[fblike]
Here is today’s Christmas edition of the Extemp Central news quiz. Good luck and have a great day!
1. This U.S. retail outlet is dealing with state prosecutors and a torrent of lawsuits after a cyber attack stole data from 40 million credit and debit cards of shoppers that visited its stores during the holidays.
[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”]Target. Lawmakers like New York Senator Charles Schumer, the third highest ranking Democrat in the Senate, have called for the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to look into the incident.[/toggle]
2. After a judicial ruling, which U.S. state became the latest to legalize gay marriage?
[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”]Utah. A district court judge on Friday ruled that the state’s constitutional ban on gay marriage violated the Fourteenth Amendment. The ban was approved by more than two-thirds of voters in 2004.[/toggle]
3. The U.S. provoked a diplomatic row with India last week over what incident?
[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”]India’s former deputy consul general in New York Devyani Khobragade was arrested on charges of visa fraud and underpaying her nanny. Her arrest included a strip search, which India argues is an affront to her dignity and a national outrage. India revoked privileges for U.S. diplomats in retaliation.[/toggle]
4. Who was Time Magazine’s Person of the Year for 2013?
[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”]Pope Francis was given Time’s annual Person of the Year award. Pope Francis took over for Pope Benedict XVI in March 2013 and currently enjoys an 88% approval rating among American Catholics.[/toggle]
5. India’s Supreme Court recently re-criminalized this practice, which drew angry reactions from parts of the international community and Sonia Gandhi, the president of the ruling Congress Party.
[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”]India’s Supreme Court re-criminalized homosexuality, reversing a 2009 ruling that legalized the behavior between consenting adults.[/toggle]
6. What percentage of the Middle East population are Christian?
[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”]Currently, 5% of the Middle East population is Christian, which is a dramatic decline from 20% a century ago. The decline is related to the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the region, political Islam’s modifications of Arab identity, and the end of Western imperialism in the region.[/toggle]
7. Name at least two of the prominent people/groups that were recently released from Russian prisons in a general amnesty. Experts argue that the amnesty was prompted by the upcoming Sochi Olympics.
[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”]There are multiple answers to this question, but the three most prominent releases were: Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former oil tycoon, Pussy Riot, a music group jailed for singing an anti-Putin song in a prominent Russian cathedral, and members of the Greenpeace International ship Arctic Sunrise, which had its members jailed on charges of piracy.[/toggle]
8. This American credit card company’s subsidiaries recently forced to refund more than 300,000 customers after it was found by fedral regulators to have engaged in illegal credit card practices related to add-ons like credit monitoring and payment protection plans.
[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”]American Express. It is expected that American Express through its subsidiaries will pay $59.5 million to more than 335,000 customers.[/toggle]
9. The world’s newest nation is facing an outbreak of violence. What is this nation and why has this violence erupted?
[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”]South Sudan, which became independent in 2011. Violence broke out when rebel forces loyal to former Vice President Riek Machar, who was fired by President Salva Kiir in July, attacked the presidential palace last week. Machar demands that Kiir resign and the United Nations and United States are preparing to send more peacekeeping troops to the area. It is estimated that at least 500 people have died so far and 100,000 have been displaced by the violence.[/toggle]
10. Name the five nations that possess the world’s largest oil reserves.
[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”](Listed in order): Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, Canada, Iran, and Iraq. It is estimated that Venezuela has thirty million more barrels of oil in its reserves than Saudi Arabia.[/toggle]