VOL. 43 | NO. 30 | Friday, July 26, 2019
TENNESSEE TITANS
Even before training camp starts this week, the question of whether Marcus Mariota is the Tennessee Titans’ long-term answer at quarterback has been examined ad nauseam on talk radio, internet blogs and social media.
Last year: Coach Mike Vrabel just missed the playoffs in his debut season despite having enough issues to distract any veteran head coach. The Titans opened with the longest game (in overall time) in NFL history, losing top pass catcher TE Delanie Walker to season-ending injury in the process. Their most-experienced receiver, Rishard Matthews, was released at his demand, and DC Dean Pees was in hospital for the loss in Indianapolis. QB Marcus Mariota also missed three starts, including the season finale with a playoff berth on line.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee left tackle Taylor Lewan plans to appeal his four-game suspension for violating the policy against performance-enhancing drugs, even knowing he'll most likely lose.
TIM GHIANNI: STREET LEVEL
Dark brown eyes and hair showcasing her Italian heritage, the namesake of Rosie’s International Famous Twin Kegs scans her business, where she promises Woodbine’s (and she hopes Nashville’s) best burger-and-beer selection.
RICHARD COURTNEY: REALTY CHECK
There were 4,172 homes sold in June, eclipsing the 4,036 in June 2018, Greater Nashville Realtors sales data shows.
NEWSMAKERS
Attorney Dudley West, formerly with White & Reasor, has joined Miller & Martin’s Nashville office.
BRIEFS
One of Vanderbilt’s iconic brick towers on West End is being imploded Saturday morning at 9 a.m.
BEHIND THE WHEEL
The luxury vehicle of your dreams might now be something you can afford, thanks to a record number of lease returns hitting the used-car market.
PERSONAL FINANCE
As a spokesperson for the insurance industry, Loretta Worters, often gives tips to homeowners on preventing water damage. Some of her knowledge comes from personal experience.
MILLENNIAL MONEY
A typical July includes vacations, travel, shopping, weddings and beaches. Budgets? Not really.
CAREER CORNER
Since the launch of the internet, job searching has becoming increasingly transactional. Job seekers are able to apply to jobs in bulk. In fact, they must apply in bulk if they want to increase their chances of getting hired.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 31
STATE GOVERNMENT
NASHVILLE](AP) — Tennessee officials say they weren't aware that the state's pension fund invested stock in a marijuana industry company, despite the state's opposition to legalizing any usage of marijuana.
AUTO INDUSTRY
DETROIT (AP) — General Motors on Thursday reported an increase of 1% in its second quarter profit as strong sales of higher-priced pickups and SUVs overcame falling global sales.
REGION
ATLANTA (AP) — Atlanta will soon add lessons about the South's racist history on markers placed next to four historic monuments.
HEALTH CARE
Health insurer stocks heated up in July.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. factory activity expanded at a slower rate in July, as measures of production and employment fell.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate Wednesday for the first time in a decade to try to counter the impact of President Donald Trump's trade wars, stubbornly low inflation and global weakness.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump and his Senate GOP allies are relying on lots of Democratic votes to propel a hard-won budget and debt deal to the finish line.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Some of the Democratic presidential contenders dug in their heels with unsupported rhetoric about immigration, the economy and more Wednesday night as they scrambled to stay in contention for the winnowed-down debates to come.
TUESDAY, JULY 30
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Nearly half the House Democrats now support an impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A hard-won, warts-and-all budget pact between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Donald Trump is facing a key vote in the GOP-held Senate, with many conservatives torn between supporting the president and risking their political brand with an unpopular vote to add $2 trillion or more to the government's credit card.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
Stocks fell and bond yields rose on Wall Street Wednesday after the Federal Reserve lowered its key interest rate for the first time in a decade but left investors feeling uncertain about the likelihood of further cuts.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate Wednesday for the first time in a decade to try to counter threats ranging from uncertainties caused by President Donald Trump's trade wars to chronically low inflation and a dim global outlook.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration said Wednesday it will set up a system to allow Americans to legally import lower-cost prescription drugs from Canada, weakening a longstanding ban that had stood as a top priority for the politically powerful pharmaceutical industry.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The annual wages and benefits for U.S. workers rose in the second quarter at a slightly slower pace than the first, suggesting that the lowest unemployment levels in a half century have not triggering rapid gains in worker compensation.
SHANGHAI (AP) — U.S. and Chinese envoys met Wednesday for talks aimed at ending a tariff war after President Donald Trump rattled financial markets by accusing Beijing of trying to stall in hopes he will fail to win re-election in 2020.
MONDAY, JULY 29
REGION
ATLANTA (AP) — Thousands of petitioners are hoping to stop the demolition of a downtown Atlanta building where the first country hit song is believed to have been recorded.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee is providing access to federal grant programs to help communities and volunteer fire departments become better equipped for wildfires.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — More Americans signed contracts to purchase homes in June, marking the second straight month of growth.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
U.S. stocks were on track for modest losses Tuesday afternoon as a mixed batch of corporate earnings weighed on the market, nudging it farther from its recent record highs for the second straight day.
WASHINGTON (AP) — American consumer confidence rebounded this month to the highest level since November after drooping in June.
SEATTLE (AP) — A security breach at Capital One Financial, one of the nation's largest issuers of credit cards, compromised the personal information of about 106 million people, and in some cases the hacker obtained Social Security and bank account numbers.
NEW YORK (AP) — One of the country's biggest credit card issuers, Capital One Financial, is the latest big business to be hit by a data breach, disclosing that roughly 100 million people had some personal information stolen by a hacker.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Consumer spending rose a healthy 0.3% in June, slightly below the strong gains of the past three months, while incomes turned in a solid 0.4% gain for the fourth straight month.
LONDON (AP) — European stock markets were down sharply Tuesday after U.S. President Donald Trump published a series of tweets that cast doubt on any hopes of an imminent easing in trade tensions between the U.S. and China. Apple earnings later could help change the sentiment.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — If President Donald Trump putting race at the forefront of his re-election campaign rings familiar, that's because another White House hopeful did the same half a century ago — and saw the strategy resonate with many Americans.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A conservative lawyer and writer who argues for selling off the nation's public lands is now in charge of a nearly quarter-billion acres in federally held rangeland and other wilderness.
FRIDAY, JULY 26
REAL ESTATE
NEW YORK (AP) — Weaker home sales trends are expected to contribute to a sharp slowing in the home remodeling market.
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — A prosecutor who has come under fire for making anti-gay and anti-Islam remarks now faces calls to have his law license immediately suspended.
PERSONAL FINANCE
Money is about more than numbers: emotions are often at play too. Just as you can seek professional help for unhealthy issues in life, financial therapists can help you deal with problems related to money.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee officials are halting a 30-year-old fee on grain producers because a fund has hit its $10 million minimum balance.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Treasury Department said Monday it expects to borrow $433 billion in the current July-September quarter. That would be the largest quarterly borrowing total since early 2018, as the government replenishes its cash reserves following the expected resolution over raising the debt limit.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. business economists expect economic growth to slow this year, and a rising proportion of them think corporate sales and profits will decline.
PARIS (AP) — France is pushing ahead with a landmark tax on tech companies like Google and Facebook despite U.S. President Donald Trump's threats of retaliatory tariffs on French wine.
BEIJING (AP) — Two months after U.S.-Chinese talks aimed at ending a tariff war broke down, both sides are trying to temper hopes for a breakthrough when negotiations resume Tuesday on an array of disputes that has grown to include tension over China's tech giant Huawei.
TECHNOLOGY
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is promising to retaliate against France for adopting a pioneering tax on internet giants like Google, Amazon and Facebook.
SEATTLE (AP) — Rachel Whalen remembers feeling gutted in high school when a former friend would mock her online postings, threaten to unfollow or unfriend her on social media and post inside jokes about her to others online.
COURTS
RIDGETOP, Tenn. (AP) — A Tennessee city is accused of violating the civil rights of its police department when it abruptly disbanded the agency last month.
NASHVILLE (AP) — A Tennessee death row inmate has declined to choose the method of his execution scheduled for mid-August. Making no choice would result in death by lethal injection.
STATEWIDE
MEMPHIS (AP) — The National Civil Rights Museum says this year's Freedom Award recipients are musician John Legend, feminist writer Gloria Steinem and human rights activist Hafsat Nabiola.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks pushed to record heights Friday following strong profit reports from Google's parent company, Twitter and other big corporations.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is pressuring the World Trade Organization to stop letting China and other economies receive lenient treatment under global trade rules by calling themselves "developing" countries.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — President Donald Trump is vowing to slap tariffs on Apple's Mac Pros if the company shifts production of the computer from Texas to China.
NEW YORK (AP) — McDonald's newly modernized stores and growth in delivery helped the world's largest hamburger chain serve up the biggest increase in global sales at established locations during the second quarter in seven years.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. regulators have approved T-Mobile's $26.5 billion takeover of rival Sprint, despite fears of higher prices and job cuts, in a settlement that would create three giant U.S. cellphone companies.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The government says the U.S. economy grew more slowly in 2018 than it previously estimated, downgrading its estimate from 3% to 2.5%. President Donald Trump had frequently boasted of the 3% growth figure as evidence that his policies invigorated the economy.
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese internet company SoftBank Group Corp. has set up a new fund for investing in technologies such as artificial intelligence.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Twitter is reporting surprisingly strong user numbers and revenue even as it eliminates robotic and fake accounts on its platform.
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — The European Central Bank says it and 21 national central banks in Europe are letting a formal agreement regulating gold sales expire, saying the deal that once sought to stabilize the market for the precious metal is no longer needed.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump announced Friday that Guatemala is signing an agreement to restrict asylum applications to the U.S. from Central America.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Elizabeth Warren became a household name thanks to her prescient warning of what became a global financial crisis. Now she's staking her credentials on another forecast of fiscal trauma ahead.
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she's not "running out the clock" on impeachment as lawmakers start a six-week summer recess without having delivered on a top liberal priority.
DETROIT (AP) — When Barack Obama was on the ballot in 2008 and 2012, there was no question that Terrance Holmes would vote for the first black president. But as he helped fix cars this week at a repair shop on Detroit's west side, he recalled his ambivalence about the 2016 campaign.
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is downplaying any differences with high-profile progressive lawmaker Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Pelosi says she had a "nice meeting" Friday with the social media dynamo who's made some tart observations about the Democratic leadership team.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The House Judiciary Committee is expected to file a lawsuit Friday seeking secret grand jury material underlying former special counsel Robert Mueller's report.
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — A prosecutor scrutinized for anti-Islam and anti-gay remarks says outgoing Tennessee House Speaker Glen Casada's office didn't doctor a black activist's email to frame him for a bond violation.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department said Thursday that it will carry out executions of federal death row inmates for the first time since 2003.
AUTO INDUSTRY
TOKYO (AP) — Nissan is slashing 12,500 jobs or about 9% of its global workforce to cut costs and achieve a turnaround amid tumbling profits, the Japanese automaker said Thursday.
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Volkswagen said Thursday that its after-tax profit rose 24% in the second quarter as the company managed to increase its share in contracting markets, and as more-profitable vehicles such as SUVs and pricey Porsche luxury cars took a bigger role in the sales mix.
DETROIT (AP) — Four major automakers have reached a deal with California to increase gas mileage and greenhouse gas emissions standards, bypassing the Trump administration's plan to freeze standards at 2021 levels.
TRANSPORTATION
FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — American Airlines said Thursday that the long grounding of Boeing 737 Max jets will cut its pretax earnings for 2019 by about $400 million, including $175 million in the second quarter.
DALLAS (AP) — Southwest Airlines doesn't expect to use Boeing 737 Max jets until January, and it is talking to Boeing about compensation for the grounding, which the airline says cost it $175 million in the second quarter.
TECHNOLOGY
If you're one of Facebook's more than 2 billion users, are you any better off now than you were before the Federal Trade Commission imposed new privacy restrictions and a $5 billion fine on the company this week?
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Apple is paying Intel $1 billion for the chip maker's smartphone modem division in a deal driven by the upcoming transition to the next generation of wireless technology.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. long-term mortgage rates fell this week, edging toward three-year lows amid signals from Federal Reserve officials that they could cut their benchmark interest rate at their meeting next week.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — A prescription drug compromise that would lower costs for Medicare recipients and save billions for Medicare and Medicaid cleared a key hurdle in the Senate on Thursday, but Republican resistance signaled trouble as the legislation faces floor consideration.
Patients are about to be enrolled in the first study to test a gene-editing technique known as CRISPR inside the body to try to cure an inherited form of blindness.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks retreated from record highs on Wall Street Thursday as large companies delivered weak earnings and disappointing forecasts.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Orders to U.S. factories for large manufactured goods rose last month after sharp declines the previous two months, propelled by demand for commercial aircraft and cars. A category that tracks business investment had its biggest increase in four months.
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — The European Central Bank joined the U.S Federal Reserve in making clear that more stimulus could be coming soon to support an economy weakening in the face of global trade tensions.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — A hard-won, bipartisan budget and debt compromise between President Donald Trump and Speaker Nancy Pelosi has easily passed the Democratic-controlled House.
MEMPHIS (AP) — U.S. House members have passed a bill expanding horse soring regulations at Tennessee Walking Horse shows.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former special counsel Robert Mueller's warning that Russian interference is still happening "as we sit" is putting pressure on Republican leaders in Congress to join Democrats in passing additional election security legislation.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The House Oversight Committee has voted along party lines to authorize subpoenas for personal emails and texts used by White House officials, including Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner.
WASHINGTON (AP) — After months of anticipation, Congress finally heard testimony from former special counsel Robert Mueller. So what now?
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is encouraging Republican lawmakers to back a sweeping bipartisan budget deal his administration struck with Democrats.
Major U.S. stock indexes closed mostly lower Monday as investors turned cautious ahead of a key Federal Reserve interest policy announcement and other potentially market-moving developments on tap for this week.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. companies added a healthy 156,000 jobs in July with larger firms accounted for much of the gains, a private survey found.