Invasion of the Spice Islands

The Invasion of the Spice Islands was a military invasion by British forces that took place between February to August 1810 on and around the Dutch owned Maluku Islands (or Moluccas) also known as the Spice Islands in the Dutch East Indies during the Napoleonic wars.
By 1810 the Kingdom of Holland was a vassal of Napoleonic France and Great Britain along with the East India Company sought to control the rich Dutch spice islands in the East Indies. Two British forces were allocated; one to the island of Ambon and Ternate, then another force would capture the more heavily defended islands of Banda Neira, following which any other island that was defended.
In a campaign that lasted seven months British forces took all of the islands in the region; Ambon was captured in February, Banda Neira in August and Ternate and all other islands in the region later that same month.
The British held on to the islands until the end of the war. After the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 the islands were handed back to the Dutch, but in the meantime the East India Company had uprooted a lot of the spice trees for transplantation throughout the British Empire.
Background.
The Moluccas were known as the Spice Islands because of the nutmeg, mace and cloves that were exclusively found there. The presence of these sparked European colonial interest in the sixteenth century, starting with Portugal who virtually held a monopoly on the spice trade. The Dutch East India Company (VOC) arrived in the islands in 1599 and eventually ousted the Portuguese.
The English East India Company arrived soon after who in turn competed with the Dutch and had claimed the island of Ambon and the small island of Run. The competition soon came to a head with the Amboyna massacre in 1623 which influenced Anglo-Dutch relations for decades. After 1667 under the Treaty of Breda, both agreed to maintain the colonial status quo and relinquish their respective claims, which continued well in the 18th century.
After the financially disastrous Fourth Anglo-Dutch War the Dutch Republic became the Batavian Republic and allied with Revolutionary France. The VOC was then nationalised in 1796. During the war that followed Prince William V of Orange ordered the Dutch East India Company to hand over their colonies to the British to stop trade falling into French hands. The VOC was officially dissolved in 1799; the overseas possessions then became Dutch government colonies (the Moluccas became part of the Dutch East Indies). The islands were captured by Vice Admiral Peter Rainier – Ternate was later viciously contested by the Dutch. These were subsequently returned as a result of the Treaty of Amiens seven years later. Peace however did not last long and thus began the Napoleonic Wars. By 1808, most of the Dutch colonies had been neutralised in a series of brief but successful campaigns; the Cape was invaded and captured by Sir Home Riggs Popham in January 1806 and the island of Java by Sir Edward Pellew in a campaign that ended in December 1807. The French and British were nevertheless each seeking to control the lucrative Indian Ocean trade routes. The British had started by invading the French Indian Ocean islands of Ile de France and Île Bonaparte in 1809. The Dutch East Indies had to be taken by the British for a number of reasons; firstly it was necessary to subvert French power there before it entrenched itself too firmly to be dislodged easily by the British. This was the primary concern of the East India Company who felt that their China trade would be threatened.
Preparations.
In 1806 Herman Willem Daendels became Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies and sought to defend the region against the British. Using forced labour Daendels reinforced the garrisons, improved defences and built the Great Post Road in Java to counter a potential British threat.
In the middle of 1809 the Colonial Governor of India, 1st Earl of Minto wanted to set up two squadrons to conquer the Moluccas. This fell under Rear Admiral William O'Brien Drury who was resolved to seize the Dutch settlements. The first was set up in February 1810 – Captain Edward Tucker commanded a small squadron comprising HMS "Dover", the frigate under Captain William Augustus Montagu and the sloop HMS "Samarang". They carried two companies of troops numbering around 400 men of the Madras European Regiment and the Madras Artillery. Their main objective were the islands of Amboyna and Ternate.
The second force intended to capture the Banda Islands, the heart of the Spice trade – notably the strongly defended island of Banda Neira. The force comprised the 36-gun frigate "", the former French frigate "HMS Piedmontaise", the 18-gun sloop , and a 12-gun transport, the captured Dutch vessel , which was serving as a tender to "Caroline". The frigates and sloop carried a hundred officers and men of the Madras European Regiment, as well as sailors and Royal Marines, and twenty men and two guns from the Madras Artillery. The squadron was commanded by Captain Christopher Cole, with Captain Charles Foote on "Piedmontaise" and Captain Richard Kenah aboard "Barracouta". They departed from Madras and sailed via Singapore, where Captain Richard Spencer informed Cole that over 700 regular Dutch troops may be located in the Bandas.
A number of East India Company agents were in tow partially to look at the idea of uprooting all of the spice trees namely nutmeg and clove which they had done on a small scale during the islands previous occupation in the 1790s. The primary consideration was the commercial advantage – the occupation of the Spice Islands meant not only a curtailment of the Dutch trade and power in the East Indies but also an equivalent gain to the company of the rich trade in spice.
By 1810 the Kingdom of Holland was a vassal of Napoleonic France after being annexed under orders from Napoleon Bonaparte.
Invasion of the Moluccas.
Amboyna.
The British force allocated to take Ambon left Madras on 9 October 1809. By the middle of the following February they arrived off the island the most considerable of the Dutch Spice islands and seat of government. On 6 February "Dover" captured the Dutch brig-of-war "Rambang". Both "Dover" and "Cornwallis" anchored off the town of Ambon situated at the bottom of a small bay beneath a line of low hills. These were defended by batteries along the beach as well as on some of the neighbouring heights and by Fort Victoria the main fort mounting a number of heavy guns. As the elevations on the left and in the rear of the town commanded its defences, the British intended to assault them.
The British launched their attack on 16 February – the squadron at the same time occupied the attention of the Dutch by a vigorous cannonade. The troops aided by seamen and marines led by a Captain Court were landed on the right of the bay unnoticed by the Dutch, capturing two batteries that overlooked the port and Fort Victoria. During the night, "Samarang" landed forty men, who were joined by two field pieces from "Dover". These joined in the bombardment of Fort Victoria as well as from the two captured batteries.
British cannon fire from the ships and shore guns proved effective at showing considerable force – three ships were sunk in the harbour. A summons was then given to the Dutch Governor Colonel Filz for the surrender of the island, and after a few hours the articles of capitulation were agreed upon. On 18 February the town capitulated; British casualties were extremely light, with only three dead, one of whom was a marine from "Samarang". The entire island defended by 250 Europeans and around 1,000 Javanese and Madurese people laid down their arms.
During the campaign the British captured several Dutch vessels. One was the Dutch brig "Mandurese" which had twelve guns. She was one of three vessels sunk in the inner harbour of Amboyna. However, the British raised her after the island surrendered. They took her into service as . From Amboyna, the squadron went on to capture the islands of Saparua, Harouka, Nasso-Laut, Buru, and Manipa.
After the attack on Amboyna, Spencer sailed "Samarang" to the island of Pulo Ay (or Pulo Ai), in the Banda Islands. There he conducted a successful and bloodless attack on Fort Revenge. Spencer disguised "Samarang" to look like a Dutch merchant vessel, which fooled the fort's commander, enabling Spencer to take the fort by surprise. The Dutch commander committed suicide by taking poison after he realised that he had surrendered to what was a relatively weak British force.
Next, "Samarang" captured the Dutch brig "Recruiter" on 28 March, when she arrived off the island of Pulau Ai. She was armed with twelve guns and had a crew of fifty men under the command of Captain Hegenheard. She had on board 10,000 dollars, the payroll of which were for the Dutch garrison at Banda Neira as well as provisions, a doctor, nurse, and twenty infants, on their way to conduct a vaccination campaign. "Samarang" shared the prize money by agreement with "Dover" and "Cornwallis". Between 29 April and 18 May, "Dover", "Cornwallis", and "Samarang" captured the Dutch ships "Engelina" and "Koukiko". Both Pulau Ai and Run were captured without a fight.
After sending all the Dutch officers and troops from Amboyna to Java, Captain Tucker sailed for the Dutch port of Gorontello, in the Bay of Tommine, on the north-east part of the island of Celebes in June 1810. Although the Dutch flag was flying over Fort Nassau, the settlement was governed by a Sultan and his two sons on behalf of the Dutch. He persuaded the Sultan to allow the British to replace the Dutch – which he agreed to.
Finally on 26 June "Dover" captured the island of Manado, where Fort Amsterdam was protected by two heavy batteries. The fort surrendered without opposition when Captain Tucker pointed out to the Dutch Governor that an English frigate, with guns ready to fire and volunteers waiting in her boats, was waiting to storm the Dutch position. Manado had a garrison of 113, including officers, and the fort and the batteries mounted fifty guns.
Banda Neira.
The British force destined for the Banda Islands appeared at Banda Neira on 9 August. The main defence on the islands was Fort Belgica which is a fairly significant position built in the stereotypical Vauban pentagon and surrounded by a ditch. The older Fort Nassau lay further down to Belgica. The defences had been strengthened since the British had left the islands. In addition there were ten batteries (exclusive of the two forts) and as Spencer had predicted, there were 700 regular Dutch troops and 800 native militia.
The operational concept was to approach Banda Neira after dark on 8 August and disembark the landing force of about 400 sailors, marines, and European infantry in small boats. These boats would run into the harbour before dawn and take Fort Belgica and other strongpoints by surprise.
In the event, not much went according to plan. They were taken under fire from a battery during the night from the small island of Rosensgan as the Dutch were on alert, then the weather worsened dispersing the fleet of small boats. About 100 yards from the shore and directly opposite a Dutch battery consisting of ten 18-pounders the boats grounded on a coral reef. The men leapt into the water, then after an hour and a half before daylight the force were able to land in a sandy cove. When Captain Cole reached the assembly area for the attack there were less than 200 seaman, marines and soldiers remaining. He made the decision to press ahead with the attack - Commander Richard Kenah of "Barracouta" attacked the Dutch battery in front of them from the rear. Using boarding pikes they killed one sentry and captured the remainder of the garrison, some sixty men, without firing a shot.
Leaving a small guard in the battery – twenty minutes later they attempted to storm Fort Belgica. As dawn was breaking they were helped by a native guide to the outer ramparts of the fort. Despite the British being spotted and the alarm called, the heavy rain worked to the advantage of the attackers. The defenders visibility was reduced and their firearms rendered useless. Having erected scaling ladders the attackers stormed over the outer walls and despite coming under desultory musket fire this part of the fort was stormed and taken. The inner walls were then attempted but the ladders were too short. However, the main gate had been opened to admit the commandant who lived outside. The British took the opportunity, made a rush, and by 5:30am the fort was in their possession. The Dutch side the fort commandant and ten men were killed, two officers and thirty men were taken prisoner, along with fifty two cannon. The British loss was trifling with only a few men wounded.
Captain Cole sent Commander Kenah to demand the surrender of the Dutch governor. As negotiations were taking place the "Caroline", "Piedmontaise", and "Barracouda" attempted to enter the harbour but were fired on by Dutch batteries. The British used the guns of Fort Belgica to return fire and threatened to destroy the nearby town if the governor did not surrender but he complied.
Ternate.
The final part of the campaign involved the capture of the island of Ternate, the last remaining Dutch possession of any consequence in the Moluccas; after capturing Manado, Tucker and 174 men from HMS "Dover" arrived there on 25 August. The plan was to capture Fort Kalamata a small fortress which lies near the main town which was made up Fort Oranje; a bigger fort – this contained 92 heavy calibre guns and a garrison of 500 men of which 150 were Dutch. Many of the natives soldiers however had been in near mutiny over their pay.
After having found an amphibious landing difficult at night Tucker and his men resorted in daylight and succeeded at Sasa, a village screened by a point of land from the fort by 7am on 28 August. They managed to ascend a hill, occupied it to place a field gun to command the position. The area on top was covered in thick forest and so Tucker attempted a night march. They were met by a roadblock, so a detour along a stream led to a sharp firefight against a strong Dutch detachment. After driving the Dutch away with a bayonet charge, they came across a beach which was only within a hundred yards of Fort Kalamata. The Dutch opened fire, but even so the attackers decided to make an assault. After crossing a ditch, the British stormed the fort using scaling ladders on the flank of the bastion, and carried it after some sharp fighting. Owing to the darkness and rapidity of the advance the casualties were moderate with three killed and fourteen wounded.
Tucker attempted to demand the Dutch governor Colonel Jon van Mithman to surrender but in response guns were fired at the British ships from Fort Kota Baro a small fort which lay in between Kalamata and Oranje. "Dover" having placed her herself in front of it then used hers guns to silence the battery, following which a small detachment took possession of after a surprise attack. "Dover" then faced off against Fort Oranje pounding it with considerable effect. The Dutch fought back for a few hours, but after experiencing severe damage to the fort and rising losses it was then assaulted by a surprise attack from the rear by a Royal Marine detachment from Kalamata led by Lieutenant Cursham. The British then turned both fort guns on the town itself, and with "Dover" then pounded the town. By 5am the Dutch had had enough and the town finally surrendered.
A day after the town's surrender Mithman then surrendered the island to the British who promptly took possession. By August 31 the campaign in the Moluccas had ended.
Aftermath.
After the Dutch surrender, Captain Charles Foote (of "Piedmontaise") was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of the Banda Islands. This action was a prelude to Britain's invasion of Java in 1811 which Cole also took a leading role in planning and executing. This was successfully completed under Rear-Admiral Robert Stopford. For his services, Cole was knighted in May 1812, awarded a specially minted medal, and given an honorary doctorate by the University of Oxford.
Before the Dutch regained control of the islands, the East India Company used their occupation of the Spice Islands to gather spice seedlings. Thus began a transplantation on an almost industrial scale – most were sent to Bencoolen and Penang, as well as Ceylon and other British colonies. In the previous occupation in the 1790s the EIC had established spice gardens in Penang; by 1805 these contained 5,100 nutmeg trees and 15,000 clove trees. After the occupation in 1815 that number had jumped to 13,000 nutmeg trees and as many as 20,000 clove trees. From these locations the trees were then transplanted to other British colonies elsewhere, notably Grenada and later Zanzibar. As a result, this competition largely destroyed the value of the Banda Islands to the Dutch.
The Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 restored the islands as well as Java to the Dutch. The islands then remained part of the Dutch East Indies, a colony of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, until Indonesia's independence in 1949.


Scottish Libertarian Party

The Scottish Libertarian Party, also known as the Scottish Libertarians, is a political party in Scotland that advocates libertarianism.
History.
The party was first founded on 3 January 2012 under the leadership of author Daniel Logan-Scott. It was refused registration by the Electoral Commission due to naming similarities with the Libertarian Party UK. This was resolved when the Libertarian Party UK altered its registration to no longer stand candidates or run in elections in Scotland. Despite organising various events, the party became inactive and stopped updating their blog.
After 3 years of inactivity, the Scottish Libertarian Party launched again in December 2015 under new leader Alan Findlay, officially registering with the Electoral Commission in March 2016.
In the 2016 Scottish Parliament election the party stood in the West Scotland, Mid Scotland and Fife, North East Scotland regions and the Edinburgh Central constituency. The party received its highest percentage of votes in Edinburgh Central with 0.3%, or 119 votes, and received 650 votes in Mid Scotland and Fife, 552 in North East Scotland and 480 in West Scotland, for a total of 1,805 votes in Scotland.
In the 2019 general election the party fielded one candidate in the constituency Kilmarnock and Loudoun, getting 405 votes (0.9% of the votes cast). However, they said that the reason they were only standing one candidate was because this election was solely about Brexit, and that it would be better to save their money for the 2021 Scottish Parliament election, when they hope to stand candidates in all regions and a few key constituencies. They did, however, advise people to vote for whatever party was the most likely to deliver a no-deal Brexit.
On 10 November 2020, the Scottish Libertarian Party announced that Aberdeenshire councillor for Stonehaven and Lower Deeside, Sandy Wallace had joined the party. Cllr Wallace was originally elected as a Conservative at the 2017 Aberdeenshire Council election, but became an independent on 12 December 2018, citing he had no faith in either the Prime Minister or the Conservative controlled Coalition in Aberdeenshire. He is the first and only person to represent the party at any level of governance.
Policies.
Economic policy.
The Scottish Libertarian Party advocates for a free market, opposing the idea of the welfare state and would like to see all sectors of the economy run privately, including education and healthcare. They are against the idea of state ownership, saying, "Every person has a right to their justly earned or created property to use, sell, rent, lend, or dispose of as they choose... What is commonly seen as property ownership in the United Kingdom is in fact property use. The actual owner remains the government." They also advocate for the abolition of all taxes with the exception of income tax. They say that they recognise that income tax is the primary means of funding the government, and that until a better alternative is found, it would be reduced to a smaller, flat tax. They also want to abolish corporate welfare, including subsidies and special privileges for big businesses.
The party is against all tariffs and supports the idea of unilateral free trade with all other countries.
On inflation, the party says, "...the Scottish Libertarians advocate a monetary system based on gold, silver, or both and denounce the fiat money system and the central banking system that creates inflation."
Social policy.
The Scottish Libertarians believe that "there are no groups" when it comes to issues such as gender equality and sexual orientation, instead stating "There are only people and people come individually."
On crime and justice, they say that the rights of the person accused must never be undermined, such as the rights of due process, a speedy trial, legal counsel, trial by jury, and the legal presumption of innocence until proven guilty. In their 2016 Scottish Parliament manifesto, they stated that individuals have the right to live how they want to live, as long as they don't harm others. They also said that they would prefer a more restorative justice system.
The party is for the legalisation of all drugs and would end what they call the costly and ineffective War on drugs. They also support the decriminalisation of prostitution in line with the New Zealand Model, as advocated by Amnesty International.
The party is pro-free speech, and oppose restrictions of what the SNP describes as "hate speech." The party's leader, Tam Laird, wrote once that he lived in Zambia as a boy. He said that he enjoyed it, but criticising the president, the army and UNIP (the party the President Kenneth Kaunda was leader of) were crimes. He complained that, in time, the situation would be the same in Scotland, comparing it to the boiling frog theory.
Foreign policy.
The party supports Scottish independence, because they say that their policies are impossible to enact under the current political situation. However, unlike most other pro-independence Scottish parties, they are against the EU, as they claim that re-joining it after independence would "simply be trading one foreign master for another." They are willing to work with the EU for reduction of barriers to trade and movement of people between Scotland and the EU. They are against all tariffs and wish for the country to adopt unilateral free trade. They have voiced support for Liberland.
On immigration, the party takes a very liberal stance, and support easy immigration to Scotland. However, they support "reasonable controls... to prevent the entry of foreign nationals who pose a credible threat to security, health, or property."
When it comes to international conflicts and warfare, the party argues for diplomacy as the primary option for resolution and rejects the use of force, either militant or economic, as a means of achieving the international goals. Should diplomacy fail and the life, liberty, or property of the nation was at stake, then war becomes the only option remaining and will be officially declared through the passage of legislation.
Education and healthcare.
The party believes that education is best facilitated by the free market and that schools should be managed locally, arguing it'd help achieve greater accountability and parental involvement.
They consider the current healthcare system to be poorly performing and would heavily reform it. They would replace it with a system of compulsory insurance, modelled on the Dutch system, which they believe would increase patient choice over the level of health care they require and flexibility to choose where they wish to receive their health treatments. They also would legislate to allow for assisted suicide or 'dignified death'.


Civic Democratic Forum

The Civic Democratic Forum (; abbr. ГДФ or GDF) is a liberal political party in Serbia. It was founded in 2019 by former members of Movement of Free Citizens. It has no representatives in the National Assembly, since it was founded after the last parliamentary elections in Serbia. It has positioned itself as an opposition to government led by Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). However, GDF often criticizes other opposition parties.
History.
When Saša Janković resigned as President of Movement of Free Citizens, candidates for his successor were actor Sergej Trifunović and Aleksandar Olenik. The interim president was Rade Veljanovski. When Trifunović won with 60% of the vote, Veljanovski, Olenik, and several other members left the movement. On 2 March 2019, they formed Civic Democratic Forum.
In April they formed signed an cooperation agreement with Party of Modern Serbia. Together they issued a statement in which they present a solution for Kosovo. Their stance is that Serbia should exchange territories with Kosovo and recognize its independence.
On 5 February 2020 GDF, Party of Modern Serbia and League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina formed "European block." European block together with newly formed organisation Serbia 21 (former members of SDS, LDP and DS) will participate in 2020 Serbian parliamentary election in a pro-european coalition "United Democratic Serbia".
The party keeps close ties to the Together for Serbia political party and its leader Nebojša Zelenović.


Steven Landsburg

Steven E. Landsburg (born February 24, 1954) is an American professor of economics at the University of Rochester in Rochester, New York. From 1989 to 1995, he taught at Colorado State University. Landsburg is also an outspoken commentator on economic, legal, and political issues whose comments have sometimes been regarded as controversial.
Education.
Landsburg was an undergraduate at the University of Rochester.
Landsburg received a PhD in mathematics from the University of Chicago in 1979.
Writings and work.
Commentary and opinions.
Landsburg wrote a column on "everyday economics" for "Slate" magazine from 1996 to 2008. The subjects of the columns were diverse and often drew on current affairs. In them, Landsburg discussed the national debt, the obesity crisis, payments to Hurricane Katrina evacuees in New Orleans and salary caps in the NFL. Landsburg also discussed recent research in micro-economics and its implications, as in an article on the value of mobile phones and driving, the (career) cost of motherhood, and whether or not daughters (as opposed to sons) cause divorce.
Landsburg also addressed legal issues: in a "Slate" column from 2003, he proposed punishing jurors when a jury's decision is later "proven" to be wrong, such as when an acquitted defendant later admits to committing the crime. If a jury's judgment is later "proven" to be right, Landsburg suggested the jurors should be financially rewarded.
Landsburg has been particularly critical of mainstream environmentalism, having devoted both "Slate" columns and book chapters (in "The Armchair Economist") to criticize environmentalist principles. As a self-described "hardcore libertarian", Landsburg emphasizes the importance of individual choice. This position extends to health care, and his view that those who choose no insurance should not receive potentially life-saving treatment. This position was asserted partly as a response to an article published by Daily Kos.
Landsburg supports free trade and opposes protectionism, and his writings in the topic have appeared in various newspapers and magazines, including "The New York Times" and "The Washington Post". Landsburg's comparison of protectionism to racism in "Forbes" magazine prompted a response from Pat Buchanan. On April 8, 2005, Landsburg debated protectionism and free trade with John Gibson on the Fox News Channel's "The Big Story". Before the 2004 presidential election Landsburg stated that he planned to vote against John Kerry because of his belief that John Edwards, Kerry's running mate, was a "xenophobe" due to his opposition to free trade. He compared Edwards' views to David Duke's racism.
He has also reviewed popular economics books " Freakonomics" and "The Undercover Economist" for the "Wall Street Journal."
Landsburg has spoken at many distinguished events and in February 2012 he spoke at Warwick Economics Summit and the Adam Smith Institute in the United Kingdom.
In March 2012, Landsburg supported some of pop radio personality Rush Limbaugh's attacks against a Georgetown University student, Sandra Fluke Fluke spoke before Congress advocating mandating birth control coverage in some insurance programs, citing their use in preventing ovarian cysts. "There are really good arguments for subsidizing and bad arguments for subsidizing [birth control]," Landsburg said during an interview with WHAM-TV. "However, [Fluke] didn't bother to make any. She made no argument. She simply said she wanted it subsidized." On his blog, Landsburg discussed Limbaugh's calling Fluke a "slut", and said "A far better word might have been 'prostitute' (or a five-letter synonym therefor), but that's still wrong because Ms. Fluke is not in fact demanding to be paid for sex...The right word for that is something much closer to 'extortionist'." Landsburg's comments drew a rebuke from University of Rochester President Joel Seligman, who said he was "outraged that any professor would demean a student in this fashion", and a silent protest from thirty UR students who formed a line between him and his students during one of his classes.
In a blog post from March 20, 2013 titled "Censorship, Environmentalism and Steubenville," Landsburg spawned controversy when discussing principles on which to justify what is legal. He proposed as a second attempt that "You can do anything you want as long as you're not causing anybody direct physical harm"; he proceeds to conduct an argument by demonstrating that "it would also allow you to rape an unconscious victim if there were no physical consequences". This outcome, in obvious violation of common sense, is then evidence against the second principle. Critics claim this is an attempt to justify rape on an economic basis.
Many students and faculty at the University of Rochester claimed that Landsburg's "thought experiment" was offensive and potentially dangerous, in that it called into question whether or not the rape of unconscious individuals should be illegal. Some protesters pointed out that the young men charged in the Steubenville rape case (to which Landsburg's post directly refers) claimed not to have known that it was illegal to have sex with an unconscious, non-consenting partner—an ignorance that, according to protesters, Landsburg's thought experiment was helping to perpetuate.
A petition calling on the University to censure Landsburg received several hundred signatures; this petition, along with a student-led protest outside Landsburg's classroom, attracted national media attention. In response, Landsburg issued an apology in which he said that he had assumed all of his regular blog readers would know that he found rape repugnant, and that the point of the post was to illustrate the paradoxes that arise when trying to prove such obvious conclusions from first principles.
Academic writings.
Landsburg's articles in academic journals have dealt with many fields, including algebraic K-theory, module patching, philosophy of science and, moral philosophy.
Teaching.
Landsburg teaches intermediate and advanced microeconomics at the University of Rochester. He was promoted from adjunct associate professor to professor during the 2005–2006 academic year and in 2007 he received the University's Professor of the Year in Social Sciences award.
Personal.
For several years, Landsburg served on the board of directors of Hutchinson Technology, a manufacturer of suspension assemblies for disk drives.
Landsburg lives in Rochester, NY. He has one daughter, named Cayley, who was featured in his book "Fair Play".
He has eastern European Jewish heritage. Landsburg is an atheist.


Jacobus Vanderveer House

The Jacobus Vanderveer House, also known as Knox House, is a U.S. Federal style house located just north of the community of Pluckemin in Bedminster Township, Somerset County, New Jersey at the junction of US 202 and 206 north of River Road. The house was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 29, 1995, and noted as an "excellent example of a Dutch–American house". The Vanderveer /Knox House & Museum while owned by Bedminster Township, is operated under the direction of the Friends of the Jacobus Vanderveer House, a 501-C3 non-profit organization. The Jacobus Vanderveer House is situated on part of the that make up River Road Park. The house was thought to be built somewhere in the mid-1770s by James (Jacobus) Vanderveer, son to Jacobus Vanderveer after the property was willed to him by his father.
The house is notable as being the headquarters for General Henry Knox during the second Middlebrook encampment (1778–79). He was in command of the Continental Army Artillery Cantonment, what is now known as America's first military training academy, the forerunner to the United States Military Academy at West Point. What was then known as the Pluckemin Continental Artillery Cantonment Site is near the Vanderveer/Knox house, which happens to be the only remaining original structure on the fringe of the cantonment.


Royston Brady

Royston Mathew Brady (born 24 August 1972) is an Irish businessman and former politician, who was lord mayor of Dublin between 2003 and 2004.
Background and early life.
Brady was born in Holles Street Hospital brought up in Artane, he was one of the nine children of Richard Brady from Dublin's inner city and Doreen Lynch from Clanbrassil Street; his father was a taxi-driver, showband singer and furniture dealer.
He attended the Billie Barry stage school and appeared as an extra in the film Excalibur in 1981, he was also an under-age footballer with St Vincent's GAA Club.
He attended St. Joseph's Secondary C.B.S. in Fairview and later studied in Athlone RTC, Louvain in Belgium and Boston College USA.
Business life.
Having trained as a hotelier in the US and Ireland Brady became general manager of the Royal Marine Hotel in Dún Laoghaire in June 1997. From 2000 to 2003 he worked as a consultant for training agency CERT. In 2005 he set up Alpha Recruitment, a recruitment and Consultancy Company specialising in the hotel and tourism sectors. Having built up the business it was sold for an undisclosed sum to Stepone Recruitment in 2008.
Brady left his job as general manager at Roganstown Hotel Country Club in Swords, Co. Dublin after highlighting alleged "illegal" bar licensing practices. Mr.Brady subsequently project managed the opening of Parnell's GAA Club, in Coolock, a multi-million-pound development, including state of the art playing facilities, clubhouse and gym.
Brady has also served on a number of boards including Dublin Port, Dublin Tourism and Dublin Enterprise Board.
Political career.
Brady was elected to Dublin City Council in June 1999 as a Fianna Fáil candidate. Aged 26, he was the youngest member of the council at the time. In 2000 he served as deputy Lord Mayor of Dublin and in 2003 was elected Lord Mayor of Dublin.
At his inauguration, he declared that he would be a people's mayor, insisting that Dubliners deserved better than a token figurehead. He said he was making the issue of street crime in Dublin one of his top priorities and while in office he was publicly critical of then minister Michael McDowell's efforts against crime and at one point referred to him as a bully giving the two fingers to Dublin.
Brady worked to tackle homelessness in Dublin receiving an International Honour for his efforts. He also hosted a homeless couple's wedding in the Mansion House to raise awareness of the plight of Dublin's homeless.
A Dublin football supporter, during his time Brady conferred the freedom of the city on Dubs legend Kevin Heffernan.
Brady was a candidate at the 2004 European Parliament election when he was falsely accused of lying about an incident involving his father's taxi being involved in the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings. Brady was accused by the media of using the incident to obtain the sympathy of the voters. He was later vindicated when the truth of the matter was revealed on 5 – 7 live, the RTÉ Radio programme, on Friday 18 June 2004. Dave Mc Hugh, an RTÉ Researcher who had made a Radio Documentary on the Dublin and Monaghan bombings, discovered that Royston Brady's father had been kidnapped on the evening of 16 May 1974.
Possible return to politics.
Having left Fianna Fáil Brady was publicly courted by Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny who is quoted as saying " He's going to join up, He's a man of energy, drive and commitment." Brady: "I wouldn't rule anything out," he said, later adding: "I have to say, he's (Kenny) a gentleman. I think I'm probably too much a maverick for Fine Gael."
On the Late Late Show he said politicians "need to get real about the issues" and they are out of touch with what is going on with the normal person but "that you can never say never" about returning to politics.
Honours.
While Lord Mayor, Brady was awarded a knighthood by the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George in recognition of Dublin City Council's work "in assisting homeless people." The award was bestowed by Cardinal Mario Pompedda at a ceremony in Áras an Uachtarain in May 2004.
Family and personal life.
Brady married Michelle McConalogue from Carndonagh, County Donegal in December 2003; they currently live in the United States with their children.
His father won an All Ireland minor medal with Dublin in 1954, and his brother, Cyprian was also active in politics.


Social media disruption by far-right groups in Germany

The Reconquista Germanica (RG) is an extreme-right channel running on the Discord application, which was set up to disrupt the German election of 2017. The group has over 5000 users. The goal of the group is to ‘ensure the strongest possible showing for the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in the Bundestag’. It is managed according to hierarchical structures using military language and alt-right vocabulary. According to Julia Ebner, who studied the group, there are links between RG and the AfD.
The Süddeutsche Zeitung cites 5 000 users on the RG Discord channel. They have been instructed to create as many Twitter accounts as possible and to re-tweet as much as possible the material on the RG Discord channel. Thus the impression of RG representing a majority point of view may be created. The goal is not so much to convince their opponents, but to provoke, humiliate and insult them. Other strategies used in social media include representing oneself as a refugee or to pretend publicly that there is no longer a war in Syria. During one day in September 2017 seven of the hashtags defined by RG reached the top 20 trending hashtags in Germany.
The RG vets potential members carefully through several layers of interviews and social media background checks to weed out spies, however the organization was infiltrated by the NGO Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD). The RG and Internet trolls have, according to the ISD, dictated social media conversations and influenced top trending hashtags.
Connections to other groups.
According to Julia Ebner, who studied the group, there are links between RG and the AfD. Further, German broadcaster ARD has documented organizational links between AfD youth organization "Junge Alternative" and the RG.
The self-proclaimed "Commander-in-Chief" of RG, who uses the code name "Nikolai Alexander", has acknowledged close connections with Russia, and stated the group would not have been possible in its actual form without Russian assistance.


Don Patinkin

Don Patinkin (Hebrew: דן פטינקין) (January 8, 1922 – August 7, 1995) was an Israeli-American monetary economist, and the President of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Biography.
Don Patinkin was born January 8, 1922, in Chicago, to a family of Jewish emigrants from Poland. While doing his undergraduate studies at the University of Chicago, he also studied the Talmud at the Hebrew Theological College in Chicago. He continued at Chicago for his graduate studies, earning a Ph.D. in 1947 under the supervision of Oskar R. Lange. Patinkin was a strong Zionist and, while doing his graduate studies, planned to immigrate to Palestine; in his graduate research he studied Palestinian economics, although he did not complete his thesis in this subject.
After graduating he held lecturer positions at the University of Chicago and the University of Illinois until he succeeded in emigrating to Israel in 1949, where he was hired by the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In 1956 he was appointed the research director of the Falk Institute for Economic Research, which was established by Simon Kuznetz with the support of the Falk Foundation.
Academic career.
He remained at the Hebrew University. becoming university president from 1982 to 1986, following Avraham Harman. He resigned due to the poor state of the university's finances and was succeeded by Amnon Pazy. He retired in 1989, and died August 7, 1995 in Jerusalem.
Economic research.
Patinkin's work explored some of the microfoundations of Keynesian macroeconomics, particularly the role of money demand. His monograph "Money, Interest, and Prices" (1956) was for many years one of the most widely used advanced references on monetary economics.
Huw Dixon believes that: ""Money, Interest and Prices" is perhaps as great in its vision as Keynes' "General Theory". Whilst the latter has a greater abundance of originality, the former has a greater clarity of insight and formal expression. Don Patinkin states his theory of the labour market and corresponding notion of the full employment equilibrium in just three pages of "Money, Interest and Prices" (in the 1965 edn. pp. 127–30). These pages deserve great attention: they state the labour market model that became the standard foundation for the aggregate supply curve in the aggregate demand/aggregate supply (AD/AS) model. Although Patinkin himself did not formulate the AD/AS representation, it is implicit in his "Money, Interest and Prices"."
Awards and recognition.
Patinkin was awarded the Israel Prize in 1970.
In 1989, a conference was held in honor of Patinkin's retirement.


Battle of Ballyellis

The Battle of Ballyellis on 30 June 1798 was a clash during the Irish Rebellion of 1798 (Éirí Amach 1798 in Irish), between a surviving column of the dispersed Wexford rebel army and pursuing British forces which resulted in a victory for the rebels.
Background.
The British victory at Vinegar Hill on 21 June had denied the rebels static bases of operation but had not finished the rebellion and at least three major columns of rebels were operating throughout the southeast, moving outwards from county Wexford in an effort to spread and revive the rebellion.
One such column, numbering about 1,000 but accompanied by a number of women and juveniles was mobile in north county Wexford, continually altering course to elude combined movements of pursuing British forces. The column was led by Joseph Holt and headed in the direction of Carnew, County Wicklow toward the security offered by its mountain ranges when one of its foraging parties was intercepted and destroyed by a cavalry patrol. It quickly became evident to the British authorities that this party was a detachment from the main body of rebels and a mounted force of 200 troops consisting of Ancient Britons, dragoons, and three yeomanry corps, assembled near the neighbourhood of Monaseed to begin a pursuit of the rebels.
Battle of Ballyellis.
However, the approaching British had been spotted and a force of rebels then moved ahead of the main force to prepare an ambush at the townland of Ballyellis. The spot chosen was behind a curve in the road flanked by high ditches and estate walls; wagons were then placed on the road and access points cut into the ditches. The main force arrived and deployed itself behind the wagons, on the wall and ditches with a small force left to stand on the road ahead of the barricades standing to face and lure in the approaching soldiers.
Upon spotting the small force standing on the road, the pursuing British quickened their pace and charged forwards, assuming that they were facing only the rearguard of the fleeing column. Upon reaching the turn, they were met by a barrage of gunfire and hemmed in by the rebels on three sides. As more mounted troops arrived they pressed their comrades further into the trap making effective manoeuvre impossible and many were easily picked off by the long pikes of the rebels.
The rear-ranks quickly fled with a few more soldiers escaping by jumping their mounts over the ditch but the rebels organised a relentless pursuit of the soldiers who were tracked and killed through the adjoining fields. At the end of the action about 60 troops (including a French émigré) and two officers were killed for no rebel casualties.
Aftermath.
The news of this rebel victory came as a shock to the authorities in Dublin Castle who had assumed that the offensive capabilities of the rebels had been finished at the battle of Vinegar Hill. Reports of the defeat were downplayed and the scale of losses withheld from the general public, but the military now recognised Wicklow as the main theatre of rebel operations and began to transfer troops there in anticipation of a new anti-insurgency campaign.


Battle of Mesoten

The Battle of Mesothen took place from 26-30 September to 1 October 1812, between the Russian Corps of Finland and the French-allied Prussian Auxiliary Corps. It was fought near the Latvian town of Mežotne (), then part of the Courland Governorate.
Background.
In September 1812, Russian troops of General Steinheil entered Mitau, Gross Eckau and Bauska without a fight. However, they were spread out and vulnerable to enemy counterattacks. The Prussian command deployed its forces to defend the artillery stationed at the Bauska Castle and sent small squads to the ford across the river Lielupe.
Battle.
On September 29, the Prussians launched a counterattack against the advancing Russian forces and attacked their vanguard at 5 pm. The struggle lasted until late at night and pushed the Russian troops back. On the same night, Ludwig von Wartenburg sent forces under the command of Friedrich Kleist against the troops of , which were chasing a retreating Prussian squad on the left bank of the Lielupe. The resulting battle was fought in darkness and involved only infantry units. Vastly outnumbering the enemy, the Prussians forced the Russian troops back and, after having received substantial reinforcements, went on the offensive.
Aftermath.
As a result of the battle, Steinheil called off the advance and returned to Riga. Although a defeat, the battle eased some of the pressure on the Russian army of Peter Wittgenstein, helping it to eventually capture the city of Polotsk on October 20.


Ofir Katz

Ofir Katz (, born 19 May 1980) is an Israeli politician. He is currently a member of the Knesset for Likud.
Biography.
Born in Afula, Katz joined Likud during at the age of 18, and started working for the office of Benjamin Netanyahu when Likud were the opposition party in the late 2000s. When Likud became the ruling party after the 2009 elections, he became an advisor to Minister of Culture and Sport Limor Livnat, before starting to work for Gilad Erdan when he was Minister of Internal Affairs and Minister of Public Security.
In the build-up to the April 2019 elections, he was placed twentieth on the party's list, the slot reserved for the Galilee and Valleys. He was elected to the Knesset as Likud won 36 seats.
Katz is married with two children and lives in Afula.


Ola Elvestuen

Ola Elvestuen (born 9 October 1967) is a Norwegian politician for the Liberal Party who served as Minister of Climate and the Environment from 2018 to 2020.
Elvestuen was a member of the Norwegian Parliament from Oslo for the 2013–2017 term, and served as leader of the Energy and the Environment Committee since 2013.
Prior to this, he served as a deputy representative to the Parliament of Norway from Oslo during the terms 2001–2005, 2005–2009 and 2009–2013. On the local level Elvestuen is a member of Oslo city council, and served as city commissioner for public transport and environmental affairs from 2011 until his election to Parliament in 2013. In 2008 he became second deputy leader of his party, and then first deputy in 2012, which he was until 2020.
He is a younger brother of illustrator Per Elvestuen.
References.


Loevestein faction

The Loevestein faction () or the Loevesteiners were a Dutch States Party in the second half of the 17th century in the County of Holland, the dominant province of the Dutch Republic. It claimed to be the party of "true freedom" against the stadtholderate of the House of Orange-Nassau, and sought to establish a purely republican form of government in the Northern Netherlands.
History.
The name Loevestein refers to Loevestein Castle. There, stadtholder William II locked up six members of the States of Holland and West Friesland during his coup d'état of 30 July 1650. Amongst them was the burgomaster of Dordrecht, Jacob de Witt (father of Johan and Cornelis de Witt). After pressure by the States of Holland, they were already subsequently released between 17 and 22 August 1650. Jacob de Witt lost all his functions, but when William II died several months after his coup, Jacob retrieved most of his functions. These events made the term "Loevestein faction" synonymous for pro-States regenten who opposed the stadtholderate. The De Witt family, too, walked over to the States camp after this incident.
The term "Loevestein faction" was invented by their Orangist adversaries. It has been suggested that Jacob had 'poisoned' his sons with anti-Orange sentiments, and he allegedly told them every day to 'Gedenck aan Loevesteyn' ("Remember Loevestein"), although this is disputed. From the 1660s onwards, the Prince's supporters would start identifying the Brothers de Witt with earlier States supporters such as Johan van Oldenbarnevelt (executed for his opposition against Maurice of Nassau) and Hugo Grotius (sentenced to life imprisonment in Loevestein in 1619 at Maurice's instigation, but he escaped in a book chest in 1621). After the assassination of the Brothers de Witt in 1672, their allies started doing the same, reappropriating the word "Loevesteiner".
In the 18th century, van Oldenbarnevelt and Grotius were retroactively counted amongst the "heroes and martyrs of the Loevestein tradition". In the early 19th century, king William I preferred to let the factional struggles during the Dutch Republic be 'forgiven and forgotten', but amongst others the firmly Orangist historian Willem Bilderdijk on the one hand and the liberal historian Reinier Cornelis Bakhuizen van den Brink (calling himself a "Loevesteiner [...] to the bone") on the other, vehemently disagreed, and sought to rewrite the history of the Netherlands according to their own views.


Solidariedade

Solidariedade (, ) is a Brazilian social-democratic political party that uses the TSE number 77. The party won 14 seats in the 2014 Brazilian general election.
Ideology.
The party identifies itself as centre-left and social-democratic. The party has strong links with Força Sindical, a labour union that historically strongly opposes the hegemony of Central Única dos Trabalhadores and other leftist labour movements in favor of a less ideological and more pragmatic approach, "Sindicalismo de Resultados" (Unionism of Results), which means less ideology and more direct gains for the working class.
The party supports a world-view following social constructionism and social constructivism.


Battle of Heilsberg

The Battle of Heilsberg took place on 10 June 1807, during the Napoleonic Wars.
Overview.
On 24 May 1807, the Siege of Danzig ended when Prussian General Friedrich Adolf, Count von Kalckreuth capitulated to French Marshal François Joseph Lefebvre. This gave Napoleon the opportunity to engage the Russian forces led by Levin August von Bennigsen. On 2 June, before Napoleon could act, Bennigsen ordered his columns to converge on Marshal Michel Ney's exposed VI Corps. Outnumbered by 63,000 to 17,000, Ney fought a rear guard action at the Battle of Guttstadt-Deppen on 5 and 6 June. Though he lost his baggage train, two guns, and 2,042 men, Ney managed to escape to the southwest over the Pasłęka (Passarge) River with the bulk of his soldiers.
Within two days, Napoleon had ordered his 190,000-man army to close in on the 100,000 Russians and 15,000 Prussians. Aware of their approach, Bennigsen ordered his troops to fall back on Lidzbark Warmiński ("Heilsberg" in German). The Russian army took up strong defensive positions around the town, which stood on the Łyna (Alle) River. The French army, under Marshals Murat and Lannes, attacked on 10 June. Bennigsen repelled several attacks, resulting in huge French casualties, but had to withdraw towards Friedland the following day. Four days later, the decisive Battle of Friedland occurred, ending the War of the Fourth Coalition with the passing of the Treaty of Tilsit.
Influences on the battle.
Geography.
The Battle of Heilsberg was fought on the Alle river, known today as the Lyna. The Teutonic Castle being the focal point of the battle was held by Russian control.
Terrain.
Aside from geographical advantages, the Russians had also spent three to four months compiling tactics on how to defend against a French invasion, regardless of where they would attack the castlegrounds. Defensively, the castle was supported by its bridges and walls, both of which were built along the perimeter of the castle. The land surrounding the Teutonic Castle acted as an obstacle for the French army due to the increase of elevation from the base of the river to the castles foundation. The Prussian 21st Fusiliers, commanded by Ludwig August von Stutterheim, was garrisoned there.
Climate.
Although the terrain was punishment enough for the French, weather also took a toll on their abilities and health. During the day, on top of the weight being carried in regards to supplies and armory, temperatures reached dangerously hot and humid levels. The dampness and bitter cold of the night also played a significant role by providing little opportunity for rest.
Progress of the battle.
Tactics.
Benningsen had been fooled into retreat by false reports of the French numbers. The Russians, having moved back to Heilsberg, had some protection from substantial fieldworks. In order to storm the fortifications, Napoleon had to choose between an immediate advance or a flanking movement, threatening the Russian supply base of Königsberg (now Kaliningrad). He chose the latter, and the French thus positioned themselves so as to cut off any opportunity for the Russians to obtain reinforcements.
The battle.
The French cavalry under Joachim Murat was selected to lead the frontal attack, but Napoleon did not arrive on the field in person until Murat had already led a disastrous charge. Marshal Mortier and Marshal Davout advanced on the Königsberg side. Soult and Lannes, leading separate cavalry units, and Ney, with the infantry, moved forwards on both sides of the River Łyna. These smaller units proved ineffective, especially when Prussian reinforcements arrived, sent by Anton Wilhelm von L'Estocq at Bennigsen's request. Lannes made an unsuccessful attack which cost the French 3,000 casualties. On the Russian side, Bennigsen was suffering from fever and had difficulty remaining in command.
On 11 June, the substantial casualties on both sides and the success of the Russian defence gave Bennigsen and Napoleon little choice but to call an undocumented truce to end hostilities. The French had lost an estimated 12,000 men. The truce was focused primarily on the recovery of wounded soldiers. The battle ended with medics and soldiers from both sides helping the wounded and retrieving the dead. When Napoleon entered the deserted Russian positions the following day, he found that all except the wounded had been evacuated overnight.
Outcome and post-war analysis.
This battle is recognized as having been tactically indecisive due to neither side having gained any significant ground, it is most notably discussed as a battle that yielded little change in the balance of strength between the Russians and the French. By most accounts, this was a successful Russo-Prussian rearguard action. Napoleon never realized he faced the entire army at Heilsberg. Murat and Soult attacked prematurely and at the strongest point in the Russo-Prussian line. The Russians had built extensive fortifications on the right bank of the Alle river, but only a few minor redoubts on the left bank, yet the French advanced over the river to give battle, squandering their advantages and incurring casualties
The Battle of Heilsberg was fought four days before the decisive Battle of Friedland.
French Army losses.
1,398 killed, 10,059 wounded, 864 captured Three units lost their eagles, and Digby Smith places the losses higher than Clodfelter, at 1,398 killed, 10,059 wounded and 864 captured.
Nicolas Jean-de-Dieu Soult's IV corps sustained the majority of losses: 8,286, and General François Xavier Roussel, Chief of Staff of the Imperial Guard, was killed. Three generals were wounded, and Jean Lannes' corps lost 2,284 killed and wounded.
Russo-Prussian losses.
Disputes over the killed and wounded remain. Clodfelter estimates 6,000 killed and wounded. In addition, generals Koschin, Warneck, and Pahlen were killed; Dmitry Dokhturov, Werdrevski, Fock, Zakhar Dmitrievich Olsufiev, Duka, Laptiev, Passeck and Duke Charles of Mecklenburg were wounded. The Russian commander, Bennigsen was sick all day, but remained on his horse despite falling off unconscious several times. Digby Smith says that the Russian Prussian force lost 2-3000 dead, and about 5-6000 wounded, and they lost two guns.
Notable officers of the French Army present were:
Notable officers of the Russian Army present were:


America-Lite

America-Lite: How Imperial Academia Dismantled Our Culture (and Ushered in the Obamacrats) is a 2012 book by David Gelernter, published by Encounter Books.
Overview.
In "America-Lite", Gelernter argues that the profound changes in American society, especially between the 1960s and the 1980s, can be explained by an earlier rise of an academic class quite different from those who dominated pre-War American universities, especially in the Ivy League.
Gelernter views the changes in morality, social norms, and attitudes to normativity itself as principally an effect of these academics, recruited from the 1940s onwards, who selectively recruited colleagues sharing their world view, and taught this world view to their students. A confluence is seen in which acquiescence to academic expertise increases at the same time that core questions as human nature, right and wrong, art, equality, justice, progress, religion etc. are questioned by these experts. The uniformity of this expert opinion, along with ignorance by students of alternatives, is then seen as a relatively straightforward cause of very significant changes in society, rules, laws, regulations, expectations, and attitudes that come to mirror this post-modern world view.
It was reviewed in "The Chronicle of Higher Education" in the article "Dreaming of a World With No Intellectuals", in "Commentary" magazine in the article "Reign of Ignorance", In a "National Review" interview "Dismantling Culture", as well as in "Publishers Weekly" and elsewhere.
Stephen Daisley wrote in "Commentary" magazine that Gelernter portrays Obama's presidency as a symbol of the failure of American education and the success of its replacement with a liberal indoctrination system. As a solution, Gelernter proposes moving all of human knowledge to online servers so that the in-person college experience can be replaced by user-driven self-education. Daisley wrote, ""America-Lite" is lean, incisive convincing, delightfully indelicate, and, in a break from the conventions of the literature on education, honest. It is a fine dissection—de-construction, if you must—of the corruption of higher education and the resulting debasement of political culture. If it makes its way on to a single college reading list, Hell will have frozen over." Russell Jacoby was sharply dismissive in his review of Gelernter's book. Among other criticisms he made, Jacoby said that Gelernter blamed intellectuals for causing the breakdown of patriotism and the traditional family but never explained how that came about.


Elyakim Badian

Elyakim-Gustav Badian (, born 12 December 1925, died 13 February 2000) was an Israeli politician who served as a member of the Knesset for Likud between 1977 and 1981.
Biography.
Born in Chernivtsi in Romania (today in Ukraine), Badian joined the Zionist Movement. He attempted to make aliyah to Mandatory Palestine, but was captured by the British authorities and sent to one of the Cyprus internment camps in 1947, where he became a member of the High Committee. In 1949 he finally made aliyah.
He studied engineering at the Technion, and was later awarded an MBA by Tel Aviv University. He worked as an engineer, and was national secretary of the Engineers Union from 1968 until 1972, and again from 1974 until 1977.
Having been a member of the leadership of the Dor Hadash faction in the General Zionists, Badian became a member of the Liberal Party when the General Zionists merged into it in 1961. He became a member of the party's board in 1964, and was elected onto Haifa city council in 1965, serving until 1969, and again between 1972 and 1978. In 1977, he was elected to the Knesset on the Likud list (an alliance of the Liberal Party, Herut and other right-wing parties), but lost his seat in the 1981 elections.
He died in 2000 at the age of 74.


William Volker Fund

The William Volker Fund was a charitable foundation established in 1932 by Kansas City, Missouri, businessman and home-furnishings mogul William Volker. Volker founded the fund with the purposes of aiding the needy, reforming Kansas City's health care and educational systems, and combating the influence of machine politics in municipal governance. Following Volker's death in 1947, Volker's nephew, Harold W. Luhnow continued the fund's previous mission, but also used the fund to promote and disseminate ideas on free-market economics. During Luhnow's tenure as the fund's primary manager, the William Volker Fund was one of the few libertarian organizations with significant amounts of money at its disposal, making it a key leader in developing the modern libertarian and conservative movements in the United States.
William Volker and the establishment of the Fund.
William Volker was born in Hanover, Germany, in 1859, and his family immigrated to the United States in 1871 and settled in Chicago in October after the Great Fire destroyed portions of the city. According to his official biography, Volker "saw the operations of a vast spontaneous system of relief supported by charitable persons from every section of the world" (23). According to family tradition, the event convinced Volker of the power of private charity. As a young man, Volker moved to Kansas City, Missouri, where he started a home furnishings business, the William Volker & Co., which sold picture frames, blinds, and other home furnishings. As his fortune increased in the early 1900s, he secretly started giving most of it away.
Because of his secret charity, locals nicknamed Volker "Mr. Anonymous" and he became an important figure in Kansas City public life. He became an important Progressive civil reformer in the city who helped create important social-welfare programs such as the Board of the Pardons and Paroles and Board of Public Welfare.
In 1932, Volker set aside half of his fortune into the William Volker Charities Fund. The fund's articles of incorporation claimed it would "care for the sick, aged and helpless"; "provide means and facilities for the physical, mental, moral and spiritual betterment of persons"; "improve living and working conditions"; and provide "education and educational facilities" (209–210).
Harold Luhnow and the post-Volker management of the Fund.
When William Volker died in 1947, his nephew Harold W. Luhnow took control of William Volker & Co. and also became the head of the William Volker Charities Fund's board of directors.
Edmund W. Kitch, "The Fire of Truth: A Remembrance of Law and Economics at Chicago, 1932-1970," 23
Journal of Law and Economics 164 at 180-1 (1983):
William Volker had no children, and he had hired Harold W. Luhnow, son of his sister Emma, to work for him. Born and reared in Chicago, Luhnow graduated from Kansas State University in 1919 and went to work for the company soon thereafter. Luhnow "was involved with a group that succeeded in overthrowing the Pendergast Machine in Kansas City," which acquainted him with Loren B. Miller of the Civic Research Institute. The Fund had assets in 1947 worth approximately $15 million. It operated with a single professional staff person, Herbert Cornuelle (1949–53), and Ken Templeton. In the 1960s the company and the Fund moved to Burlingame, California. The Fund was dissolved after Luhnow's death and its assets distributed to local Kansas City charities and to the Hoover Institution of Stanford University.
Under Luhnow's administration the fund shifted its focus away from charities in the Kansas City area and began pursuing a number of strategies for increasing the acceptance of Old Right and Austrian economics thought in the United States. Luhnow's dedication to right-wing and libertarian ideas grew from his association with Loren "Red" Miller at the Bureau of Government Research, a Detroit-based "good government" foundation. During the 1930s, Miller helped Luhnow undermine the Pendergast machine in Kansas City and Miller introduced Luhnow to intellectuals and public figures who shared the businessmen's hostility to machine politics. During this period, Luhnow read books like F.A. Hayek's "The Road to Serfdom" and became a proponent of classical liberalism.
Luhnow was interested in theories of political economy that are generally called "libertarian" or "classical liberal," but at various times have been called "Conservative," "neoliberal," "right-wing radical," "eighteenth- and nineteenth-century liberal," or Straussian. As Luhnow's commitment to these ideas grew, he used the Volker Fund to give sizable contributions to libertarian and conservative causes. The Fund was instrumental in bringing Friedrich Hayek to the University of Chicago. It also helped support many other classical liberal scholars who at the time could not obtain positions in American universities, such as Ludwig von Mises and Aaron Director. Through its subsidiary the National Book Foundation, the Volker Fund gave away books authored by libertarian and conservative academics to college libraries throughout the U.S. The National Book Foundation distributed books by wide range of influential authors, including Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, Gordon H. Clark, Hayek, Mises, Roscoe Pound, Leo Strauss, Eric Voegelin, and many others.
Under Luhnow's management, the fund helped the then small minority of Old Right scholars to meet, discuss, and exchange ideas. Milton Friedman's "Capitalism and Freedom", Bruno Leoni's "Freedom and the Law", and Hayek's "Constitution of Liberty" were all influenced by the ideas discussed at such meetings. Among its most significant contributions to such academic conferences, the fund supported North American participation at the first Mont Pèlerin Society meeting in 1947.
Under the directorship of "master recruiter" F. A. Harper, the fund systematically recruited a number of young libertarian and conservative scholars. These researchers and staffers eventually became important figures in American right-wing. Notable staffers included a young Murray Rothbard who began working for the Volker Fund in 1951 and wrote book reviews for the Fund until 1962. Rose Wilder Lane also contributed book reviews. Prominent Christian Right pioneers Rousas John Rushdoony and Gary North also gained early notoriety because of their association with the fund.
In addition to its own activities, the Volker Fund also helped support the formation of various complementary institutions, including the Intercollegiate Society of Individualists (ISI), which was later renamed Intercollegiate Studies Institute, and the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE). It also worked closely with similar charitable endeavors, such as the Earhart Foundation and the Relm Foundation.
Controversy and collapse.
In the early 1960s, Luhnow's management of the fund became increasingly inconsistent, and in early 1963 he suddenly fired most of his staff, including Harper and Rothbard. Harper continued the basic nature and spirit of his Volker Fund work by creating the Institute for Humane Studies. Luhnow hired Ivan R. Bierly, an ex-Foundation for Economic Education senior staffer. Luhnow reorganized the Volker Fund as the Center for American Studies and ended the fund's charitable commitments to Kansas City institutions. Bierly recruited William T. Couch, R. J. Rushdoony, and David Leslie Hoggan to run the new center. Rushdoony hired his future son-in-law, Gary North, as a summer intern in 1963.
Immediately, Rushdoony and Hoggan became lightning rods for controversy. Rushdoony, a conservative Presbyterian minister, alienated many of the fund's secular and non-Protestant supporters and was fired by Bierly. Hoggan was even more controversial for his explicitly pro-Hitler and pro-Nazi sympathies. He was fired shortly after Rushdoony.
The Rushdoony/Hoggan controversy left Bierly and Couch scrambling to find support for the center even as Luhnow grew old and sick and was no longer able to support the organization. They courted Stanford University and the Hoover Institution with several million dollars in remaining Volker money only to be rebuffed. The center proved short lived and closed late in 1964 when Couch and Birely failed to secure the support of Stanford and Hoover. A decade later, the remainder of the Volker Fund money, amounting to about seven million dollars, went to the Hoover Institution. The Fund's files have disappeared.


Jonas Cornelius Falk

Jonas Cornelius Falk (1844–1915) was a Norwegian politician for the Liberal Party.
He served as a deputy representative to the Parliament of Norway during the term 1898–1900, representing the constituency of Nordlands Amt. He worked as a telegraph manager. He lived in Hemnesberget, was married to Anna Margrethe Middelthon (1857–1924) and is otherwise known as the father of politician and ideologist Erling Falk.


Colts Neck Inn

The Colts Neck Inn is a steakhouse located on County Route 537 in what is now Colts Neck Township, New Jersey. Established as the Colts Neck Tavern in 1717, the inn became known as the Colts Neck Hotel before becoming a restaurant. A separate Colts Neck Inn Hotel was incorporated in 1997.
History.
The Colts Neck Inn claims on its commercial sign that it was established as a tavern about 1717, but documentation of the inn's actual founding date is unavailable. The tavern was a stopover for stagecoaches and messengers traveling the post road between Freehold and Perth Amboy, New Jersey.
Tavern.
Levi Hart (?-1775), of England, settled in the village of Colts Neck, then part of Freehold Township, New Jersey, in about 1735 and set himself up as the tavern keeper. His place became known as Hart's Tavern. (His Jewish heritage led the British to mark Colts Neck on their Battle of Monmouth map as Jewstown.) After Levi died in 1775, his widow, Catherine (Applegate) Hart, owned the tavern. She remarried in 1778 to Joshua Huddy, who became involved in local activities against Loyalists during the first years of the American Revolution. He was often in court as a defendant and at one point the Monmouth County sheriff had to intervene in a dispute in which Huddy allegedly attempted to wrest ownership of the tavern from his wife and put her and the children on the street. (Note: By September 1780, Huddy was living in a Colts Neck house that would later belong to Thomas G Haight, the father of US Congressman and New Jersey Assemblyman Charles Haight, of Freehold. This is where Colonel Tye and his band of Loyalists attempted to capture and kill Huddy.) Jacob Hart took over for his mother and ran the tavern until 1817.
Samuel Laird (1 February 1787 - 5 July 1859) replaced Jacob Hart as proprietor of the tavern in 1817 and served in that role until his death in 1859. Samuel served as the first postmaster of Colts Neck when a post office was opened on 24 February 1824. Samuel was running the tavern when Colts Neck became part of Atlantic Township in 1857.
Samuel Laird trained race horses while operating the tavern. Prominent among the horses was the thoroughbred Fashion, which was owned by William Gibbons and which Samuel's son Joseph T. Laird rode for all engagements. Joseph was known as the best jockey on the US East Coast at the time. Fashion's big race was at the Union Course on Long Island, New York on 10 May 1842 against a horse named Boston.
Samuel's son Robert Laird ran the tavern from the time of his father's death until 1869. Augustus Manning took over, followed by several unknown proprietors. As of 1885, Monroe Matthews ran the tavern.
Samuel's father, Robert Laird (7 Apr 1758 - 3 June 1811), established Laird & Company, a distillery adjacent to the tavern and operated it from 1780 until his death in 1811. Cited as the oldest licensed distillery in the United States, Laird & Company produced and sold applejack from this location until the distillery burned to the ground in 1849. Samuel Laird's son Robert, who was operating the distillery at the time of the fire, rebuilt it in nearby Scobeyville, New Jersey, where it remains today.
Hotel.
Frederick Luther was operating the hotel when he sold it to Louis V. Snyder of Long Branch, New Jersey in December 1908. The inn, which had more than 25 guest rooms, stables for 25 horses, and several acres of land at the time, was said to be the only hotel between Eatontown and Freehold, New Jersey. Luther planned to retire and engage in the horse business. Snyder would take over the business in March 1909.
The hotel was incorporated as a separate business in 1997. Peter Mavrookas was President of the corporation as of 2003.
The hotel had 47 guest rooms as of October 2016.
Inn.
Arthur Ruffalo and his brother, Joseph Ruffalo, were partners in the Colts Neck Inn in the mid-1960s. The Inn was sold to George Mavrookas in 1973. The family of the new owner continues to control the business as of October 2017.


A.-M. Lafortelle

Auguste Lafortelle called A.-M. Lafortelle (11 January 1769 in Paris – 21 February 1851 in Paris) was an 18th/19th-century French playwright whose works were given on the most important Parisian stages of his time including the Théâtre des Variétés, the Théâtre du Palais-Royal, and the Théâtre du Vaudeville.


Scott Banister

Scott Banister (born 1975) is an American entrepreneur, startup founder, and angel investor. He cofounded the anti-spam company IronPort, and he was an early advisor and board member at PayPal. He invented paid search advertising via keyword auction, the core business model for internet advertising companies like Google and Facebook.
Early life and career.
Banister is the son of Debbie and Bruce Banister (1951–2006), a civil engineer who lived in Kansas City, Missouri.
In the summer of 1995, while Banister attended University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, he cofounded SponsorNet New Media, Inc., with fellow students Max Levchin and Luke Nosek.
Banister left college during his sophomore year in 1996 to cofound Submit It!, "a free, automated resource for bringing your page to the attention of many Web-searching outfits at once", according to "The New York Times". Ali Partovi called it "a simple but elegant concept that turned out to be one of the best business ideas in history". Submit It! was acquired by LinkExchange in June 1998, then by Microsoft in November 1998.
Banister has worked with other start-ups as a board member and investor, including eVoice, the first email-enabled home voicemail service acquired by AOL in 2001. He served as VP of Ideas at idealab!, where he contributed the unique bid-for-placement search engine model that powers Overture.
In December 2000, with Scott Weiss, Banister "cofounded spam-blocking firm IronPort to stop porn from flooding corporate in-boxes". It was acquired in 2007 by Cisco for US$830 million.
He was an early investor in Powerset, a startup building a natural language search engine. His other private equity investments include Uber, Zappos.com, LiveOps, Facebook, Hi5.com, Tagged.com, iLike, Causes.com, Topsy Labs, Teleport, Inc. and TekTrak. Banister also cofounded Zivity, an adult themed social networking site, with his wife, Cyan Banister, and Jeffrey Wescott.
David Gelles has identified Banister as one of the "PayPal Mafia", former board members of PayPal, influential investors in "a collection of some of the most valuable technology start-ups ever seen".
Personal life.
Banister is a marijuana rights activist and was a supporter of Republican Senator Rand Paul. In 2015, Banister donated $3 million to a Super PAC supporting Paul. He later switched his endorsement to Ted Cruz after Paul suspended his campaign.
Banister lives in Half Moon Bay, California, with his wife Cyan. On September 5, 2018, Cyan Banister spoke at TechCrunch Disrupt, telling her surprising origin story, and how the couple met and work together.
Awards and honors.
Cyan and Scott Banister won the Angel of the Year Crunchie award at the 2016 TechCrunch ceremonies. Jessi Hempel of Wired wrote that they "won TechCrunch’s Angel of the Year award last spring for prescient bets on SpaceX, Uber, and DeepMind Technologies."
In 2015, Eugene Volokh announced that the UCLA First Amendment Amicus Brief Clinic would be renamed the "Scott & Cyan Banister First Amendment Clinic", "in recognition of the Banisters' very generous gift in support of the clinic."


Fort Motte

Fort Motte (Fort Motte Station) was developed first as Mt. Joseph Plantation; it was commandeered in 1780 by the British and fortified as a temporary military outpost in what is now South Carolina during the American Revolutionary War. It was significant for its military use as a depot for their convoys between Camden and Charleston, which they occupied. Located along the Congaree River, it is roughly 90–95 miles from Charleston by 21st-century roadways. The British had fortified the big house and surrounds, and it became known as Fort Motte, after Rebecca Brewton Motte, who had been occupying it with her family. During the Patriot Siege of Fort Motte, the plantation mansion was set on fire. The British surrendered at this site.
After the war, this site was considered for the capital of the newly formed state of South Carolina, before Columbia was chosen. Today Fort Motte is the name of an unincorporated village at the nearby crossroads of SH 419 and State Road S-9-13.
The former area of the plantation house and grounds is known as the Fort Motte Battlefield Site. Privately owned, it was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
History.
The Cherokee Path is nearby, long used by indigenous peoples for trading and travel. The first Anglo-European colonists in the area were Scots and English traders, who established trading posts with the Cherokee and other regional Native American tribes. Some posts were fortified as early forts in the colonial period. Amelia Town was established in this area about 1735.
Mt. Joseph Plantation was built in 1767 as an up-country estate by Miles Brewton of Charleston, near the confluence of the Congaree and Wateree rivers. A slave trader, he owned several ships and plantations. He became one of the wealthiest men in the province before he and his family died when lost at sea in 1775 on their way to Philadelphia for him to serve as a delegate at the Second Continental Congress.
His sister Rebecca Brewton Motte (1737-1815) inherited some of his property, including Mt. Joseph. She was widowed in 1780, when her husband Jacob died of illness. After the British appropriated the Miles Brewton House for their headquarters in Charleston, Motte left the city and moved to the relative safety of Mt. Joseph Plantation, 95 miles away.
They were living there when the British took over this property. After the military took over the mansion, the Motte family moved to the overseer's house. The British fortified the big house and its grounds.
A British garrison of regular, Hessian and Provincial forces occupied the plantation, using it as a depot for their convoys running between Camden and Charleston. Waterways were still the key as transportation routes. Mt. Joseph plantation was near a strategic river crossing of the Congaree River, which gave the British access to an important chain of transport from Charleston to points north and west.
By May 1781 the British had constructed wood and earth fortifications at Mt. Joseph: palisades (9' tall) and ramparts (10-11' wide), were faced with a 6' deep ditch in front. 20-30' from the ditch was a row of abatis. Defending the fortified mansion were 184 British regulars, Hessians, and Provincials under the command of Capt. Lt. Donald McPherson. It became known as Fort Motte, because it had been occupied by Rebecca Brewton Motte and her family. She had inherited it from her brother Miles Brewton after he died with his family at sea in 1775, on his way to the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia.
General Francis "Swamp Fox" Marion and Colonel Henry Lee laid siege to the fortified site. Rebecca Motte became known for giving him arrows from East India which would ignite on impact. His forces shot flaming arrows into the roof to set it on fire and drove the British from it, and shot artillery to prevent soldiers from putting out the fire. Captain Lt. McPherson surrendered. "The British surrender of the fort alarmed Lord Rawdon and hastened his retreat from Camden to Charleston."
Miles Brewton and his family died at sea in 1775 as he was en route to Philadelphia after being elected to the second Provincial Congress.
His sister Rebecca Brewton Motte (1737-1815), widowed in 1780 when her husband Jacob died, later inherited her brother's estate and plantations, becoming more wealthy. She and her sister Frances jointly inherited the Miles Brewton House in Charleston. Motte had inherited Fairfield Plantation (Charleston County, South Carolina), which she and her husband had owned, and its more than 240 slaves, as well as their town house in Charleston.
The South Carolina Department of Archives and History, the South Carolina Library, and the University of South Carolina have the earliest extant maps for this area. When cultivation of short-staple cotton became profitable at the turn of the nineteenth century, after the invention of the cotton gin, this upland area was developed for cotton as a commodity crop. The battlefield site is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, considered important because of the military and other history from 1750-1799.


Dean Cameron

Dean Cameron (born Dean Eikleberry; December 25, 1962) is an American television and film actor and musician. He is known for his role as Francis "Chainsaw" Gremp in the 1987 Mark Harmon comedy "Summer School". He also played Dave Marshak in "Ski School" and "Ski School 2". Cameron, along with comedian Victor Isaac, tour in a two-person show that Cameron wrote, called "The Nigerian Spam Scam Scam".
Early life.
Cameron was born in Morrison, Illinois, the son of Kay Elizabeth (Kytle) Huff and Burton Robert Eikleberry. He spent his childhood in Oklahoma and summers in Santa Barbara, California. He graduated from Norman High School in Norman, Oklahoma.
Career.
Dean has starred in short-lived television series like "Spencer" (1984), "Fast Times" (1986, a spinoff of the 1982 film "Fast Times at Ridgemont High)", "They Came from Outer Space" (1990), and "Mister Sterling" (2003). He made guest appearances on many TV series, including "The Facts of Life", "ALF", "My Sister Sam", "Will & Grace", "ER", "Felicity", and "Psych".
He performs a two-person show, "The Nigerian Spam Scam Scam", in which he and actor Victor Isaac read from Cameron's 11-month correspondence with a Nigerian 419 scammer. The show was performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Comedy Festival in 2004 and 2005, the Just For Laughs festival and the Upright Citizens Brigade theater in 2006 and ran in Los Angeles from September 2004 to December 2004. The first professional show was at The Amaz!ng Meeting, TAM2 for the James Randi Educational Foundation in 2004.
Cameron co-wrote the 2001 feature film "Hollywood Palms", wrote and directed a short film, "Glutton Falls" and directed/choreographed "Bukowsical", a late night musical theater parody at the Sacred Fools Theater Company in Los Angeles, California. Cameron directed the videos "Fat Girl" and "Pussy Whipped" for heavy metal band Steel Panther as well as co-wrote the song "Girl From Oklahoma" on their 2009 debut album "Feel the Steel" and "Supersonic Sex Machine" on their 2011 follow-up album "Balls Out". Cameron also co-wrote and directed a presentation pilot for Steel Panther.
In 2006, he originated the role of Carl in "Love Tapes", a play based on videotapes sent by a fan to guitarist Steve Vai. "Love Tapes" was written by Steven Banks and Penn Jillette and directed by Cameron's wife, Jessie Marion.
Cameron was one of the camera operators during the filming of the 2005 film "The Aristocrats". During the 2005 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, he and comedian Paul Provenza shot a live version of "The Aristocrats". The intent was to release it on the Special Features of the DVD. Cameron explained to actor Samm Levine in an interview, "We ended up naked and had props like mayonnaise, mustard and ketchup... applejuice... puppets... ". Because they were shooting late at night in a Scottish pub, no one had releases with them, one of the actors refused to sign the form afterwards and the film was never released.
Cameron is mentioned in the comedy-drama TV show "Psych" when character Shawn Spencer (played by actor James Roday) states, "No one paints a scene like Dean Cameron". The "Robot Chicken" television series also mentions him on their Christmas special during the introduction. The "Star Trek" parody opening says "Christmas, the birthday of Jesus, also the birthday of actor Dean Cameron, who played "Chainsaw" in the movie "Summer School", now we celebrate these equally important men with the "Robot Chicken Christmas Special"".
Since late 1999, has worked as voiceover talent for radio and television commercials and animated series like "Regular Show" and "We Bare Bears".
Music.
His first purchased album was the hip hop record "Straight Outta Compton" which he played "the hell out of". Cameron credits his ability to play the guitar to Tammy Moore, a girl from the ninth grade. She asked him if he could play an instrument and he lied and said "I play banjo," The next day, he told her that he also played the guitar. "I had to learn how to play the guitar pretty quickly". He spent the next six months learning to play "Stairway to Heaven" from a friend. In the 1980s, he switched to the bass guitar.
In 2003, Cameron played bass guitar for a LA, local band called The Thornbirds (formerly called The Ducks). Cameron co-wrote the songs "Girl from Oklahoma" and "Supersonic Sex Machine" for the band Steel Panther, two of the members later joined The Thornbirds. When that group released "All The Same" in 2004, both of the songs were on that album. Cameron is also in a karaoke band that parodies actor/musicians, Corey Haim, Corey Feldman and Corey Hart called Coreyoke. Cameron says on his website that "may be the most fun i’ve ever had in my long life." The story line behind Coreyoke is that they are musicians from the 1980s who are trying to revive their careers and play backup for Michael Jackson.
Personal life.
Cameron is married to Jessie Marion, granddaughter of actress Elena Verdugo, and lives in Los Angeles. Their son, Duncan, was born in August 2009. Cameron rarely uses capital letters. Cameron grew up without religion, and was a teen before he realized that "there was a thing called atheism". He credits his father with teaching him and his siblings to think critically.
Listed as a hard-core Libertarian on Cameron's IMDB profile, he tells interviewer Samm Levine that he prefers the term "Freedom Fighter". Cameron is also the inventor of the "Bill of Rights: Security Edition Cards" which have the Bill of Rights stamped on metal the size of a normal playing card. The idea is that they can be carried comfortably in the pocket of a flyer, and when a metal detector beeps after detecting the metal, the carrier will have to hand the TSA federal inspectors the card and "give up his Bill of Rights... before boarding a plane." The website also sells Bill of Rights luggage tags and socks with the rights printed on them.


Pierre-Louis Moline

Pierre-Louis Moline ( – 20 March 1820) was a prolific French dramatist, poet and librettist. His play "La Réunion du six août" was one of the longest-running patriotic pieces during the time of the French Revolution with 52 performances at the Paris Opéra. He also wrote the epitaph for the tomb of Jean-Paul Marat. However, he is best remembered today for having adapted Calzabigi's libretto for Gluck's "Orphée et Euridice" (a reworked version of his "Orfeo ed Euridice").
Biography.
Moline was born in Montpellier and studied art at the University of Avignon. He then went to Paris, where he studied law. He was accepted as a lawyer to the French parliament, but devoted most of his time to literary pursuits. Two of his librettos for the Paris Opera were highly successful: his adaptation of Calzabigi for Gluck's "Orphée et Euridice" (1774) and Jean-Frédéric Edelmann's "Ariane dans l'isle de Naxos" (1782). Moline also collaborated with Gluck on his 1775 revision of "L'arbre enchanté", a one-act "opéra comique", which had premiered in Vienna at the Schönbrunn Palace in 1759.
During the French Revolution he served as a secretary-clerk to the National Convention and wrote several patriotic theatrical pieces, including his most famous work of this type, "La Réunion du six août". Moline died in Paris, leaving no known heirs.
Julian Rushton, writing in "The New Grove Dictionary of Opera", says of Moline: "With deplorable fecundity, he contributed to every fashionable stage genre, including tragedy, comedy of manners, bourgeois drama and Revolutionary "sans-culottide"."
References.
Notes
Sources


Jon Caldara

Jon Caldara is an American libertarian activist who serves as the president of the Independence Institute. He is a radio host and has a current events show, "Devil's Advocate with Jon Caldara", that airs on Colorado Public Television.
Early life and education.
Caldara was born in Trenton, New Jersey. His family moved to Colorado when he was six years old. He graduated from Heritage High School and the University of Colorado Boulder. While in college, he drew a comic strip called "B Street." After college, Caldara worked as a roadie setting up stage equipment for rock bands. He later started a stage lighting business.
Public policy career.
Caldara was elected to the board of directors for the Regional Transportation District, eventually becoming chairman. He replaced Tom Tancredo as president of the Independence Institute, a Colorado think tank, in 1998.
Voter registration protest.
When the Colorado legislature relaxed voter registration requirements to allowed people to register in a jurisdiction if they declared their intent to move there, Caldara objected. He decided to test the law by declaring his intent to move to Colorado Springs (Caldara is a long-time resident of Boulder, Colorado) in order to vote in a recall election there. In September 2013, Caldara cast a blank ballot, but never moved to Colorado Springs, although he sublet a room there for a brief time.
Colorado Attorney General John Suthers investigated Caldara for voting fraud, but decided against prosecuting him. Suthers called the incident "suspicious," and said that it was questionable that Caldara ever intended to become an El Paso County resident. However, Suthers noted "arguable ambiguity” in the same-day voter law, and took no action. Caldara’s answer to his critics was: "I told you what I did was legal, neener-neener-neener."
Personal life.
Caldara is the father of three children, one of whom died of cancer when she was one year old. His son has Down syndrome.


Yigal Cohen

Yigal Cohen (, born 1928, died 6 December 1988) was an Israeli politician who served as a member of the Knesset for Likud between 1974 and 1988.
Biography.
Born in Tel Adashim during the Mandate era, during his youth Cohen co-ordinated the Youth Committee of the Moshavim Movement, and was a member of both the HaNoar HaOved and Mapai youth leadership secretariats. He attended the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and was a member of the Palmach's first brigade. He worked as a trainer for immigrant moshavim in the Jerusalem corridor, and later as a Gadna trainer in Europe, the United States and Africa for the Ministry of Defense.
In 1965 he was part of the Rafi group that broke away from Mapai, and in 1968 switched to the new National List party, chairing its group in the Histadrut's Executive Committee. He won a place on the Likud list (an alliance of several right-wing parties including the National List, Herut and the Liberal Party) for the 1973 Knesset elections. Although he failed to win a seat, he entered the Knesset on 23 December 1974 as a replacement for Ariel Sharon, who had resigned his seat. He was re-elected in 1977, 1981 and 1984, after which he was appointed Deputy Speaker. He retained his seat again in the November 1988 elections, but died shortly after taking his seat, and was replaced by Michael Kleiner.


Clotilde-Suzanne Courcelles de Labrousse

Clotilde-Suzanne Courcelles de Labrousse, commonly Suzette Labrousse or Suzanne Labrousse (1747-1821) was a French medium, known for her prophecies during the French Revolution, of which she was said to have foretold the outbreak. She was used by the Jacobins and Maximilien de Robespierre as a tool for political propaganda.


Triton (novel)

Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia (1976) is a science fiction novel by American writer Samuel R. Delany. It was nominated for the 1976 Nebula Award for Best Novel, and was shortlisted for a retrospective James Tiptree, Jr. Award in 1995. It was originally published under the shorter title Triton.
Delany has said that "Trouble on Triton" was written partly in dialogue with Ursula K. Le Guin's anarchist science fiction novel "The Dispossessed", whose subtitle was "An Ambiguous Utopia". It is also loosely linked to other books by him (particularly "Neveryóna") in its references to "the modular calculus", a vaguely described future mathematics that would analyze analogies, fictional constructs, and possibly human personalities. The most recent U.S. edition from Wesleyan University Press (1996) has a foreword by the postmodern novelist Kathy Acker, focusing on "Trouble on Triton" as Orphic fiction.
Plot introduction.
As the subtitle implies, the novel offers several conflicting perspectives on the concept of utopia. "Utopia" literally means "good place" or "no place". Delany takes the term "heterotopia" from the writings of philosopher Michel Foucault. Literally, heterotopia means "other place" or "a place of differences". Foucault uses the term to designate spaces outside everyday fixed institutional and social spaces, for example trains, motels and cemeteries. In the novel's future solar system, Neptune's moon Triton supports one of several human societies independent from Earth, which has developed along radically libertarian lines in some ways: though a representative government exists, it has virtually no power to regulate private behavior, and citizens may choose to live in an area where no laws apply at all. Technology provides for a high degree of self-modification, so that one can change one's physical appearance, gender, sexual orientation, and even specific patterns of likes and dislikes.
Plot summary.
The novel examines how Triton's freedoms and customs are perceived by the main characters, particularly Bron Helstrom, a young man who has previously worked on Mars as a male prostitute. The society of Mars is far harsher than that of Triton, and it has evidently influenced Bron's personality. He is self-absorbed, often lacks insight about himself and others, and has great difficulty with personal relationships. Though the civilization of Triton offers everything that he could reasonably want, he is unhappy with his life, out of harmony with those around him, and continually looking for others to blame whenever things go wrong.
As the novel continues, political tensions between Triton and Earth lead to a destructive interplanetary war. This is mainly used as the backdrop for Bron's (ultimately disastrous) relationship with a brilliant young woman known as the Spike, but Delany speculates about how an interplanetary war might actually unfold.
Reception.
Although dissatisfied with the novel's "abrupt" conclusion, Richard A. Lupoff praised "Triton" as "a thoroughly absorbing, highly rewarding reading experience. . . . a noble and fascinating experiment [that] speaks well for the author."
Technology.
The novel offers a unique directional artificial gravitational field created by inducing relativistic motion of atomic particles, essentially extreme elliptical orbits.
Connections to other works.
"Trouble on Triton" is not to be confused with the 1941 Henry Kuttner novel or the 1954 Alan E. Nourse novel "Trouble on Titan."
The title of the novel was inspired by Leonard Bernstein's 1952 opera, "Trouble in Tahiti". Fred Pohl, the editor at Bantam, made Delany shorten the title to "Triton" to avoid confusion.
"Trouble on Triton" contains the first two parts of the five-part series "Some Informal Remarks Toward the Modular Calculus", which continues in several volumes of the "Return to Nevèrÿon" series. The novel as a whole is Part One, while Part Two is the novel's second appendix.
Bron's home city of Bellona on Mars shares its name with the Bellona where Delany's other novel "Dhalgren" is set.
Several plot elements in "Trouble on Triton" have similar corresponding elements in Delany's "Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand".
"Trouble on Triton" is set in the same universe as Delany's short story "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones", included in his collection "Aye, and Gomorrah, and other stories".
The complex game "vlet", which Bron observes the play of, is inspired by the Joanna Russ short story "A Game of Vlet", found in her collection "The Zanzibar Cat".