Compiled by Mary Lou Masters
Jordan Stevenson opened the show with some local news concerning a woman in custody for disorderly conduct. She resides at the Piedmont Athens Regional Medical Center after being barred from two local gas stations. According to a police report, the woman was barred from Marathon on Lexington Road around 3:15 a.m. after knocking over trash cans and yelling at customers.
During the incident, the woman made a claim to police that she wanted to be barred. The woman made her way over to the Racetrac on Oconee Street 30 minutes later where she touched all the food on the roller grill and dragged signs around the outside of the gas station.
In other local news, Athens-Clarke County Police Department reports say $900 in Georgia football ticket transactions have been stolen between Oct. 2 and Oct 6. In one case, a woman paid over $400 through CashApp for tickets to the Georgia vs. Auburn game but never received the tickets or a refund.
Police say the seller had agreed to refund the woman on Oct. 5 but stopped replying and never returned the money. Another woman paid over $500 through PayPal for three tickets and also never received the tickets or a refund. Police reports provide no indication that the fraudulent translations are connected.
Laura Lenz reported on how several metro Atlanta school districts are preparing to return to in-person learning this fall, but City Schools of Decatur will be postponing a return to the classroom until January, according to the AJC. The decision to postpone was made after several teachers resigned and students and parents protested the reopening plans.
At a school board meeting on Tuesday, Superintendent David Dude said he revised his reopening plans because of recent public health information, including the risk of airborne transmission and the number of infections. The superintendent’s announcement to postpone reopening was a relief for many community members.
Julie Gutman, a city of Decatur community member, thanked Dr. Dude “for recognizing that the data do not support returning to school.”
The earlier announcement to reopen exposed many concerns that teachers, parents and board members share. Some of these concerns included safely eating lunch in the classroom and plans for teachers and students that are to remain online.
Laura then detailed that airlines took a huge financial hit amid the coronavirus pandemic, and according to NPR, Delta lost $5.4 billion in the third quarter, leading the company to consider furloughing upwards of 17,000 pilots. These losses in addition to $5.7 billion lost in the second quarter amount to $11 billion lost this year.
Delta and other airlines have made efforts to take safety measures to ensure travel is safe, such as deep cleaning protocols and mandatory face masks for passengers and crew, although these safety measures weren’t enough to bounce back from their previous losses and encourage travelers to fly. Following increases in the number of COVID-19 cases, air travel in July, August and September was 70% lower than a year ago, according to NPR. Additionally, business travel is down 85% from last year and may take longer to bounce back with the emergence of video conferencing platforms.
Delta CEO Ed Bastian responded to the losses and stated that it might be longer to return to previous levels of air travel demand.
“We do believe it could still be two years or more until we achieve a normalized revenue environment. Until then, we will be smaller in the short term, but also more agile and more efficient,” Bastian said.
Wood Smith had national news about Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s statement on Tuesday that the Republican-led Senate would vote next week on a targeted $500 billion dollar coronavirus economic aid bill of the type Democrats have already rejected as they hold out for trillions in relief.
With negotiations on a broader package stalled and Election Day approaching, both Republicans and Democrats faced pressure to take action to help Americans weather a pandemic that has killed more than 214,000 people and damaged the US economy.
Both sides say more aid is needed now, but appear to remain far apart. With leaders of the Democratic-run House and Republican Senate still sparring, a bipartisan deal on coronavirus relief remains unlikely before the November third presidential and congressional elections.
President Donald Trump, who called off coronavirus relief talks last week only to restart them days later, pushed lawmakers again on Tuesday to “Go big or go home!!”
In recent days, Pelosi has refused a White House offer for a $1.8 trillion dollar coronavirus aid package even though it moved closer to her $2.2 trillion dollar proposal despite mounting pressure from some members of her own Democratic caucus who would like to see a compromise. Pelosi said she remained hopeful for a deal and appeared to leave the door open to additional talks.
“I don’t think our leverage has ever been greater than it is now,” she said in a conference call with Democrats on Tuesday, according to a source on the call.
Mary Lou Masters reported that in the first two days of early voting, Georgia voters in Metro Atlanta have been showing out in record numbers. According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Fulton County had their “second-busiest early voting day in Fulton history,” garnering about 20,000 early voters.
Long lines caused waits to be “as long as eight hours in Gwinnett and five in Cobb.” Some say this issue is because of high voter turnout while others suggest it could be a result from social distancing guidelines and more.
Due to the coronavirus, the polling stations lack workers to adhere to CDC guidelines. A limited number of voters are allowed inside the voting locations at the same time. Technology glitches have been reported.
Lengthy ballots consist of a few different areas to fill out, including a multitude of offices along with some questions concerning legislation. Those who previously asked for an absentee ballot simultaneously showed up to vote in person, which requires a cancellation of the other ballot. All of these factors resulted in massive delays, causing the previously mentioned eight hour lines.
Sarah Train gave listeners a Bachelorette recap. Last night, America finally got to see what’s in store for the new season of The Bachelorette. Clare Crawley’s season premiered last night on ABC after being postponed in March amid the coronavirus outbreak and finally picked back up again shooting in July.
The premiere was not at its typical location, the bachelor mansion. Instead, all the contestants stayed at the La Quinta Resort & Club in order to quarantine. All the contestants had to get two negative COVID-19 tests in order to be good to go to meet Clare.
There had been rumors on the internet before the premiere about Crawley leaving the show early to be with contestant Dale Moss and last night proved that some of those rumors just might be true. The 32-year-old former football player made quite the impression on Crawley on the first night and she was visibly smitten by him.
Other men seemed to make a good impression as well. It was revealed in the premiere that contestant Blake Moynes was the only guy to actually contact Crawley during quarantine and check up on her. However, Crawley is still keeping quiet about how the show ends, and refuses to address any of the rumors in order not to spoil anything.
Many believe that past contestant Tayshia Adams was brought on to be the new lead. However, ABC and Warner Bros. have yet to confirm this switch-up, although they definitely teased it in last night’s promo.
Jordan Stevenson also had a story concerning the Pope. Whereas the Pope would normally socialize with audiences at the Vatican, he has recently apologized to the faithful for being absent in his weekly visits.
Due to a recent spike in coronavirus cases in Italy, Pope Francis has been hesitant to conversate with the public, shake hands and kiss babies as he would normally. Instead he walks onto a stage by himself to begin his catechism lesson. The Pope is considered high-risk for the coronavirus at age 83 with long standing lung problems dating back to his mid-20s.
He shares with the Wednesday crowd, “I would like to come down as usual and get close to you to greet you, but with new prescriptions, we would better keep our distances.”
According to APNews, Pope Francis speaks in a whisper and seems out of breath and wearing a mask may be uncomfortable in his condition. Italy has seen a substantial resurgence of the virus recently, with the country as a whole recording its biggest jump in cases in one day on Wednesday with 7,332 cases.
Mary Lou Masters also had the latest on the Supreme Court nominee taking Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s vacant seat. Today, Supreme Court Justice nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, will seek the final day of questioning by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
This nomination and confirmation process has been highly contested, given she was nominated by President Donald Trump.
According to the Wall Street Journal, GOP Senators back the nominee while “Democrats instead have used the hearings to amplify their pitch to voters, positioning Judge Barrett as the personification of Mr. Trump’s agenda to strike down the Affordable Care Act and erase the constitutional right to abortion.”
Yesterday, Barrett was questioned by both parties for over 10 hours. Republicans tended to ask her more about her method of interpretation and Democrats asked about her stance on multiple policies, most of which were known for controversial remarks from President Trump.
In explaining her method of interpretation of the Constitution to the Republicans, she coined herself as a mixture of an originalist and textualist. Originalists are those who, when interpreting the Constitution, take the founders’ point of view and what their intent was into consideration. Textualists are those who strictly interpret the Constitution by using its exact language.
Barrett went on to explain that she acquired these methods by working closely with the late Justice Antonin Scalia after graduating from law school. Some topics that the Democrats focused on in their questioning include: abortion, the Affordable Care Act, white supremacy and the second amendment.
Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination and potential upcoming confirmation will be a historically important one. Although leaning to the right for many years, if confirmed the Supreme Court will then be majority Conservative, something that “Republicans have long sought.”
Sarah Detwiler also brought listeners the Sports Power Minute. According to ESPN, The New York Jets announced Tuesday that the team has released running back Le’Veon Bell. This move concluded a bitter 19 month relationship that was filled with disappointment and frustration from both sides.
Bell arrived to the team as a marquee free agent in 2019 and allegedly never clicked with head coach Adam Gase, who opposed his signing from the start. The tipping point in their relationship came Sunday, when Bell was upset with his role in the Jets’ 30-10 loss against the Arizona Cardinals. On Monday he met with Gase and general manager Joe Douglas to explore possible trading options for him.
“The Jets organization appreciates Le’Veon’s efforts during his time here and we know he worked hard to make significant contributions to this team. We believe this decision is in the best interested of both parties and wish him future success,” the team said in a statement.
Shortly after the announcement, Bell shared his thoughts on Twitter posting a tweet with the praying-hands emoji. Since Bell is a vested veteran he is not subject to waivers. Bell will be a free agent as of 4 p.m. ET Wednesday.
According to ESPN, only four days before they are scheduled to play LSU, the Florida Gators have halted all football activities as of Tuesday afternoon due to a coronavirus outbreak. Across Florida’s football program, they have had 19 players, coaches and personnel test positive for the virus over the past few days.
Over the weekend, head coach Dan Mullen said that he wants more fans in the stands, “I know our governor passed that rule, so certainly, hopefully, the UF administration decides to let us pack The Swamp against LSU — 100% — because that crowd was certainly a factor in the game.”
Wood closed out the show with election coverage. President Donald Trump will participate in a town hall with NBC News on Thursday night, setting up a competing television event with Joe Biden in lieu of a presidential debate in which voters would have seen both go head-to-head over the important issues in the 2020 presidential election.
Former Vice-President Joe Biden is set to appear in an ABC Town Hall and both events are scheduled for 8 p.m. EST. The two were originally scheduled to participate in a second presidential debate but the event was eventually canceled after Trump objected to the virtual format announced by the Commission on Presidential Debates in light of his positive coronavirus diagnosis last week.
The NBC Townhall with the Republican Nominee will be moderated by Savannah Guthrie, who will sit 12 feet from the president. Attendees will be required to wear face masks.
Trump is down in all national polls and either behind or tied Biden in key swing states and is in greater need of a national platform in which he can make his case to voters with less than three weeks to go before Election Day.