While you wait for Jeb Bush's big announcement on Monday, take our latest Week to Week news quiz and study up on the issues.
Here are some random but real hints: That's not even legal in San Francisco anymore; finish the work we began; he got a cold reception; and he was always more Hammer than Corman. Answers are below the quiz.
1. Why is the head of the NAACP chapter in Spokane, Washington, under fire?
a. She wrote an editorial for National Review Online defending the Texas officer who drew a gun at a pool party
b. She tried to close a budget deficit by merging with the conservative Discovery Institute
c. Her parents say she is white and is only pretending to be African-American
d. She has signed on as a domestic policy advisor to GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry
2. Why did Malaysia jail, fine, and then deport four Westerners?
a. They were heard insulting Islam
b. For public indecency when they stripped naked on a mountain considered sacred
c. They staged an anti-government rally without a permit
d. They had caused an earthquake
3. What is China's former security chief Zhou Yongkang planning to do next?
a. Go to prison; he's the highest-ranking Chinese official to be convicted of corruption
b. He is slated to become communist party chairman and state president at the 2019 party congress
c. According to leaked documents, he is going to head up China's military computer hacking operation
d. He is the new head of the Chinese National Red Cross Committee
4. On Tuesday, why were the White House Press Room and part of a Senate office building emptied of people?
a. Senator Rand Paul held an open viewing of live-streamed video of Dennis Hastert's arraignment
b. A bipartisan Taco Tuesday event, the first of what Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pledges will be a "weekly mending of fences"
c. Bomb threats
d. Anthrax scare
5. Where is President Obama sending 450 military trainers to "train and advise" local troops?
a. Syria
b. Iraq
c. Israel
d. Russia
6. What consoling advice did televangelist Pat Robertson have for someone whose three-year-old toddler died?
a. "What a horrible, terrible, life-shaking event that must have been for the parents"
b. "[T]hat little baby could grow up to be Adolf Hitler, he could grow up to be Joseph Stalin"
c. "I didn't do it"
d. "He's better off than living in this fallen world"
7. How is a North Carolina Republican businessman spending $175 million?
a. Trying to ban all abortions in his state
b. Funding a campaign to reunite North and South Carolina
c. Pushing his party to deal with climate change
d. Opposing Senator Rand Paul's presidential bid
8. To what did former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert plead not guilty on Tuesday?
a. Abuse of power while in office
b. Sexual abuse of students he was coaching
c. Lying to the FBI about bank withdrawals
d. Influence peddling as a lobbyist after leaving office
9. What did Bill Clinton say he'll do if his wife becomes president?
a. Stop giving paid speeches
b. Be secretary of state
c. Become UN secretary general
d. Be nominated to the Supreme Court
10. Actor Christopher Lee passed away at the age of 93 this week. Which one of the following movies did not feature Lee?
a. Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
b. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
c. Howling II: Your Sister Is a Werewolf
d. The Masque of the Red Death
BONUS. Why is Figo a hero?
a. According to a 60 Minutes profile, she teaches Pakistani grade school-age girls in secret, despite Taliban control of her province
b. He's not; he's the anti-hero of the new movie starring The Rock, called Tarry Me Not
c. She is a Dubai billionaire who has invested $2 billion in ventures, including The Huffington Post, to further independent political reporting
d. He is a service dog who put himself in front of a school bus to protect his blind owner, and then he stayed by her side until emergency crews helped them
ANSWERS
1) c.
2) b.
3) a.
4) c.
5) b.
6) b.
7) c.
8) c.
9) a.
10) d (Masque starred fellow actor Vincent Price).
BONUS) d.
WANT THE LIVE NEWS QUIZ EXPERIENCE? Join us Monday, June 29 in downtown San Francisco for our next live Week to Week political roundtable with a news quiz and a social hour at The Commonwealth Club of California. Panelists include Joe Garofoli and Debra J. Saunders.
EXPLANATIONS OF THE HINTS: That's not even legal in San Francisco anymore: public nudity gets you in trouble in famously libertine San Francisco, so it's no surprise that it doesn't fly in famously not-libertine Malaysia; finish the work we began: they'll provide training to Iraqi forces we've trained and/or fought against in the past; he got a cold reception: he's got an interesting challenge pushing climate change concerns in the GOP; and he was always more Hammer than Corman: Masque was part of horror filmmaker Roger Corman's oeuvre, but Christopher Lee was a fixture of British competitor Hammer Films' productions.