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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 the current basic retirement age for Social Security?
[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”]65 (for those born prior to 1938) or 67 (for those born in 1960 or later). One of the issues of the 2016 presidential election might be over whether the Social Security retirement age should be increased. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton does not back an increase, but former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, who is expected to run, has publicly backed raising the retirement age to 68 or 70.[/toggle]
2. What revision was recently made to U.S. first quarter GDP numbers?
[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”]First quarter GDP growth was revised downward from +0.2% to -0.7%. The contraction in business activity was attributed to a harsh winter, as well as the growing strength of the U.S. dollar. The number is likely to give the Federal Reserve pause as it decides whether to raise interest rates this month.[/toggle]
3. Why was former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert indicted by federal authorities last week?
[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”]Hastert, the Republican Speaker of the House from 1999 to 2007, is under indictment for lying to officials from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) about why he was withdrawing large sums of money from his bank accounts. News reports indictate that Hastert withdrew $3.5 million to cover up allegations of sexual abuse during his time as a teacher and wrestling coach in Illinois.[/toggle]
4. California’s state legislature is moving to make this chance to the smoking age.
[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”]California’s State Senate recently voted to raise the state’s smoking age from eighteen to twenty-one. The bill had bipartisan support, but it still needs to clear the state Assembly and be signed by Governor Jerry Brown.[/toggle]
5. What change does the USA Freedom Act make to the National Security Agency’s (NSA) practice of collecting phone calls?
[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 USA Freedom Act abolishes the NSA’s existing surveillance program and instead sets up a mandate that private telephone companies store data that can be accessed by a court order.[/toggle]
6. How long as Omar al-Bashir governed Sudan?
[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”]al-Bashir has governed Sudan for the last twenty-five years, having assumed office in June 1989. al-Bashir took power in a military coup during the Sudanese Civil War and he has been re-elected president since that time, with his most recent victory coming in April where he easily won after opposition parties boycotted the election. He became the first sitting head of state to be indicted by the ICC in July 2010 for crimes committed by the Sudanese government against the peoples of the Darfur region.[/toggle]
7. Former British politician Charles Kennedy passed away on June 1. What role did he play in the British political system?
[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”]Kennedy was the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party from 1999 to 2006. He constituted a thorn in the side of the Labour government of Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2003 when he led the Liberal Democrats to oppose the Iraq War. Although Kennedy lost his leadership after his admission of a drinking problem, he engineered Liberal Democratic gains in the House of Commons that would later help the party join a coalition government with the Conservative Party in 2010.[/toggle]
8. Why is Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi blaming members of the anti-ISIS coalition for the setbacks that Iraqi forces have faced against the group?
[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”]al-Abadi argues that nations that oppose ISIS are not doing enough to prevent their citizens from joining the group. He also argues that Iraqi forces are not being provided with sufficient arms or ammunition such as anti-tank guns that are needed to wage war more effectively. Twenty nations recently met in Paris to talk about squelching the ISIS threat and al-Abadi reiterated how he is trying to take steps to reduce sectarian tensions in Iraq, but said characterizations of Iraq’s military forces as inherently weak are incorrect.[/toggle]
9. The President of FIFA announced his resignation on Tuesday. Who is this individual?
[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”]Sepp Blatter. Blatter is a Swiss football administrator that has been the President of FIFA since June 1998. Blatter’s resignation was somewhat surprising since he was just elected to another term last week. U.S. legal investigations into corruption within FIFA likely played a role in Blatter’s decision to resign.[/toggle]
10. Name everyone who has officially declared that they are running for president in 2016.
[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”]On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, and former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley are running. On the Republican side, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, former neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, former New York Governor George Pataki, and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham are running for the nomination.[/toggle]