title: Unfinished Sympathy

text: Sean O'Hagan of "The Guardian" described the clip as a "benchmark in modern video direction, more a breathtaking short film than a mere pop promo". English alternative rock band The Verve later paid homage to it in the video for their 1997 song "Bitter Sweet Symphony", which in turn was parodied in the video for the song "Vindaloo" by Fat Les.


title: Unfinished Sympathy

text: "Unfinished Sympathy" was released as the second single from "Blue Lines" on 11 February 1991. As the single was released in the midst of the Gulf War, the word "attack" was temporarily dropped from the group's name at the advice of their record company and management. The name "Massive Attack" had previously been deemed "unpatriotic" by the BBC – thus, the name change was carried out to prevent the single from being banned from airplay. The single was a commercial success for the group, managing to chart highly in several European countries. "Unfinished Sympathy" became a number-one hit on the Dutch Top 40 and peaked at number two on the Dutch Mega Single Top 100 chart. It also gave the group their first major hit in the United Kingdom, where it peaked at number 13 on the UK Singles Chart, remaining on the chart for nine weeks. But on the UK Dance Singles Chart, it hit number three. The single reached the top ten in Switzerland and the top twenty in Germany and the Flanders region of Belgium. Outside of Europe, it peaked at number 48 in New Zealand.


title: Unfinished Sympathy

text: Upon its release the single received widespread critical acclaim from the music press. The "NME" made it single of the week and called it "an intense, warmblooded dance track that boasts more fire in its balls than the Pixies ever dug for" (referring to the Pixies' recently released single "Dig for Fire"). In "Record Mirror", where it was also crowned single of the week, the review said, "The wisely understated production allows both the beauty of the swelling strings and the emotional pull of the vocals to shine through. Fiendishly expert with rhythms, too cerebral to be termed just a dance act, Massive can't put a foot wrong." Although it was not reviewed in "Melody Maker" at the time of its release, in December 1991 the magazine made "Unfinished Sympathy" its single of the year, stating that it "will unquestionably stand as one of the greatest soul records of all time". The song was also placed at number eight in the "NME" critics' list of the singles of the year.


title: Unfinished Sympathy

text: Former "Record Mirror" writer and BBC Northern Ireland presenter Stuart Bailie stated that, "It was soul music. But it had bold, symphonic arrangements. It featured samples of the Mahavishnu Orchestra going 'hey, hey hey, hey'. It had funky breaks and an emotional power that was hard to figure. It sounded anxious and lost. But there was a grandeur in the music also. People who came across the record became obsessed, spinning it endlessly."


title: Unfinished Sympathy

text: Elsewhere in music media, "Unfinished Sympathy" has frequently been placed highly on lists of "the best songs of all time":


title: Unfinished Sympathy

text: According to Acclaimed Music, a site which uses statistics to numerically represent critical reception, "Unfinished Sympathy" is the fifth most well-received song of the 1990s, and the 63rd of all time.


title: Ze (Cyrillic)

text: The shape of Ze is very similar to the Arabic numeral three , and should not be confused with the Cyrillic letter E .


title: Ze (Cyrillic)

text: In the Early Cyrillic alphabet its name was ("zemlja"), meaning "earth". The shape of the letter originally looked similar to a Greek or Latin letter Z with a tail on the bottom (). Though a majuscule form of this variant () is encoded in Unicode, historically it was only used as caseless or lowercase.


title: Ze (Cyrillic)

text: Medieval Cyrillic manuscripts and Church Slavonic printed books have two variant forms of the letter Zemlja: з and . Only the form was used in the oldest ustav (uncial) writing style; з appeared in the later poluustav (half-uncial) manuscripts and typescripts, where the two variants are found at proportions of about 1:1. Some early grammars tried to give a phonetic distinction to these forms (like palatalized vs. nonpalatalized sound), but the system had no further development. Ukrainian scribes and typographers began to regularly use З/з in an initial position, and otherwise (a system in use till the end of the 19th century). Russian scribes and typographers largely abandoned the widespread use of the variant in favor of з in the wake of Patriarch Nikon's reforms. They still used the older form mostly in the case of two З's in row: (the system in use till the mid-18th century).


title: Ze (Cyrillic)

text: The civil (Petrine) script knows only one shape of the letter: З/з. However, shapes similar to Z/z can be used in certain stylish typefaces.


title: Ze (Cyrillic)

text: In calligraphy and in general handwritten text, lowercase з can be written either fully over the baseline (similar to the printed form) or with the lower half under the baseline and with the loop (for the Russian language, a standard shape since the middle of the 20th century).


title: Ze (Cyrillic)

text: A letter that looks like Cyrillic Ze (actually, a stylization of digit 3) was used in the Latin Zhuang alphabet from 1957 to 1986 to represent the third (high) tone. In 1986, it was replaced by .


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe is a city in eastern Riverside County, California, United States. It is in the Palo Verde Valley of the Lower Colorado River Valley region, an agricultural area and part of the Colorado Desert along the Colorado River, approximately east of Los Angeles and west of Phoenix. Blythe was named after Thomas Henry Blythe, a San Francisco financier, who established primary water rights to the Colorado River in the region in 1877. The city was incorporated on July 21, 1916. The population was 18,317 at the 2020 census.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe was named after Thomas Henry Blythe, a San Francisco businessman and entrepreneur. Mr. Blythe established primary water rights to the Colorado River in the southwestern California region in 1877. The town was originally named Blythe City, by Thomas Blythe himself, but the name was shortened to simply "Blythe" around the time the first post office was opened in 1908.


title: Blythe, California

text: In the early or mid-1870s, William Calloway (known as Oliver Calloway in some sources), an engineer and a former captain of the 1st California Infantry Regiment, explored an area across the Colorado River from Ehrenberg, Arizona, and found its potential for development. Calloway made preliminary surveys and filed land claims under the Swamp Land Act of 1850. He interested the wealthy San Francisco "Capitalist" Thomas Henry Blythe (originally born Thomas Williams in Mold, Wales) to undertake development and settlement of an "empire" located next to the Colorado. Together they purchased a total of 140,000 acres under the Swamp Land Act, and another 35,000 acres under the Desert Land Act of 1877.


title: Blythe, California

text: On July 17, 1877, Blythe filed his first claim for Colorado River water on what was to become the "Blythe Intake". Blythe appointed another man named George Irish as manager to assist Calloway in building an irrigation system. Calloway died in a Chemehuevi attack on March 28, 1880, and was replaced by C.C. Miller, the father of Frank Augustus Miller. Thomas Blythe died on April 4, 1883; his only revisit to the valley was in November 1882. After his death, the work in the valley halted and Blythe's estate subsequently went into litigation between his illegitimate daughter Florence and other claimants, the trial beginning in 1889. In the 1900s, Florence was awarded the estate, after several years of preceding rulings in favor of her and appeals against her.


title: Blythe, California

text: Frank Murphy and Ed Williams, who were involved with the cattle industry in southeastern Arizona, came to the area in 1904 and were convinced it was well-suited for cattle and farming. With the Hobson brothers from Ventura County, they bought Blythe's estate and formed the Palo Verde Land and Water Company. During 1911–1912, W.F. Holt, who helped develop nearby Imperial Valley, was the company's general manager.


title: Blythe, California

text: On August 8, 1916, the California Southern Railroad reached Blythe from the desert station of Rice, then known as Blythe Junction. It was later renamed to honor G.W. Rice, an engineer and superintendent of the railroad. The dramatic growth in the valley following this event attracted national attention. Production totals increased annually from virtually nothing to near $8,000,000 in few years, primarily from cotton and cotton seed shipped to the ports. The lower cotton prices in 1920 ended this prosperous time. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway began leasing the line in 1921 and acquired it at the end of 1942.


title: Blythe, California

text: The first automobile bridge over the Colorado River between Blythe and Ehrenberg was constructed in 1928 to replace a cable ferry service. The bridge's successor was built in the early 1960s and was expanded to four lanes and a pedestrian walkway in early 1974.


title: Blythe, California

text: In 1935, the completion of Boulder Dam extinguished the annual destructive floods in the valley. As noted during the city's fiftieth anniversary, some forty crops were grown on the farms, and large cattle feeds were another aspect of the agriculture industry. As of 1947, the Fisher ranch had the biggest herd of registered Brahman cattle in California, the breeding stock having been sold to western states and other countries.


title: Blythe, California

text: During World War II, Blythe was the site of United States Army Air Forces facilities at the Blythe Airport and the Gary Field.


title: Blythe, California

text: In 1972, Interstate 10 was built through the city, replacing US 60 and the previously decommissioned US 70 on Hobsonway as the main thoroughfare.


title: Blythe, California

text: In 2016, the voter-approved recreational use of cannabis in California has made the cannabis industry drawn to the economically declined city due to lower land prices, water, and potentially lower taxes compared to other parts of the state.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe is located near the California/Arizona border in the Colorado Desert section of the Sonoran Desert, at the junction of Interstate 10 and US 95. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and (2.9%) is water.


title: Blythe, California

text: Nearby communities include Vidal to the north, Ripley to the south, Desert Center to the west, and Ehrenberg, Arizona, to the east. Major cities in the region include Yuma (85 miles), Indio (95 miles), Phoenix (150 miles), San Bernardino (170 miles), Riverside (172 miles), and Las Vegas (200 miles). Blythe is within 4 hours via car of 10% of the United States' population.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe has a hot desert climate, featuring extremely hot summers and mild winters. There are an average of 178.4 days with highs of or higher. There are an average of 18.9 days with lows of or lower. Until 2016, the record high temperature was on July 7, 1920, and June 24, 1929. But on June 20, 2016, that long-standing record was shattered when Blythe reached . The record low temperature was on January 6, 1913. There are an average of 16 days with measurable precipitation. The wettest year was 1951 with and the driest year was 1956 with . The most rainfall in one month was in August 1951, which included the 24-hour record rainfall of on August 27.


title: Blythe, California

text: At the airport, there are an average of 176.0 days with highs of or higher. There are an average of 5.4 days with lows of or lower. The record high temperature was on June 20, 2016. The record low temperature was on January 8, 1971. There are an average of 17 days with measurable precipitation. The wettest year was 1992 with and the driest year was 1953 with . The most rainfall in one month was in August 1951, which included the 24-hour record rainfall of on August 26.


title: Blythe, California

text: Also notable is the geological history of Blythe – despite California's reputation for earthquakes, according to geologists Blythe has not had an earthquake centered in the city for over 500,000 years.


title: Blythe, California

text: Tourism is a major component of the local economy. Blythe is a stopover city with full services for travelers between any of the nearby regions, in particular the major cities of Los Angeles and Phoenix, since it is approximately midway between those two metropolitan areas. The winter months bring visitors avoiding the colder climates of the north, when the population of the area within 50 miles (80 km) of Blythe has been known to exceed 500,000.


title: Blythe, California

text: XPO Logistics freight has a large facility here. It is used mainly at night for cross dock operations, as there is seldom a need to make deliveries here.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe also contains 24 churches, one library, two newspapers ("Palo Verde Valley Times", "The Desert Independent"), two museums, two radio stations (KERU-FM and KJMB-FM ), three banks, a three-screen movie theater (now closed), one funeral home and an 18,500 sq ft (1,720 m). recreation center. The area is popular with campers and hikers and has six parks, seven campgrounds, seven RV parks, 3 boat ramps onto the Colorado River, and an 18-hole public golf course.


title: Blythe, California

text: The 2010 United States Census reported that Blythe had a population of 20,817. The population density was . The racial makeup of Blythe was 12,396 (59.5%) White (28.3% Non-Hispanic White), 3,126 (15.0%) African American, 243 (1.2%) Native American, 319 (1.5%) Asian, 32 (0.2%) Pacific Islander, 4,045 (19.4%) from other races, and 656 (3.2%) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 11,068 persons (53.2%).


title: Blythe, California

text: The Census reported that 12,972 people (62.3% of the population) lived in households, 82 (0.4%) lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, and 7,763 (37.3%) were institutionalized.


title: Blythe, California

text: There were 4,513 households, out of which 1,972 (43.7%) had children under the age of 18 living in them, 1,995 (44.2%) were opposite-sex married couples living together, 855 (18.9%) had a female householder with no husband present, 344 (7.6%) had a male householder with no wife present. There were 396 (8.8%) unmarried opposite-sex partnerships, and 24 (0.5%) same-sex married couples or partnerships. 1,071 households (23.7%) were made up of individuals, and 367 (8.1%) had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.87. There were 3,194 families (70.8% of all households); the average family size was 3.41.


title: Blythe, California

text: The population was spread out, with 4,157 people (20.0%) under the age of 18, 1,770 people (8.5%) aged 18 to 24, 7,332 people (35.2%) aged 25 to 44, 5,764 people (27.7%) aged 45 to 64, and 1,794 people (8.6%) who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38.0 years. For every 100 females, there were 218.1 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 268.1 males.


title: Blythe, California

text: There were 5,473 housing units at an average density of , of which 2,358 (52.2%) were owner-occupied, and 2,155 (47.8%) were occupied by renters. The homeowner vacancy rate was 4.0%; the rental vacancy rate was 10.3%. 6,913 people (33.2% of the population) lived in owner-occupied housing units and 6,059 people (29.1%) lived in rental housing units.


title: Blythe, California

text: According to the 2010 United States Census, Blythe had a median household income of $48,327, with 16.1% of the population living below the federal poverty line.


title: Blythe, California

text: A large portion of the city's population are inmates in the Chuckawalla Valley and Ironwood State Prisons. Both hold up to 3,000 prisoners each.


title: Blythe, California

text: As of the census of 2000, there were 12,155 people, 4,103 households, and 2,974 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 4,891 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 55.4% White, 8.3% Black or African American, 1.4% Native American, 1.4% Asian, 0.2% Pacific Islander, 28.8% from other races, and 4.5% from two or more races. 45.8% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race.


title: Blythe, California

text: There were 4,103 households, out of which 41.4% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 50.0% were married couples living together, 16.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 27.5% were non-families. 22.9% of all households were made up of individuals, and 7.1% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.91 and the average family size was 3.45.


title: Blythe, California

text: In the city, the population was spread out, with 33.9% under the age of 18, 8.7% from 18 to 24, 28.4% from 25 to 44, 19.0% from 45 to 64, and 9.9% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 31 years. For every 100 females, there were 99.2 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 97.0 males.


title: Blythe, California

text: The median income for a household in the city was $35,324, and the median income for a family was $40,783. Males had a median income of $32,342 versus $26,671 for females. The per capita income for the city was $14,424. About 19.0% of families and 20.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 24.9% of those under age 18 and 21.6% of those age 65 or over.


title: Blythe, California

text: The Blythe Heat was a winter professional minor league baseball team of the Arizona Winter League, and also a member of the Arizona Summer League, but the leagues folded in 2017. They play on Alexander Field in Todd Park facing the Palo Verde College. Some games of the Lake Havasu Heat (folded in 2009) of the semi-pro Pacific Southwest Baseball League played in Blythe during the summer months.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe has its own police department and volunteer fire department. The Riverside County Sheriff's Department also has a regional station in Blythe.


title: Blythe, California

text: Emergency medical services are provided by American Medical Response, which staffs two paramedic ambulances in the city 24 hours a day.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe area public elementary and secondary schools comprise the Palo Verde Unified School District, which contains 3 elementary schools and 1 high school, and continuation/adult education school. Palo Verde Community College District is part of the California Community College system and includes Palo Verde College in Blythe and an educational center in Needles. As of 2012, there is one private non-profit school, The Desert Learning Center, for grades K-8.


title: Blythe, California

text: Interstate 10 crosses Blythe in an east–west direction. State Route 78's eastern terminus is west of the town. U.S. Route 95 crosses Blythe in the eastern side. Lovekin Boulevard and Midland Road serve the ghost town of Midland.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe was served in rail by the Arizona and California Railroad but currently has no rail service since an embargo in late 2007 and abandonment in 2009.


title: Blythe, California

text: Health facilities in Blythe include Palo Verde Hospital, a General Acute Care Hospital with 55 total beds and 24-hour standby emergency services, 23 physicians/surgeons, 2 dentists, 2 optometrists, 1 chiropractor, and 1 podiatrist.


title: Blythe, California

text: Blythe has its own police department, the Blythe Police Department who patrol Blythe. However the highways in and around Blythe are managed by California Highway Patrol and the nearby Riverside County patrolled by Riverside County Sheriff's Department who also run the county jail.


title: Horsemen (film)

text: Horsemen is a 2009 American psychological horror thriller film directed by Jonas Åkerlund, written by David Callaham, produced by Michael Bay, and starring Dennis Quaid and Zhang Ziyi. It follows Aidan Breslin (Dennis Quaid), a bitter and emotionally distracted detective who has grown apart from his two sons after the death of his devoted wife. While investigating a series of murders, he discovers a terrifying link between himself and the suspects that seem to be based on the Biblical prophecies concerning the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: War, Famine, Conquest and Death. The film was shot in Winnipeg and was released on March 6, 2009.


title: Horsemen (film)

text: Detective Aidan Breslin is a widower who has become emotionally distanced from his two sons, Alex and Sean. Due to his dental forensics expertise, Breslin is called to investigate a crime scene that includes human teeth and a painted message: "come and see". After matching the teeth to a missing man, Breslin investigates the murder of a woman, Mrs. Spitz, who was discovered hanging from a hook contraption in her bedroom; the same message appears on four walls. According to her autopsy report, she drowned in her own blood due to a precise stabbing. They also discover Mrs. Spitz had been pregnant, and the fetus was removed. Aidan speculates there were four attackers, who recorded the murder. After leaving the crime scene, Breslin comforts the Spitz's adopted daughter, Kristen.


title: Horsemen (film)

text: The next murder shares the same M.O.; the similar hook contraption leads Breslin to a tattoo parlor whose owner constructed four devices. Another murder occurs, this time with no hooks and a message on three walls. While Breslin reviews the evidence at his home, Sean stumbles on one of the photographs. Sean's insights indirectly point Breslin to the Bible, where he discovers the killings are patterned after the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Each room corresponds to a horseman; the "come and see" message is a quotation from the Book of Revelation. Kristen contacts Breslin unexpectedly, and, during their conversation, Kristen produces the missing fetus, confessing to the stunned Breslin. During her interrogation, Breslin discovers the darker side of Kristen's personality, one similar to the horseman War.


title: Horsemen (film)

text: At Kristen's house, Breslin and his partner, Stingray, discover snuff videos and pictures of Kristen posing sexually with Mr. Spitz. Stingray and Breslin arrest Mr. Spitz, and his children are placed in protective custody. When Breslin confronts Kristen in jail, she claims to have been sexually abused for years and murdered Mrs. Spitz as punishment for her complicity and to hurt Mr. Spitz. Evidence discovered in the unrigged victim's stomach leads Breslin to a booby-trapped apartment. A suspect escapes, and magnesium ribbons destroy most of the evidence.


title: Horsemen (film)

text: Meanwhile, a gay young man, Corey, has a confrontation with his brother, Taylor. After Taylor insults him, Corey hands Taylor a drugged drink. As Taylor drunkenly stumbles out to his car, a thief accosts Corey in the parking lot. Corey stabs the man, who later provides the police with Corey's description. The precision of the stab wound, and a reference to Hell leads Breslin to assume it was done by the horseman Death. Elsewhere, Taylor awakens hooked onto a rig with his eyes fixed open. Corey attempts to cut out his own heart with a bone saw, killing himself in front of Taylor.


title: Horsemen (film)

text: Breslin, convinced that there may be another victim, questions Kristen, who confirms she represents War and the unrigged victim was Pestilence, who betrayed their trust. She refuses to identify their leader. Breslin realizes he was meant to be assigned to the case and becomes concerned his family will be targeted next. Breslin asks Stingray to go on ahead and check his house. At the Breslin home, Stingray is attacked and knocked out. Breslin arrives later and enters Alex's room for the first time in three years. To his horror, he realizes Alex is Conquest, their leader. A clue points him to the Metropolitan Theater, where Breslin met his wife. Alex sedates him, and, when he comes to, Breslin is handcuffed to a seat as Alex dangles over the stage on the final hook rig. As Alex bleeds to death, he describes the horsemen's emotional detachment from their families. Breslin rips his handcuffs off the seating and fires his gun to detach the rigging from the ceiling. Alex awakens as his father holds him. At the Breslin home, Sean wakes up from a nightmare as Breslin comforts him. When he asks where Alex is, Breslin reassures him that Alex will be okay.


title: Horsemen (film)

text: Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film an approval rating of 20% based on five reviews; the average rating is 4.1/10. Jordan Mintzer of "Variety" called it a predictable film that uses four cinematic cliches: "overstylized torture, whiplash editing, compulsive script reversals and crude neon lighting".


The Inglehart–Welzel cultural map of the world is a scatter plot created by political scientists Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel based on the World Values Survey and European Values Survey. It depicts closely linked cultural values that vary between societies in two predominant dimensions: traditional versus secular-rational values on the vertical y-axis and survival versus self-expression values on the horizontal x-axis. Moving upward on this map reflects the shift from traditional values to secular-rational ones and moving rightward reflects the shift from survival values to self-expression values.


title: Inglehart–Welzel cultural map of the world

text: According to the authors: "These two dimensions explain more than 70 percent of the cross-national variance in a factor analysis of ten indicators—and each of these dimensions is strongly correlated with scores of other important orientations."


text: The authors stress that socio-economic status is not the sole factor determining a country's location, as their religious and cultural historical heritage is also an important factor.


text: Analysis of the World Values Survey data by Inglehart and Welzel asserts that there are two major dimensions of cross-cultural variation in the world:


text: The map is a chart in which countries are positioned based on their scores for the two values mapped on the x-axis (survival values versus self-expression values) and the y-axis (traditional values versus secular-rational values). The map shows where societies are located in these two dimensions. Clusters of countries reflect their shared values and not geographical closeness.


text: Traditional values emphasize the importance of religion, parent-child ties, deference to authority, absolute standards and traditional family values. People who embrace these values also reject divorce, abortion, euthanasia and suicide. Societies that embrace these values have high levels of national pride and a nationalistic outlook.


text: Secular-rational values have the opposite preferences to the traditional values. Societies that embrace these values place less emphasis on religion, traditional family values and authority. Divorce, abortion, euthanasia and suicide are seen as relatively acceptable.


text: The shift from traditional to secular-rational values has been described by Engelbrekt and Nygren as "essentially the replacement of religion and superstition with science and bureaucracy as the basis of behaviour and authority relations in a society".


text: Survival values place emphasis on economic and physical security. They are linked with a relatively ethnocentric outlook and low levels of trust and tolerance.


text: Self-expression values give high priority to subjective well-being, self-expression and quality of life. Some values more common in societies that embrace these values include environmental protection, growing tolerance of foreigners, gays and lesbians and gender equality, rising demands for participation in decision-making in economic and political life (autonomy and freedom from central authority), interpersonal trust, political moderation, and a shift in child-rearing values from emphasis on hard work toward imagination and tolerance.


text: The shift from survival to self-expression also represents the transition from industrial society to post-industrial society, as well as embracing democratic values.


text: A 2017 version of the map had countries divided into nine clusters: the English-speaking, Latin America, Catholic Europe, Protestant Europe, African-Islamic, Baltic, South Asian, Orthodox and Confucian clusters. In previous studies, the African-Islamic cluster was split into two (the African cluster and the Islamic cluster) and the Baltic states did not have their own cluster.


text: Another proposed way to cluster the societies is by material wealth, with the poorer societies at the bottom of both axes, and richer at the top.


text: Out of Western world countries, the United States is among the most conservative (as one of the most downwards-located countries), together with highly conservative Catholic countries such as Ireland and Poland. Simoni concludes that "On the traditional/secular dimension, the United States ranks far below other rich societies, with levels of religiosity and national pride comparable with those found in some developing societies."


text: Asian societies are distributed in the traditional/secular dimension in two clusters, with more secular Confucian societies at the top, and more traditional South Asian ones at the center of the map.


text: Russia is among the most survival-value oriented countries, and at the other end, Sweden ranks highest on the self-expression chart.


text: It has also been found that basic cultural values overwhelmingly apply on national lines, with cross-border intermixtures being relatively rare. This is true even between countries with shared cultural histories. Additionally, even cultural clusters of countries do not intermix much across borders. This suggests nations are culturally meaningful units.


text: The map is updated and modified regularly along with the new waves of data from the World Values Survey. The different versions are available at the website of the World Values Survey.


text: An early version of the map was published by Ronald Inglehart in 1997 with the dimensions named "Traditional vs. Secular-Rational Authority" and "Survival vs. Well-being".


text: Inglehart and Welzel revised this map in 2005 and named the dimensions "Traditional vs. Secular-Rational Values" and "Survival vs. Self-expression Values". This map and its various updates are generally referred to as the Inglehart–Welzel Cultural Map.


text: Welzel published a quite different map in 2013 with two closely related dimensions named "Emancipative Values" and "Secular Values", where Emancipative Values provide the main variable behind his theory of human empowerment.


text: The cultural map has generally been well received and it is often cited or referred to. In 2009 Arno Tausch described it as "one of the most famous pieces of Inglehart's research tradition". Likewise, a number of scholars have referred to it as famous (Niels-Christian Fritsche in 2009, Elisabeth Staksrud in 2016, Manfred Buchroithner in 2020, Luigi Curini and Robert Franzese, likewise in 2020).


text: Despite its popularity, several scholars, have questioned whether the two dimensions represent adequate and useful measures of cultural differences.. In 2007 Majima and Savage have questioned which measures of culture are most adequate and whether the measured change over time is real, and Bomhoff and Gu in 2012 have argued that East Asian attitudes and values are not adequately reflected.


text: In 2010 calculations by Beugelsdijk and Welzel suggested that the split into two factors or dimensions is only weakly justified by the data, and that a single-factor solution might be appropriate. In 2013 Welzel has suggested that the two dimensions may be combined under a common framework of human empowerment. Similarly, Inglehart in 2018 finds that a single factor combining cultural values reflects modernization quite well.


text: According to Agner Fog's 2020 research, a meta-analysis of studies of cultural differences finds that many other studies of cultural differences have resulted in similar factors, but rotated differently. The common practice of factor rotation has obscured the similarity between different studies with different orientations of the axes on the cultural maps. The unrotated solution has the strongest factor or dimension corresponding to a line from the lower left to the upper right of Inglehart and Welzel's map, combining the two dimensions. This combined dimension may be interpreted as development or modernization. It combines a lot of economic, technological, institutional, and psychological variables that happen to be strongly correlated with each other. An unrotated second factor or dimension corresponds to a vertical line on Inglehart and Welzel's map, reflecting the special cultural values of East Asian cultures.


text: In 2020 Fred Dervin, Robyn Moloney and Ashley Simpson criticized the map for "cultural essentialism and potential racism" due to generalizations and simplifications which stigmatize developing countries and label them as being inferior to predominantly White, European, Christian countries.


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple Labs, Inc. is an American technology company which develops the Ripple payment protocol and exchange network. Originally named Opencoin and renamed in 2015, the company was founded in 2012 and is based in San Francisco, California.


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ryan Fugger conceived Ripple in 2004 after working on a local exchange trading system in Vancouver. The intent was to create a monetary system that was decentralized and could effectively empower individuals and communities to create their own money. Fugger later built the first iteration of this system, RipplePay.com. Concurrently, in May 2011, Jed McCaleb began developing a digital currency system in which transactions were verified by consensus among members of the network, rather than by the mining process used by Bitcoin. In August 2012, Jed McCaleb hired Chris Larsen and they approached Ryan Fugger with their digital currency idea. After discussions with McCaleb and long-standing members of the Ripple community, Fugger handed over the reins. In September 2012, Chris Larsen and Jed McCaleb co-founded the corporation OpenCoin.


title: Ripple Labs

text: OpenCoin began development of the ripple protocol (RTXP) and the Ripple payment and exchange network. On April 11, 2013, OpenCoin announced it had closed an angel round of funding with several venture capital firms. That same month, OpenCoin acquired SimpleHoney to help it popularize virtual currencies and make them easier for average users.


title: Ripple Labs

text: On May 5, 2015, Ripple received a civil money penalty from U.S. Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) for “willful violation of the Bank Secrecy Act by acting as a money services business without registering with FinCEN.” On October 6, 2015, the company was rebranded from Ripple Labs to Ripple.


title: Ripple Labs

text: On June 13, 2016, Ripple obtained a virtual currency license from the New York State Department of Financial Services, making it the fourth company with a BitLicense.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In September 2017, R3 sued Ripple for specific performance of an option agreement in which Ripple agreed to sell up to five billion XRPs for a price of $.0085. Ripple countersued, claiming that R3 reneged on a number of contractual promises, and was simply acting in a spirit of opportunism, after the cryptocurrency increased in value more than 30 times. In September 2018, Ripple and R3 reached an undisclosed settlement agreement.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In March 2018, a Japanese bank consortium led by SBI Ripple Asia, comprising 61 banks launched "MoneyTap", a Ripple-powered mobile app to provide on-demand domestic payments in Japan. In May 2018, Spanish Banking group Santander released One Pay FX — the first mobile application for international payments powered by blockchain technology, that uses Ripple's xCurrent technology. Following the creation of a Mumbai office, Ripple has been adding multiple Indian customers in 2018, including leading banks such as Kotak Mahindra Bank, Axis Bank, and IndusInd, that announced that they started using Ripple's products.


title: Ripple Labs

text: On December 22, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission charged Ripple and two of its executives with violating investor protection laws. The SEC alleged that Ripple, co-founder Christian Larsen and CEO Bradley Garlinghouse, raised more than $1.3 billion through an unregistered securities offering. The government agency brought charges against Ripple for the fault of depriving the “potential purchasers [of XRP] of adequate disclosures about XRP and Ripple’s business and other important long-standing protections that are fundamental to our robust public market system,” according to the complaint that the SEC filed in federal district court in Manhattan, New York. In April 2021, Judge Sarah Netburn granted a motion from Garlinghouse and Larsen to dismiss the SEC's subpoenas for access to eight years' of banking records, referring to the request as a "wholly inappropriate overreach." The defendants have already agreed to turn over all data involving XRP transactions.


title: Ripple Labs

text: The primary source of funding Ripple has been sales of the XRP cryptocurrency. According to its own records it sold


title: Ripple Labs

text: $1,254.54 million worth of XRP between Q4 2016 and Q2 2020, to a mix of institutional investors and retail investors via sales on cryptocurrency exchanges.


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple is a privately funded company. It has closed five rounds of funding, which included two rounds of angel funding, one round of seed funding, one Series A round, one Series B round and one Series C round.


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple's revenue sources include professional services provided to financial network operators being integrated with Ripple, software built to integrate legacy financial systems with Ripple and the native currency (XRP). Ripple (a private company registered in Delaware) chooses not to reveal information to the public about sales revenues from software and professional services.


title: Ripple Labs

text: Of the 80 billion XRP that Ripple Labs was gifted, Ripple follows a distribution strategy that encompasses payments to business partners such as gateways, market makers and charitable organizations.


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple Labs began working with the World Community Grid in November 2013. The World Community Grid pools surplus processing power from volunteers’ computers and electronic devices to support humanitarian causes such as fighting AIDS, improving solar energy and defeating cancer. Individuals who join the Ripple Labs team and donate their spare processing power are rewarded with XRP. As of March 18, 2014, Ripple Labs has given away 134,528,800 XRP through the World Community Grid at a rate of 1,250,000 XRP per day.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In 2018, Ripple has made multiple donations. The company has donated $29 million of XRP to USA public schools, and $4 million to The Ellen DeGeneres Wildlife Fund


title: Ripple Labs

text: In March 2014, CrossCoin Ventures launched an accelerator which funds companies that work to advance the Ripple ecosystem. The firm funds accepted startups with up to in XRP, Ripple's native currency, in exchange for a 3% to 6% stake in diluted common stock. Mentorship and support is provided by CrossCoin and Ripple Labs, Inc.


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple also developed early partnerships with companies such as ZipZap, with the relationship called a threat to Western Union in the press.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In cooperation with other industry leaders, Ripple Labs became a co-founding member of the Digital Asset Transfer Authority (DATA) in July 2013. DATA provides best practices and technical standards, including anti-money laundering compliance guidance for companies that work with digital currency and other emerging payments systems. The committee works as a liaison among public officials, businesses and consumers and create common rules to protect consumers. The initiative attempts to create a cohesive voice of Bitcoin community members when interacting with regulators.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In June 2018, Ripple has committed over $50 million in funding to create the University Blockchain Research Initiative, which aims at support research to:


title: Ripple Labs

text: In May 2018, Ripple has announced "an initiative by Ripple that will invest in, incubate, acquire and provide grants to companies and projects that [...] will use the digital asset XRP and the XRP Ledger, the open-sourced, decentralized technology behind XRP, to solve their customers’ problems.".


title: Ripple Labs

text: In March 2019, Ripple announced a $100 Million fund for gaming developers which would be overseen by Forte.


title: Ripple Labs

text: For its creation and development of the ripple protocol (RTXP) and the Ripple payment/exchange network, the magazine "MIT Technology Review" recognized Ripple Labs as one of 2014s 50 Smartest Companies in its February 2014 issue. The criteria for the recognition revolved around "whether a company had made strides in the past year that will define its field."


title: Ripple Labs

text: On February 9, 2014, Ripple Labs was named as a finalist for a 2014 PYMNTS Innovator Award in two separate categories: Best New Technology as well as Most Disruptive Company. The recognition pertains to Ripple Labs work in creating Ripple, an open-source, distributed payment protocol powering a new global value web.


title: Ripple Labs

text: On January 12, 2016, Ripple was listed by UK-based company Richtopia at No. 8 in the list of 100 Most Influential Blockchain Organisations.


title: Ripple Labs

text: On May 5, 2015, FinCEN fined Ripple Labs and XRP II US$700,000 for violation of the Bank Secrecy Act, based on the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network's anti-money laundering (AML) additions to the act in 2013. According to the FinCEN announcement: "Ripple Labs willfully violated several requirements of the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) by acting as a money services business (MSB) and selling its virtual currency, known as XRP, without registering with FinCEN, and by failing to implement and maintain an adequate anti-money laundering (AML) program designed to protect its products from use by money launderers or terrorist financiers."


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple Labs agreed to remedial steps to ensure future compliance, which included an agreement to only transact XRP and "Ripple Trade" activity through registered money services businesses (MSB), among other agreements such as enhancing the Ripple Protocol. It has been argued that the changes made to the protocol did not change the protocol itself, but instead added AML transaction monitoring to the network and improve transaction analysis. However the FinCen statement clearly indicated that Ripple itself was making changes to the protocol as a result of the enforcement action. "Ripple Labs will also undertake certain enhancements to the Ripple Protocol to appropriately monitor all future transactions."


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple executives, including CTO David Schwartz, have admitted the software that is sold to banks for payments processing, XCurrent, is not a blockchain or any form of distributed ledger. Schwartz described it as “bi-directional messaging” that can eventually plug into distributed ledgers, but xCurrent’s technology itself “is not a distributed ledger.”


title: Ripple Labs

text: In May 2018, Stewart Hosie MP, at a UK parliamentary inquiry into digital currencies, questioned Ryan Zagone of Ripple about the value and nature of the XRP Cryptocurrency: "...but the point that was made earlier, Mr Zagone, is that if people buy XRP—a financial asset—from Ripple Labs, it does not entitle them to an ownership stake, there is no right to be converted back into conventional currencies and it does not pay any return. It also seemingly has no purpose. Is that simply to avoid XRP looking like a security or an equity, and to avoid the necessary regulation?"


title: Ripple Labs

text: Ripple claims to be completely separate from and have no control over the XRP cryptocurrency, in spite of the FinCen press release describing XRP as "its virtual currency, known as XRP". However Ripple controls the vast majority of the supply of XRP and, according to its own published records, earns the majority of its income from selling XRP. They do own a lot of XRP but the network is not based on PoS, therefore the amount of XRP do not determine how much control you have over the network. The XRP Ledger has its own consensus algorithm with over 39 entities included in the overlap of all the currently published and used UNLs.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In 2018 CEO claimed on multiple occasions that by end of that year "major banks" would be using Ripple tools that made use of the XRP cryptocurrency and that by end of 2019 "dozens" of banks would be using XRP. Both claims by the end of 2019 were proven to be untrue. At a conference in June 2019, Hikmet Ersek, CEO of Western Union, commented that his company had experimented with Ripple in 2018 but had chosen not to adopt their cryptocurrency based payments software because, “It’s five times more expensive”, than using their existing infrastructure.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In 2018 and 2019 Garlinghouse claimed on multiple occasions that the published error rate for SWIFT messaging was at least 6%, this was shown to be untrue by research published by the London School of Economics Business Review that showed Garlinghouse's claims were based on mis-reading of a paper published by SWIFT that did not refer to error rates in messaging.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In February 2020 an article in Financial Times Alphaville revealed that Moneygram, the largest public user of Ripple's XRP based liquidity tools, has not only received a $50m investment prior to adopting the tools but that the software was provided free of charge by Ripple and that Moneygram was receiving an on-going subsidy for using XRP, amounting to $8.9m in Q4 2019. The same article revealed that Ripple was dependent on sales of XRP to remain profitable.


title: Ripple Labs

text: In October 2020, Ripple board member Ken Kurson resigned from the company when he was charged with committing a range of cyber-crimes by the United States Attorney for the southern district of New York.


title: Fort Boyard (fortification)

text: Fort Boyard () is a fort located between the Île-d'Aix and the Île d'Oléron in the Pertuis d'Antioche straits, on the west coast of France and is the filming location for the eponymous TV game show (1990 – present). Though a fort on Boyard bank was suggested as early as the 17th century, it was not until the 1800s under Napoleon Bonaparte that work began. Building started in 1801 and was completed in 1857. In 1967, the final scene of the French film "Les aventuriers" was filmed at the remains of the fort.


title: Fort Boyard (fortification)

text: Fort Boyard is stadium-shaped, long and wide. The walls were built high. At the centre is a yard, and the ground floor provided stores and quarters for the men and officers. The floor above contained casemates for the emplacements of guns and further quarters. Above that were facilities for barbette guns and mortars.


title: Fort Boyard (fortification)

text: The construction of the fort was first considered during a build-up of the French armed forces undertaken by Louis XIV between 1661 and 1667. Fort Boyard was to form a line of fortification with Fort Enet and Fort de la Rade on Île-d'Aix to protect the arsenal of Rochefort from Royal Navy incursions. With the limited range of artillery in the 17th century, there was an unprotected gap between the fields of fire of the fortifications on the islands of Aix and Oléron; a fort on Boyard bank, roughly midway between the two, would have filled that gap. In 1692 the French engineer Descombs began planning the programme of building the fort; however, once it became clear how expensive it would be the scheme was abandoned. Vauban, Louis XIV's leading military engineer, famously advised against it, saying "Your Majesty, it would be easier to seize the moon with your teeth than to attempt such an undertaking in such a place".


title: Fort Boyard (fortification)

text: After a British raid on Île-d'Aix in 1757, plans for a fort on Boyard bank were once again considered. Though plans were drawn up, it was abandoned again due to the logistical problems. Efforts were renewed under Napoleon Bonaparte in 1800, and the following year engineers Ferregeau and Armand Samuel de Marescot, and Vice-Admiral François Étienne de Rosily-Mesros designed a fort to be built on the bank. To facilitate the work, a port was established on île d'Oléron. The village of Boyardville was built for the workers. The first stage of construction was to establish a plateau, some , to act as foundation. To this end, stones were piled up on the bank.


title: Fort Boyard (fortification)

text: The project was suspended in 1809. Construction resumed in 1837, under Louis-Philippe, following renewed tensions with the United Kingdom. The fortifications were completed in 1857, with sufficient room for a garrison of 250 men; however, by this time the range of cannons had significantly increased, covering the hitherto unprotected gap and making the fort unnecessary.


title: Fort Boyard (fortification)

text: After 1871, Fort Boyard was briefly used as a military prison, and abandoned in 1913, after which the unmaintained fort slowly deteriorated and crumbled into the sea. In 1950 it was made a listed building, and in 1961 was sold to Charente Maritime Regional Council.


title: Fort Boyard (fortification)

text: In 1989, the reconstruction of fort began in preparation for hosting the game show. An access platform for the berth of ships was built 25 meters from it (the old fort pier was destroyed long ago). The fort was completely cleared of a huge layer of guano (50 cm thick). In 1996, artillery platforms were also restored. However, the fort was still exposed to harmful influences from the sea. Therefore, in 1998, additional restoration work was carried out. The outer walls were completely cleaned and the sealing of the terrace completed. The final stage was the restoration of a central courtyard which was completed in early 2004. It has been used as the location for the filming of both the French and international versions of the TV game show of the same name since 1990, and was also the location for filming "The Last Adventure", starring Alain Delon, Lino Ventura and Joanna Shimkus.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: Many adaptations of "The Lord of the Rings", an epic by the English author J. R. R. Tolkien, have been made in the media of film, radio, theatre, video games, and recorded readings.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: Early attempts to adapt Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings" were made by Walt Disney, William Snyder, Forrest J. Ackerman, Denis O'Dell (who considered Richard Lester to direct, but approached star directors David Lean, Stanley Kubrick and Michaelangelo Antonioni instead), Peter Shaffer, John Boorman and George Lucas. These attempts resulted in some unproduced concept art and scripts, original fantasy films like "Excalibur" and "Willow", and an animated short of "The Hobbit."


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: Three cinema adaptations have been completed. The first was "The Lord of the Rings" by the American animator Ralph Bakshi in 1978, the first part of what was originally intended to be a two-part adaptation of the story. The second, "The Return of the King" in 1980, was a television special by Rankin-Bass. The third was "The Lord of the Rings" film trilogy by the New Zealand director Peter Jackson in the early 2000s, released in three instalments as "", "", and "".


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: A Swedish live action television film, "Sagan om ringen", inspired by the music album "Music Inspired by Lord of the Rings" by Bo Hansson was broadcast in 1971. A Finnish live action television miniseries, "Hobitit", was broadcast in 1993 based on the events of "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings". A live-action TV special of The Hobbit was produced in the Soviet Union in 1985, a pilot for an animated Hobbit series in 1991, and a live-action television play of "The Fellowship of the Ring", "Khraniteli" has newly been discovered and uploaded in Russia's Channel 5 YouTube Channel in 2 parts. The adaptation had been aired in Russia once, and was thought lost.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: Tolkien's novel has repeatedly been adapted for radio both in the United States and in Europe, from soon after its publication in the 1950s onwards. In 1955 and 1956, the BBC broadcast "The Lord of the Rings," a 12-part radio adaptation of the story. "The Fellowship of the Rings" was adapted as six 45-minute episodes, then "The Two Towers" and "The Return of the King" together were compressed into six 30-minute episodes. Tolkien disparaged this dramatisation, referring to the portrayal of Tom Bombadil as "dreadful" and complaining bitterly about several other aspects. The recordings were lost, but in 2022 the original scripts by the producer Terence Tiller, including a sheet with handwritten suggestions by Tolkien, were rediscovered in the BBC archives.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: In 1981, BBC Radio 4 produced a new dramatisation of "The Lord of the Rings" in 26 half-hour stereo instalments. The script by Brian Sibley and Michael Bakewell attempts to be as faithful as possible to the original novel. It was a critical success and Ian Holm, who voiced Frodo Baggins in the radio serial, went on to play Bilbo Baggins in Peter Jackson's movie trilogy.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: The New York radio station WBAI-FM broadcast a reading from the book in 1972, narrated by Baird Seales; since then, they have rebroadcast it annually.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: A 1979 dramatisation was broadcast by National Public Radio in the United States. The series was produced by The Mind's Eye. It was produced by Bob Lewis and adapted for radio by Bernard Mayes. In 1981 the BBC broadcast its version in 26 half-hour instalments. It starred Ian Holm as Frodo Baggins, Bill Nighy as Sam Gamgee, and Michael Hordern as Gandalf. In 1992 the German radio stations Südwestrundfunk and Westdeutscher Rundfunk broadcast "Der Herr der Ringe", a 30-episode adaptation directed by Bernd Lau with music by Peter Zwetkoff. It had a cast including Hans Peter Hallwachs, Walter Renneisen, and Rufus Beck, and was narrated by Ernst Schröder. In 1999-2000 the Danish radio station Danmarks Radio broadcast "Eventyret om Ringen", a Danish language retelling by Rune T. Kidde. The music was by The Tolkien Ensemble, Hedningarna, Sorten Muld and Kim Skovbye. In 2001, 2002 and 2003, the three volumes of the novel were adapted into a Slovak radio series, consisting of three annual series of fully cast radio plays, each of six episodes. The Hobbit character Bilbo Baggins served as the narrator. The eighteen episodes were produced and broadcast as a co-production between the public broadcaster Slovak Radio (now Radio and Television Slovakia) and the private broadcaster Rádio Twist (later known as Rádio Viva).


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: Several musical theatre adaptations, whether serious or parodic, have been made based on "The Lord of the Rings"; they have met with varying success. Full-length productions of each of "The Fellowship of the Ring" (2001), "The Two Towers" (2002), and "The Return of the King" (2003) were staged in Cincinnati, Ohio.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: Lifeline Theatre in Chicago, Illinois, produced individual plays of each of the three books, with "The Fellowship of the Ring" in 1997, "The Two Towers" in 2000, and "The Return of the King" in 2001. Karen Tarjan and Ned Mochal were involved in adapting and directing the plays, with varying roles.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: In 2006, a large-scale three-and-a-half-hour "The Lord of the Rings" musical was produced in Toronto. The expensive production lost money and closed six months later. It was edited for a production at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in London, and ran from May 2007 until July 2008; "The Guardian" wrote that "at £25m, it was the most costly musical mistake in West End history".


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: A musical parody of "The Fellowship of the Ring", titled "Fellowship!", ran in Los Angeles for a stint on two occasions, coming back 3 years after its debut for a number of shows in the middle of 2009.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: Numerous computer and video games have been inspired by J. R. R. Tolkien's works set in Middle-earth. Titles have been produced by studios such as Electronic Arts, Vivendi Games, Melbourne House, and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: The Library of Congress, which makes versions especially for the blind, recorded an unabridged version of "The Lord of the Rings" in 1967, narrated by Livingston Gilbert, on vinyl media. This version was taken out of circulation at the time of the recording of the 1978 version. It recorded a second unabridged version of "The Lord of the Rings" in 1978, narrated by Norman Barrs, on 4-track tape media. This version was taken out of circulation at the time of the recording of the 1999 version. It recorded a third unabridged version of "The Lord of the Rings, A trip to Mordor" in 1999, narrated by David Palmer, on 4-track tape media. This version is also available on the new digital players provided for Library of Congress patrons.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: In 1990, the Australian actor Rob Inglis read and performed an unabridged version for Recorded Books in their New York studio. While not strictly a dramatisation, Inglis created voices for all the characters, and along with project producer Claudia Howard, he created music for all the songs, which he performed. The project took six weeks to record, not counting preparation time.


title: Adaptations of The Lord of the Rings

text: In 2021, the British actor Andy Serkis, who played Gollum in Peter Jackson's films, recorded an unabridged version of all three volumes of "The Lord of the Rings" for HarperCollins and Recorded Books.


The Tuvan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (; ), or the Tuvan ASSR (; ), was an autonomous republic of the Russian SFSR. It was created on 10 October 1961 from the Tuvan Autonomous Oblast. Its territory measured 175,000 square kilometers and bordered Mongolia to the south, Buryat ASSR to the east, Gorno-Altai Autonomous Oblast to the west and Khakas Autonomous Oblast to the north.


title: Tuvan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Tuvan ASSR was awarded the Order of Lenin on 9 October 1964 to commemorate its 20th anniversary of its incorporation into the Soviet Union, as well as the Order of Friendship of Peoples on 29 December 1972 to honor the 50th anniversary of the USSR. The highest organ of government in the Tuvan ASSR was the Supreme Soviet of the Tuvan ASSR, made up of 130 deputies on five-year terms.


text: 1990 saw the beginning of ethnic clashes between minority Russians and majority Tuvans, although according to Estonian politician and writer Toomas Alatalu, the magnitude of these attacks were largely exaggerated by the Russian media. This came as a result of numerous policies alienating the indigenous population in favor of the minority Russian population, such as the policy of the compulsory admittance of sons of cattle-raisers' children to Russian boarding schools.


text: According to Alatalu, Tuva had become a bastion of Soviet Conservatism fueled by the strong partocracy which had grown within the small republic, despite ethnic tensions. The Tuvan elections of 1990 was the first time since the incorporation of Tuva into the USSR that all three positions of power within the Tuvan administration were held by ethnic Tuvans. The 1991 Russian presidential election saw Tuva being one of the few autonomous republics to overwhelmingly vote for the Communist Party candidate Nikolai Ryzhkov, with 65% of the vote going to Ryzhkov and 15% for Boris Yeltsin. In 1991 a democratic coalition of forces, including youth leaders and intellectuals, initiated a hunger strike on 27 August, demanding the resignation of the republic’s leadership. On 28 August, a meeting of Parliament was called, where Chimit-Dorzhu Ondar, then Chairman of the Supreme Soviet, resigned, and all property of the Communist Party was absorbed by the government. This action led to the dissolution of the Tuvan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. On 31 March 1992, its successor, the Tuva Republic, became a constituent member of the Russian Federation.


text: The Tuvan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic’s economy was mostly composed of two primary sectors, agriculture and mineral extraction, its principal crops were wheat and barley. In contrast to largely indigenous agriculture, Tuvan industry was largely fueled by Russian immigrant labour.


text: Despite Russian immigration and the education system both secondary and post-secondary being carried out almost exclusively in Russian by the 1990s, Tuvans remained the largest ethnicity in Tuva (approximately 206,000 residents were of Tuvan ethnicity, and 98,000 were of Russian ethnicity in 1990. For much of its existence, the Tuvan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was home to numerous prison camps as well as labor colonies.


title: Beatrice Six

text: The Beatrice Six are Joseph White, Thomas Winslow, Ada JoAnn Taylor, Debra Shelden, James Dean and Kathy Gonzalez, who were falsely found guilty in 1989 of the 1985 rape and murder of Helen Wilson in Beatrice, Nebraska and served prison terms before being exonerated in 2009.


title: Beatrice Six

text: The conviction was won on five confessions which were obtained under threats that they would be given the death penalty if they did not. Additionally Dr. Reena Roy, the Nebraska State Patrol forensic scientist who performed blood and semen analysis, was never called to the stand to testify during the case, despite her analysis determining that none of the defendants on trial were a specific match to blood or semen found at the scene. In 2008, DNA evidence implicated Bruce Allen Smith, an original prime suspect in the murder who had died in 1992, and all of the Beatrice Six were exonerated the following year.


title: Beatrice Six

text: Most of the defendants were persuaded by the police psychologist, Wayne Price, that they had repressed memories of the crime. White, who maintained his innocence, demanded the examination of DNA evidence that led to their exoneration and then filed a Federal civil rights lawsuit against Gage County, Nebraska on behalf of all six defendants, which went to trial in January 2014; White had by then died in a workplace accident in 2011. In July 2016, a jury awarded them $28 million, The county's appeal reached the Supreme Court of the United States, which declined to hear the case on March 4, 2019. Gage County had to raise property taxes to the maximum amount permitted under the law in order to pay the jury award. It is expected that the county will make payments twice a year after property taxes are collected. The Beatrice Six, including the heirs of White, received their first payment in June 2019.


title: Beatrice Six

text: An HBO Original six-part documentary series about the Beatrice Six, the murder, investigation, trial, exoneration, civil suits and aftermath titled "Mind Over Murder" was released in 2022, with the first episode airing on Monday, June 20.


title: 2008–09 Chelsea F.C. season

text: The 2008–09 season was Chelsea Football Club's 95th competitive season, 17th consecutive season in the Premier League and 103rd year in existence as a football club.


title: 2008–09 Chelsea F.C. season

text: After again finishing second to Manchester United in the Premier League the previous season, Chelsea sacked their manager Avram Grant, replacing him with the Brazilian Luiz Felipe Scolari, who had managed the Portugal national team at UEFA Euro 2008 that lost in the quarter finals to Germany. The first few months of his management went according to plan, as Scolari's narrow 4–1–4–1 formation, using Ashley Cole and new arrival José Bosingwa as wing-backs, initially took the league by storm, leaving Chelsea top ahead of Liverpool after 13 games.


title: 2008–09 Chelsea F.C. season

text: By the end of November, however, Scolari's Chelsea began to lose their form due to exhaustion. They suffered a 3–1 defeat away to Roma in the Champions League and being eliminated from the League Cup at Stamford Bridge by Championship side Burnley on penalties. In the league, they had a 0–0 draw at home to Newcastle United, (who were later to be relegated). Chelsea lost a home league game for the first time since 2004 (and 86 matches) when they lost to Liverpool, and a second home league defeat to rivals Arsenal dropped Chelsea to second place.


title: 2008–09 Chelsea F.C. season

text: Chelsea qualified for the knock-out stages of the Champions League with a 2–1 victory against Romanian champions CFR Cluj at Stamford Bridge in the final match of the group. During the winter months, they drew against West Ham United, Fulham, Hull City and League One's Southend United in the FA Cup. Chelsea suffered defeats away to Manchester United and Liverpool, which left them in fourth place during February which would mean a Champions League place would not be certain. Long-term injuries to Michael Essien and Joe Cole marked the period while Didier Drogba was not included frequently.


title: 2008–09 Chelsea F.C. season

text: Chelsea sacked Scolari, replacing him with Russia national team manager Guus Hiddink for the remainder of the season. Hiddink's regenerative effect was immediate, with four-straight league wins, including a vital 1–0 victory away to Aston Villa in his first game in charge, moving Chelsea into the top three. Eleven wins in the team's last 13 league games, marked by a 4–1 victory over Arsenal away at the Emirates Stadium, finally secured third place in the league, and Champions League football for a seventh consecutive season.


title: 2008–09 Chelsea F.C. season

text: Although Chelsea's title challenge was already realistically over when he arrived, Hiddink led Chelsea to their fifth Champions League semi-final, knocking out Juventus and Liverpool before they were eliminated by Barcelona on away goals in the semi-final, with the performance of second leg referee Tom Henning Øvrebø proving particularly controversial. Despite the Champions League exit, the season culminated in a trip to Wembley Stadium, with Chelsea's final game of 2008–09 contested against Everton in the 2009 FA Cup Final. Chelsea won 2–1, winning the FA Cup for the fifth time in their history.


title: Checkers speech

text: The Checkers speech or Fund speech was an address made on September 23, 1952, by Senator Richard Nixon (R-CA), six weeks before the 1952 United States presidential election, in which he was the Republican nominee for Vice President. Nixon had been accused of improprieties relating to a fund established by his backers to reimburse him for his political expenses. His place was in doubt on the Republican ticket, so he flew to Los Angeles and delivered a half-hour television address in which he defended himself, attacked his opponents, and urged the audience to contact the Republican National Committee (RNC) to tell it whether he should remain on the ticket. During the speech, he stated that he intended to keep one gift, regardless of the outcome: a black-and-white Cocker Spaniel that his children had named Checkers, thus giving the address its popular name.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon came from a family of modest means, as he related in the address, and he had spent his time after law school in the military, campaigning for office, and serving in Congress. After his successful 1950 Senate campaign, his backers continued to raise money to finance his political activities. These contributions went to reimburse him for travel costs, postage for political mailings which he did not have franked, and similar expenses. Such a fund was not illegal at the time, but Nixon had made a point of attacking government corruption which exposed him to charges that he might be giving special favors to the contributors.


title: Checkers speech

text: The press became aware of the fund in September 1952, two months after Nixon's selection as General Dwight D. Eisenhower's running mate, and the story quickly grew until it threatened his place on the ticket. In an attempt to turn the tide of public opinion, Nixon broke off a whistle-stop tour of the West Coast to fly to Los Angeles and make a television and radio broadcast to the nation; the RNC raised the $75,000 to buy the television time. The idea for the Checkers reference came from Franklin D. Roosevelt's Fala speech, given eight years to the day before Nixon's address, in which Roosevelt mocked Republican claims that he had sent a destroyer to fetch his dog, Fala, when Fala was supposedly left behind in the Aleutian Islands.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon's speech was seen and heard by about 60 million Americans, including the largest television audience to that time, and it led to an outpouring of public support. The RNC and other political offices received millions of telegrams and phone calls supporting Nixon. He was retained on the ticket, which swept to victory weeks later in November 1952. The Checkers speech was an early example of a politician using television to appeal directly to the electorate, but it has sometimes been mocked or denigrated. The term "Checkers speech" has come more generally to mean any emotional speech by a politician, lacking material substance.


title: Checkers speech

text: In 1950, California Congressman Richard Nixon was elected to the Senate, defeating Representative Helen Gahagan Douglas. With the six-year term secured, Nixon campaign officials discussed how to further his career. Campaign manager Murray Chotiner and campaign chairman Bernie Brennan proposed a year-round campaign for the next six years, leading up to a re-election bid in 1956. Nixon's Southern California campaign treasurer Dana Smith suggested what became known as "the Fund," to be administered by himself, which would pay for Nixon's political expenses.


title: Checkers speech

text: As a senator, Nixon received an annual salary of $12,500 (). While he received an expense allowance of over $75,000, more than most senators received (because California was one of the most populous states), that money went to pay his staff of twelve and to cover the cost of stationery, telephone service, telegrams, and other office expenses. It also paid for the one set of round-trip airline tickets between Washington, D.C., and California that Nixon was allowed to buy for himself and his family at taxpayer expense each Congressional session.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon later characterized the attitude of his backers and aides as, "We want you to start campaigning right now for 1956, and we think the way to do it is to have available the funds to make speeches, make trips to California, and so forth." Contributors were drawn only from his early supporters, and contributions were limited to $1,000 (). Nixon was not to be informed of the names of contributors; however, the fundraising letter stated that Nixon "will of course be very appreciative of your continuing interest". By October 30, 1951, some $16,000 () had been raised, of which Nixon had spent approximately $12,000 (), principally from contributors in the Los Angeles area. The senator's Christmas card expense for 1950 and 1951 totaled $4,237.54 (). Despite the initial fundraising success, only $2,200 could be raised from November 1951 to July 1952, and an engraving bill was unpaid pending a hoped-for contribution of $500.


title: Checkers speech

text: In 1952, the Republicans chose Dwight D. Eisenhower as their presidential candidate, who then selected Nixon as his running mate, while the Democrats nominated Illinois Governor Adlai Stevenson for president and Alabama Senator John Sparkman for vice president. The California delegation to the 1952 Republican National Convention, including Nixon, had been pledged to the state's "favorite son" candidate, Governor Earl Warren, who hoped to gain the presidential nomination in a brokered convention. Warren failed in his attempt to gain the nomination, and his supporters alleged that Nixon had worked behind the scenes to nominate Eisenhower despite his pledge to support Warren, and accused him of political opportunism for accepting the vice-presidential nomination. A disgruntled Warren supporter from Pasadena leaked the Fund story to several reporters.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon had campaigned for public integrity in his time in the Senate, even calling for the resignation of his own party chairman, Guy Gabrielson, when the latter was implicated in a loan scandal. By using such "indignant rhetoric," Nixon had "weakened his own position" when the Fund crisis erupted.


title: Checkers speech

text: On September 14, Nixon was asked about the Fund by reporter Peter Edson of the Newspaper Enterprise Association after the senator completed an appearance on "Meet the Press". Nixon told Edson that the Fund was set up by his supporters to pay political expenses, explained that he had made no effort to find out the names of the donors, and referred Edson to Smith for further information. Edson, and other reporters, did contact Smith, who answered questions about the Fund. Three days later, Nixon's campaign train, the ""Dick Nixon Special,"" left Pomona, California, on a whistle-stop campaign tour of the West Coast and Rocky Mountain states.


title: Checkers speech

text: Edson's column on the 18th, which included lengthy quotes by Smith on the supposed safeguards in the Fund, was later called by Nixon, "fair and objective". However, Leo Katcher of the "New York Post" interviewed Smith and wrote a story under the headline "Secret Rich Men's Trust Fund Keeps Nixon in Style Far Beyond His Salary" and referred to the Fund donors as a "millionaires' club". Nixon later praised Katcher's younger brother Edward, also a reporter, for his objectivity, but told him, "your brother Leo is a son of a bitch."


title: Checkers speech

text: When the "Dick Nixon Special" arrived in Bakersfield, California, that day, Nixon, still oblivious to the developing furor, made a speech promoting the Republican ticket, and backing local congressman Thomas H. Werdel. After the speech, Republican activist Keith McCormac showed Nixon the "Post" story, which had been picked up by United Press under the headline "Nixon Scandal Fund". According to McCormac, the senator collapsed into his seat in shock, and needed the help of Murray Chotiner, who was again Nixon's campaign manager, and Congressman Patrick J. Hillings (a Nixon confidant who had succeeded him in the House of Representatives) to return to his compartment.


title: Checkers speech

text: Democratic National Committee Chairman Stephen A. Mitchell called for Nixon's resignation from the ticket, saying that "Senator Nixon knows that [the Fund] is morally wrong. General Eisenhower knows that it is morally wrong. The American people know that it is morally wrong." On the other hand, Republican Senator Karl Mundt called the story "a filthy maneuver by left-wingers, fellow travelers, and former communists". Nixon issued a written statement explaining that the fund was to pay political expenses, in lieu of charging them to the taxpayer. Newspapers printed increasingly lurid accounts of the Fund and its beneficiary. The "Sacramento Bee" termed Nixon, "the pet protégé of a special interest group of rich southern Californians ... their front man, if not, indeed, their lobbyist". The "Pasadena Star-News", meanwhile, reported that one contributor had been appealed to on the grounds that the Nixon family needed a larger home and could not afford a maid.


title: Checkers speech

text: The train reached Marysville, California, on the morning of September 19, and Nixon gave a speech from the rear platform. As the train pulled out, while he remained on the rear platform, someone in the crowd yelled, "What about the $16,000?" (the amount then thought to have been contributed to the Fund). Nixon had the train stopped, and responded that he had been told that if he continued on his political course, "crooks and communists" would smear him. He told the crowd that the Fund had saved the taxpayer money, since it paid for matters that could have been paid for through his Senate expense allowance. He promised to throw the "crooks and communists" out of Washington.


title: Checkers speech

text: Eisenhower was on his own train, the "Look Ahead, Neighbor", stumping through Missouri, and on the morning of the 19th, his campaign staff made him aware of the gathering storm. Eisenhower publicly called upon Nixon to release all documents relating to the Fund, somewhat to the dismay of Chotiner, who wondered, "What more does the general require than the senator's word?" Eisenhower aides contacted the senior Republican senator from California, William Knowland, and persuaded him to fly from Hawaii to join the Eisenhower train and be available as a potential replacement running mate.


title: Checkers speech

text: By this time, Nixon campaign headquarters was receiving a flood of messages, calling on Nixon to resign from the ticket. When Eisenhower's train stopped for the candidate to make speeches, he faced protesters with signs reading "Donate Here to Help Poor Richard Nixon". The influential "The Washington Post" and "New York Herald-Tribune" both called for Nixon to leave the ticket, facts which Chotiner did not tell his candidate; Nixon learned them from a questioning reporter. Over 100 newspapers would editorialize about the Fund on the morning of September 20, opinion running two to one against Nixon. As his train stopped in Eugene, Oregon, Nixon was met with protestors' signs referencing his wife: "Pat, What Are You Going to Do With the Bribe Money?" and "No Mink Coats for Nixon—Just Cold Cash". He angrily responded with a phrase which would be echoed in the Checkers speech. After stating that there were no mink coats for the Nixons, he said that he was "proud of the fact that Pat Nixon wears a good Republican cloth coat, and she's going to continue to".


title: Checkers speech

text: Politicians from both parties opined on the propriety of the Fund and on what Nixon should do, most in accord with their political affiliation. Democratic presidential candidate Stevenson, though, publicly reserved judgment, leading Chotiner to suspect "that Stevenson is afraid of something here. I bet he has something to hide."


title: Checkers speech

text: On September 20, Republican National Committee official Bob Humphreys first suggested that Nixon give a televised speech to the nation to explain his position. RNC chairman and future Postmaster General Arthur Summerfield thought well of the idea, but was concerned about the expense. That evening, Nixon conferred with his aides, who unanimously urged him not to resign from the ticket. Humphreys called Chotiner at Nixon's hotel in Portland, Oregon that evening, and the campaign manager realized that the broadcast was the best opportunity for Nixon to make his case. Humphreys suggested Nixon appear on "Meet the Press", but Chotiner rejected the suggestion, insisting that his candidate must have complete control of the broadcast "without interruption by possibly unfriendly press questions". Humphreys mentioned that Summerfield was concerned about the cost of a television broadcast, but Chotiner noted that the cost of reprinting all campaign materials to reflect a change on the ticket would be far more than that of a telecast.


title: Checkers speech

text: The avalanche of editorial opinion continued the following day, Sunday, September 21, but Eisenhower continued to withhold judgment. Eisenhower considered asking retired Supreme Court Justice Owen Roberts to evaluate the legality of the Fund, but time constraints ruled him out. Eisenhower decided to ask the Los Angeles law firm Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher for a legal opinion, while asking the accounting firm Price Waterhouse to audit the Fund's records. Nixon, meanwhile, was encouraged by a supportive telegram from his mother and discouraged by one from former Minnesota governor Harold Stassen urging him to resign from the ticket. New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey, a Nixon supporter, called to tell Nixon that most Eisenhower aides favored his removal, and that if Nixon made the telecast, he should call for people to write to express their opinions. Dewey added that if the response was not strongly pro-Nixon, then he should leave the ticket.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon finally got a call from Eisenhower at 10:00 pm, Pacific Time, Sunday night. Eisenhower expressed a reluctance to see him leave the ticket, and felt that he should have a chance to make his case to the American people. Nixon enquired if Eisenhower would be able to make a decision on whether to keep him as the running mate immediately after the broadcast, and when Eisenhower equivocated, he angrily burst out: "General, there comes a time in matters like this when you've either got to shit or get off the pot." Eisenhower replied that it might take three or four days to gauge public reaction.


title: Checkers speech

text: Through the night to the morning of September 22, Eisenhower and Nixon aides arranged the speech. The RNC worked to raise the $75,000 () needed to buy the half-hour of television time, while the Eisenhower staff secured sixty NBC stations to telecast the speech, with radio coverage from CBS and Mutual. The Nixon staff initially advocated a half-hour that evening, Monday, September 22, to follow the immensely popular "I Love Lucy" show, but when Nixon indicated he could not be ready that soon, settled for 6:30 pm Tuesday night, 9:30 pm in the East, following the almost equally popular "Texaco Star Theater", starring Milton Berle. The campaign arranged to use the El Capitan Theatre, in Hollywood, where several NBC variety shows were then broadcast, since its lighting was superior to that of NBC Radio City West. Nixon told the press that he would be addressing the nation on television, but refused to take any questions about what he might say.


title: Checkers speech

text: On Monday morning, Nixon flew to Los Angeles, making notes for his speech aboard the plane. He jotted down the line he had said in Eugene regarding his wife's coat. He made notes concerning the family finances, upsetting Pat Nixon, who asked why people had to know their financial details. Nixon responded that people in politics live in a fishbowl. He recalled the Fala speech, in which Franklin Roosevelt had sarcastically responded to Republican claims he had sent a destroyer to fetch his dog, Fala, and remembered the dog his children had recently received: A Texas traveling salesman named Lou Carrol had read a report that Pat Nixon said her children Tricia and Julie "longed" for a dog, and his own dog, an American Cocker Spaniel, had just had a litter. After a telegram exchange, he crated the puppy and shipped it by rail to the Nixons, and six-year-old Tricia Nixon named the dog "Checkers". Nixon decided that including the anecdote evoking FDR would needle his enemies and delight his friends.


title: Checkers speech

text: When the plane reached Los Angeles, Nixon secluded himself in a suite in The Ambassador Hotel, letting no one except his wife, Chotiner, and attorney and adviser William P. Rogers have any hint what he was planning. He called two professors he knew at his alma mater, Whittier College, seeking appropriate Abraham Lincoln quotes. They called back with two suggestions, one of which he used. Unwilling to have his message filtered, Nixon adamantly refused to provide the media with any advance text of his speech, convinced that it would reduce the size of his audience. Without any hard information on what would be said during the speech, rumors flew through the media. UPI reported that Nixon would resign from the ticket well before the scheduled time for the speech. On the evening of the 22nd, the media broke the story that Democratic nominee Adlai Stevenson had a similar fund, as Chotiner had predicted. The Stevenson information had been leaked by Bob Humphreys at the RNC, but as he later ruefully noted, "Nobody paid much attention to it."


title: Checkers speech

text: The morning of the 23rd, the day of the speech, brought the reports from the lawyers, who opined that it was legal for a senator to accept expense reimbursements, and from the accountants, who stated that there was no evidence of misappropriation of money. The Fund was to be dissolved, and gifts accepted since Nixon's nomination were to be accounted for as campaign contributions. Despite the reports, Eisenhower had second thoughts about relying on the success of the speech. He told an aide to call Governor Dewey, who was to call Nixon and instruct him to close his speech with his resignation from the ticket. Believing they had resolved the situation at last, Eisenhower and his staff had a relaxed dinner and began to prepare for his own speech that evening, before 15,000 Republican supporters in Cleveland.


title: Checkers speech

text: At 4:30 pm, Nixon, Chotiner, and Rogers were discussing where the public should be told to send their responses to the speech, when a Dewey aide telephoned for Nixon. Reluctantly, suspecting the reason for the call, Chotiner brought Nixon to the phone to speak with the New York governor. Dewey told Nixon that Eisenhower's aides were unanimous that Nixon must resign, though Dewey did not agree, and that Nixon was to so state at the end of his telecast. Nixon asked what Eisenhower wanted him to do. Dewey hedged, stating that he had not spoken with the presidential candidate himself, but that the word had come from such close aides to Eisenhower that the demand had to represent the general's view. Nixon replied that it was very late for him to change his remarks; Dewey assured him he need not do so, but simply add at the end his resignation from the ticket and his insistence that Eisenhower accept it. Dewey suggested he even announce his resignation from the Senate and his intent to run in the special election which would follow—he was sure Nixon would be returned with a huge majority, thus vindicating him. Nixon remained silent for some time, and when Dewey asked him what he would do, the senator told him that he did not know, and if Eisenhower's aides wanted to find out, they could watch just like everyone else. Before slamming down the receiver, Nixon added, "And tell them I know something about politics, too!"


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon, somewhat dazed by the conversation with Dewey, dressed for the speech and reviewed his notes. Chotiner came into Nixon's room, and told him that if he was forced off the ticket, Chotiner would call a huge press conference and reveal all the maneuvering that had led to Nixon's departure; Chotiner added that the resulting furor would mean nothing to either of the two men, since they would be through with politics anyway. Nixon later stated that Chotiner's promise broke the tension and gave him a needed lift. The Nixons and the campaign staff journeyed to the El Capitan, where they were met by a cheering group of Young Republicans on the sidewalk outside, including future White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman. In Cleveland, General and Mamie Eisenhower, with the general's aides, prepared to watch the speech on television in the manager's office above the Cleveland Public Auditorium, where the presidential candidate was to speak.


title: Checkers speech

text: The El Capitan Theatre, at Nixon's insistence, was entirely deserted. Press members were confined to a nearby room, where they could watch on television; stenographers were standing by at the Ambassador to ensure an accurate transcript of Nixon's remarks for the press, who would be facing deadlines in the East. Chotiner and Rogers would watch from behind a screen in the theatre; Pat Nixon, wearing a dress knitted by supporters, would sit on stage a few feet from her husband. The chosen set was a "GI bedroom den" with a desk, two chairs, and bookshelves. Nixon usually preferred to work from a memorized text, but would work from notes for this speech to make the talk sound more spontaneous. Nixon spent some time practicing movements for the cameramen and finally went into the dressing room with his wife for a few minutes of solitude. He told her that he did not think he could go through with it, but she reassured him.


title: Checkers speech

text: The speech opened with Nixon sitting at the desk. He began, "My fellow Americans, I come before you tonight as a candidate for the Vice Presidency, and as a man whose honesty and integrity has been questioned." Nixon indicated that he would not follow the example of the Truman Administration and ignore charges, and that the best response to a smear "is to tell the truth".


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon mentioned the $18,000 Fund, and that he was accused of taking money from a group of his supporters. After stating that the Fund was wrong if he had profited from it, if it had been conducted in secret, or if the contributors received special favors, he continued,


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon stated that no contributor to the fund got any service that an ordinary constituent would not have received, and then anticipated the skeptical questions, "Well, what did you use the fund for, Senator? Why did you have to have it?" In response to his rhetorical question, he explained salary and office allowances for senators. He went through different ways that political expenses could be met. One way was to be rich, but he stated that he was not rich. Another way was to put one's spouse on the Congressional office payroll, as, he stated, his Democratic rival, Senator John Sparkman, had done. Nixon did not feel comfortable doing that himself with so many deserving stenographers in Washington needing work, though Pat Nixon was a "wonderful stenographer" and sometimes helped out in the office as a volunteer. At this point, the camera turned from Nixon for the first time to reveal Pat Nixon sitting alongside the desk. Nixon indicated he could not continue his law practice, as some Congressmen did, due to the distance to California, and in any event he felt that practicing law while a lawmaker was a conflict of interest. Thus, he indicated, he had found that the best way to pay for political expenses not within his means was to allow contributors to do so. Nixon proffered the legal and accounting opinions as proof of his statements.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon, continuing to ask skeptical rhetorical questions, indicated that some might feel that even with the opinions, he might have found some way to personally benefit. In response to his own question, he detailed his background and financial situation, beginning with his birth in Yorba Linda, and the family grocery store in which the Nixon boys helped out. He alluded to his work in college and law school, his service record, and stated that at the end of the war, he and Pat Nixon had $10,000 in savings, all of it patriotically in government bonds. He gave the dollar amounts of small inheritances that the Nixons had received from relatives, before turning to their life in Washington:


title: Checkers speech

text: As Nixon discussed their finances, the telecast again showed Pat Nixon, fixedly watching her husband. Pat Nixon later stated that her rapt gaze was because she did not know exactly what he would say, and wanted to hear. Nixon detailed their assets and liabilities: the mortgaged home in Washington; the similarly mortgaged home in California, then occupied by his parents. The loans from his parents and from Riggs Bank. The borrowed-against life insurance policy on the senator; no insurance on his wife or children. The two-year-old Oldsmobile and the family furniture, and that he and his wife owned no stocks or bonds.


title: Checkers speech

text: While Nixon made these points, Murray Chotiner "let out shouts of glee" in his screened booth. As Chotiner exulted, Nixon moved ahead with the lines "that would give the speech its name, make it famous, and notorious":


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon expressed pleasure that Stevenson, whom he termed a man who inherited wealth from his father, could run for president. But people "of modest means" must also get a chance, and he recited the quotation attributed to Lincoln: "Remember Abraham Lincoln, you remember what he said: 'God must have loved the common people—He made so many of them.'"


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon then called for Stevenson to give a full accounting of his own fund, and a full list of the donors. He also called for Senator Sparkman, who, as Nixon repeated, had put his wife on the payroll, to state fully any outside income he might have had. "Because, folks, remember, a man that's to be President of the United States, a man that's to be Vice President of the United States must have the confidence of all the people. And that's why I'm doing what I'm doing, and that's why I suggest that Mr. Stevenson and Mr. Sparkman since they are under attack should do what I am doing." As Nixon made this point, Eisenhower, sitting in the Cleveland office, slammed his pencil down, realizing that he would not be allowed to be the only major party candidate whose finances would evade scrutiny. Eisenhower had benefited from a favorable Act of Congress, allowing the income from his bestselling memoirs to be considered capital gains.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon warned that other smears would be made against him, and many of the same commentators who were attacking him now had also attacked him for his role in the Alger Hiss case, for which he made no apologies. He then rose to his feet, came out from behind the desk, and continued:


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon alleged that Stevenson had downplayed the threat of communism, and was thus unfit to be president. He affirmed that Eisenhower was the only man fit to lead the country in ridding the government of corruption and communism. Reading parts of a letter from the wife of a serviceman fighting in the Korean War, who, despite her financial woes, had scraped together $10 to donate to the campaign, Nixon promised that he would never cash that check.


title: Checkers speech

text: With less than three minutes left in the allotted time, Nixon finally addressed the question: Would he stay or would he go? He indicated that he did not think he should go. "Let me say this: I don't believe that I ought to quit because I'm not a quitter. And, incidentally, Pat's not a quitter. After all, her name was Patricia Ryan and she was born on St. Patrick's Day, and you know the Irish never quit."


title: Checkers speech

text: Seizing on the fact that the Republican National Convention had routinely given the RNC the power to fill vacancies on the ticket, Nixon evaded Eisenhower's power as the general again slammed his pencil down, this time breaking it:


title: Checkers speech

text: Advancing towards the camera, he completed the speech by praising Eisenhower, "He's a great man. And a vote for Eisenhower is a vote for what's good for America."


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon was initially convinced that the speech was a failure. Despite the congratulations of Rogers and Chotiner, and the fact that one of the cameramen had tears running down his face, he reproved himself for not mentioning the address of the Republican National Committee. Though the Young Republicans continued their applause as the Nixon party left the theatre, he fixed on an Irish Setter running alongside his car as it pulled away from the curb. "Well, we made a hit in the dog world anyway." Despite the senator's despair, his wife was convinced that her husband had vindicated himself. Over sixty million Americans had watched or listened to the speech, including the largest television audience up to that point.


title: Checkers speech

text: Nixon had left the Ambassador with the lobby quiet; he returned to a mob scene, and he was soon surrounded by well-wishers congratulating him. The party was able to get through to his suite, and after a few minutes of tense quiet, calls and telegrams began to pour in "from everywhere" praising the speech and urging him to remain on the ticket—but no word came from Eisenhower in Cleveland.


title: Checkers speech

text: In Cleveland, as the speech concluded, General Eisenhower turned to RNC Chairman Summerfield, "Well, Arthur, you sure got your money's worth." Mamie Eisenhower was in tears, and the general told her that Nixon was a completely honest man. The 15,000 supporters waiting for Eisenhower to speak had heard the Checkers speech over the hall's public address system, and when Congressman George H. Bender took the microphone and asked the crowd, "Are you in favor of Nixon?", pandemonium ensued. As the crowd below chanted, "We want Nixon!", Eisenhower quickly revised his speech.


title: Checkers speech

text: Both Eisenhower's speech to the excited crowd and telegram to his running mate were noncommittal. The general applauded his running mate for his speech, but stated that the two had to meet face to face before a final decision could be made. While Eisenhower affirmed that the RNC had the power to elect a replacement candidate, Eisenhower indicated that the committee would, most likely, be guided by his wishes. Eisenhower asked Nixon to meet with him in person in Wheeling, West Virginia, where their campaign was next scheduled to go. Eisenhower's telegram was delayed in transmission and lost among the flood being sent to Nixon's suite, and the latter learned of his running mate's position from a wire service report.