June 4: National Cheese Day

Nixon vetoes 'Sharia Law' bill, saying it would endanger foreign adoptions

ST. LOUIS • Gov. Jay Nixon vetoed on Monday an anti-“Sharia Law” bill, saying that in its zeal to address an imaginary problem, the legislation creates a real one for parents seeking foreign adoptions.

The bill would make it illegal for Missouri to enforce any foreign law or legal decision deemed “repugnant or inconsistent” with Missouri or U.S. law. It doesn’t specify Islamist Sharia religious law, but it’s part of a movement by conservative lawmakers in more than 20 states who have pushed similar measures to highlight alleged Sharia influences in the U.S.

“There are certainly problems facing our state and nation, but this isn’t one of them,” said Nixon, speaking to families at Lutheran Family and Children’s Services, a major adoption proponent. The bill, he said, could muck up the works for families attempting to adopt through foreign governments: “The laws passed in Jefferson City have real consequences. This bill could jeopardize a family’s ability to adopt children from other countries.”

The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Brian Nieves, R-Washington, scoffed at that explanation for the veto, saying there was nothing in the bill that would have endangered foreign adoptions.

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/political-fix/nixon-vetoes-sharia-law-bill-saying-it-would-endanger-foreign/article_e44c0b8c-2ed3-50fa-ac46-d503232271da.html

Bass Pro Billionaire Building Megastores With Taxpayers Money

The Bass Pro Shops store in Rancho Cucamonga, California, is little more than an hour’s drive from Santa Monica, a West Coast enclave known for its anti-gun rallies and vegetarian cafes.

It might as well be on another planet. In this 180,000-square-foot, cathedral-like structure, shoppers can buy a Remington Varmint Rifle -- $569.99 with a $50 rebate -- grab a National Rifle Association flier by the door vilifying the state’s Senator Dianne Feinstein for her effort to ban assault weapons, or order a 12-ounce New York strip steak from the adjoining restaurant.

The architect of this shooter’s paradise is John “Johnny” Morris, a media-shy Missourian who became a billionaire stitching together shopping outlets for multiple outdoor sports and adding a touch of entertainment to the mix, often using local taxpayer funds to expand his empire.

“It had been a very fragmented market, with a lot of independent retail shops catering to firearms, hunting and fishing,” said Sean Naughton, a vice president and senior research analyst who covers the consumer sector for Minneapolis -based Piper Jaffray Cos. “All these categories that consumers like to do, but there wasn’t a national chain.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-03/bass-pro-billionaire-building-megastores-with-taxpayers.html?cmpid=yhoo

June 3: National Egg Day

St. Louis, MO Raw Video: Winds Rip Apart Industrial Park

EARTH CITY, MO (KTVI) – Here is surveillance video inside CI Select when the storm hit Earth City Friday night. In one clip, you can see the wind blow out the wall between CI Select and a neighboring business, S.P. Richards which distributes business supplies.

http://fox2now.com/2013/06/01/raw-video-winds-rip-apart-industrial-park/

3 tornados confirmed in St. Louis area; leave path of destruction

ST. LOUIS—The National Weather Service confirms three tornadoes were part of the Friday night storm that raked portions of the St. Louis area, damaging hundreds of homes but causing no serious injuries.

The weather service’s Jayson Gosselin says a 1,000-yard-wide twister that hit portions of St. Charles County and portions of north St. Louis County was an EF-3, which has winds between 136 and 165 mph.

Authorities said the tornado went on a 22-mile damage path through the southern and eastern parts of St. Charles into north St. Louis County.

The tornado started in Weldon Spring Heights and moved east through Harvester, Earth City, Bridgeton and Ferguson. Its end point has not been determined.

http://www.kmov.com/news/local/Strong-storms-leave-path-of-destruction-across-St-Louis-area-209805401.html

St. Louis, Lambert Airport suffers storm damage; airfield closed

(KMOV) – The airfield at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport is closed after a strong storm damaged several buildings at the airport on Friday night.

There were no reports of any injuries or damage to any of the airport’s terminals and concourses after the storm hit around 8 p.m. The cleanup of the debris throughout the airfield is expected to take hours, according to the airport’s blog post at 10:15 p.m.

Airport officials confirmed, through the blog post, damage to the roof of the auto shop and a building that houses emergency equipment, in addition to a guard station.

The terminals and concourses remain open.

http://www.kmov.com/news/local/Lambert-suffers-storm-damage-airfield-closed-209761891.html

June 1, 1796 – Tennessee is admitted as the 16th state of the United States.

Tennessee (i/tɛnɨˈsiː/) (Cherokee: ᏔᎾᏏ is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. Tennessee is the 36th most extensive and the 17th most populous of the 50 United States. Tennessee is bordered by Kentucky and Virginia to the north, North Carolina to the east, Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi to the south, and Arkansas and Missouri to the west. The Appalachian Mountains dominate the eastern part of the state, and the Mississippi River forms the state's western border. Tennessee's capital and second largest city is Nashville, which has a population of 609,644. Memphis is the state's largest city, with a population of 652,050.[4]

The state of Tennessee is rooted in the Watauga Association, a 1772 frontier pact generally regarded as the first constitutional government west of the Appalachians.[5] What is now Tennessee was initially part of North Carolina, and later part of the Southwest Territory. Tennessee was admitted to the Union as the 16th state on June 1, 1796. Tennessee was the last state to leave the Union and join the Confederacy at the outbreak of the U.S. Civil War in 1861, and the first state to be readmitted to the Union at the end of the war.[6]

Tennessee furnished more soldiers for the Confederate Army than any other state, and more soldiers for the Union Army than any other Southern state.[6] In the 20th century, Tennessee transitioned from an agrarian economy to a more diversified economy, aided at times by federal entities such as the Tennessee Valley Authority. In the early 1940s, the city of Oak Ridge was established to house the Manhattan Project's uranium enrichment facilities, helping to build the world's first atomic bomb.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennessee

June 1, 1792 – Kentucky is admitted as the 15th state of the United States.

Kentucky i/kɪnˈtʌki/, officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state located in the east south-central region of the United States. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth (the others being Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts). Originally a part of Virginia, in 1792 Kentucky became the 15th state to join the Union. Kentucky is the 37th most extensive and the 26th most populous of the 50 United States.

Kentucky is known as the "Bluegrass State", a nickname based on the bluegrass found in many of its pastures because of the fertile soil. One of the major regions in Kentucky is the Bluegrass Region in central Kentucky which houses two of its major cities, Lexington and Louisville. It is a land with diverse environments and abundant resources, including the world's longest cave system, Mammoth Cave National Park, the greatest length of navigable waterways and streams in the contiguous United States, and the two largest man-made lakes east of the Mississippi River.

Kentucky is also home to the highest per capita number of deer and turkey in the United States, the largest free-ranging elk herd east of the Mississippi River, and the nation's most productive coalfield. Kentucky is also known for horse racing, bourbon distilleries, automobile manufacturing, tobacco, bluegrass music, and college basketball.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kentucky

June 1: National Doughnut Day