.

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Southwest Georgia Resident Criminally Charged with CARES Act Fraud

Chris Butler

A federal grand jury has returned a 12-count indictment charging a Sycamore, Georgia, resident with bank fraud, money laundering and making false statements related to the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. Officials indicted Anthony C. Boncimino, 46, this month with four counts of bank fraud, four counts of money laundering and four counts of making false statements.

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Candidates Line Up to Challenge Spanberger in Virginia Midterms

Eric Burk
Taylor Keeney for Congress

Former Governor Bob McDonnell communications staffer Taylor Keeney is running for the GOP nomination in Virginia’s seventh congressional district. Keeney is the second GOP candidate to announce a campaign for the seat in July; Tina Ramirez announced her candidacy earlier in July.

“I’m tired of the same career politicians failing to flip the seat from blue back to red. That’s why I’m running for Congress,” Keeney said in an announcement video Wednesday.

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75 Florida Teachers Sign Petition Vowing to Defy Critical Race Theory Ban

Peter D'Abrosca

As The Tennessee Star reported, the Zinn Education Project,  a nonprofit that pushes social justice curriculum in schools, released a petition signed by more than 5000 teachers nationwide who vow to continue to teach Critical Race Theory, even if it’s banned in their schools. 

“Lawmakers in at least 21 states are attempting to pass legislation that would require teachers to lie to students about the role of racism, sexism, heterosexism, and oppression throughout U.S. history,” the petition says.

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Metro Nashville Public Schools Drops Mask Requirement for Fall Semester

Corinne Murdock

Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) announced Tuesday that they won’t require students or faculty to wear masks for the upcoming school year.

MNPS said that these updated COVID protocols were “commonsense.” In the announcement, MNPS Director of Schools Adrienne Battle asserted that masks for the unvaccinated were strongly encouraged – especially for those with underlying health conditions or students under 12 years old. Otherwise, Battle said that MNPS will monitor case data in the event they need to adjust masking requirements.

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Senator Marsha Blackburn Calls on Biden to Support Protesters in Cuba

Cooper Moran

U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn urged President Biden and her colleagues in the Senate to fully support the ongoing protests in Cuba against the current communist regime.

“The ruling communists have bled the Cuban people dry and now armed thugs have taken to the streets to repress the opposition at any cost. Make no mistake. This is a test for President Biden. He must draw a line in the sand. I call on my colleagues in the majority, on President Biden, and the members of his cabinet to join me in supporting all who would risk their lives to expose the ravages of socialism in Cuba,” she said while speaking on the Senate floor.

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Commentary: The Democrats’ Topsy-Turvy Spin Machine

Admin
Joe Biden talking to staff members

The guessing game of how long the levitation of the Biden presidency can be taken seriously seems to be entering a new phase. The deluge of illegal entries into the United States at the southern border is now running at a rate of closer to 3 million than 2 million a year and yet we still see and hear the bobbling talking head of the Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas assuring us, “The southern border is closed.” 

The media has provided almost no coverage of this calamitous invasion. A recent Trafalgar poll found that 56 percent of Americans don’t think Joe Biden is “fully executing the duties of his office,” yet the docile White House press corps continues to ask him about his ice cream and other such probing questions of national interest. Apart from a rising stock market and a quieter atmosphere, the record of the new administration is one of almost complete failure. 

The oceanic influx of unskilled labor at the southern border cannot fail to aggravate unemployment and depress the incomes for the vulnerable sectors of what, under President Trump, was a fully employed workforce. The administration has reduced domestic oil production and squandered the country’s status as an energy self-sufficient state. These are all familiar issues to those who follow public affairs, but the 95 percent Democratic-supporting media preserve the cocoon of a fairyland Biden presidency, whose bumbling chief flatters himself with comparisons to Franklin D. Roosevelt.

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Commentary: FBI Caught Lying About ‘Lego Man’ Charged in January 6 Capitol Breach

Admin
Robert Morss

The Department of Justice now says a DoJ court document claiming to have  recovered a “fully constructed U.S. Capitol Lego set” from the home of a man charged in the Jan. 6 Capitol breach was “a miscommunication,” and the Lego set was actually unconstructed and in a box. Robert Morss, 27, is accused of leading fellow rioters in what prosecutors say was “one of the most intense and prolonged clashes” with officers on Jan. 6.

The new court filing said, “In original detention memoranda, the undersigned stated that law enforcement found a ‘fully constructed US Capitol Lego set.’ That statement appears to be inaccurate. The Lego set was in a box and not fully constructed at the time of the search.”

Once again, the Justice Department has had to admit that they lied about events surrounding January 6th. While the Lego lie may seem silly, it is part of a pattern that federal law enforcement has demonstrated in this case, and indeed over the past five years.

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States Join Coalition to Stop California from Setting U.S. Automotive Standards

The Center Square
Ford dealership shop

A coalition of 16 states is urging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to not reinstate a waiver allowing California to implement its own carbon emissions standards that essentially regulate the automotive industry for the rest of the U.S.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton joined a coalition led by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, which also includes attorneys general from the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah and West Virginia.

Under the Clean Air Act, the Trump administration created national standards for vehicle carbon emissions for model years 2021 through 2026. The policy revoked a waiver previously granted to California in order to treat all states as equal sovereigns subject to one federal rule, the attorneys general explain in their 12-page letter.

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Medical Journal Declares That Parents Should Lose Their Authority to Object to Transgender Surgery for Children

Admin
Mother and child hugging

A major medical journal in the United States is facing widespread criticism after it published an article declaring that parents should lose their “veto power” to object to their children trying to seek gender-altering surgical procedures, Breitbart reports.

The Journal of Medical Ethics published an article titled “LGBT testimony and the limits of trust,” authored by Dr. Maura Priest, a professor of philosophy and bioethics at Arizona State University (ASU). In the article, Priest claims that “it is no longer the job of physicians to do their own weighing of the costs and benefits of transition-related care,” as “only the patient can make this assessment, because only the patient has access to the true weight of transition-related benefits.”

Furthermore, Priest declares that “taking LGBT patient testimony seriously also means that parents should lose veto power over most transition-related pediatric care.” Priest had expanded on this assertion in a pre-publication draft, where she said that “guardian veto power over identity-affirming care [results] in injustice whenever such power means one trans child is denied the care that another receives.”

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Google Hit with $590 Million Fine For Not Paying Publishers

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Google was fined $590 million Tuesday by a French regulator Tuesday for failing to negotiate with news publishers for use of their content.

France’s Competition Authority issued the €500 million (roughly $590 million) fine after Google repeatedly violated April 2020 orders forcing the company to pay news publishers to display their content in search results, the agency announced in a statement Tuesday. The orders were issued after the tech company failed to comply with a 2019 European Union (EU) copyright law mandating news aggregators such as Google license content from news publishers and press agencies, The Wall Street Journal reported.

“Google’s negotiations with publishers and press agencies cannot be regarded as having been conducted in good faith,” Isabelle de Silva, president of Competition Authority, said in the statement.

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CDC: Students Should Return to In-Person Classes

The Center Square
A classroom of students in class

The Center for Disease Control updated federal COVID guidance Friday with several major changes as schools around the country grapple with policies for students’ return in the fall.

The CDC urged schools to allow students to return to in-person classes whether or not they are vaccinated as most studies showed significant learning loss during remote-only or hybrid teaching models.

The agency also said teachers and students should wear masks unless they have gotten the vaccine, a recommendation that is certain to drive controversy.

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Commentary: An Inside Look at Lockdown Orders from 2020

RealClearWire
Person putting hands on glass, inside of home

Life in the United States and in many parts of the world was transformed in mid-March 2020. That was when the great experiment began. It was a test. How much power does government have to rule nearly the whole of life? To what extent can all the power of the state be mobilized to take away rights that people had previously supposed were protected by law? How many restrictions on freedom would people put up with without a revolt?

It was also a test of executive and bureaucratic power: can these dramatic decisions be made by just a handful of people, independent of all our slogans about representative democracy?

We are far from coming to terms with any of these questions. They are hardly being discussed. The one takeaway from the storm that swept through our country and the world in those days is that anything is possible. Unless something dramatic is done, like some firm limits on what governments can do, they will try again, under the pretext of public health or something else. 

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Inflation Spikes Again, Marks Quickest Increase in 13 Years

Admin

Inflation surged 5.4% over the 12-month period ending in June, the quickest spike since August 2008, a Department of Labor report showed.

The consumer price index (CPI) increased 0.9% between May and June, according to the Labor Department report released Tuesday morning. Economists projected the report would show that CPI ticked up 4.7% between July 2020 and June, The Wall Street Journal reported.

“We’re in a transitional phase right now,” Joel Naroff, the chief economist at Naroff Economics, told the WSJ. “We are transitioning to a higher period of inflation and interest rates than we’ve had over the last 20 years.”

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Loudoun County Diverts Cash from Low Income Students to ‘Racial Equity’ Training

Peter D'Abrosca

As the battle over Critical Race Theory rages on between parents and Loudoun County Public Schools, it has been revealed that that school system diverted funds from low income students for “racial equity” training. 

The school district paid The Equity Collaborative, a North Carolina-based consulting firm, $24,000 to teach six virtual training sessions on equality between February and April. 

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Gov. Abbott: Democratic Legislators to Be Arrested upon Return to Texas

The Center Square
Photo caption from Twitter says " Conversation Dan Patrick @DanPatrick Smiling House Dems fly off to DC on a private jet with a case of Miller Lite, breaking House quorum, abandoning their constituents, while the Senate still works. It’s my hope that Senate Dems report tomorrow to do what they were elected to do."

More than 60 House Democrats who fled Austin Monday to prevent a vote on election reforms will be arrested when they return to Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott said.

“Once they step back into the state of Texas, they will be arrested and brought to the Texas capital and we will be conducting business,” Abbott said.

The 67 Democratic lawmakers flew on chartered flights to Washington D.C. in protest of proposed legislation seeking to reduce the chances of fraud in future elections. The legislation is one of a number of measures being considered during a July special session called by Abbott.

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RomaDrama Live! Adds Musical Performances to Weekend Event

Bethany Bowman

NASHVILLE, Tennessee – In true Music City fashion, RomaDrama® Live!, is adding live musical performances scheduled to take place during the weekend event, to be held July 30-August 1 at The Factory at Franklin in Franklin, Tennessee.

In addition to the already announced stellar list of TV stars RomaDrama® Live! is bringing to Nashville, Tennessee, favorite music stars from the Nashville Area will also be performing.

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