December 1, 2017

Did T-shirt company violate Lexington's fairness ordinance? States high court to decide.

Kentucky’s highest court will hear a controversial case involving a Lexington company’s refusal to print a T-shirt for the city’s annual gay-pride festival.

The Kentucky Supreme Court issued an order last month saying it would hear the case, which stems from a decision in 2012 by Hands On Originals to refuse to print a T-shirt for the Lexington Gay and Lesbian Services Organization. The company’s owner said he had religious objections to “pride in being gay.”

The case, which began five years ago, has been watched closely across the state and the country.

The Lexington Human Rights Commission ruled that Hands On Originals violated the Lexington’s fairness ordinance, part of which prohibits businesses that are open to the public from discriminating against people based on sexual orientation.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/local/counties/fayette-county/article186842438.html

December 1, 2017

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas and there's still no revised pension bill

Frankfort -- Christmas decorations have started going up in the Kentucky Capitol but House Republicans still haven’t settled on a bill to overhaul the state’s ailing public pension systems.

“We have a plan that we were able to talk about in here today that literally I think everybody wants to try and and get their arms around,” House Speaker Pro Tempore David Osborne said Tuesday after emerging from a nearly two and a half hour meeting of House Republicans. “Certainly building consensus is difficult, as we’ve seen in this process, it’s a very difficult issue for everybody. And so to get a consensus that everybody’s gonna just love, I think we’re awfully close to having something that people feel good about.”

Close might not be enough. Gov. Matt Bevin, a Republican, remains insistent that he will call a special legislative session before the end of the year to deal with one of the worst-funded pension systems in the country.

Despite a legislative body that doesn’t support his original pension reform bill and a sexual harassment scandal that derailed discussions in early November, Bevin said in an interview with Terry Meiners on WHAS radio last week that he has full confidence the legislature will be ready for a special session in December.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article186945898.html

December 1, 2017

Kentucky Baptists threaten to kick out churches that think it's OK to hire 'practicing homosexuals'

Southern Baptists have long opposed same-sex marriage and ordaining gay ministers, arguing that the Bible unequivocally rejects homosexuality as sinful and perverted.

The Louisville-based Kentucky Baptist Convention hasn't left that position to interpretation. The powerful Southern Baptist group, which has 2,400 churches and 750,000 members across the state, has ousted congregations that bless gay unions and welcome people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender as pastors and missionaries.

That's why discussions on dropping a ban against hiring gay and transgender people by a more liberal group of affiliated churches, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, has threatened to trigger an even larger rift.

Paul Chitwood, executive director of the Kentucky Baptist Convention, said that if the fellowship's leaders soften their rule against hiring “practicing homosexuals,” it would be a perilous step in the wrong direction. In essence, they're "redefining sin," he said.

Read more: https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/religion/2017/11/27/kentucky-baptists-threaten-expulsion-lgbt-gay-hiring-ban/885825001/

So the Southern Baptists in Kentucky changed their hiring requirements from 'practicing homosexuals' to 'experienced homosexuals'?

December 1, 2017

Officials: Kentucky cop agreed not to arrest woman for sex

HOPKINSVILLE, Ky. -- Authorities say a police officer in western Kentucky is facing official misconduct charges after agreeing not to arrest a woman if she would have sex with him.

The Kentucky New Era reports State Police have charged former Hopkinsville Police Officer Daniel Gray with two counts of first-degree official misconduct. Gray has resigned.

A criminal complaint says Gray was supposed to arrest a woman for violating her probation. Instead, he took her to a hotel and had sex with her. The woman told police she had sex with Gray multiple times in exchange for not arresting her.

Hopkinsville Police Chief Clayton Sumner said the allegations give a black-eye to the profession.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/latest-news/article186281128.html

December 1, 2017

Four Tennessee governor candidates won't release tax returns

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- Four of the seven major candidates for Tennessee governor are declining to release details of their federal income tax returns.

The Tennessean newspaper asked the five Republicans and two Democrats in the race for copies of their federal tax filings. U.S. Rep. Diane Black and fellow Republican state House Speaker Beth Harwell provided financial summaries, and Democrat Craig Fitzhugh released his 2016 tax return.

Among the remaining Republicans, former state Sen. Mae Beavers and businessmen Randy Boyd and Bill Lee declined the request. As did Democratic former Nashville Mayor Karl Dean.

Dean and Boyd said they may consider releasing details in the future.

Read more: http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/breakingnews/story/2017/nov/27/wont-release-tax-returns/457905/

December 1, 2017

Nashville teachers protest Betsy DeVos' agenda after Tennessee visit

Chanting and holding signs calling for her departure, public school teachers and parents gathered by the downtown riverfront Thursday night to voice their opposition to U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos.

"We want the people of Nashville to know that we feel it is really important to send a strong message to Secretary DeVos that we don't agree with what she's doing," said Amanda Kail, a teacher in Metro Nashville Public Schools and advocacy chair for the Metropolitan Nashville Education Association, which organized the protest.

"As teachers, we find her budget to be immoral," Kail said of the billions of dollars in education cuts proposed by President Donald Trump's administration. "The amount of money she is cutting from the education budget will have devastating effects on public education."

Earlier Thursday, DeVos spoke to a crowd gathered at the Omni Nashville Hotel for the ExcelinEd conference, an event founded by one-time Republican presidential candidate and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.

Read more: http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2017/11/30/betsy-devos-nashville-teacher-protest-tennessee-schools/910917001/

December 1, 2017

Betsy DeVos warns teachers unions: 'I'm not going anywhere. In fact I'm just getting started.'

During a speech in Nashville on Thursday, U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos called for education reform groups to continue the fight for school choice and said rumors of her departure are false.

Her lunchtime speech at the ExcelinEd conference included a heavy focus on the benefits of school choice for students and national tax reform efforts.

She also issued a warning to teachers unions and “defenders of the status quo” that she is just getting settled into her post as President Donald Trump’s education secretary.

“Allow me to borrow a line from the great American author Mark Twain, ‘The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.’ "

“I’m not going anywhere. In fact I’m just getting started.”

Read more: http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/education/2017/11/30/betsy-devos-set-address-jeb-bush-education-summit-nashville-protests-planned/853128001/

Cross-posted in the Education Group.

December 1, 2017

Betsy DeVos warns teachers unions: 'I'm not going anywhere. In fact I'm just getting started.'

During a speech in Nashville on Thursday, U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos called for education reform groups to continue the fight for school choice and said rumors of her departure are false.

Her lunchtime speech at the ExcelinEd conference included a heavy focus on the benefits of school choice for students and national tax reform efforts.

She also issued a warning to teachers unions and “defenders of the status quo” that she is just getting settled into her post as President Donald Trump’s education secretary.

“Allow me to borrow a line from the great American author Mark Twain, ‘The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.’ "

“I’m not going anywhere. In fact I’m just getting started.”

Read more: http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/education/2017/11/30/betsy-devos-set-address-jeb-bush-education-summit-nashville-protests-planned/853128001/

Cross-posted in the Tennessee Group.

December 1, 2017

Scheming Contractor Nailed By Feds

After hammering for justice, a scheming government contractor got hammered by justice.

Milton Cleve Collins, 54, pleaded guilty to one count of major fraud against the United States Thursday before U.S. District Judge John T. Fowlkes, Jr.

Collins had a $1.5 million federal government contract to replace the roof and the air conditioning system at the Ed Jones Federal Courthouse and Post Office in Jackson, Tenn.

He sub-contracted the work to a “small Memphis-area business,” according to D. Michael Dunavant, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee, but did not pay the business in full. Collins then lied about it in documents to federal officials. For Collins, the scheme was worth over $580,000.

Read more: https://www.memphisflyer.com/NewsBlog/archives/2017/11/30/scheming-contractor-nailed-by-feds

December 1, 2017

Why Doesn't Anyone Believe Scottie Nell Hughes? (former Fox pundit)

The former Fox pundit opens up for the first time about how her dream job turned into a nightmare — and why she won’t quit fighting


Scottie Nell Hughes does not give a damn what you think about her.

To be clear, she probably wouldn’t phrase it like that. Unlike most of the journalists you’ll meet, Hughes does not swear like a sailor. But spending time talking with Hughes — and interviewing some of the people who know her best (on and off the record) — makes it clear that the only opinions that matter to her are those of her husband, her two children and a small circle of friends and family.

-snip-

Hughes knows what you probably do think of her, of course. To liberals she’s that ditzy blonde defending Donald Trump on Fox News and CNN, the younger one who isn’t Kellyanne Conway. To many conservatives, she’s a tea party star who betrayed her own conservative religious values by cheating on her husband to advance her career.

In truth, the 37-year-old Hughes is none of the above. She’s smart, she’s funny, she doesn’t think Democrats are the devil, and, in her telling, every sexual encounter she had with Fox Business anchor Charles Payne was unwanted.

Read more: https://www.nashvillescene.com/news/cover-story/article/20983970/why-doesnt-anyone-believe-former-fox-pundit-scottie-nell-hughes