Month: October 2023

Government-Funded News Outlet Orders Staff Not to Call Hamas ‘Terrorists’

Georgia Star News Staff

Government-funded news outlet Voice of America (VOA) management has ordered its employees not to refer to Hamas as “terrorists” unless they are quoting statements, National Review reported.

VOA’s guidance originally distributed on Oct. 10 suggests that reporters and editors are allowed to refer to Hamas’ Oct. 7 assault on Israel as terrorist attacks or acts of terror but informed staff they should “avoid calling Hamas and its members terrorists, except in quotes,” according to emails National Review obtained. VOA’s associate editor responsible for news standards conveyed the publication’s guidelines regarding reporting on the initial attacks and the subsequent Israeli retaliation in an email to employees on Friday.

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Commentary: Bidenomics Takes Its Toll on Biden 2024

Georgia Star News Staff

Drops in inflation-adjusted compensation and wages preceded the losses of Harry Truman in 1952, who opted not to run, Gerald Ford in 1976, Jimmy Carter in 1980, George H.W. Bush in 1992 and Donald Trump in 2020, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics and Bureau of Economic Analysis data.

They also preceded the historic wipeouts of Republicans in 2008 by Barack Obama and Senate Democrats in the 1958 midterms, and the Republican House wins of the 2010 and 2022 midterms.

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Georgia Supreme Court Upholds Six-Week Abortion Ban

Georgia Star News Staff

The Georgia Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that the state’s six-week abortion ban should remain in place, refuting a lower court’s argument that the law was unconstitutional, according to court documents.

A group of pro-abortion organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia, filed a lawsuit in July 2022 and a trial court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, saying that the 2019 law was signed prior to the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Center and was, ultimately, unconstitutional, according to NPR. The state’s Supreme Court, however, dismissed the lower court’s decision and said that the previous ruling “rests on a faulty premise” that the Dobbs decision changed the meaning of the Constitution, itself, according to WABE, a local media outlet.

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Music Spotlight: Orlando Mendez

Bethany Bowman

 I’ll admit that I don’t watch music competition shows like I did when I was younger. When I watch TV, it’s usually a mind-numbing procedural or mystery.

But thankfully, a lot of the people I interview got their start on a show and if they are country, they often find their way into my email inbox. Because the competition is so fierce, most of the artists pitched to me are outstanding performers. Orlando Mendez is one such artist and I feel privileged to tell his story.

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Oregon Suspends Basic Skills Graduation Requirement in the Name of Equity

Georgia Star News Staff

In the state of Oregon, high school students will no longer need to display basic comprehension of reading, math, or writing in order to graduate, with state officials claiming that such a change is necessary to guarantee higher graduation rates for minority students.

As reported by Fox News, the pause on such basic graduation requirements had first been implemented during the Chinese Coronavirus pandemic. But last week, the Oregon State Board of Education voted unanimously to extend the requirement suspension at least until the end of the 2027-2028 school year.

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Commentary: Gag Order Against Trump Is the Real Threat to Democracy

Georgia Star News Staff

The reason you have not heard of a gag order on par with the one imposed on former President Trump is that it is highly unusual. Normally, in a criminal proceeding, there are no gag orders. To the extent they exist, they typically only bind the lawyers, who are admonished to adhere to the rules of professional conduct. Rarely—as in almost never—are criminal defendants forced into a gag order on such spurious grounds as they might “vilify and implicitly encourage violence against public servants who are simply doing their jobs.”

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Commentary: The Uncommon Ella Knowles Haskell

Georgia Star News Staff

Praise for the “common man” is all too common in the world. It’s the “uncommon” man (or woman) for whom we ought to be most grateful.

Who in their right mind tells their children to aspire to nothing more than common or average? Good parenting is nothing less than encouraging children to become better than simply “run of the mill.” Since when is it a virtue to blend in with the mob, indistinguishable from the mediocre? Who itches to see a movie if the reviews suggest it’s just ordinary and unexceptional?

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CCP-Tied Battery Firm’s Dominance Could Pose Major National Security and Espionage Threats, New Report Warns

Georgia Star News Staff

A battery firm with considerable ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) could pose significant espionage and national security risks to the U.S. as policymakers move to electrify American life, according to a new report by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a non-partisan research institute focused on issues of national security and foreign affairs.

CATL, a battery manufacturing firm headquartered in Fujian, China, is a major player in the global battery market, as it already holds a dominant position in the global electric vehicle (EV) battery market and is poised to supply crucial large-scale energy storage systems to American utility companies to help them provide the decarbonized power grids of the future, according to the FDD report. CATL, which has subsidiaries based in the U.S. and several European countries, has already had equipment installed within a U.S. military base, and the burgeoning dependence on the Chinese company’s products may leave essential American infrastructure vulnerable to espionage and malware attacks, according to the FDD report.

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Minnesota Rep. Emmer Wins GOP House Speaker Nomination

Just the News

Minnesota GOP Rep. Tom Emmer, the House majority whip, won his party’s nomination for House speaker on Tuesday after five rounds of secret ballot voting. His nomination now moves to the House floor where it needs at least 217 votes to pass. It’s unclear when the vote will be held.

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‘Tucker on X’ Episode 33: Col. Douglas Macgregor Says, ‘Something as Bad or Potentially Even Worse Than 9/11 Could Happen Here’

Kaitlin Housler

In episode 33 of his newest production, “Tucker on X,” host Tucker Carlson interviewed U.S. Army Colonel Retired Combat Veteran Douglas Macgregor on whether the U.S. can engage in war with Iran.

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Former Trump DOJ Attorney Urges D.C. Bar to Delay His Disbarment Trial Pending Georgia RICO Prosecution with Trump

Rachel Alexander

Jeffrey Clark, an attorney who served at high levels of the Department of Justice under former President Donald Trump, including briefly as acting attorney general, has been indicted by Fulton County District Attorney Fanni Willis along with Trump in the racketeering case over the 2020 election challenges, and charged with dishonesty and attempting to interfere with the administration of justice by the District of Columbia Bar.

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Soaring Interest Rates Are Squeezing Out Small Businesses

Georgia Star News Staff

Small businesses are feeling the effects of the Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes as tightening credit puts more businesses and workers in dangerous positions, according to The New York Times.

Interest payments for small businesses will rise to about 7 percent of revenues next year on average, as opposed to being just 5.8 percent of revenues in 2021, according to the NYT. The Fed has raised its federal funds rate to a range of 5.25 percent and 5.50 percent following a series of 11 hikes that started in March 2022, bringing the rate to its highest point in 22 years.

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‘Deeply Opposed:’ GOP Reps Urge Biden Not to Take in Palestinian Refugees

Georgia Star News Staff

Republican lawmakers led by Oklahoma Rep. Josh Brecheen are trying to discourage the Biden administration from taking in Palestinian refugees, according to a Monday letter first obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Democratic New York Rep. Jamaal Bowman has requested that the U.S. take in Palestinian refugees after Hamas terrorists infiltrated Israel on Oct. 7, killing, kidnapping and raping hundreds of civilians. The Republicans requested that Biden ask Egypt to take in Palestinian refugees and not abuse his authority to bring in foreign populations, according to the letter, which is signed by Reps. Jeff Duncan of South Carolina, Andy Ogles of Tennessee and Clay Higgins of Louisiana.

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Bipartisan House Lawmakers Demand Biden Drop Julian Assange Case

Georgia Star News Staff

Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and James McGovern, D-Mass., are leading a House of Representatives letter demanding President Joe Biden to stop prosecuting Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who is fighting extradition to the U.S.

The two congressmen asked fellow House lawmakers to join their bipartisan attempt to “strongly encourage the Biden administration to withdraw the U.S. extradition request currently pending against Australian publisher Julian Assange and halt all prosecutorial proceedings against him as soon as possible,” according to a “Dear Colleague” letter, Fox News Digital reported Monday.

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Anti-Israel Sentiment has Permeated Biden Administration from the Start

Just the News

Even as President Joe Biden touts his support for Israel, many of his appointees have expressed anti-Israel and anti-Semitic sentiments, even after Hamas terrorists invaded Israel and killed more than 1,400 people, including at least 31 U.S. citizens.

“Biden has appointed the most anti-Semitic, anti-Israel people to important posts we’ve ever seen,” Zionist Organization of America National President Morton Klein told Just the News.

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Georgia Politician Loses Title in Official Sanction After She Allegedly Fabricated Date Rape Drug Story

Tom Pappert

A member of the Clayton County Commission was stripped of her title on Monday as part of an official sanction after her claims of being slipped the date rape drug at a Morrow bar were contradicted by a police investigation and video that appeared to show her consume at least five alcoholic drinks before losing consciousness.

The Clayton County Commission unanimously voted to sanction Commissioner Felicia Franklin and strip her from the vice chairman position, The Atlanta Journal Constitution reported. Franklin did not attend the meeting or participate in the vote.

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Commentary: SCOTUS Takes Up Free Speech Case, Putting Biden Administration’s Censorship Regime on Trial

Georgia Star News Staff

Late Friday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Missouri v. Biden, a case that may end the Biden administration’s circumvention of the First Amendment by outsourcing censorship to Big Tech. The case was initially filed by the states of Missouri and Louisiana, along with various private plaintiffs who allege that social media platforms censored them at the behest of federal agencies. U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty ruled for the plaintiffs on July 4, enjoining the agencies from communicating with platforms about “content moderation.” The Biden administration sought relief from the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals and lost again, making a Supreme Court clash inevitable.

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Commentary: Bret Baier Rips the Mask Off of Lying Leon Panetta

Georgia Star News Staff

Bret Baier and his millions of listeners could hardly believe their ears last week when Leon Panetta answered Baier’s questions about the letter signed by 51 former “intelligence” bigwigs claiming the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation.

Panetta is a former secretary of defense, director of the CIA, White House chief of staff, director of the Office of Management and Budget, and representative from California. And, clearly, a hard-core Democrat — willing to lie, and lie, and lie (see below) for the team.

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More than 300,000 Illegal Aliens Entered U.S. through Southwest Border in September Alone

The Center Square

More than 300,000 people illegally entered the U.S. through the southwest border in September, according to newly released U.S. Customs and Border Protection data and gotaway data first reported by The Center Square.

Border Patrol and Office of Field Operations agents apprehended 269,735 people last month and Border Patrol agents reported at least 33,203 known gotaways, bringing the total to 302,938.

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Outsider Libertarian Javier Milei Advances to Run-Off Presidential Election in Argentina

Georgia Star News Staff

Argentina’s right-wing populist presidential candidate Javier Milei will head to a run-off after failing to win the first round of the presidential election on Sunday.

Milei and former security minister Sergio Massa will face off again in November in a runoff vote, according to the New York Times. The election has become a high point of contention as Milei has said he seeks to rid the country of leftist policies while his opponent, Massa, hopes to keep the left-wing administration that has held power since 2019, according to The Associated Press.

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Americans Are Burning Through Savings to Keep Biden’s Economy Afloat, Experts Say

Georgia Star News Staff

Under President Joe Biden, economic growth has been partly sustained by Americans spending through their savings on everyday goods, according to experts who spoke to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Gross Domestic Product (GDP), a measure of economic growth, has remained persistently high, coming in at 2.1 percent for the second quarter of 2023, even as the Federal Reserve has attempted to tame growth through hikes of its federal funds rate. The main contributor to U.S. GDP is consumer spending, which has managed to notch consistent increases at the expense of the savings of average Americans, experts told the DCNF.

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Commentary: 25 Traditionalist Books to Read with Your Children

Georgia Star News Staff

One of the best things parents can do for their children is read with them. Even reading a few minutes a day makes a world of difference.

Literacy is not only the key skill required by almost all education formats but also one of the most influential factors in any learning endeavor. Even children too young to read independently garner an incredible amount from listening to books read aloud. They significantly increase their language skills, attention span, memory, visual awareness, and emotional response and regulation. And, of course, reading together offers children time to cuddle up with parents for quality bonding time.

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‘No Speaker, No Recess:’ House Freedom Caucus Urges Republicans to Stay in Town Until New Speaker Is Elected

Georgia Star News Staff

The House Freedom Caucus (HFC) is urging Republican leadership to keep its members in Washington, D.C., until a new speaker is elected, according to a Monday press release obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The House has been without a speaker since Kevin McCarthy was ousted on October 3, and has since failed to elect two GOP nominees — House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan. With nine House Republicans in the running for the position, the HFC is asking for no more recess until someone secures the gavel “with all possible speed and determination,” according to the press release.

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Vivek Ramaswamy Joins Elon Musk, David Sacks on X Spaces in Discussing How the Israel-Hamas Conflict Could Lead to WWIII

Kaitlin Housler

GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, X owner Elon Musk, and venture capitalist David Sacks hosted a discussion on X Spaces surrounding the current conflict in Israel and if the world is marching towards WWIII. Kicking off the conversation, Musk, citing his close ties to the intelligence department, said U.S. officials are saying the conflict in the Middle East continues “getting worse, not better.”

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Fed: American Households Increased Net Worth During Pandemic

Georgia Star News Staff

A new report from the Federal Reserve claims that the average American household actually saw an increase in its net worth during the Chinese Coronavirus pandemic.

As reported by Axios, the Fed’s Survey of Consumer Finances, which is released every three years, came out on Wednesday. It was lasted conducted in 2019, thus meaning the next iteration would be held after the pandemic, covering the three-year time period from start to finish.

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Feds Warn in Friday Memo: Hamas, Hezbollah Could Be Crossing Southern Border

Georgia Star News Staff

Federal officials are warning that members of Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Hezbollah could be crossing through the southern border, according to an internal Oct. 20 memo exclusively obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The San Diego Field Office Intelligence Division of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) sent the memo warning that due to the war between Israel and Hamas, there could be encounters of terror-tied individuals who are seeking to travel to or from the Middle East via transit across the southern border. Hamas, PIJ and Hezbollah, all of which are U.S.-designated terrorist organizations, have been committing attacks on Israel in a war that began with a surprise attack on hundreds of civilians on Oct. 7.

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New Pentagon Memo Reveals Almost 300 Reports of Potential UFO Encounters Since August 2022

Just the News

On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Defense publicly released the 2023 report on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP)—colloquially known as UFOs—which revealed that there have been almost 300 reports of potential UAP observed, with some cases of UAP exhibiting “high-speed travel or unusual maneuverability.”

The report, titled “Fiscal Year 2023 Consolidated Annual Report on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena” was released by the Department of Defense for open publication along with charts detailing trends in UAP reporting which included the typically-reported characteristics of the objects as well as a heat map their locations.

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U.S. to Roll Out $3.5 Billion in New Projects to Strengthen Electric Grid

Georgia Star News Staff

On Wednesday, the Biden Administration announced another round of spending on energy projects across the country, aimed at strengthening the nation’s weakened electric grid in the face of several major natural disasters.

As Fox News reports, the administration plans to spend at least $3.5 billion on 58 different projects across the country, as the electric grid deals with the strain of such disasters as wildfires in Maui and California.

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Atlanta Public Safety Training Center Nearly Halfway Complete, Mayor Claims

Tom Pappert

Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said on Thursday that the city’s new Public Safety Training Center is about 40 percent complete, and he expects construction on the site’s buildings will begin in January.

Dickens told the Buckhead Young Republicans that the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center is nearly halfway complete, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The training center is located in Buckhead, the uptown commercial and residential district of Atlanta that has sought to become its own city, and the outlet noted that 61 percent of residents supported its construction in a March poll. 

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Alan Dershowitz Commentary: Harvard Must Condemn Pro-Hamas Students

Georgia Star News Staff
Outside of Harvard Law School

There’s an ongoing debate on university campuses about whether and how to respond to students who support, defend or even praise what Hamas terrorists deliberately did to innocent Israeli children, the elderly and other civilians.

On the one hand, there are free-speech and academic-freedom considerations.

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In California, Violent Crime Rises While Arrests Fall

Georgia Star News Staff

New crime statistics reveal that in the state of California, violent crime has risen sharply while arrests have fallen, despite a decrease in violent crime nationwide.

As reported by Just The News, the newly-released FBI statistics show that, from 2021 to 2022, the rate of violent crime in California for every 100,000 people rose from 481.2 to 499.5, despite a nationwide decrease from 387 to 380.7. Meanwhile, arrests declined all over the state, falling dramatically below pre-pandemic levels.

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Commentary: Notorious Southern Poverty Law Center Tries to Blacklist Turning Point USA, Project Veritas from Donor-Advised Funds

Georgia Star News Staff

by Tyler O’Neil   The Southern Poverty Law Center routinely attempts to shame charities into blacklisting conservative nonprofits to defund the SPLC’s ideological opponents, whom it brands as hateful. This week, the SPLC released a report condemning six donor-advised funds for directing money to “extremist finance.” The report aims to shame the charity…

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736 Known or Suspected Terrorists Apprehended at U.S. Border in Fiscal 2023

The Center Square

There were 736 known or suspected terrorists (KSTs) apprehended at the northern and southern borders in fiscal 2023.

The Center Square initially reported 659 were apprehended for the fiscal year, as of Sept. 15, 2023. The fiscal year ended Sept. 30.

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Common Themes on Energy Policy Emerge Among Republican Presidential Candidates

Just the News

by Kevin Killough   In the past few years, America has seen high inflation rates and a faltering economy that some observers say will go into a recession. The latest conflict in the Middle East could likely pose a significant disruption in global energy supplies. Where the GOP contenders stand on energy policies…

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U.S. Urges Americans to Flee Lebanon, Accuses Hamas of Blocking Americans from Leaving Gaza

Just the News

by John Solomon   The State Department on Sunday night urged U.S. citizens to depart from Lebanon because of an “unpredictable security situation” while accusing Hamas of blocking Americans from fleeing Gaza ahead of an expected Israeli offensive. “To date, at least, Hamas has blocked them (Americans) from leaving, showing once…

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Biden Admin Reports Over 3 Million Illegal Aliens Cross America’s Borders in Single Year

Georgia Star News Staff

For the first time ever, U.S. border agents encountered over 3.2 million illegal aliens on America’s borders in a single fiscal year, a number that is greater than the combined population of Hawaii, Alaska, and Vermont.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection, or CPB, reported Saturday that agents encountered 3,201,144 illegal immigrants at or between ports of entry to the country between October 1, 2022, and September 30, 2023. (The federal government’s fiscal year runs from October through September.)

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New York A.G. Flouts Court Orders by Pressuring Social Media to Censor ‘Hateful’ Speech, Lawyers Say

Just the News

Free speech battles over Hamas terrorism against Israeli civilians and the Jewish state’s military response aren’t just roiling college campuses such as New York University, which is investigating its law school’s student body president for using her office to blame Israel.

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Supreme Court Takes Up Landmark Government Censorship Case

Georgia Star News Staff

The Supreme Court on Friday took up Missouri v. Biden, the free speech case challenging the Biden administration’s efforts to censor content on social media, while issuing a pause on a preliminary injunction granted by a lower court.

Republican attorneys general from Missouri and Louisiana sued the Biden administration over its communications with social media companies related to the suppression of online speech, arguing it violated the First Amendment. District of Louisiana Judge Terry A. Doughty issued an injunction in July blocking certain parts of President Joe Biden’s administration from colluding with social media platforms to censor content online. The Supreme Court paused the injunction, but agreed to take up the case, according to the court order.

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D.C. Judge Pauses Trump Gag Order in January 6 Case

Just the News

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan on Friday agreed to temporarily pause a gag order she imposed on former President Donald Trump while he appeals the decision.

Chutkan on Monday issued the order, prohibiting him from publicly attacking the court staff, the prosecution, and any potential witnesses. The judge is overseeing special counsel Jack Smith’s Jan. 6 case against the former president. Trump has vocally accused Smith of pursuing a political witch hunt against him to derail his 2024 White House bid.

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‘The Chosen’ Season Four to Debut in Theaters This February

Georgia Star News Staff

“I know it’s hard,” Jesus (played by Jonathan Roumie) says in a voiceover for “The Chosen’s” Season 4 teaser. “Man makes it much harder when he leans on his own understanding.” 

The smash hit’s fourth season premieres in theaters on Feb. 1, 2024, producers announced Monday. The rollout will begin in the U.S. and Canada with a two-week run of episodes 1-3 on Feb. 1, followed by episodes 4-6 beginning Feb. 15, and Episodes 7-8 beginning Feb. 29, according to a news release. 

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Attorney Ben Crump Claims Leonard Cure Was ‘Triggered’ by Georgia Deputy Before Fatal Shooting

Tom Pappert

The attorney representing the family of Leonard Cure, who a Georgia deputy fatally shot during a traffic stop, claimed on Friday that Cure was “triggered” by law enforcement before the struggle that preceded his death on October 16.

Cure was fatally shot by a Camden County Sheriff’s deputy last week when he refused to cooperate with the deputy after being pulled over for allegedly driving more than 100 miles per hour. Video released by the Camden County Sheriff’s office reveals that, after being tased, a struggle ensued between the deputy and Cure. It continued despite the deputy deploying his baton and striking Cure, and only ended when the deputy removed his pistol and appeared to fire once into Cure’s abdomen.

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Commentary: The Reason the Department of Education Is Afraid of Innovation in Higher Ed

Georgia Star News Staff

Online learning has revolutionized higher education, but a recent move by the federal Department of Education is threatening to tear down systems that are helping millions of students learn.

An extremely wide diversity of students choose to take online courses or to get entire online degrees. Colleges that offer them need to be nimble as the economy changes, yet traditional colleges are slow to change, and they often lack the expertise and funding to develop and manage online courses independently.

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