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Here is this week’s Extemp Central news quiz. Good luck!
To access a list of all our old quizzes, click here.
1. What is “fair trade”?
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Fair trade is when countries in the developed world demand higher environmental and worker protections of developing nations than conventional free trade agreements. Whereas free traders believe in opening up new markets and reducing tariff barriers with little regard for the factors that enable developing countries to export their goods cheaply (e.g. a lack of worker and environmental regulations), fair traders believe that trading relationships should be more mutually beneficial and focus more on the human element. Some fair traders also believe that developed nations should pay higher prices for the goods they receive from developing nations so as to improve the standard of living of farmers and industrial workers. Extempers should be aware, though, that there is not a universally accepted definition of “fair trade” which means that they should always seek to establish what they mean if they use the term in a round.[/toggle]
2. According to new data from the Department of Education, what percentage of American high school students are graduating in four years?
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]80%. The data represent progress and some think the number can hit 90% in 2020. However, critics allege that the data is skewed by states lowering their graduation standards by eliminating core classes like Algebra II from their curriculum and that credit recovery courses are rushing students through without much learning taking place.[/toggle]
3. This NBA franchise came into the public eye last week after its owner made racist remarks.
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]The Los Angeles Clippers. Its owner, Donald Sterling, was recorded in a conversation with his girlfriend making remarks to the effect that he did not want her bringing African Americans to Clipper games. The NBA is reviewing Sterling’s remarks and considering ways to punish him.[/toggle]
4. Name one of the ways that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) wants to regulate e-cigarettes.
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]The FDA is calling for e-cigarette manufacturers to include a warning label on their product that they contain nicotine. It also wants to ban minors (those under the age of 18) from being able to purchase e-cigarettes, which critics allege are a gateway to cigarette smoking.[/toggle]
5. The mayor of this Colombian city was reinstated last week after being ousted a month ago by the country’s inspector-general.
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Bogota. Its mayor, Gustavo Petro, had been removed from office by Colombian inspector-general Alejandro Ordonez due to violating the free market and endangering public health during a trash-collection crisis in 2012. Petro, a former guerilla rebel, claimed this removal was politically motivated.[/toggle]
6. The Supreme Court recently found that 28 states in the Midwest and the South must comply with this federal mandate regarding air pollution?
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]The Supreme Court in a 6-2 decision in the cases of EPA v. EME Homer City Generation and American Lung Association v. EME Homer City Generation that 28 states must comply with a federal rule that mandates these states, whose polluted air blows north and east, slash ozone and fine particle emissions. The states had argued that states should be able to devise their own emissions standards, but Court found that the federal government was best suited to regulate the issue because of the pollution crossing state lines.[/toggle]
7. Why is Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan asking the United States to extradite Fethullah Gulen?
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Erdogan is demand that Gulen, a moderate Islamic spiritual leader that lives in Pennsylvania, be extradited for orchestrating a plot to topple his government. Gulen’s followers have been accused by Erdogan of instigating a corruption probe into his government and leaking information on the Internet.[/toggle]
8. The Syrian opposition has accused Bashar al-Assad’s government of new chemical weapons attacks. What type of gas was allegedly used in these attacks?
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Chlorine gas. Syrian rebels allege that Syrian forces have used chlorine gas weapons against them three times in the last month, which would be a violation of the Syrian government’s agreement with the international community to dismantle and not use its chemical weapons. Thus far, Syria has destroyed 92% of the chemicals that it pledged last year to eliminate.[/toggle]
9. Germany was recently embarrassed when this former chancellor was pictured embracing Russian President Vladimir Putin at a birthday celebration.
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Gerhard Schroeder. Schroeder served as German chancellor from 1998 to 2005 and was a member of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). The emergence of the pictures of Schroeder and Putin seemingly confirm suspicions that Germany does not want to get tough on Russia over the Ukrainian crisis.[/toggle]
10. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has drawn criticism from pro-Israeli lawmakers over recent comments about Israel. What did Kerry say?
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]Secretary Kerry drew bipartisan criticism for his remarks on Monday that warned that Israel could become an “apartheid state” if it does not agree to a peace deal with the Palestinians. Since demographics indicate that the Palestinian population is growing faster than the Israeli one, the lack of a two-state solution could one day result in a Jewish minority governing an Arab-majority state that has very few political, social, and economic rights. Kerry has begun to back off of his remarks, which were made before Holocaust Remembrance Day.[/toggle]