title: West Berlin

text: On 2 December 1964 East Germany, always short of hard currency, decreed that every Western visitor had to buy a minimum of 5 Eastern "Mark der Deutschen Notenbank" per day (MDN, 1964–1968 the official name of the East German mark, to distinguish it from the West Deutsche Mark) at the still held arbitrary compulsory rate of 1:1. The 5 marks had to be spent, as exporting Eastern currency was illegal, which is why importing it after having bargained for it at the currency market at Zoo station was also illegal. Western pensioners and children were spared from the compulsory exchange (officially in , i.e. "minimum exchange"). Not long after East Germany held the first cash harvest from the new compulsory exchange rules by allowing West Berliners to visit East Berlin once more for a day during the Christmas season. The following year, 1965, East Germany opened the travelling season for West Berliners on 18 December. In 1966 it opened for a second harvest of Western money between the Easter (10 April) and Pentecost (29 May) holidays and later again at Christmas.


title: West Berlin

text: The situation only changed fundamentally after 11 December 1971 when, representing the two German states, Egon Bahr from the West and Michael Kohl from the East signed the Transit Agreement. This was followed by a similar agreement for West Berliners, once more allowing regular visits to East Germany and East Berlin.


title: West Berlin

text: After ratification of the Agreement and specifying the relevant regulations, West Berliners could apply for the first time again for visas for any chosen date to East Berlin or East Germany from 3 October 1972 onwards. If granted, a one-day-visa entitled them to leave the East until 2 am the following day. West Berliners were now spared the visa fee of 5 Western Deutsche Marks, not to be confused with the compulsory exchange amounting to the same sum, but yielding in return 5 Eastern marks. This financial relief did not last long, because on 15 November 1973 East Germany doubled the compulsory exchange to 10 Eastern marks, payable in West German Deutsche Marks at par.


title: West Berlin

text: One-day visas for East Berlin were now issued in a quickened procedure; visas for longer stays and visas for East Germany proper needed a prior application, which could be a lengthy procedure. To facilitate applications for West Berliners seeking such Eastern visas, the GDR Foreign Ministry was later allowed to open "Offices for the Affairs of Visits and Travelling" () in West Berlin, which were not allowed to show any official symbols of East Germany. The Eastern officials working commuted every morning and evening between East and West Berlin. Their uniforms showed no official symbols except the name "Büro für Besuchs- und Reiseangelegenheiten". They accepted visa applications and handed out confirmed visas issued in the East to the West Berlin applicants. A shed formerly housing one such "Büro für Besuchs- und Reiseangelegenheiten" can be found on Waterlooufer 5–7 in Berlin-Kreuzberg, close to Hallesches Tor underground station.


title: West Berlin

text: Another form of traffic between East and West Berlin was the transfer of West Berlin's sewage into East Berlin and East Germany through the sewer pipes built in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The sewage flowed into the East because most of the pre-war sewage treatment facilities, mostly sewage farms, happened to be in the East after the division of the city. Sewer pipes, however, once discovered as a way to flee the East, were blocked by bars. West Berlin paid for the treatment of its sewage in Western Deutsche Marks which were desperately needed by the East German government. Since the methods used in the East did not meet Western standards, West Berlin increased the capacity of modern sewage treatment within its own territory, such that the amount of its sewage treated in the East had been considerably reduced by the time the Wall came down.


title: West Berlin

text: The situation with refuse was similar. The removal, burning or disposal of the ever-growing amount of West Berlin's rubbish became a costly problem, but here too an agreement was found since West Berlin would pay in Western Deutsche Marks. On 11 December 1974 East Germany and West Berlin's garbage utility company "BSR" signed a contract to dispose of refuse on a dump right beside the Wall in East German Groß-Ziethen (today a part of Schönefeld). An extra checkpoint, solely open for Western bin lorries (garbage trucks), was opened there. Later on, a second dump, further away, was opened in Vorketzin, a part of Ketzin.


title: West Berlin

text: As for the S-Bahn, operated throughout Berlin by the East German Reichsbahn, the construction of the Wall meant a serious disruption of its integrated network, especially of the Berlin's circular S-Bahn line around all of the Western and Eastern inner city. The lines were separated and those mostly located in West Berlin were continued, but only accessible from West Berlin with all access in East Berlin closed. However, even before the Wall had been built, West Berliners increasingly refrained from using the S-Bahn, since boycotts against it were issued, the argument being that every S-Bahn ticket bought provided the GDR government with valuable Western Deutsche Marks.


title: West Berlin

text: Usage dropped further as the Western public transport operator "BVG" (West) offered parallel bus lines and expanded its network of underground lines. After the construction of the Wall, ridership fell so much that running the S-Bahn lines in West Berlin turned into a loss-making exercise: wages and maintenance – however badly it was carried out – cost more than income from ticket sales. Finally, the Reichsbahn agreed to surrender operation of the S-Bahn in West Berlin, as had been determined by all Allies in 1945, and on 29 December 1983 the Allies, the Senate of Berlin (West; i.e. the city state government) and the Reichsbahn signed an agreement to change the operator from Reichsbahn to "BVG" (West) which took effect on 9 January 1984.


title: West Berlin

text: On 9 November 1989 East Germany opened the borders for East Germans and East Berliners, who could then freely enter West Berlin. West Berlin itself had never restricted their entry. For West Berliners and West Germans the opening of the border for free entry lasted longer. The regulation concerning one-day-visas on entering the East and the compulsory minimum exchange of 25 Western Deutsche Marks by 1989, continued. However, more checkpoints were opened. Finally, on 22 December 1989, East Germany granted West Berliners and West Germans free entry without charge at the existing checkpoints, demanding only valid papers. Eastern controls were slowly eased into spot checks and finally abolished on 30 June 1990, the day East and West introduced the "union concerning currency, economy and social security" ().


title: West Berlin

text: When the Wall was built in 1961, three metro lines starting in northern parts of West Berlin passed through tunnels under the Eastern city centre and ended again in southern parts of West Berlin. The lines concerned were today's underground lines U 6 and U 8 and the S-Bahn line S 2 (today partly also used by other lines). On the sealing off of West Berlin from East Berlin by the Berlin Wall the entrances of the stations on these lines located in East Berlin were shut. However, western trains were allowed to continue to pass through without stopping. Passengers of these trains experienced the empty and barely lit ghost stations where time had stood still since 13 August 1961. West Berlin's public transport operator "BVG" (West) paid the east an annual charge in Western Deutsche Marks for its underground lines to use the tunnels under East Berlin. U 6 and S 2 also had one subterranean stop at the Eastern Berlin Friedrichstraße railway station, the only station beneath East Berlin where western U Bahn trains were still allowed to stop. Passengers could change there between U 6, S 2 and the elevated S 3 (then starting and ending in Friedrichstraße) or for the transit trains to West Germany, buy duty-free tobacco and liquor for Western marks in GDR-run Intershop kiosks, or enter East Berlin through a checkpoint right in the station.


title: Sword Art Online: Alicization

text: Sword Art Online: Alicization is the third season of the anime series adapted from the light novel series "Sword Art Online", written by Reki Kawahara and illustrated by abec. It is animated by A-1 Pictures and directed by Manabu Ono. It covers the first part of the "Alicization" arc and adapts from the novel's ninth volume, "Alicization Beginning", to the fourteenth volume, "Alicization Uniting". The second part of the anime, titled Sword Art Online: Alicization – War of Underworld, adapts from the novel's fifteenth volume, "Alicization Invading", to the eighteenth volume, "Alicization Lasting". While not covered in the light novels, "Alicization" takes place after "", as it incorporates elements from the film not found in the novels.


title: Sword Art Online: Alicization

text: The first part of the series premiered on October 7, 2018, and aired until March 31, 2019, with a one-hour world premiere airing in Japan, the United States, Mexico, Australia, France, Germany, Russia, and South Korea on September 15, 2018. The second part of the series premiered on October 13 and aired until December 29, 2019, with a recap episode summarizing the first part airing on October 6, 2019. The second half of the "War of Underworld" series was originally scheduled to premiere on April 26, 2020, but was delayed to air from July 12 to September 20, 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Aniplex of America's English-dubbed version aired on Adult Swim's Toonami programming block from February 10 until July 14, 2019, while the first cour of the second part of the series aired from January 19 until April 5, 2020. The second cour of the second part of the series premiered on Toonami on November 8, 2020. The series is available with multilingual subtitles on iQIYI in South East Asia.


title: Sword Art Online: Alicization

text: The first opening theme of "Sword Art Online: Alicization" is "Adamas" by LiSA, and the first ending theme is by Eir Aoi. The second opening theme is "Resister" by Asca, and the second ending theme is "Forget-me-not" by ReoNa, with episode 19 featuring , also sung by ReoNa. In "Sword Art Online: Alicization – War of Underworld", the first opening theme is "Resolution" by Haruka Tomatsu, and the first ending theme is "Unlasting" by LiSA. The second opening theme is "Anima" by ReoNa, and the second ending theme is "I will" by Eir Aoi. The series' music is composed by Yuki Kajiura.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Sir Nicholas William Peter Clegg (born 7 January 1967) is a British media executive and former Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom who has been president for global affairs at Meta Platforms since 2022, having previously been vicepresident of global affairs and communications at Facebook from 2018 to 2022. Before joining Facebook, Clegg served as Deputy Prime Minister of the UK from 2010 to 2015 and as Leader of the Liberal Democrats from 2007 to 2015. He was Member of Parliament (MP) for Sheffield Hallam from 2005 to 2017. An "" liberal, he has been associated with both socially liberal and economically liberal policies.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Born in Buckinghamshire, Clegg was educated at Westminster School before going on to study at the University of Cambridge, University of Minnesota and College of Europe. He worked as a journalist for the "Financial Times" before becoming a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) in 1999. After his election to the House of Commons in 2005, Clegg served in a variety of leadership roles in the Liberal Democrats, most notably as spokesperson for Home Affairs, before being elected to succeed Menzies Campbell as party leader in 2007. During his tenure as leader, Clegg asserted that the Liberal Democrats had transcended left and right-wing politics and described the party as radical centrist. He advocated for reduced taxes, electoral reform, cuts on defence spending and an increased focus on environmental issues.


title: Nick Clegg

text: As a result of the 2010 general election, Clegg's Liberal Democrats found themselves with 57 seats in the House of Commons. The Conservative Party, which failed to receive a majority, formed a coalition with the Liberal Democrats, and Clegg was appointed by David Cameron to serve as his Deputy Prime Minister. In this capacity, he became the first leader of the Liberal Democrats to answer for the Prime Minister's Questions, and used his influence in the position to pass the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. Controversy arose during this time surrounding the Liberal Democrats' decision to abandon their pledge to oppose increases in tuition fees, which had previously been a key issue that won the party support from students.


title: Nick Clegg

text: During the party's time in coalition, the Liberal Democrats saw a significant drop in support, and the 2015 general election left the party with just 8 seats, which resulted in Clegg's ousting as Deputy Prime Minister and his resignation as party leader. In 2016, following a referendum in which a majority supported leaving the European Union, Clegg returned to the Liberal Democrat frontbench, concurrently serving as Spokesperson for Exiting the European Union and for International Trade from July 2016 to June 2017. In the 2017 general election, Clegg was defeated in his constituency of Sheffield Hallam by Jared O'Mara of the Labour Party. After losing his seat, Clegg moved to the United States after he was appointed by Mark Zuckerberg as Vice-President for Global Affairs and Communications of Facebook, Inc. (now Meta Platforms, Inc.) in 2018. In February 2022, Clegg was promoted by Zuckerberg to President for Global Affairs at Meta Platforms.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg was born in Chalfont St Giles, Buckinghamshire, the third of four children of Hermance van den Wall Bake and Nicholas Peter Clegg, chairman of United Trust Bank and a former trustee of the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation (where Ken Clarke was an adviser).


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg has one-quarter Baltic-German ancestry. His paternal grandmother, Baroness Kira von Engelhardt, of Smolensk, was a Baltic-German noblewoman, niece of Moura Budberg, adventuress and suspected double agent, and the granddaughter of attorney general of the Imperial Russian Senate, Ignatiy Platonovich Zakrevsky. Through this Russian connection, Clegg is distantly related to Michael Ignatieff, leader of the Liberal Party of Canada from 2008 to 2011.


title: Nick Clegg

text: His English grandfather was Hugh Anthony Clegg, editor of the "British Medical Journal" for 35 years.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg's mother is Dutch and was interned, along with her family, by the Japanese military in Batavia (Jakarta) in the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) during the Second World War. She met Clegg's father during a visit to England in 1956, and they married on 1 August 1959.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg is multilingual. He speaks English, French, Dutch, German, and Spanish. His background has informed his politics. He says, "There is simply not a shred of racism in me, as a person whose whole family is formed by flight from persecution, from different people in different generations. It's what I am. It's one of the reasons I am a liberal." His Dutch mother instilled in him "a degree of scepticism about the entrenched class configurations in British society".


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg was educated at two independent schools: at Caldicott School in Farnham Royal in South Buckinghamshire, where he was joint Head Prefect in 1980, and later at Westminster School in Central London. As a 16-year-old exchange student in Munich, he and a friend drunkenly set fire to what he called "the leading collection of cacti in Germany". When news of the incident was reported during his time as Liberal Democrat Home Affairs spokesperson, Clegg said he was "not proud" of it. He was arrested and not formally charged, but performed a type of community service.


title: Nick Clegg

text: He spent a gap year working as a skiing instructor in Austria, before going on to Cambridge in 1986, where he studied Archaeology and Anthropology at Robinson College. He was active in the student theatre at Cambridge, acting in a production of "The Normal Heart" under director Sam Mendes. He was also captain of his college's tennis team, and campaigned for the human rights organisation Survival International. Clegg spent the summer of 1989 as an office junior in Postipankki bank in Helsinki.


title: Nick Clegg

text: It has been alleged that Clegg joined the Cambridge University Conservative Association between 1986 and 1987. Clegg has maintained he has "no recollection of that whatsoever". However, Conservative MP Greg Hands has a record of CUCA members for 1986–1987, and Clegg's name appears on the list. Hands noted that "for the avoidance of any doubt, there was only one 'N Clegg' at Robinson College ... [he] is listed in the 'Robinson College Record', under 'Freshmen 1986'. He graduated with an upper second class honours (2:1) degree in social anthropology.


title: Nick Clegg

text: After university, he was awarded a scholarship to study for a year at the University of Minnesota, where he wrote a thesis on the political philosophy of the Deep Green movement. He then moved to New York City, where he worked as an intern under Christopher Hitchens at "The Nation", a progressive liberal magazine, where he fact-checked Hitchens's articles.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg next moved to Brussels, where he worked alongside Guy Spier for six months as a trainee in the G24 co-ordination unit which delivered aid to the countries of the former Soviet Union. After the internship he studied for a master's degree at the College of Europe in Bruges, a university for European studies in Belgium, where he met his wife, Miriam González Durántez, a lawyer and the daughter of a Spanish senator. Nick Clegg is an alumnus of the "Mozart Promotion" (1991–92) of the College of Europe.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Between 1992 and 1993, he was employed by GJW Government Relations Ltd, which lobbied on behalf of Libya.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In 1993, Clegg won the inaugural "Financial Times" David Thomas Prize, in remembrance of an "FT" journalist killed on assignment in Kuwait in 1991. He was later sent to Hungary, where he wrote articles about the mass privatisation of industries in the former communist bloc.


title: Nick Clegg

text: He took up a post at the European Commission in April 1994, working in the TACIS aid programme to the former Soviet Union. For two years, Clegg was responsible for developing direct aid programmes in Central Asia and the Caucasus worth €50 million. He was involved in negotiations with Russia on airline overflight rights, and launched a conference in Tashkent in 1993 that founded TRACECA—an international transport programme for the development of a transport corridor for Europe, the Caucasus and Asia. Vice-President and Trade Commissioner Leon Brittan then offered him a job in his private office, as a European Union policy adviser and speechwriter. As part of this role, Clegg was in charge of the EC negotiating team on Chinese and Russian accession talks to the World Trade Organization.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg has written extensively, publishing and contributing to a large number of pamphlets and books. With Dr Richard Grayson he wrote a book in 2002 about the importance of devolution in secondary education systems, based on comparative research across Europe. The final conclusions included the idea of pupil premiums so that children from poorer backgrounds receive the additional resources their educational needs require.


title: Nick Clegg

text: He wrote a controversial pamphlet for the Centre for European Reform advocating devolution and evolution of the European Union, and contributed to the 2004 "", where he offered market liberal solutions for reform of European institutions. He co-authored a pamphlet with Duncan Brack arguing for a wholesale reform of world trade rules to allow room for a greater emphasis on development, internationally binding environmental treaties, and parliamentary democracy within the WTO system.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In 1998, Clegg was selected as the lead Liberal Democrat candidate for the European Parliament in the East Midlands constituency; the following year, Paddy Ashdown was first to tip him as a politician to watch. On his election in 1999, he was the first Liberal parliamentarian elected in the East Midlands since Ernest Pickering was elected MP for Leicester West in 1931, and was credited with helping to significantly boost the Liberal Democrat poll rating in the region in the six months after his election. Clegg worked extensively during his time as an MEP to support the party in the region, not least in Chesterfield where Paul Holmes was elected as MP in 2001. Clegg helped persuade Conservative MEP Bill Newton Dunn to defect to the Liberal Democrats, with Newton Dunn subsequently succeeding him as MEP for the East Midlands.


title: Nick Clegg

text: As an MEP, Clegg co-founded the Campaign for Parliamentary Reform, which led calls for reforms to expenses, transparency and accountability in the European Parliament. He was made Trade and Industry spokesman for the European Liberal Democrat and Reform group (ELDR). In December 2000, Nick Clegg became the Parliament's Draftsman on a complex new EU telecoms law relating to "local loop unbundling"—opening-up telephone networks across Europe to competition. Clegg decided to leave Brussels in 2002, arguing in an article in "The Guardian" newspaper that the battle to persuade the public of the benefits of Europe was being fought at home, not in Brussels.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In 2004, Clegg explained to the Select Committee on European Union that the aim of MEPs like himself, who had been active in the debate on the EU's negotiating mandate, was to obtain the right to ratify any major WTO deal entered into by the European Union. That same year he chaired a policy working group for the Liberal Democrats on the Third Age, which focused on the importance of ending the cliff-edge of retirement and providing greater opportunities for older people to remain active beyond retirement. The group developed initial proposals on transforming post offices to help them survive as community hubs, in particular for older people. He served on Charles Kennedy's policy review, "Meeting the Challenge", and the "It's About Freedom" working parties.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg, for four years whilst an MEP, wrote a fortnightly column for "Guardian Unlimited". One particular article in 2002 accused Gordon Brown of encouraging "condescension" towards Germany. In an article, Clegg wrote that "all nations have a cross to bear, and none more so than Germany with its memories of Nazism. But the British cross is more insidious still. A misplaced sense of superiority, sustained by delusions of grandeur and a tenacious obsession with the last war, is much harder to shake off". The article was dusted down during the 2010 general election campaign when the "Daily Mail" interpreted the article as being a "Nazi slur on Britain" and Clegg had begun to feel the full heat of the British tabloid press following his success during the first leaders' debate.


title: Nick Clegg

text: On leaving the European Parliament, Clegg joined political lobbying firm GPlus in April 2004 as a fifth partner:


title: Nick Clegg

text: In May 2003, Richard Allan, the then Liberal Democrat MP for Sheffield Hallam, announced his intention to stand down from the House of Commons. Clegg was selected as the prospective parliamentary candidate. He took up a part-time teaching position in the politics department of the University of Sheffield, combining it with ongoing EU consultancy work with GPlus. He also gave a series of seminar lectures in the international relations Department of the University of Cambridge.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg worked closely with Allan throughout the campaign in Sheffield Hallam—including starring in a local pantomime—and won the seat in the 2005 general election with over 50% of the vote, and a majority of 8,682. This result represents one of the smallest swings away from a party in a seat where an existing MP has been succeeded by a newcomer (4.3%). He also served as treasurer and secretary of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on National Parks, a particular interest given that his constituency includes part of the Peak District National Park.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Following his election to parliament, Clegg was promoted by leader Charles Kennedy to be the party's spokesperson on Europe, focusing on the party's preparations for an expected referendum on the European constitution and acting as deputy to Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Menzies Campbell. Clegg's ability to articulate liberal values at a very practical level quickly lent him prominence, with many already seeing him as a future Liberal Democrat leader. Following the resignation of Kennedy on 7 January 2006, Clegg was touted as a possible leadership contender. He was quick to rule himself out however instead declaring his support for Menzies Campbell ahead of his former colleague in the European Parliament Chris Huhne, with Campbell going on to win the ballot. Clegg had been a signatory to the letter circulated by Vince Cable prior to Kennedy's resignation, which stated his opposition to working under Kennedy's continued leadership.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Following the 2006 leadership election, Clegg was promoted to be Home Affairs spokesperson, replacing Mark Oaten. In this job he spearheaded the Liberal Democrats' defence of civil liberties, proposing a Freedom Bill to repeal what he described as "unnecessary and illiberal legislation", campaigning against Identity Cards and the retention of innocent people's DNA, and arguing against excessive counter-terrorism legislation. He has campaigned for prison reform, a liberal approach to immigration, and defended the Human Rights Act against ongoing attacks from across the political spectrum. In January 2007, Clegg launched the 'We Can Cut Crime!' campaign, "proposing real action at a national level and acting to cut crime where the Liberal Democrats are in power locally".


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg caused a degree of controversy when, at the Liberal Democrat party conference in 2007, he admitted his leadership ambitions to journalists at a fringe event. The admission followed a period of increased media speculation about Sir Menzies Campbell's leadership, which the admission by Clegg did nothing to reduce and resulted in a rebuke by some of his frontbench colleagues. This followed a report from Kevin Maguire in the "New Statesman" that Clegg had failed to hide his disloyalty to Campbell's leadership. Campbell eventually resigned on 15 October 2007, saying that questions about his leadership were "getting in the way of further progress by the party".


title: Nick Clegg

text: After Campbell's resignation, Clegg was regarded by much of the media as front-runner in the leadership election. The BBC's Political Editor Nick Robinson stated the election would be a two-horse race between Clegg and Chris Huhne who had stood against Campbell in the 2006 election. On Friday 19 October 2007, Clegg launched his bid to become leader of the Liberal Democrats. Clegg and Huhne clashed in the campaign over Trident but were largely in agreement on many other issues. It was announced on 18 December that he had won. Clegg was appointed to the Privy Council (PC) on 30 January 2008, and affirmed his membership on 12 March 2008.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In his acceptance speech upon winning the leadership contest, Clegg declared himself to be "a liberal by temperament, by instinct and by upbringing" and that he believes "Britain [is] a place of tolerance and pluralism". He has stated that he feels "a profound antagonism for prejudice of all sorts". He declared his priorities as: defending civil liberties; devolving the running of public services to parents, pupils and patients; and protecting the environment.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In an interview on BBC Radio 5 Live on the morning after his election to the leadership, Clegg stated that he does not believe in God, but that he has "an immense amount of respect for people of faith". In 2010, Clegg elaborated on this question, stating: "I was asked a question once in one of those questions where you're only allowed to answer 'yes' or 'no', and I was asked 'Do you believe in God?' As it happens I don't know whether God exists. I'm much more of an agnostic."


title: Nick Clegg

text: He resigned as the leader of the Liberal Democrats after the 2015 general election. He said the results were "immeasurably more crushing and unkind than he feared". He was succeeded by Tim Farron after a leadership election.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In March 2008, "GQ" magazine ran with an interview conducted by Piers Morgan in which Clegg admitted to sleeping with "no more than 30" women. Senior Lib Dem MPs defended his comments; Lembit Öpik said it showed "you can be a human being and a party Leader", and Norman Lamb that "Nick tries to be absolutely straight in everything that he does, and that might sometimes get him into trouble but he will build a reputation for being honest and straightforward." Speaking to the BBC about the interview Clegg said "wisdom with hindsight is an easy thing" as what had been a split second response had been "taken out of context, interpreted, over interpreted and so on".


title: Nick Clegg

text: Upon his election Clegg appointed leadership rival Huhne as his replacement as Home Affairs spokesperson and following his strong performances as acting party leader, Vince Cable was retained as the main Treasury spokesperson. Media commentators noted that the Clegg-Huhne-Cable triumvirate provided the Liberal Democrats with an effective political team for the coming years. On 5 March 2008, Clegg suffered a real test following the resignation of three of his front bench team. David Heath, Alistair Carmichael and Tim Farron had been told to abstain in the vote for a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty but had wanted to vote in favour and so defied the whip. In addition to the three frontbenchers, a further 12 more backbench LibDem MPs also defied the whip and voted "yes". Clegg said "though we have disagreed on this issue I fully understand and respect their strongly held views on the subject... However, as they have recognised, the shadow cabinet cannot operate effectively unless the principle of collective responsibility is maintained."


title: Nick Clegg

text: The resignations happened not long after Michael Martin, the Speaker of the House of Commons, had on 26 February 2008 blocked calls by the Liberal Democrats for an "in or out" referendum on Britain's EU membership. The Speaker's authority was called into question when, led by Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrats marched out of the House of Commons, calling the Speaker's decision a constitutional "outrage". Just moments earlier, frontbench foreign affairs spokesman for the party Ed Davey had been expelled from the chamber by the Speaker's deputy, Sir Michael Lord, for further challenging the ruling.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In November 2008, Clegg suffered more allegations of difficulties with the front bench following an article in the "Daily Mirror" that reported that Clegg had criticised senior members of his front bench whilst on a plane journey. He told the BBC's Politics Show that "a lot of it is, frankly, fiction".


title: Nick Clegg

text: In the Commons, Clegg initially concentrated most of his fire on Labour and Prime Minister Gordon Brown, but in the autumn of 2009 began also focusing on Cameron and the Conservatives. Clegg rejected an appeal from Cameron for their two parties to work together. Clegg argued that the Conservatives were totally different from his party, and that the Lib Dems were the true "progressives" in UK politics. At the 2009 party conference in Bournemouth, he accused the Conservatives of "simply believing it is their turn" and claimed that come the election the "choice before people is the choice between fake, phoney change from David Cameron's Conservatives, and real change the Liberal Democrats offer".


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg became the first party leader in modern political history to call for a Speaker of the House of Commons to resign, describing then-Speaker Michael Martin, following his handling of the expenses scandal, as a defender of the status quo and an obstacle to the reform of Parliament.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In response to revelations about MPs' expenses, Clegg set out his plans for reform of Parliament in "The Guardian". Speaking about the plans, he said: "let us bar the gates of Westminster and stop MPs leaving for their summer holidays until this crisis has been sorted out, and every nook and cranny of our political system has been reformed." He argued for the "reinvention of British politics" within 100 days, calling for a commitment to accept the Kelly expenses report in full; the power to recall members suspended for misconduct; House of Lords reform; reform of party funding; fixed-term parliaments; enabling legislation for a referendum on AV+; and changes to House of Commons procedure to reduce executive power.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Shortly ahead of the election, Clegg was asked about his own expenses by Andrew Neil of the BBC. Clegg allegedly claimed the full amount permissible under the Additional Cost Allowance, including claims for food, gardening and redecorating his second home. "The Telegraph" also said Clegg claimed £80 for international call charges, a claim he said he would repay.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg aimed to modernise the Liberal Democrat Party at the same time as maintaining its traditions of political and philosophical liberalism. In 2011, he told a party conference that the Liberal Democrats were radical centrist in orientation: "Our opponents try to divide us with their outdated labels of left and right. But we are not on the left and we are not on the right. We have our own label: Liberal. We are liberals and we own the freehold to the centre ground of British politics. Our politics is the politics of the radical centre."


title: Nick Clegg

text: When he became leader of the Liberal Democrats, Clegg called for more choice for patients on waiting lists in the National Health Service (NHS), giving them the option to go private and to be funded by the NHS if they wish; a substantial tax cut to "put more money back into the pockets of people", better action on the environment, the abandonment of Britain's Trident missile-defence system, fixed-term parliaments; devolving more power to local councils; giving constituents the power to force a by-election if their MP was found responsible for serious wrongdoing; and a slimming of government across the board. Clegg campaigned to cut spending on defence projects such as Eurofighter as well as the UK Trident programme. As regards public spending, at the party's 2009 conference in Bournemouth Clegg argued for "savage" spending cuts and said politicians need to treat voters "like grown ups" whilst accusing the Labour and Conservative parties of indulging in "childish games" over the "c-word".


title: Nick Clegg

text: On 29 April 2009 the Liberal Democrats proposed in the House of Commons to offer all Gurkhas an equal right of residence; the motion resulted in a defeat for the Government by 267 votes to 246. It was the only first day motion defeat for a government since 1978. On speaking about the result Clegg said "this is an immense victory [...] for the rights of Gurkhas who have been waiting so long for justice, a victory for Parliament, a victory for decency". He added that it was "the kind of thing people want this country to do".


title: Nick Clegg

text: On 21 May 2009, the Home Secretary Jacqui Smith announced that all Gurkha veterans who retired before 1997 with at least four years' service could settle in the UK. The actress and daughter of Gurkha corps Major James Lumley, Joanna Lumley, who had highlighted the treatment of the Gurkhas and campaigned for their rights, commented: "This is the welcome we have always longed to give".


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg became Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Lord President of the Council on 11 May 2010 through a coalition with the Conservative Party under Prime Minister David Cameron. He was also made Minister for Constitutional and Political Reform, which was a key point for the Liberal Democrats during the creation of the coalition.


title: Nick Clegg

text: The morning after the 2010 general election presented the country with no single political party able to form a government that would command a majority in the House of Commons, since the February 1974 general election with the Labour Party led by Harold Wilson falling short of a majority. In light of this reality the Conservative leader, David Cameron, went public and gave a "big, open and comprehensive offer" to the Liberal Democrats' leader and said that he wanted to open up negotiations with them to form Britain's first coalition government since Winston Churchill's war ministry during the Second World War. In reply, Clegg said that he had always maintained that the party with the most seats and the most votes should have the right to seek to govern. Speaking to the press he said: "It seems this morning that it is the Conservative Party which has more votes and more seats – although not an absolute majority – which is why I now think that it is the Conservative Party which should seek to govern in the national interest."


title: Nick Clegg

text: Following the announcement, teams of negotiators from both parties formulated what would become the Coalition Agreement which would form the basis of their partnership together. Gordon Brown's resignation on 11 May 2010 meant that Cameron was invited by the Queen to form a government and a coalition with the Liberal Democrats was agreed, with Nick Clegg as the Deputy PM and Lord President of the Council. The initial agreement was published on 12 May 2010. It consisted of a seven-page document, in 11 sections. In the foreword, it stated "These are the issues that needed to be resolved between us in order for us to work together as a strong and stable government". Of the 57 Liberal Democrat MPs, only two (Charles Kennedy and John Leech) refused to support the Conservative Coalition agreement.


title: Nick Clegg

text: On 5 July 2010, Clegg unveiled plans to have fewer MPs and to hold a referendum on the voting system so that the next general election would be contested under the Alternative Vote system. In a statement, he said UK democracy was "fractured", with some votes counting more than others. As part of the statement he also changed initial plans requiring the number of MPs needed to vote to dissolve Parliament from 55% to 66%. The Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill was presented to parliament on 22 July 2010 for its first reading which if successful would see the date of the referendum on changing the voting system from the current 'first past the post' system to the Alternative Vote (AV) system set for 5 May 2011.


title: Nick Clegg

text: The bill also introduced plans to reduce the number of MP's in the House of Commons from 650 to 600, something the Labour party attacked as gerrymandering, as to do this there would need to be boundary changes. Clegg told MPs: "Together, these proposals help correct the deep unfairness in the way we hold elections in this country. Under the current set-up, votes count more in some parts of the country than others, and millions feel that their votes don't count at all. Elections are won and lost in a small minority of seats. We have a fractured democracy, where some people's votes count and other people's votes don't count." On 22 July 2010, the question for the referendum on AV was published, asking voters if they wish to "adopt the 'alternative vote' system instead of the current 'first past the post' system" for electing MPs". The question required a yes or no answer. The Act received Royal Assent on 16 February 2011. The result of the referendum was that the alternative vote proposal was defeated by a margin of 2:1.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg also confirmed that the government planned to introduce legislation for five-year fixed-term parliaments, with elections to be held on the first Thursday in May of the fifth year after the previous general election, starting with 7 May 2015. The corresponding bill was presented to parliament on 22 July 2010 and the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 received Royal Assent on 15 September 2011.


title: Nick Clegg

text: On 21 July 2010, Clegg became the first Liberal Democrat leader to answer for Prime minister's questions. He courted controversy during the exchange when at the despatch box he attacked Shadow Secretary of State for Justice and Shadow Lord Chancellor Jack Straw for the decision to invade Iraq, saying "perhaps one day you could account for your role in the most disastrous decision of all, which is the illegal invasion of Iraq." Despite having long-held views about the issue, the comment was controversial, as it did not reflect the policy of the government, which was that the legality of the war in Iraq was currently being studied by the Iraq inquiry.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg next stepped in for Prime Minister's Questions on 8 September 2010 following the news that Cameron's father was very ill. Standing in for the Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman, Jack Straw challenged Clegg on the allegations of phone hacking against Downing Street's director of communications Andy Coulson. Responding, Clegg said that the allegations dating from Coulson's time at the "News of the World" were a matter for the police to investigate. On 10 November 2010, as Cameron was making a trade visit to China, Clegg deputised for the third time, meeting Harman across the despatch box. On a day that coincided with violent student protests against tuition fees in London, the Labour deputy leader chose the same subject to quiz Clegg, accusing him of a U-turn on pledges made before the election. Responding, Clegg accused Harman of trying to re-position Labour as the party of students when the party had previously campaigned against fees only to end up introducing them.


title: Nick Clegg

text: The issue of student financing had been considered one of the flagship policies of the Liberal Democrats with all of the party's MPs, including Nick Clegg, signing the Vote for Students pledge to oppose any increase in student tuition fees prior to the 2010 general election. As part of the coalition agreement the Lib Dems abandoned their pledge to oppose any increase in tuition fees but gained permission to abstain on any vote relating to the increase of tuition fees. The Browne Review recommended that the present cap on student fees be lifted, potentially paving the way for universities to charge much higher fees in the future.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg wrote to his MPs saying that he had "struggled endlessly" with the issue and said that departing from the pledge he had made prior to the election would be "one of the most difficult decisions of my political career". Defending recommendations of the review, Clegg said that poorer students would pay less since the income level at which students needed to earn before beginning to pay off their student loan would rise from £15,000 to £21,000.


title: Nick Clegg

text: During an interview on 24 October 2010 with the BBC's Andrew Marr, Clegg said that he "regretted" not being able to keep his pre-election policy to scrap tuition fees but claimed that this was a result of the financial situation the country had found itself in.


title: Nick Clegg

text: On 19 September 2012, Clegg apologised, not for breaking his pledge, but for having "made a promise we weren't absolutely sure we could deliver". The apology was parodied in a song.


title: Nick Clegg

text: On 14 October 2010, Clegg delivered a speech at a school in Chesterfield, at which he announced the government's intention to spend £7 billion on a 'fairness premium' designed to see extra support going to the poorest pupils over the course of the parliament. Clegg claimed that the funds for the scheme would be "additional" to the current education budget and this view was backed up by a Number 10 aide who when interviewed by "The Guardian" said "the money for this will come from outside the education budget. We're not just rearranging furniture – this is real new money from elsewhere in Whitehall." The package announced would provide 15 hours a week free nursery education for the poorest two-year-olds and a 'pupil premium' which would be given to schools to help those pupils eligible for free school meals worth £2.5 billion a year.


title: Nick Clegg

text: The announcement by Clegg ensured that two elements of the government's Coalition Agreement had been fulfilled, that of the promise to support free nursery care to pre-school children and that of funding a 'significant premium for disadvantaged pupils from outside the schools budget by reductions in spending elsewhere'. For Clegg the announcement was an important one politically coming two days after the publication of the Browne Review into the future of university funding which signalled the reversal of the long cherished Liberal Democrat policy of opposing any increase in tuition fees. The pupil premium announcement was important as it formed one of the four key 'priorities' on which the party had fought the last election. On 20 October 2010, the plans for the 'fairness premium' were introduced by the Treasury as part of the spending review which said that the money would be introduced over the period of the review which "will support the poorest in the early years and at every stage of their education".


title: Nick Clegg

text: In June 2011, Clegg proposed that more than 46 million people would be handed shares in Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group under the "people's bank" plan. The plan proposes that ordinary voters would be able to profit from any increase in the value of their shares once the Treasury has recouped taxpayers' money used for the bail-out – an offer that could eventually be worth up to £1,000 to householders. Clegg said that it was "psychologically immensely important" for people to be given a stake in the banks in the wake of the financial crisis. "Their money has been used to the tune of billions and billions and billions to keep the British banking system on a life-support system," he said. The taxpayer owns 84 per cent of RBS and 43 per cent of Lloyds after the Government spent £65.8 billion buying shares at the height of the financial crisis. The share price of both banks has fallen sharply since the bail-out.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Aides close to Cameron and George Osborne warned that the Liberal Democrat scheme could cost £250 million to establish and would prove an "administrative nightmare". However Stephen Williams said "We are absolutely convinced it (standard privatisation) would not be cheaper, we are absolutely convinced of that." A Downing Street spokesman said that the Liberal Democrat plan was "an option". "The Treasury has said it is going to look at all the options and this will be one of those options," the spokesman said. "We will be driven by making sure that we deliver the best value for the taxpayer." The Treasury also played down the likelihood of the proposal becoming reality. A source said Mr Osborne was "happy to listen to ideas" but the "issue doesn't currently arise".


title: Nick Clegg

text: In August 2012, after reform of the House of Lords was abandoned, Clegg said the Conservatives had defied the Coalition agreement by trying to "pick and choose" which items of Government policy they support. The row marked one of the most serious crises for the Coalition since the 2010 general election. Jeremy Hunt, the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport, said he was "very disappointed", describing the decision as a "great shame". Clegg said that favoured by the Conservatives to make sure the Coalition is a fair and equal partnership. "My party has held to that [Coalition] contract even when it meant voting for things that we found difficult," he said. "But the Conservative party is not honouring the commitment to Lords reform and, as a result, part of our contract has now been broken." Clegg also revealed the Conservatives rejected his suggestion of a "last ditch" compromise to save both policies. "Clearly I cannot permit a situation where Conservative rebels can pick and choose the parts of the contract they like, while Liberal Democrat MPs are bound to the entire agreement," he said.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In September 2012, Clegg formally announced that he was "regrettably" withdrawing proposals to reform the Lords in the face of overwhelming opposition from Conservative MPs. He signalled he would exact his revenge by refusing to sack any Liberal Democrat minister who voted against changes to MPs' boundaries – which is Government policy – in retaliation over the Lords reform débâcle. Traditionally party leaders are offered peerages when they leave the House of Commons. When asked by the Member of Parliament for Bolsover Dennis Skinner, from the Labour Party, if he would take a seat in the Lords, he said: "No", adding: "I personally will not take a seat in an unreformed House of Lords. It just sticks in the throat."


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg retained his Sheffield Hallam seat in the 2015 election, despite a strong campaign from Labour with a 17% swing in the vote. Clegg campaigned for Remain in the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, as did all other Liberal Democrat MPs, and became the Lib Dem spokesperson for Exiting the European Union and International Trade.


title: Nick Clegg

text: After Clegg became leader, the polls were mixed; the Liberal Democrats occasionally polled above 20 points, averaging around 19%. In May 2009, the party overtook Labour in an opinion poll (25%–22%) for the first time since the days of its predecessor, the SDP–Liberal Alliance, in 1987. Clegg thus became the first Liberal Democrat leader to out-poll Labour in an opinion poll. After Clegg's performance in the first of three general election debates on 15 April 2010, there was an unprecedented surge of media attention and support for the Liberal Democrats in opinion polls. ComRes reported the Liberal Democrats at 24% on the day, and on 20 April in a YouGov poll, the Liberal Democrats were on 34%, one point above the Conservatives, with Labour in third place on 28%. This success was described as by journalists.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Following the formation of the coalition, support for the Liberal Democrats fell. On 8 December 2010, the eve of a House of Commons vote on changes in the funding of higher education, an opinion poll conducted by YouGov recorded voting intention figures of Conservatives 41%, Labour 41%, other parties 11% and Liberal Democrats 8%, the lowest level of support recorded for the Liberal Democrats in any opinion poll since September 1990.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Five parliamentary by-elections were held during Clegg's leadership prior to the 2010 general election. At Crewe and Nantwich the party's share of the vote decreased by 4%. In the subsequent Henley by-election the party achieved a 1.8% increase in their vote. At the Norwich North by-election the party came third with a 2.2% fall in their vote share. The two Scottish by-elections, Glenrothes and Glasgow East, saw decreases in the Liberal Democrat vote, 8% and 10% respectively.


title: Nick Clegg

text: The local election results for the Liberal Democrats during the same period were mixed. In the 2008 local elections the Liberal Democrats took second place with 25% of the vote making a net gain of 34 councillors and took control of Sheffield City Council, but their share of the vote was down 1%. The next year the Liberal Democrats gained Bristol but lost both Somerset and Devon producing a net loss of councils and a net loss of one councillor. The party however did increase its share of the vote by 3% to 28% beating the Labour Party into third place. In the European Parliament elections held on the same day, the Liberal Democrats gained a seat but had a slight decrease in their share of the vote, staying in 4th place compared to the previous European elections, behind the two main parties and UKIP.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In the 2008 London Assembly elections the Liberal Democrats were the only one of the three main parties to see a decrease in their share of the vote, and in the mayoral election the Liberal Democrat candidate Brian Paddick came third again with a decreased share of the vote.


title: Nick Clegg

text: At the 2010 general election, the Liberal Democrats won 23% of the vote, an improvement of 1%, however they only won 57 seats, 5 fewer than in 2005. No political party had an overall majority, resulting in the nation's first hung parliament since February 1974. Talks between Cameron, the Conservative Party leader, and Clegg led to an agreed Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition, enabling the Queen to invite Cameron to form a government.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Since the 2010 general election, Clegg's Liberal Democrats have contested 13 by-elections in Great Britain (as of 2 March 2013). The party scored their first by-election win of Clegg's leadership at Eastleigh in 2013, with Mike Thornton holding the seat for the Liberal Democrats, despite a 19% swing away from the party. Clegg described the result as an election in which Liberal Democrats "overcame the odds with a stunning victory."


title: Nick Clegg

text: Earlier by-elections in the parliament had proven less successful. They failed to win Oldham East and Saddleworth in January 2011, after they had successfully petitioned to overturn the general election result. They polled 32% of the vote, a small increase on 2010, but lost out to Labour whose vote was up by 10 percentage points. The Liberal Democrats also came second at Leicester South (which they had held between 2004 and 2005) in May 2011 with 23% (down 4% on 2010), and at Manchester Central in November 2012 where they polled 9% (down 17%).


title: Nick Clegg

text: In the remaining nine contests, Liberal Democrats have finished no higher than third place (and in Rotherham finished in an unprecedented 8th position, with just 451 votes, or 2% of the total). In every by-election except Oldham East and Saddleworth their vote has fallen, with decreases of over 10% recorded at eight of the contests. In six of the 13 by-elections, the party have lost their deposit after failing to poll 5% of the vote – an unusually high number of such lost deposits for a major party.


title: Nick Clegg

text: A year following the formation of the Coalition Clegg's Liberal Democrats faced poor results in the local elections. In Scotland the party lost all its mainland constituency seats, holding only the Shetland and Orkney islands. Their constituency vote share also fell from 16% to just 8% In the Welsh elections the party held just one of its 3 constituency seats, that of Welsh leader Kirsty Williams, but gained a regional seat. In the 2011 local elections, the Lib Dems lost over 700 councillors, and slumped from 25% to 17% in the share of the local council vote, also losing control of Sheffield City Council with the LibDems dropping to the lowest number of councillors in more than 20 years.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In the AV referendum, the Yes vote, supported by the Liberal Democrats, was defeated by 67.9% to 32.1%. In the face of the election results, Clegg told the BBC that Liberal Democrats must "get up, dust ourselves down and move on".


title: Nick Clegg

text: Local elections were held in May 2012 to 185 local authorities in Great Britain, including all 32 councils in Scotland and 21 out of 22 in Wales.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Results again proved poor for the Liberal Democrats, as they won 431 seats in total, a loss of over 300 on the pre-election position. They also lost overall control of one council (Cambridge, though the Liberal Democrats hold 21 out of 42 seats, so they exercise control with the mayor's casting vote). They retained control of the other six councils they were defending in England. Despite the losses, the Liberal Democrat vote share saw a modest increase compared to 2011.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Elections were also held for the Mayoralties of Salford and Liverpool. Liberal Democrat candidates polled 5% and 6% respectively, with Labour winning both contests.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In London, elections were held to the London Assembly and Mayoralty. The Liberal Democrats again selected Brian Paddick as their Mayoral candidate. He polled just 4% of the vote (down from 10% in 2008), and finished fourth behind the Green Party. In the Assembly, the Liberal Democrats also finished behind the Greens across London, and failed to win any of the individual constituency seats. They polled 7% of the vote on the London-wide list (which elects "top-up" candidates to the assembly under a form of proportional representation), which represented a decline of 5% on the previous contest. This meant that the party lost one seat, and was reduced to just two assembly seats, their smallest representation since the formation of the assembly in 2000.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In the aftermath of the results, Clegg again faced calls to quit as leader, with former MP Lembit Öpik suggesting that Clegg retain his Cabinet position while relinquishing leadership of the party, saying "My empirical view is that we would have done better with a different leader".


title: Nick Clegg

text: As part of the Coalition Agreement, directly elected Police and Crime Commissioners were introduced to replace Police Authorities. Elections to the new posts took place in November 2012. Liberal Democrats contested 24 of the 41 police force areas, and failed to win any of the contests (and in fact never progressed to the second round of the two-stage count in any of the elections they fought). Their best performance was in Cumbria, where they polled 22%, while their worst was Surrey where the took just 6% of the vote.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Despite not winning any contests under their official party label, one Liberal Democrat, Winston Roddick was elected as Police and Crime Commissioner for North Wales having stood as an Independent. Roddick claimed that he had never hidden his party membership and that his campaign was "financed by himself with no donations or backing from any political party and he was an independent candidate in every sense of the word". His campaign also dismissed as "sour grapes" claims from the Labour Party that "the only way in which the Lib Dems thought they could win the election was by presenting themselves as independent."


title: Nick Clegg

text: In the 2015 general election, the Liberal Democrats were reduced from 57 seats to 8. Clegg held his Sheffield Hallam seat with a reduced majority. After his party's result, he resigned the party leadership the day after the election.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In the 2017 general election, Clegg lost to Labour candidate Jared O'Mara by a margin of 2,125 votes (4.2%).


title: Nick Clegg

text: In October 2017, Clegg wrote "How To Stop Brexit (And Make Britain Great Again)", which made the case that Brexit was not inevitable.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In May 2018, he joined David Miliband and Nicky Morgan calling for a soft Brexit. The next month he appeared at a People's Vote march in London to mark the second anniversary of the EU referendum of 2016. People's Vote was a campaign group calling for a public vote on the final Brexit deal between Britain and the EU.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In July 2019, Clegg said that "aggressive and regressive English nationalism" had taken over the Conservative Party in their competition with Nigel Farage, the leader of the Brexit Party established in November 2018. When asked how he expected the next few years to unfold, Clegg told the "New Statesman" that "the clock is now ticking for the end of the union of the United Kingdom".


title: Nick Clegg

text: Since January 2013 Clegg has presented a weekly radio show on LBC called "Call Clegg". Initially broadcast in the London area, the programme went national along with LBC in February 2014. The programme was nominated for two Radio Academy Awards in 2014. Since April 2018, Clegg has fronted a podcast called "Anger Management with Nick Clegg", in which he interviews known persons about the politics of anger. Since the first episode, it has been featured in "The Guardian" under Podcast of the Week.


title: Nick Clegg

text: A party political broadcast in which Clegg apologised for the Liberal Democrats breaking the promise over tuition fees was remixed into a song, "Nick Clegg Says I'm Sorry" by The Poke and Alex Ross, and sold on iTunes as a charity single. The song charted on 23 September 2012 at number 143 in the Official UK Singles Charts before climbing to 104 the following week. In his 2010 production Dandelion Mind, comedian Bill Bailey sang "Nick Clegg you don't have to wear that dress tonight, walk the streets for money, you don't have to sell your body to the right" to the tune of "Roxanne".


title: Nick Clegg

text: In June 2018, vice-president of global affairs and communications at Facebook, Inc. Elliot Schrage announced he would be resigning his position. After talks with the Facebook leadership and Richard Allan, Baron Allan of Hallam, Facebook's Director of Policy in Europe and the Liberal Democrat MP for Sheffield Hallam before Clegg, in October 2018 it was announced that Clegg had been hired as a lobbyist and public relations officer, replacing Schrage as Vice-President, Global Affairs and Communications. He joined Facebook because he was "convinced that the culture is changing" and that "lawmakers need to have a serious conversation about whether data-intensive companies allow other companies to share and use data". He admitted that the Cambridge Analytica data scandal had "rocked Facebook to its very foundations" and told the BBC that the company "hadn't done enough in the past" in regards to data privacy.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In April 2019, Clegg was accused by Věra Jourová, European Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality, in a letter signed by a number of senior EU civil servants, of misunderstanding EU law, stating that proposed new Facebook guidelines on political advertising would "hinder the exercise of EU electoral rights." In May 2019, he rejected calls by American presidential candidates Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris, as well as Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes to break Facebook up, saying that Facebook was "a great American success story" and that "I don't think it's a very American tradition to start penalizing success." In June 2019, Clegg said there was "absolutely no evidence" that Russia had influenced the outcome of the EU referendum using Facebook. He said that the company was working towards greater regulation of technology firms. In October 2019, Damian Collins, chair of the British House of Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee, formally asked Clegg to explain why Facebook had exempted political statements from fact-checking guidelines.


title: Nick Clegg

text: In 2020, Clegg helped lead the creation of the Facebook Oversight Board, which reported to him, convincing former Danish Prime Minister and former College of Europe friend Helle Thorning-Schmidt to serve as its co-chair. He then played a role in Facebook's deplatforming of U.S. President Donald Trump in mid-2021.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Ahead of the release of the whistleblown Facebook Files in October 2021, Clegg authored an internal memo saying that there was no evidence Facebook was a main cause in polarisation and that the company does not "profit from polarization, in fact, just the opposite." He later posted a public statement saying that the reporting on the Files "conferred egregiously false motives to Facebook's leadership and employees," saying that it was "just plain false" that Facebook ignored its own internal research. After the release of the Files, he then made a number of public interviews defending the company. In one of the interviews, he stated that "I can't give you a yes or no answer" when asked if Facebook played a role in amplifying extremist content ahead of the 2021 United States Capitol attack. Clegg faced criticism for his role in defending the company, with "The Guardian" journalist John Harris dubbing him "the fall guy for Facebook's failures".


title: Nick Clegg

text: In September 2000, Clegg married Miriam González Durántez, from Valladolid, Spain. They have three sons. While Clegg has stated that he does not believe in God, his wife is a Roman Catholic and they are bringing up their children as Catholics. On 16 September 2010, during Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the United Kingdom, Clegg attended the State reception in the grounds of Holyrood Palace and was introduced to the Pope by Her Majesty the Queen. Clegg identifies as a feminist.


title: Nick Clegg

text: Clegg lives in Atherton, California, having previously lived in Parkfields, Putney, south west London. He also has a house in his former constituency close to the Peak District, and often walked with his wife near Stanage Edge, which he describes as "one of the most romantic places in the world". In May 2010 Downing Street announced that Clegg and the Foreign Secretary William Hague would share use of Chevening, which is typically the official country residence of the Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom. In August 2022, Clegg announced he was returning to live in London for personal reasons, including being closer to elderly parents, dividing his working time between London and California.


title: Nick Clegg

text: When he appeared on "Desert Island Discs" in October 2010, his choice of discs included Johnny Cash, Prince and Radiohead and his luxury was a "stash of cigarettes". In an interview in April 2011, Clegg stated he dealt with the pressures of political office by reading novels late at night and he "cries regularly to music". He supports Arsenal F.C.


title: Bob Knight

text: Robert Montgomery Knight (born October 25, 1940) is an American former basketball coach. Nicknamed "the General", Knight won 902 NCAA Division I men's college basketball games, a record at the time of his retirement, and currently fourth all-time, behind his former player and assistant coach Mike Krzyzewski of Duke, Roy Williams of University of North Carolina Men’s Basketball, and Jim Boeheim of Syracuse, of whom Boeheim is still active. Knight is best known as the head coach of the Indiana Hoosiers from 1971 to 2000. He also coached at Texas Tech (2001–2008) and at Army (1965–1971).


title: Bob Knight

text: While at Army, he led the Black Knights to four post-season tournament appearances in six seasons, winning two-thirds of his games along the way. His success at Army led to his being a candidate for several major university jobs, including Wisconsin and Indiana. After taking the job at Indiana, Knight led his teams to three NCAA championships, one National Invitation Tournament (NIT) championship, and 11 Big Ten Conference championships. His 1975–76 team went undefeated during the regular season and won the 1976 NCAA tournament. Knight received National Coach of the Year honors four times and Big Ten Coach of the Year honors eight times. In 1984, he coached the USA men's Olympic team to a gold medal, becoming one of only three basketball coaches to win an NCAA title, NIT title, and an Olympic gold medal.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight was one of college basketball's most successful and innovative coaches, having popularized the motion offense. He has also been praised for running good programs (none of his teams were ever sanctioned by the NCAA for recruiting violations), and nearly all of his players graduated. Knight sparked controversy with his outspoken nature and demonstrative behavior. He once famously threw a chair across the court during a game, which was rewarded with an ejection. Knight was once arrested in Puerto Rico following a physical confrontation with a police officer. Knight regularly displayed a volatile nature and was sometimes accused of verbal conflicts with members of the press. He was also recorded on videotape appearing to have possibly grabbed one of his players by the neck. Knight remains "the object of near fanatical devotion" from many of his former players and Indiana fans. Nevertheless, Knight was accused of choking a player during practice. Following the incident, a "zero tolerance" policy was instituted specifically for coach Knight. After a subsequent run-in with a student, university president Myles Brand fired Knight in the fall of 2000. He went on to coach at Texas Tech, mostly without incident, from 2001 to 2008, in the seven full seasons he coached the Red Raiders, his teams qualified for a post-season tournament 5 times. He retired part way through the 2007-2008 season, and was replaced by his son Pat Knight at Texas Tech.


title: Bob Knight

text: In 2008, Knight joined ESPN as a men's college basketball studio analyst during Championship Week and for coverage of the NCAA Tournament. He continued covering college basketball for ESPN through the 2014–15 season.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight was born in 1940 in the town of Massillon, Ohio, and grew up in Orrville, Ohio. He began playing organized basketball at Orrville High School.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight continued at Ohio State in 1958 when he played for Basketball Hall of Fame coach Fred Taylor. Despite being a star player in high school, he played a reserve role as a forward on the 1960 Ohio State Buckeyes team that won the NCAA Championship and featured future Hall of Fame players John Havlicek and Jerry Lucas. The Buckeyes lost to the Cincinnati Bearcats in each of the next two NCAA Championship games, of which Knight was also a part.


title: Bob Knight

text: Due in part to the star power of those Ohio State teams, Knight usually received scant playing time, but that did not prevent him from making an impact. In the 1961 NCAA Championship game, Knight came off the bench with 1:41 on the clock and Cincinnati leading Ohio State, 61–59. In the words of then-Ohio State assistant coach Frank Truitt,


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight got the ball in the left front court and faked a drive into the middle. Then [he] crossed over like he worked on it all his life and drove right in and laid it up. That tied the game for us, and Knight ran clear across the floor like a 100-yard dash sprinter and ran right at me and said, 'See there, coach, I should have been in that game a long time ago!'


title: Bob Knight

text: In addition to lettering in basketball at Ohio State, it has been claimed that Knight also lettered in football and baseball; however, the official list of Ohio State football letter earners does not include Knight. Knight graduated with a degree in history and government in 1962.


title: Bob Knight

text: After graduating from Ohio State University in 1962, he coached junior varsity basketball at Cuyahoga Falls High School in Ohio for one year. Knight then enlisted in the United States Army and served on active duty from June 1963 to June 1965 and in the army reserves from June 1965 to May 1969. He conducted initial training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri and was transferred to West Point, New York in September 1963. He became a private first class.


title: Bob Knight

text: While in the army, he accepted an assistant coaching position with the Army Black Knights in 1963, where, two years later, he was named head coach at the relatively young age of 24. In six seasons at West Point, Knight won 102 games, with his first as a head coach coming against Worcester Polytechnic Institute. One of his players was Mike Krzyzewski, who later served as his assistant before becoming a Hall of Fame head coach at Duke. Mike Silliman was another of Knight's players at Army, and Knight was quoted as saying, "Mike Silliman is the best player I have ever coached."


title: Bob Knight

text: During his tenure at Army, Knight gained a reputation for having an explosive temper. For example, after Army's 66–60 loss to BYU and Hall of Fame coach Stan Watts in the semifinals of the 1966 NIT, Knight completely lost control, kicking lockers and verbally blasting the officials. Embarrassed, he later went to Watts' hotel room and apologized. Watts forgave him, and is quoted as saying, "I want you to know that you're going to be one of the bright young coaches in the country, and it's just a matter of time before you win a national championship."


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight was one of seven candidates vying to fill the Wisconsin men's basketball head coaching vacancy after John Erickson resigned to become the Milwaukee Bucks' first-ever general manager on April 3, 1968. He was offered the position but requested more time to think it over. By the time he returned to West Point, news that he was to become the Badgers' new coach was prematurely leaked to the local media. After consulting with Bo Schembechler who the previous year also had a negative experience as a Wisconsin football coaching candidate, Knight withdrew his candidacy and continued to coach at Army for three more seasons. Erickson's assistant coach John Powless was promoted instead.


title: Bob Knight

text: In 1971, Indiana University hired Knight as head coach. During his 29 years at the school, the Hoosiers won 662 games, including 22 seasons of 20 or more wins, while losing 239, a .735 winning percentage. In 24 NCAA tournament appearances at Indiana, Hoosier teams under Knight won 42 of 63 games (.667), winning titles in 1976, 1981, and 1987, while losing in the semi-finals in 1973 and 1992.


title: Bob Knight

text: In 1972–73, Knight's second year as coach, Indiana won the Big Ten championship and reached the Final Four, but lost to UCLA, who was on its way to its seventh consecutive national title. The following season, 1973–74, Indiana once again captured a Big Ten title. In the two following seasons, 1974–75 and 1975–76, the Hoosiers were undefeated in the regular season and won 37 consecutive Big Ten games, including two more Big Ten championships. The 1974–75 Hoosiers swept the entire Big Ten by an average of 22.8 points per game. However, in an 83–82 win against Purdue they lost consensus All-American forward Scott May to a broken left arm. With May's injury keeping him to 7 minutes of play, the No. 1 Hoosiers lost to Kentucky 92–90 in the Mideast Regional. The Hoosiers were so dominant that four starters – Scott May, Steve Green, Kent Benson and Quinn Buckner – would make the five-man All-Big Ten team. The following season, 1975–76, the Hoosiers went the entire season and 1976 NCAA tournament without a single loss, beating Michigan 86–68 in the title game. Immediately after the game, Knight lamented that "it should have been two." The 1976 Hoosiers remain the last undefeated NCAA Division I men's basketball team. Through these two seasons, Knight's teams were undefeated in the regular season, including a perfect 37–0 record in Big Ten games on their way to their third and fourth conference titles in a row. Behind the play of Mike Woodson, Indiana won the 1979 NIT championship.


title: Bob Knight

text: The 1979–80 Hoosiers, led by Mike Woodson and Isiah Thomas, won the Big Ten championship and advanced to the 1980 Sweet Sixteen. The following season, in 1980–81, Thomas and the Hoosiers once again won a conference title and won the 1981 NCAA tournament, Knight's second national title. In 1982–1983, with the strong play of Uwe Blab and All-Americans Ted Kitchel and Randy Wittman, the No. 1 ranked Hoosiers were favorites to win another national championship. However, with an injury to All-American Ted Kitchel mid-season, the Hoosiers' prospects were grim. Knight asked for fan support to rally around the team and, when the team ultimately won the Big Ten title, he ordered that a banner be hung for the team in Assembly Hall as a tribute to the fans, who he credited with inspiring the team to win its final three home games. Nevertheless, in the tournament Kitchel's absence was felt and the team lost to Kentucky in the 1983 Sweet Sixteen.


title: Bob Knight

text: The 1985–86 Hoosiers were profiled in a best-selling book "A Season on the Brink". To write it Knight granted author John Feinstein almost unprecedented access to the Indiana basketball program, as well as insights into Knight's private life. The following season, in 1986–87, the Hoosiers were led by All-American Steve Alford and captured a share of the Big Ten title. The team won Knight's third national championship (the school's fifth) against Syracuse in the 1987 NCAA tournament with a game-winning jump shot by Keith Smart with five seconds of play remaining in the championship game. In the 1988–1989 season the Hoosiers were led by All-American Jay Edwards and won a Big Ten championship.


title: Bob Knight

text: From 1990–91 through 1992–93, the Hoosiers posted 87 victories, the most by any Big Ten team in a three-year span, breaking the mark of 86 set by Knight's Indiana teams of 1974–76. Teams from these three seasons spent all but two of the 53 poll weeks in the top 10, and 38 of them in the top 5. They captured two Big Ten crowns in 1990–91 and 1992–93, and during the 1991–92 season reached the Final Four. During the 1992–93 season, the 31–4 Hoosiers finished the season at the top of the AP Poll, but were defeated by Kansas in the Elite Eight. Teams from this era included Greg Graham, Pat Knight, All-Americans Damon Bailey and Alan Henderson Brian Evans, and National Player of the Year Calbert Cheaney.


title: Bob Knight

text: Throughout the mid and late 1990s Knight continued to experience success with continual NCAA tournament appearances and a minimum of 19 wins each season. However, 1993 would be Knight's last conference championship and 1994 would be his last trip to the Sweet Sixteen.


title: Bob Knight

text: On March 14, 2000 (just before Indiana was to begin play in the NCAA tournament), the CNN Sports Illustrated network ran a piece on Robert Abbott's investigation of Knight in which former player Neil Reed claimed he had been choked by Knight during a practice in 1997. Knight denied the claims in the story. However, less than a month later, the network aired a tape of an Indiana practice from 1997 that appeared to show Knight placing his hand on the neck of Reed.


title: Bob Knight

text: In response, Indiana University president Myles Brand announced that he had adopted a "zero tolerance" policy with regard to Knight's behavior. Later in the year, in September 2000, Indiana freshman Kent Harvey (not a basketball player) reportedly said, "Hey, Knight, what's up?" to Knight. According to Harvey, Knight then grabbed him by the arm and lectured him for not showing him respect, insisting that Harvey address him as either "Mr. Knight" or "Coach Knight" instead of simply "Knight." Brand stated that this incident was only one of numerous complaints that occurred after the zero-tolerance policy had been put into place. Brand asked Knight to resign on September 10, and when Knight refused, Brand relieved him of his coaching duties effective immediately. Knight's dismissal was met with outrage from students. That night, thousands of Indiana students marched from Indiana University's Assembly Hall to Brand's home, burning Brand in effigy.


title: Bob Knight

text: Harvey was supported by some and vilified by many who claim he had intentionally set up Knight. Kent Harvey's stepfather, Mark Shaw, was a former Bloomington-area radio talk show host and Knight critic. On September 13, Knight said goodbye to a crowd of some 6,000 supporters in Dunn Meadow at Indiana University. He asked that they not hold a grudge against Harvey and that they continue to support the basketball team. Knight's firing made national headlines, including the cover of "Sports Illustrated" and around-the-clock coverage on ESPN.


title: Bob Knight

text: In a March 2017 interview on "The Dan Patrick Show", Knight stated that he had no interest in ever returning to Indiana. When host Dan Patrick commented that most of the administration that had fired Knight seventeen years earlier were no longer there, Knight said, "I hope they’re all dead."


title: Bob Knight

text: Following his dismissal from Indiana, Knight took a season off and was on the lookout for coaching vacancies. He accepted the head coaching position at Texas Tech, although his hiring was opposed by a faculty group that was led by Walter Schaller. When he was introduced at the press conference, Knight quipped, "This is without question the most comfortable red sweater I've had on in six years."


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight quickly improved the program, which had not been to an NCAA tournament since 1996. He led the team to postseason appearances in each of his first four years at the school (three NCAA Championship tournaments and one NIT). After a rough 2006 season, the team improved in 2007, finishing 21–13 and again making it to the NCAA tournament, where it lost to Boston College in the first round. The best performance by the Red Raiders under Knight came in 2005 when they advanced as far as the Sweet Sixteen. In both 2006 and 2007 under Knight, Texas Tech defeated two Top 10-ranked teams in consecutive weeks. During Knight's first six years at Texas Tech, the Red Raiders won 126 games, an average of 21 wins per season.


title: Bob Knight

text: On February 4, 2008, Knight announced his retirement. His son Pat Knight, the head coach designate since 2005, was immediately named as his successor at Texas Tech. The younger Knight had said that after many years of coaching, his father was exhausted and ready to retire. Just after achieving his 900th win, Knight handed the job over to Pat in the mid-season in part to allow him to get acquainted with coaching the team earlier, instead of having him wait until October, the start of the next season. Knight continued to live in Lubbock after he retired.


title: Bob Knight

text: In 1979, Knight guided the United States Pan American team to a gold medal in Puerto Rico. In 1984 Knight led the U.S. national team to a gold medal in the Olympic Games as coach of the 1984 basketball team (coaches do not receive medals in the Olympics). Players on the team included Michael Jordan and Knight's Indiana player and protégé Steve Alford.


title: Bob Knight

text: In 2008, ESPN hired Knight as a studio analyst and occasional color commentator. In November 2012, he called an Indiana men's basketball game for the first time, something he had previously refused to do. Former Indiana men's basketball coach Tom Crean reached out to Knight in an attempt to get him to visit the school again.


title: Bob Knight

text: On February 27, 2019, Don Fischer, an IU radio announcer since 1974, said during an interview that Knight was in ill health. He continued by saying Knight's health “has declined” but did not offer any specifics.


title: Bob Knight

text: On April 4, 2019, Knight made his first public appearance since Fischer made his comments. He appeared with longtime friend and journalist Bob Hammel and spoke about different aspects of his career. During the presentation, Knight seemed to struggle with his memory: he re-introduced his wife to the audience after doing so only 10 minutes earlier, he mistakenly said that former IU basketball player Landon Turner had died, and, after telling a story about Michael Jordan, he later told the same story, replacing Jordan with former IU basketball player Damon Bailey.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight and his wife resided in Lubbock, Texas even after his retirement. On July 10, 2019, the "Indiana Daily Student", IU's campus newspaper, reported that Knight and his wife had purchased a home in Bloomington for $572,500, suggesting that Knight had decided to return to Bloomington to live.


title: Bob Knight

text: On February 8, 2020, Knight was honored at an Indiana basketball game. It was the first Indiana game attended by Knight since his dismissal by the school 20 years prior.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight was an innovator of the motion offense, which he perfected and popularized. The system emphasizes post players setting screens and perimeter players passing the ball until a teammate becomes open for an uncontested jump shot or lay-up. This required players to be unselfish, disciplined, and effective in setting and using screens to get open.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight's motion offense did not take shape until he began coaching at Indiana. Prior to that, at Army, he ran a "reverse action" that involved reversing the ball from one side of the floor to the other and screening along with it. According to Knight, it was a "West Coast offense" that Pete Newell used exclusively during his coaching career. After being exposed to the Princeton offense, Knight instilled more cutting with the offense he employed, which evolved into the motion offense that he ran for most of his career. Knight continued to develop the offense, instituting different cuts over the years and putting his players in different scenarios.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight was well known for the extreme preparation he put into each game and practice. He was often quoted as saying, "Most people have the will to win, few have the will to prepare to win." Often during practice, Knight would instruct his players to a certain spot on the floor and give them options of what to do based on how the defense might react. In contrast to set plays, Knight's offense was designed to react according to the defense.


title: Bob Knight

text: The 3-point shot was adopted by the NCAA in 1986, which was midway through Knight's coaching career. Although he opposed the rule change throughout his life, it did complement his offense well by improving the spacing on the floor. He sardonically said at the time that he supported institution of the three point shot because if a team's offense was functioning efficiently enough to get a layup the team should be rewarded with three points for that basket. Knight's offense also emphasized a two-count. Players in the post are expected to try to post in the paint for two seconds and if they do not receive the ball they go set a screen. Players with the ball are expected to hold the ball for two seconds to see where they are going to take it. Screens are supposed to be held for two seconds, as well.


title: Bob Knight

text: On defense Knight was known for emphasizing tenacious "man-to-man" defense where defenders contest every pass and every shot, and help teammates when needed. However, Knight has also incorporated a zone defense periodically after eschewing that defense for the first two decades of his coaching career.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight's coaching also included a firm emphasis on academics. All but four of his four-year players completed their degrees, which was a ratio of nearly 98 percent. Nearly 80 percent of his players graduated; this figure was much higher than the national average of 42 percent for Division 1 schools.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight's all time coaching record is 902–371. His 902 wins in NCAA Division I men's college basketball games is fourth all-time to Knight's former player Mike Krzyzewski, Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim, and North Carolina head Coach Roy Williams. Knight achieved his 880th career win on January 1, 2007 and passed retired North Carolina coach Dean Smith for most career victories, a title he held until his win total was surpassed by Krzyzewski on November 15, 2011, by Jim Boeheim on December 30, 2012, and by Roy Williams on March 11, 2021. Knight is the youngest coach to reach 200 (age 35), 300 (age 40) and 400 (age 44) wins. He was also among the youngest to reach other milestones of 500 (age 48) and 600 (age 52) wins.


title: Bob Knight

text: Texas Tech's participation in the 2007 NCAA tournament gave Knight more NCAA tournament appearances than any other coach. He is the only coach to win the NCAA, the NIT, an Olympic Gold medal, and a Pan American Games Gold medal. Knight is also one of only three people, along with Dean Smith and Joe B. Hall, who had both played on and coached an NCAA Tournament championship basketball team.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight received a number of personal honors during and after his coaching career. He was named the National Coach of the Year four times (1975, 1976, 1987, 1989) and Big Ten Coach of the Year eight times (1973, 1975, 1976, 1980, 1981, 1989, 1992, 1993). In 1975 he was a unanimous selection as National Coach of the Year, an honor he was accorded again in 1976 by the Associated Press, United Press International, and "Basketball Weekly". In 1987 he was the first person to be honored with the Naismith Coach of the Year Award. In 1989 he garnered National Coach of the Year honors by the AP, UPI, and the United States Basketball Writers Association. Knight was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1991.


title: Bob Knight

text: On November 17, 2006, Knight was recognized for his impact on college basketball as a member of the founding class of the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame. The following year, he was the recipient of the Naismith Award for Men's Outstanding Contribution to Basketball. Knight was also inducted into the Army Sports Hall of Fame (Class of 2008) and the Indiana Hoosiers athletics Hall of Fame (Class of 2009). In August 2003, he was honored as the first inductee in The Vince Lombardi Titletown Legends.


title: Bob Knight

text: A number of Knight's assistant coaches, players, and managers have gone on to be coaches. Among them are Hall of Fame Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, former UCLA coach Steve Alford, Murry Bartow, and former coach Dan Dakich,and NBA coaches Randy Wittman, Mike Woodson, Keith Smart, Isiah Thomas, former Evansville and current Eastern Illinois Coach Marty Simmons, former Saint Louis Coach Jim Crews, Lawrence Frank, and former Texas Tech and current University of Texas coach Chris Beard.


title: Bob Knight

text: In 1986, author John Feinstein published "A Season on the Brink", which detailed the 1985–86 season of the Indiana Hoosiers. Granted almost unprecedented access to the Indiana basketball program, as well as insights into Knight's private life, the book quickly became a major best-seller and spawned a new genre, as a legion of imitators wrote works covering a single year of a sports franchise. In the book Feinstein depicts a coach who is quick with a violent temper, but also one who never cheats and strictly follows all of the NCAA's rules.


title: Bob Knight

text: Two years later, author Joan Mellen penned the book "Bob Knight: His Own Man" (), in part to rebut Feinstein's "A Season on the Brink". Mellen deals with seemingly all the causes celebres in Knight's career and presents the view that he is more sinned against than sinning.


title: Bob Knight

text: In 1990, Robert P. Sulek wrote "Hoosier Honor: Bob Knight and Academic Success at Indiana University" which discusses the academic side of the basketball program. The book details all of the players that have played for Knight and what degree they earned.


title: Bob Knight

text: Only a month following his termination from IU, Rich J. Wolfe wrote "Oh, What a Knight: Knightmares" which is a two part book. Part One includes stories from people who have had positive interactions with Knight such as friends and former players, and Part Two is stories from people who have had negative interactions with Knight, such as the police officer who arrested Knight in Puerto Rico, and a Purdue basketball player who was playing in the game where Knight threw the chair.


title: Bob Knight

text: A number of close associates and friends of Knight have also written books about him. Former player and current Nevada Wolf Pack head basketball coach Steve Alford wrote "Playing for Knight: My Six Seasons with Bobby Knight", published in 1990. Former player Kirk Haston wrote "Days of Knight: How the General Changed My Life," published in 2016.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight's autobiography, written with longtime friend and sports journalist Bob Hammel, was titled "Knight: My Story" and published in 2003. Three years later Steve Delsohn and Mark Heisler wrote "Bob Knight: An Unauthorized Biography".


title: Bob Knight

text: In 2013, Knight and Bob Hammel published "The Power of Negative Thinking: An Unconventional Approach to Achieving Positive Results". Knight discusses his approach to preparing for a game by anticipating all of the things that could go wrong and trying to prevent it or having a plan to deal with it. In the book Knight also shares one of his favorite sayings, "Victory favors the team making the fewest mistakes."


title: Bob Knight

text: In 2017, sports reporter Terry Hutchens published "Following the General: Why Three Coaches Have Been Unable to Return Indiana Basketball to Greatness" which discussed Knight's coaching legacy with Indiana and how none of the coaches following him have been able to reach his level of success.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight has appeared or been featured in numerous films and television productions. In 1994 a feature film titled "Blue Chips" featured a character named Pete Bell, a volatile but honest college basketball coach under pressure to win who decides to blatantly violate NCAA rules to field a competitive team after a sub-par season. It starred Nick Nolte as Bell and NBA star Shaquille O'Neal as Neon Bodeaux, a once-in-a-lifetime player that boosters woo to his school with gifts and other perks. The coach's temper and wardrobe were modeled after Knight's, though at no time had Knight been known to illegally recruit. Knight himself appears in the movie and coaches against Nolte in the film's climactic game.


title: Bob Knight

text: ESPN's first feature-length film was "A Season on the Brink", a 2002 TV adaptation from John Feinstein's book. In the movie Knight is played by Brian Dennehy. ESPN also featured Knight in a reality show titled "Knight School", which followed a handful of Texas Tech students as they competed for the right to join the basketball team as a non-scholarship player.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight made a cameo appearance as himself in the 2003 film "Anger Management". In 2008, Knight appeared in a commercial as part of Volkswagen's Das Auto series where Max, a 1964 black Beetle interviews famous people. When Knight talked about Volkswagen winning the best resale value award in 2008, Max replied, "At least one of us is winning a title this year." This prompted Knight to throw his chair off the stage and walk out saying, "I may not be retired."


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight also made an appearance in a TV commercial for with fellow coaches Mike Krzyzewski, Rick Pitino, and Roy Williams, in a parody of Tom Cruise in "Risky Business".


title: Bob Knight

text: In 2009, Knight produced three instructional coaching DVD libraries—on motion offense, man-to-man defense, and instilling mental toughness—with Championship Productions.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight married the former Nancy Falk on April 17, 1963. They had two sons, Tim and Pat, but the couple divorced in 1985. Pat played at Indiana from 1991 to 1995 and served as head coach at Lamar from the time of his father's retirement until he was dismissed in 2014. Pat Knight coached Texas Tech after his father's retirement before he moved to Lamar. In 1988, Knight married his second wife, Karen Vieth Edgar, a former Oklahoma high school basketball coach.


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight has a high regard for education and has made generous donations to the schools he has been a part of, particularly libraries. At Indiana University Knight endowed two chairs, one in history and one in law. He also raised nearly $5 million for the Indiana University library system by championing a library fund to support the library's activities. The fund was ultimately named in his honor.


title: Bob Knight

text: When Knight came to Texas Tech in 2001, he gave $10,000 to the library, the first gift to the Coach Knight Library Fund which has now collected over $300,000. On November 29, 2007, the Texas Tech library honored this with "A Legacy of Giving: The Bob Knight Exhibit".


title: Bob Knight

text: Knight supported Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, and later made an appearance at his rally in Indianapolis for the 2018 midterms. At the rally, Knight called Trump "a great defender of the United States of America".


title: Bob Knight

text: It was reported years after the incident that Knight choked and punched IU's longtime sports information director, Kit Klingelhoffer, in the 1970s, over a news release that upset the coach.


title: 2017 Gujarat Legislative Assembly election

text: The 14th Gujarat Legislative Assembly election, 2017 was held on 9 December 2017 and 14 December 2017 in the Indian state of Gujarat to elect the Members of Legislative Assembly (MLA). The votes were counted on 18 December. All 182 members of the 14th Gujarat Legislative Assembly were elected with the leader of the largest party or coalition expected to become the next chief minister.


text: The incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party obtained a simple majority with an increase in the vote share. Despite suffering a decrease in the number of seats, the incumbent government retained a simple majority in the house. The vote share and number of seats for Congress increased from the previous election in 2012. This was the highest number of seats won by the Congress in the last 32 years (after the 1985 election, in which Congress won 149 seats). The next election will be in December 2022.