TASK DEFINITION: Given a paragraph, generate a claim that is supported by the given paragraph. 1) The claim must contain information from within the paragraph. 2) A sentence within the paragraph can be used as a claim. 3) The claim should not have contradictions within the paragraph. 4) The claim should be at most one sentence long.
PROBLEM: "Veterans groups in Pennsylvania typically prepare for Memorial Day by placing small American flags beside the headstones where fallen service members have been laid to rest. When a state lawmaker from Erie County learned that the coronavirus might scuttle that sacred tradition, he posted about it on Facebook. ""Gov. Wolf is not allowing companies that distribute U.S. flags to ship out orders to be placed at veteran’s graves for Memorial Day,"" Pa. House Rep. Brad Roae posted on Facebook on May 11. We wondered whether Wolf had really blocked Pennsylvania-based American flag distributors from operating during the pandemic. Roae, a Republican, did not return a call seeking comment on his Facebook post, which has now been shared more than 7,000 times. But it looks like he was right. Not only did Wolf exclude FlagZone, a manufacturer located in Gilbertsville, from his original list of life-sustaining businesses permitted to operate during the pandemic, his administration doubled down and rejected the company’s application for a waiver. FlagZone is one of the only American flag manufacturer in Pennsylvania and one of only a half dozen across the country. The company typically distributes more than six million small stick flags annually. Casey Smith, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Community & Economic Development, told The Reading Eagle that the Wolf administration’s top priority is protecting the health and well-being of Pennsylvanians, and that flag-making, while patriotic, simply wasn’t ""life-sustaining."" ""Memorial Day celebrations and ceremonies are a staple in our nation, and many Pennsylvanians will need to adjust their routine this year to accommodate our new normal,"" Smith said. ""We encourage all Pennsylvanians to honor our nation’s fallen in their own special way."" Turns out the flags had already been manufactured and were sitting in a warehouse. FlagZone President Daniel Ziegler said it would only take a few workers to ship 400,000 flags that had been ordered by 24 different Pennsylvania counties in anticipation of Monday’s federal holiday. Bucks, Chester and Delaware counties were among those waiting to receive their orders. When State Sen. Scott Hutchinson learned about FlagZone’s woes, he also called on Wolf to ease restrictions imposed on the company. ""I see no reason why the time-honored and solemn tradition of placing flags at veterans’ graves could not be continued this year,"" Hutchinson, a Republican who represents Butler and other Western Pennsylvania counties, said in a statement sent to reporters via email. ""Certainly placing the flags in cemeteries could be done while practicing the social distancing Gov. Wolf recommends."" On Monday, FlagZone got some good news. The state cleared the way for the company to ship some flag orders even as it held firm that flag manufacturing is not essential during the pandemic. ""We’re just excited to get these flags out after months of being shut down,"" Ziegler told The Reading Eagle. ""Hopefully, when a family goes to the gravesite of a loved one who was a veteran they will now see that they were not forgotten."" Smith, of the community and economic development department, said in an interview that special approval from the state is not required for limited shipping activities and communicated  that to FlagZone. Roae posted on Facebook that Gov. Wolf had blocked companies that distribute American flags from shipping orders ahead of Memorial Day. Wolf initially blocked FlagZone from operating during the pandemic and then rejected the company’s request for a waiver. A state official later said the company did not need special permission to ship limited numbers of flags. However, the company didn’t understand this until the state said so, especially since the clarification came days after the Wolf administration rejected FlagZone’s application to resume operations."

SOLUTION: “Gov. Wolf is not allowing companies that distribute U.S. flags to ship out orders to be placed at veteran’s graves for Memorial Day.”

PROBLEM: A crowdfunding initiative by the finance minister amid reports of government spending on new vehicles for Cabinet members has only swelled public anger. Some local non-governmental organizations on Friday blamed the government for the deaths in an outbreak that is spreading beyond the capital and raising fears of a repeat of the 2008 epidemic that killed over 4,000 people. “It is alarming and quite unusual for such a medieval and preventable disease to continue to claim such valuable lives in this day and age,” said the Civil Society Health Emergency Response Coordinating Committee in a statement. It warned that government failure to “guarantee the right to health is a serious violation of both local and international law.” The government, which this week declared an emergency, has said it is committed to ending the outbreak. Health Minister Obadiah Moyo, while visiting a suburb identified as the epicenter of the outbreak on Friday, said it is not time “for a blame game.” United Nations agencies such as the World Health Organization say they have intervened to assist the southern African country whose economy collapsed under former leader Robert Mugabe, who resigned in November under military pressure. Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube used Twitter to announce a crowdfunding initiative to help fight the outbreak, infuriating some Zimbabweans long frustrated by the country’s currency crisis and high unemployment rate. ___ Follow Africa news at https://twitter.com/AP_Africa

SOLUTION: Zimbabwe’s government criticized over cholera outbreak.

PROBLEM: "Bounciest Democrat on November's statewide ballot? It might be Hank Gilbert, making his second hard charge for state agriculture commissioner versus Todd Staples, the Republican who topped him four years ago. Gilbert, ever prowling for issues, recently trumpeted that the Texas Department of Agriculture is looking at buying thousands of stress balls -- squeezable toys. He said in a Sept. 24 press release: ""Make no mistake, Texans love their balls: footballs, baseballs, basketballs, and soccer balls. But 300,000 stress balls? It seems a little extreme, but that's the quantity of grape, barbell, and book-shaped polyurethane stress balls the Texas Department of Agriculture could be spending taxpayer dollars on...""  Really? To our inquiry, Gilbert's campaign provided Web links to the agriculture agency's June request for bids as well as a September post on a state website indicating that a $99,000 contract to provide promotional materials was awarded to a Massachusetts company, Oceans Promotions. We downloaded the June 29 bid-request package from a site for state requisitions overseen by the state comptroller's office. The package shows the department was seeking bids to provide up to 300,000 stress ""relievers,"" which we're guessing are not balls because they're not round. Precisely, the package says, the agency sought bids to make ""promotional items with logo imprints to follow through on (the) TDA Food and Nutrition Texans Bring It Campaign,"" with the items to include grape-shaped stress relievers with ""Texans Bring It"" written on them or ""Eating Right,"" which would be made of polyurethane and be two inches high by three inches wide. The package says a second set of stress relievers, each one called ""Dumbbell,"" would be imprinted ""Texans Bring It"" and ""Exercise"" and be five inches high by 1.8 inches in diameter. A third stress reliever would be imprinted ""Book"" and ""Texans Bring It,"" according to the bid package, while other promotional items would include pencils, buttons and bumperstickers. The package says the bids were sought for various quantities, starting from 2,500 and topping out at 100,000 each. It electronically links to a Branders.com site showing what the agency wanted the stress relievers to look like (our interpretation: bunches of purple grapes). Is all this a real deal? To our inquiry, Bryan Black, Staples' spokesman, replied via e-mail: ""An invitation for bid was issued for these federally funded educational items to reduce the $5.8 billion avoidable health care expenditures, paid by taxpayers, associated with overweight and obesity health problems."" We followed up with Black, asking if it's accurate to conclude that up to 300,000 of the stress relievers are being purchased. We also wondered why the purchase was being made. Black said he'd limit his comment to his e-mailed statement. Surely the agency would pipe up if Gilbert got its purchase plans wrong."

SOLUTION:
Hank Gilbert Says the Texas Department of Agriculture seeks to purchase up to 300,000 promotional stress balls.