Current Event Quiz 1.2

1A. Mike Perrin was asked if he would become UT's new interim athletics director on Labor Day. He was asked this because the old athletic director, Steve Patterson will be leaving the position soon. People have been unhappy with the way that Patterson has been running the department (and most recently with UT's loss against Notre Dame) and they're happy about Perrin's hire because he himself is a UT alum and played on the football team himself.

2.The CIA director, John Brennan, was on campus yesterday for the release of documents from both the JFK and LBJ presidencies. The release of these documents mark a shift towards a government more open to the public. The documents are accessible through the CIA's website. PBD is short for President's Daily Brief and it is a top secret document given to the president each day that is intended to give the president new information on issues that warrant his attention. It is the type of document that has been released and that the article was written about.

3. Hungarian security forces stopped immigrants at the border and and attacked them with tear gas and water cannons. As a result, immigrants are forced to take routes though Croatia, many of the areas they are walking through are littered with active land mines.

4. The student, a 14-year-old Muslim boy, brought a clock he had built himself to school to show his engineering teacher and it was mistaken for a bomb. School officials took him out of class for questioning before handing him over to the police, saying that it was inappropriate of him to bring something like that to school. Over half a million people, including President Obama, showed their support for him via Twitter, tagging their tweets with #IStandWithAhmed. This incident is suspected to be based on anti-Islamic sentiment, especially since the city council endorsed a bill last spring that would prevent judges from ruling based on "foreign laws", a law that has been deemed "unnecessary and driven by anti-Muslim sentiment." 

5. I first learned about the story on Twitter. I got a notification in math class telling me that #IStandWithAhmed was trending worldwide and I checked it out. I don't think social media is an incredibly reliable source for news because anyone can say whatever they want and I don't think it's very fair either because many times one opinion can overwhelm another. I would have placed the story on the front page because of it's proximity to Austin and the people involved, and also because I think that everyone should know about this because i think it just shows how intolerant the American people are towards other cultures and hopefully it might change some people's minds about Muslim people.