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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. How long will New York City’s rent freeze last?
[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”]One year. The New York City Rent Guidelines Board voted 7-2 on Monday to freeze the rents of tenants that are signing new leases or are renewing their leases on October 1. This is the first rent freeze in forty-six years and partly fulfills a campaign pledge made by Mayor Bill de Blasio in 2013. Owners argue that the freeze will stifle much needed investment in the city’s housing infrastructure and say that it is politically, rather than economically, driven.[/toggle]
2. This state is suing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over its Clean Water Act rule.
[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”]Texas. It is being joined by Louisiana and Mississippi, which argue that the EPA’s ruling last month to expand the Clean Water Act to tributaries and wetlands violates state jurisdiction. Thirteen other states are also suing the EPA in a separate case.[/toggle]
3. How many radical imams and preachers has France expelled since 2012?
[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 French government says that it has expelled forty radical imams and preachers since 2012. The government announced the data when speaking to reporters following Yassin Salhi’s alleged beheading of a transportation company manager last week. This year, France has expelled ten radical imams as part of its crackdown on radical Islamism, an issue that has polarized French society and strengthened the far right National Front (FN).[/toggle]
4. Human rights groups have denounced a U.S. decision to restore military aid to this country.
[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”]Bahrain. The Obama administration elected to restore military aid to the country for the first time since 2011, when the U.S. withdrew security assistance after a crackdown on anti-government protesters. The U.S. says that Bahrain has made “meaningful progress” on human rights, but human rights groups such as Human Rights First have condemned the decision and say that it will free Bahrain from having to implement future reforms.[/toggle]
5. How many years has it taken the world’s Jewish population to return to pre-Holocaust levels?
[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”]Seventy years. A recent report by the Jerusalem-based Jewish People Policy Institute found that there are 16.5 million Jews living in the world today, equaling the number that existed at the end of the Second World War. The report says that most of this growth is natural, with most demographic growth taking place in Israel.[/toggle]
6. What are capital controls?
[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”]Capital controls are measures that governments take to ensure that money from their respective markets do not exit the country. Capital controls often involve taxes on financial transactions, limitations on cash withdrawals, or prohibitions on the ability of private citizens to take money out of a country. Governments enact capital controls in order to prevent significant flights of capital and to reduce market volatility.[/toggle]
7. Why did NBC recently fire Donald Trump?
[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”]NBCUniversal ended its business relationship with Trump after he made remarks that Mexican immigrants were bringing drugs and crime to the United States. Trump has stood by his remarks and says that NBC is being intolerant of dissenting opinions, noting that the network has stood by reporter Brian Williams, who was found to be fabricating parts of his reports this past February.[/toggle]
8. Last Friday saw three terror attacks on three continents. Name them.
[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 first incident was an attack Friday at a Tunisian beach resort where an estimated thirty Britons were killed. The second took place last Friday morning in Lyon, France where a lone Islamist decipitated the manager of a transportation company. And the third took place in Kuwait, where the al-Sadiq mosque was attacked and twenty-seven people were killed.[/toggle]
9. Greek banks will be closed for this many days following the country’s inability to reach a deal with the Troika.
[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”]Six days. The Greek government has refused conditions for austerity set forth by the Troika (the European Union, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund) and has closed banks for nearly a week as part of a way to step a flow of capital from the nation’s financial institutions. The Greek government is scheduling a public referendum on austerity measures, which is due to take place on June 5.[/toggle]
10. How did the Supreme Court rule in Glossip v. Gross?
[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 court ruled 5-4 that Oklahoma can continue to use the drug midazolam in its three-drug cocktail for lethal injections. The case stemmed from the botched execution of Clayton Lockett, who took forty-three minutes to die, last year. The majority opinion, authored by Justice Samuel Alito, said that inmates failed to identify an alternative drug.[/toggle]