2018 Current Events Study Guide

[dhkendall]

Morgan Tsvangirai, best known as a key opposition to former Zimbabwe leader (and 2017 Current Events Study Guide alumnus) Robert Mugabe, has died, sadly only a few months after Mugabe's resignation.

(Doubt J! would ever ask for Morgan's last name, definitely not how to spell it, but his opposition to Mugabe or the country he's associated with could come up.)

[Cat Hammarskjold]

Morgan Tsvangirai, best known as a key opposition to former Zimbabwe leader (and 2017 Current Events Study Guide alumnus) Robert Mugabe, has died, sadly only a few months after Mugabe's resignation.

(Doubt J! would ever ask for Morgan's last name, definitely not how to spell it, but his opposition to Mugabe or the country he's associated with could come up.)

He has infamously come up in NAQT.

[ouachiouat]

More Olympics that I don't think have been posted yet:

Spoiler

Shaun White wins the gold medal in half-pipe, bringing the total number of gold medals the US has won in Winter Olympic history to 100. His old nickname might come up if they ask who got the 100th gold--The Flying Tomato. I doubt other athletes winning gold will show up unless they have the staying power White has had (think Chloe Kim in 8-12 years).

[Volante]

https://earther.com/tongas-parliament-b ... 1823034782

The small island nation of Tonga’s parliament is supposed to come into session on March 1, but lawmakers are frantically scrambling to find a new home after the century-old parliament building was reduce to rubble earlier this week. Cyclone Gita roared ashore with 145-mph winds and made a direct hit on Nukuʻalofa, the island’s capital on Monday night local time.

[Volante]

Men's Figure Skating...

Spoiler

https://deadspin.com/the-youngest-ameri ... 1823057140

Seventeen-year-old Vincent Zhou, the youngest American competing in any event at these Winter Olympics, pulled off a move tonight that no one at the Games had ever landed cleanly before: the quad lutz. It’s the most difficult move currently recognized as achievable...

I could see LL asking for both the triple axel from earlier and this quad lutz in a single question. J! wouldn't be that cruel.

[Volante]

Bah, they'll ask about it. You know it, I know it, no sense delaying the inevitable...

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-peop ... SKCN1FZ33B

Jennifer Aniston and husband Justin Theroux announced their separation on Thursday after less than three years of marriage

[Cat Hammarskjold]

Austin Dillon wins the Daytona 500. He is the grandson of Richard Childress, owner of Richard Childress Racing, whose team Dale Earnhardt raced for.
Runner-up Darrell Wallace, Jr. is the first African-American to finish the Daytona 500 on the lead lap.

[Volante]

Swear I posted this, but after seeing MarkBarrett's anthem commentary and some searching, apparently neither I, nor anyone else, tackled it.

https://globalnews.ca/news/4011970/o-ca ... r-neutral/

The new, gender-neutral lyrics to "O Canada" are official.
...
The new wording changes the second line of the anthem’s English version to “in all of us command” from “in all thy sons command.”

[Johnblue]

Let's hope Fergie doesn't butcher that anthem.

[dhkendall]

Swear I posted this, but after seeing MarkBarrett's anthem commentary and some searching, apparently neither I, nor anyone else, tackled it.

https://globalnews.ca/news/4011970/o-ca ... r-neutral/

The new, gender-neutral lyrics to "O Canada" are official.
...
The new wording changes the second line of the anthem’s English version to “in all of us command” from “in all thy sons command.”

*You're* surprised no one tackled it??? How you think I felt when I realized *I* didn't?

[twelvefootboy]

Swear I posted this, but after seeing MarkBarrett's anthem commentary and some searching, apparently neither I, nor anyone else, tackled it.

https://globalnews.ca/news/4011970/o-ca ... r-neutral/

The new, gender-neutral lyrics to "O Canada" are official.
...
The new wording changes the second line of the anthem’s English version to “in all of us command” from “in all thy sons command.”

*You're* surprised no one tackled it??? How you think I felt when I realized *I* didn't?

I beseech all our Northern friends: Please, please, don't get tired of PC crap. In most cases, politically correct is simply, correct. Yes, the pendulum does overswing sometimes.

Down here, the lyric would have been changed to the phallic symbolic alternative of "in all our guns in hand".

We already have pundits blaming the Florida massacre on transgender equality and gay marriage.
End of political sadness. Dilly Dilly.

[MinnesotaMyron]

Jamaica sent its first women's bobsled team to the Winter Olympics this year. When the team's coach, Sandra Kiriasis, quit and threatened to take the team's bobsled with her, which brand of beer offered on Twitter to pay for a new sleigh?

Spoiler

Red Stripe

http://www.adweek.com/creativity/red-st ... olympians/

[9021amyers]

Jamaica sent its first bobsled team to the Winter Olympics this year. When the team's coach, Sandra Kiriasis, quit and threatened to take the team's bobsled with her, which brand of beer offered on Twitter to pay for a new sleigh?

Spoiler

Red Stripe

http://www.adweek.com/creativity/red-st ... olympians/

Olympic figure skating: defending champion Yuzuru Hanyu wins the gold medal in men’s singles, becoming the first male skater to win back-to-back golds since Dick Button in 1952.

[dhkendall]

Swear I posted this, but after seeing MarkBarrett's anthem commentary and some searching, apparently neither I, nor anyone else, tackled it.

https://globalnews.ca/news/4011970/o-ca ... r-neutral/

The new, gender-neutral lyrics to "O Canada" are official.
...
The new wording changes the second line of the anthem’s English version to “in all of us command” from “in all thy sons command.”

*You're* surprised no one tackled it??? How you think I felt when I realized *I* didn't?

I beseech all our Northern friends: Please, please, don't get tired of PC crap.

Well, as a Canadian and an anthematologist for over 25 years, you can guess I have thoughts on it.

As a Canadian, and a liberal Canadian, I applaud the move. However, speaking as someone who has studied anthems for many many years now, I actually have different thoughts. You can hear me give them when I was interviewed on the CBC back in 2010 when the Harper government first talked about changing the anthem, but the tl;dl version is that, while it's nice, the anthem isn't the government's to change, it's the people's. That's who it belongs to. If there was a big movement to change it to be gender inclusive, like there was in Austria, it should be changed. But in Canada, a small group of people really want it changed, a small group of people really want to keep it the same, and most people don't really care and will probably sing the old words any for many years to come out of stubbornness, forgetfulness, or laziness. I wish there was a larger group of people saying the anthem should be changed, so that the change can get more credence behind it, but there isn't.

[9021amyers]

Over 600 KFC restaurants in the U.K. and Ireland are closed because, due to complications related to a supplier change, the chain has run out of chicken.

[Blue Lion]

Black Panther, the latest film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise, took in more than $200 million in North America this past weekend--a record for a February release and for a film directed by an African American (Ryan Coogler). Coogler is the first African-American director of an MCU film. Earlier, he directed Creed, in which Michael B. Jordan (who plays N'Jadaka/Erik "Killmonger" Stevens in Black Panther) starred as Apollo Creed's son Adonis Johnson.

Speaking of African-American directors, Ava DuVernay's A Wrinkle in Time will be released March 9. The book version has come up in Jeopardy.

Also in pop culture, the Winter Olympics have focused attention on K-Pop, the highly-choreographed popular music from South Korea.

[Cat Hammarskjold]

As for music repopularized by the 2018 Winter Olympics, how about the music of Of A Revolution, also known as O.A.R.? Some of their songs have regained popularity.

[9021amyers]

As for music repopularized by the 2018 Winter Olympics, how about the music of Of A Revolution, also known as O.A.R.? Some of their songs have regained popularity.

From a text chain with my sister last week:

EBB9E7B7-5FEB-4A59-84FB-8F10D5B127B6.jpeg (243.19 KiB) Viewed 5672 times

[badgerfellow]

Louisville becomes the first NCAA Division I men's basketball team to vacate a national title after the NCAA denies Louisville's appeal over the ruling in the escort scandal. Along with the 2013 National Title, Louisville will also be required to vacate a 2012 Final Four run, 138 wins (regular season and post season combined), and millions of dollars in revenue.

http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basket ... onal-title

This all precedes anything from the FBI investigation that caused Rick Pitino and AD Tom Jurich to be fired.

[Peachbox]

Jamaica sent its first bobsled team to the Winter Olympics this year. When the team's coach, Sandra Kiriasis, quit and threatened to take the team's bobsled with her, which brand of beer offered on Twitter to pay for a new sleigh?

Spoiler

Red Stripe

It was Jamaica's first women's bobsled team (the men's team debuted in 1988). Also participating its first Winter Olympics ever is Nigeria, which qualified athletes in women's bobsled and women's skeleton.