VOL. 44 | NO. 8 | Friday, February 21, 2020
Area programs offer skill-building, good time for every child – or adult
Shanelle Rauh attended the 2020 American Camp Association national conference in San Diego last week and came away with a renewed energy about the upcoming summer camp season.
Growing up in Minnesota, Paula Trujillo had ice skates on her feet by the time she was 5. And she was good – so good she was in the Ice Capades as a showgirl for a decade.
Camps provide children and teens a chance to connect with nature, participate in team-based activities and develop relationships. From academics to athletics, there is a camp for everyone at every age, with any interest. Here are just a few.
JOE ROGERS: MY TAKE
If you value range and a bit of quirkiness in your movie viewing, consider this: Belcourt Theatre’s showings for February include the Oscar winning “Parasite,” the film noir classic “Key Largo,” the Hitchcock psychodrama “Rebecca,” the horror movie “Zombie,” the acclaimed boxing documentary “When We Were Kings” and, to top it all off, the Cat Video Fest.
RESTAURANTS
Randy Rayburn has been a fixture in the Nashville restaurant scene for nearly 40 years. He was interviewed for a Nashville restaurant oral history project. A longer version of this interview has been submitted for deposit at Special Collections at the Nashville Public Library.
TIM GHIANNI: STREET LEVEL
Long, brown hair framing her face, the young woman’s smile and green eyes shine as she stands by the stage at Bobby’s Idle Hour.
RICHARD COURTNEY: REALTY CHECK
The relationship between home inspectors and Realtors is one of the most misunderstood partnerships in the business world.
REAL ESTATE
Top residential real estate sales, January 2020, for Davidson, Williamson, Rutherford, Wilson and Sumner counties, as compiled by Chandler Reports.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. mortgage rates rose slightly this week but they remain far below year-ago levels, which has provided a boost to home sales.
UT SPORTS
Her last name fits her perfectly because Tamari Key does her best work in that area on the basketball court.
NEWSMAKERS
J. Thomas Trent Jr., a partner in Bradley Arant Boult Cummings’ Nashville office, is one of two attorneys in Tennessee and the only one in Nashville to win a 2020 Client Choice Award.
BRIEFS
Middle Tennessee State University’s Business and Economic Research Center has released an automobile tariffs study for the state.
BEHIND THE WHEEL
Just about every luxury automaker offers a high-performance version of one of its SUVs these days. But not everyone can afford a $70,000 Porsche Cayenne, let alone a $200,000 Lamborghini Urus.
BUSINESS BOOK REVIEW
Click. And with that quiet little sound, an email is sent, a door is unlocked, an alarm is engaged, a recipe is downloaded, a machine is launched.
CAREER CORNER
A reader recently wrote in with what clearly is an issue on the minds of professionals: Social media in the workplace. Specifically, should I be Facebook friends with my boss?
PERSONAL FINANCE
A good rule of thumb when you’re trying to eat healthy is to beware of any food you see advertised. The most beneficial fare – whole grains, fruits, vegetables – tends not to have a marketing budget.
MILLENNIAL MONEY
Blogger Dani Austin of Dallas, Texas, logged into her Southwest Airlines account a few days before the end of 2019.
ELECTION 2020
The last day for voters to cast early ballots in the March 3 presidential primary in Tennessee is Tuesday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats' desire for dramatic political change has emerged as a driving force in the party's presidential primary battle, one that extends beyond the progressive wing and presents challenges for candidates running on promises of moderation.
STATE GOVERNMENT
NASHVILLE (AP) — A federal lawsuit questioning the constitutionality of a Tennessee statute that made it a felony for sex offenders to live with their own young children has prompted moves by the GOP-dominant Statehouse to amend the 2019 law.
COURTS
The generic drugmaker Mallinckrodt has a tentative $1.6 billion deal to settle lawsuits over its role in the U.S. opioid crisis, it announced Tuesday.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee on Monday set two new execution dates, days after putting to death its seventh inmate in the past year and a half.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. home prices rose at a faster pace in December as mortgage rates remained low and a falling supply of available properties set off bidding wars between buyers.
HEALTH CARE
NEW DELHI (AP) — President Donald Trump sought Tuesday to minimize fears about coronavirus spreading rampantly throughout the U.S., saying the situation is "very well under control in our country."
NEW DELHI (AP) — President Donald Trump said Tuesday that the urgent $2.5 billion plan for coronavirus he sent to lawmakers will prepare the nation in case of an outbreak in the U.S. and help other nations unprepared to handle the threat.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Amazon is aiming to kill the supermarket checkout line.
NEW YORK (AP) — Macy's is reporting stronger-than-expected sales and profits for the fourth quarter.
BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union on Tuesday gave its chief negotiator Michel Barnier a robust negotiating mandate to get a free trade deal with Britain, which counters several of the red lines that London has set.
Intuit is buying consumer finance company Credit Karma in a $7.1 billion cash and stock deal that will take it deeper into the financial products realm.
BEIJING (AP) — Factories that make the world's smartphones, toys and other goods are struggling to reopen after a virus outbreak idled China's economy. But even with the ruling Communist Party promising help, companies and economists say it may be months before production is back to normal.
MONDAY, FEB. 24
MEDIA
NASHVILLE (AP) — A nonprofit funding pro bono legal services for local news organizations in five states has picked an attorney to help defend the right to gather and report the news in Tennessee.
HEALTH CARE
OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma launched an ad campaign Monday to tell people harmed by their powerful prescription opioid where they can file claims against the company.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House is readying an urgent budget request to address the deadly coronavirus outbreak whose rapid spread is spooking financial markets and restricting international travel.
COURTS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Justice Clarence Thomas has made no secret of his dislike of past Supreme Court decisions written by other justices, including seminal opinions about abortion rights, press freedoms and a defendant's right to a lawyer.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The educational records of a star University of Montana quarterback accused of rape will remain confidential after the Supreme Court declined to get involved in the case brought by author Jon Krakauer.
The Supreme Court on Monday appeared ready to remove an obstacle to construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, with a majority of justices expressing skepticism about a lower court ruling that tossed out a key permit needed for the natural gas pipeline to cross under the Appalachian Trial.
TECHNOLOGY
The Pentagon is adopting new ethical principles as it prepares to accelerate its use of artificial intelligence technology on the battlefield.
LONDON (AP) — China's Huawei unveiled its latest folding smartphone Monday and its first such device to be available internationally, competing in a niche category with new models from Samsung and Motorola.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Transportation Security Administration said Sunday it has stopped allowing employees to use the China-owned video app TikTok to create social media posts for the agency after the Senate's top Democrat raised concerns about potential national security issues.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
The Dow Jones Industrial Average slumped more than 1,000 points Monday in the worst day for the stock market in two years as investors worry that the spread of a viral outbreak that began in China will weaken global economic growth.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Billionaire Warren Buffett says the viral outbreak in China has slowed economic growth, but he remains confident in the long-term future of American business.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Nearly two-thirds of U.S. business economists say the Federal Reserve's interest rate policy is "about right," a sharp contrast to President Donald Trump's attacks on the Fed for not cutting rates more aggressively.
BEIJING (AP) — China's government promised tax cuts and other aid Monday to help companies recover from its virus outbreak while a spike in new cases in Iran, Italy and South Korea raised the prospect of wider disruption to tourism and other global industries.
NEW YORK (AP) — Intuit Inc. is reportedly close to a $7 billion deal to acquire personal-finance portal Credit Karma Inc. and beef up its position in the consumer-finance market.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump overstated India's progress in achieving universal access to electricity, skirted facts about sanitation and exaggerated his own administration's record as part of a 36-hour visit to India to reaffirm ties with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
WASHINGTON (AP) — In their boisterous presidential debate, several Democrats sold short the health care plans of rivals and Mike Bloomberg distorted his position on the "stop and frisk" police strategy when he was New York City mayor. In an audacious league of his own, President Donald Trump celebrated the elimination of a tax that still exists and went deep and wide in distorting what he's done in office.
FRIDAY, FEB. 21
TENNESSEE TITANS
NASHVILLE (AP) — Former Tennessee Titans coach Jeff Fisher, who led the franchise to its lone Super Bowl appearance thus far, will enter the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame.
STATE GOVERNMENT
MEMPHIS (AP) — Federal authorities said Friday that they have conducted searches at the Memphis home and business addresses of Democratic state Sen. Katrina Robinson.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Five Republican attorneys general are seeking to block an effort by three Democratic-led states to see the Equal Rights Amendment is adopted into the U.S. Constitution.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee state government services are now accessible through a new mobile app called "MyTN."
NASHVILLE (AP) — Legislative leaders say they have concerns over how the Department of Education selected its vendor to administer Gov. Bill Lee's school voucher program, but they have no plans to halt the contract from moving forward.
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — A convicted murderer was put to death in Tennessee's electric chair Thursday, becoming the state's fifth prisoner over 16 months to choose electrocution over the state's preferred method of lethal injection.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. home sales retreated 1.3% in January from the prior month, but low mortgage rates helped enable an increase in purchases from a year ago.
TECHNOLOGY
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A private equity firm seeking to buy rights to operate the internet's .org suffix said Friday it will cap price hikes and create an advisory board with veto powers to ease concerns from the nonprofit community.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
Stocks fell and bond prices rose sharply on Wall Street Friday amid fresh signs that the viral outbreak that originated in China is weighing on U.S. companies.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump signaled Friday that he's prepared to tap federal coffers again to help farmers suffering from the tariff fights that he initiated.
BEIJING (AP) — China on Friday suspended more punitive tariffs on imports of U.S. industrial goods in response to a truce in its trade war with Washington that threatened global economic growth.
TOKYO (AP) — The outbreak of the new virus threatens to erase $29 billion of this year's revenue for global airlines, mostly for Chinese carriers, as travel crashes worldwide, according to the International Air Transport Association.
TOKYO (AP) — Prime Minister Shinzo Abe should be basking in the limelight this year in the run-up to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Instead, the virus outbreak that has spread from China to even remote parts of Japan has Abe and his ruling Liberal Democratic Party playing defense.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Friday minimized new warnings from U.S. intelligence experts that Russia is interfering in this year's election campaign, and revived old grievances in claiming that Democrats are determined to undermine the legitimacy of his presidency.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell is the new acting national intelligence director, but he's expected to be a short-timer overseeing the nation's 17 spy agencies.
THURSDAY, FEB. 20
STATE GOVERNMENT
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — A Tennessee panel won't vote on whether to remove or add context to a bust of a Confederate general and early Ku Klux Klan leader in the Capitol until a board vacancy is filled, the board's chairman said at a meeting Thursday.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee officials have launched a pilot program offering some appointments and e-tickets for people looking to get their Real IDs.
COURTS
WASHINGTON (AP) — For a Supreme Court that says it has an allergy to politics, the next few months might require a lot of tissues.
TECHNOLOGY
MADRID (AP) — The top U.S. diplomat for cybersecurity policy says he welcomes European Union moves toward recognizing the risks at stake in 5G technology, but warned that the U.S. will not be able to share top-level information with countries that choose "untrusted" vendors, such as China's Huawei.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks spun lower in a dizzying day of trading Thursday as worries about the viral outbreak that started in China knocked the S&P 500 off its record high.
LONDON (AP) — London-based bank Barclays backed away Thursday from a software program that monitored an employee's productivity - including bathroom breaks - after privacy campaigners described it as "creepy.''
NEW YORK (AP) — The contest for athletic wear customers has left once high-flying Under Armour, which has a large distribution center in Mt. Juliet, dented and bruised as competitors pull ahead.
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Microsoft announced a five-year, $1.1 billion investment plan in Mexico on Thursday to develop training programs and increase the availability of cloud computing services.
NEW YORK (AP) — Investment bank Morgan Stanley announced it would buy the online brokerage E-Trade for roughly $13 billion, one of the biggest deals on Wall Street since the financial crisis.
BRUSSELS (AP) — As European Union leaders deliberated over their 1 trillion-euro ($1.1 trillion) budget Thursday, lawmakers were deeply concerned about potential conflicts of interest that could see hundreds of millions of euros in funds granted to companies linked to some of the very people deciding how the money should be spent.
NEW YORK (AP) — Victoria's Secret, which once defined sexy with its leggy supermodels prancing around in their bras and oversized angel wings, is being sold as women increasingly look for styles that more realistically fit their body type.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Trump loyalist Roger Stone was sentenced Thursday to more than three years in federal prison, following an extraordinary move by Attorney General William Barr to back off his Justice Department's original sentencing recommendation.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Victoria Coates, a top official on the National Security Council, is being reassigned amid fallout over the identity of the author of the inside-the-White House tell-all book by "Anonymous."
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump announced that Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, will become acting director of national intelligence, a move that puts a staunch Trump ally in charge of the nation's 17 spy agencies, which the president has only tepidly embraced.
ELECTION 2020
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's reelection campaign and the Republican National Committee announced Thursday that they will spend more than $10 million during the 2020 election cycle to battle Democrats on voting-related lawsuits and to bolster their Election Day operations.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Through a year of campaigning, the Democratic presidential candidates played nice, talking up party unity, disagreeing mostly politely on policy.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The latest Democratic presidential debate was a raucous one, ripe for exaggerations and distortions as Mike Bloomberg made his debut on the debate stage and rivals went after him and each other. President Donald Trump weighed in on the feisty performance at a rally where he mischaracterized what some Democrats want to do with health care.