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2001

2001

:This article is about the year 2001. For information on the movie, see 2001: A Space Odyssey. For the Dr. Dre album, see 2001. 2001 (MMI) is a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar. By strict interpretation of the Gregorian Calendar, 2001 is also the first year of the 21st century and the 3rd millennium. Popular culture, however, often views the year 2000 as holding this distinction. 2001 is also the year which marks:
- Australia's Centenary of Federation
- The International Year of the Volunteer
- The United Nations Year of Dialogue Among Civilizations See also Wikipedia's almanac of events for this year.

Events

January

January
- January 1 - A black monolith measuring approximately nine feet tall appears in Seattle's Magnuson Park, placed by an anonymous artist in reference to the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.
- January 6 - The U.S. Congress, presided over by Vice President Al Gore as President of the Senate, certifies George W. Bush's Electoral College victory and thus as the winner of 2000 presidential election.
- January 11 - The Federal Trade Commission approved the merger of AOL and Time Warner to form AOL Time Warner.
- January 13 - Major earthquake with a magnitude of 7.6 hits all El Salvador.
- January 15 - Wikipedia, a Wiki free content encyclopedia, goes online (Wikipedia Day).
- January 20 - George W. Bush succeeds Bill Clinton as President of the United States after prevailing over Al Gore in the disputed U.S. presidential election, 2000.
- January 22 - Four of the "Texas 7" are caught at a convenience store in Woodland Park, Colorado and a fifth killed himself inside a motor home.
- January 23-25 - UN war crimes prosecutor Del Ponte demands that Serbia hand over Slobodan Milošević.
- January 24 - The last two of the "Texas 7" are taken into custody in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
- January 24 - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Peter Mandelson resigns from the British cabinet for the second time.
- January 26 - A 50-year-old DC-3 crashes near Ciudad Bolivar, Venezuela killing 24.
- January 26 - An earthquake hits Gujarat, India. More than 20,000 deaths and most of the historical city is destroyed.
- January 29 - Thousands of student protesters in Indonesia storm parliament and demand that President Abdurrahman Wahid resign due to alleged involvement in corruption scandals.
- January 31 - The Scottish Court in the Netherlands convicts a Libyan and acquits another for their part in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 which crashed in Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988.

February

February hits the UK.]]
- February - Iraq disarmament crisis: British and U.S. forces carry out bombing raids attempting to disable Iraq's air defense network.
- February 5 - Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman announce that they have separated
- February 6 - Likud Party leader Ariel Sharon wins election as Prime Minister of Israel
- February 9 - American submarine USS Greeneville accidentally strikes and sinks Japanese fishing vessel Ehime-Maru.
- February 12 - NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft touchdown in the "saddle" region of 433 Eros becoming the first spacecraft to land on an asteroid.
- February 13 - An earthquake with a magnitude of 6.6 hits El Salvador, killing at least 400
- February 16 - Baghdad suburb bombed by US and UK war planes, 3 people killed.
- February 18 - NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt is killed on the last lap of the Daytona 500 while blocking for his DEI cars driven by his son, Dale Earnhardt Jr., and Michael Waltrip, who won the race.
- February 19 - A Oklahoma City bombing museum is dedicated at the Oklahoma City National Memorial.
- February 20 - FBI agent Robert Hanssen is arrested and charged with spying for Russia for 15 years.
- February 20 - 2001 UK foot and mouth crisis begins.
- February 24-27 - Patient Tony Collins spends 77 hours and 30 minutes on a hospital trolley outside the toilets in the Princess Margaret Hospital, Swindon, United Kingdom
- February 28 - An earthquake with a magnitude of 6.9 hits the Nisqually Valley area of Washington. There was one reported death, an elderly woman who suffered a heart attack.
- February 28 - The Selby rail crash kills ten people.

March

- March 23 - Russian space stations Mir re-enters the atmosphere near Nadi, Fiji, and falls into the Pacific Ocean
- March 24 - Apple Computer's Mac OS X v10.0 is released.
- March 26 - WCW is bought out by WWE.
- March 28 - Tornado [http://www.dallassky.com/fwtornado.htm Dallas Skys] rips through downtown Fort Worth killing five and causing more than 500 million dollars in property damage.
- March 31 - Invader Zim premieres on Nickelodeon.

April

- April 1 - An EP-3E American spyplane collides with a Chinese fighter jet and is forced to make an emergency landing in Hainan, China. The U.S. crew was detained for 10 days and the F-8 Chinese pilot, Wang Wei, went missing and presumed dead.
- April 1 - Former president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Slobodan Milošević surrenders to police special forces, to be tried on charges of war crimes.
- April 1 - In the Netherlands, the Act on the Opening up of Marriage goes into effect. The Act allows same-sex couples to legally marry for the first time in the world.
- April 27 - Impostor Christopher Rocancourt arrested in Oak Bay, British Columbia
- April 29 - Census of population in the United Kingdom.

May

- May 1 - The Japanese cities of Urawa, Omiya, and Yono merge to form the city of Saitama.
- May 1 - Police declare the disappearance of Chandra Levy. Her remains were discovered a year later.
- May 7 - In Banja Luka, the second largest city in Bosnia, an attempt is made to reconstruct the Ferhadija mosque. However, the ceremony resulted in mass riots by Serb nationalists that beat and stone three hundred elderly Bosnian Muslims.
- May 10 - In Ghana, a stampede at a soccer game kills over 120.
- May 11 - Comedy sci-fi author Douglas Adams of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy fame, dies from a heart attack, aged 49.
- May 16 - John Prescott, the Deputy Prime Minister of United Kingdom, assaults Craig Evans at an election rally in Rhyll, North Wales.
- May 22 - Large trans-Neptunian object 28978 Ixion found during the Deep Ecliptic Survey.
- May 22 and May 23 - Official Opening of the Bahá'í Terraces on Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel; site of the Shrine of the Báb and the Bahá'í World Centre.
- May 24 - Sherpa Temba Tsheri becomes the youngest person to conquer Mount Everest.

June

- June 1 - Crown Prince Dipendra of Nepal kills his father, the king, his mother and other members of the royal family with an assault rifle and then shoots himself. He dies June 4. King Gyanendra acceeds to the throne
- June 5-June 9 - Houston, Texas is devastated by flooding when Tropical Storm Allison produces 36 inches (900 mm) of rain. Particularly hard hit are the downtown area and the Texas Medical Center, which lost years of research and data and thousands of lab animals. Twenty-two people die; damage exceeds five billion American dollars.
- June 5 - Senator Jim Jeffords leaves the Republican party, an act which changes control of the United States Senate from the Republican party to the Democratic party
- June 7 - Tony Blair's Labour Party elected for second term in UK General Election
- June 8 - Popular editorial site suck.com, one of the first original content sites on the internet, publishes its final article, "Gone Fishin'."
- June 9 - The Colorado Avalanche win their second Stanley Cup Championship 3-1 in Game 7 over the New Jersey Devils at the Pepsi Center in Denver. This series was highly anticipated as longtime Boston Bruins star traded to become a [Colorado Avalanche|Colorado]] defenseman Ray Bourque wins the Stanley Cup for the first time in his illustrious 22 year NHL career, a few days after the team's victory, Bourque announces his retirement.
- June 11 - The United States executes Timothy James McVeigh for the Oklahoma City Bombing.
- June 19 - 23 people killed and 11 wounded by an American missile hitting a soccer field in northern Iraq, Tel Afr County.
- June 20 - Pervez Musharraf becomes President of Pakistan after the resignation of Rafiq Tarar.
- June 20 - Andrea Yates drowns her children in a bathtub and confesses to her crime. She would get life in prison for it.
- June 21 - Total solar eclipse

July

July.]]
- July 2 - World's first self-contained artificial heart implanted in Robert Tools.
- July 3 - A Vladivostokavia Tupolev Tu-154 jetliner crashes on approach to landing at Irkutsk, Russia killing 145
- July 16 - The FBI arrests Dmitry Sklyarov at a convention in Las Vegas for violating a provision of the DMCA.
- July 18 - In Baltimore, Maryland, a 60-car train derailment occurs in a tunnel sparking a fire that will last days and virtually shut down downtown Baltimore
- July 19 - UK politician and novelist Jeffrey Archer, sentenced to four years in prison for perjury and perverting the course of justice.
- July 20 - Vanessa Legget is found in contempt by a Federal Court for refusing to release notes made for her book on the Doris Angleton murder.
- July 20-22 - The 27th G8 summit takes place in Genoa, Italy. Massive demonstrations against the meeting by anti-globalisation groups. One demonstrator, Carlo Giuliani, is shot dead by a carabiniere and several others are badly injured during an attack by the police on a school which the protesters were using as their headquarters.
- July 24 - Tamil Tigers attack Bandaranaika International Airport in Sri Lanka, causing estimated $500 million of damages
- July 28 - Alejandro Toledo is sworn as the new president of Peru, eight months after the vote of no-confidence of former President Alberto Fujimori.

August

- August 1 - Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore has a 2 1/2 ton monument of the Ten Commandments surreptitiously installed in the rotunda of the judiciary building. He would later be sued to have it removed. Later, he would be removed from office.
- August 2 - Robert Mueller confirmed as the new FBI director.
- August 6 - : George W. Bush is informed in his President's Daily Brief that Osama bin Laden is determined to strike targets within the United States and that the FBI believed activity consistent with preparations for hijacking US airplanes was underway.
- August 9 - US President George W. Bush announces his support for federal funding of limited research on embryonic stem cells.
- August 9 - In the Comoros, "military committee" of major Mohamad Bacar seizes power in the island of Anjouan, that had declared independence. They plan to rejoin the Comoros

September

- September 1 - Fundation of the Free State Project.
- September 4 - Google Inc. is awarded a patent, number 6,285,999, for the PageRank search algorithm used in the Google search engine
- September 5 - Peru's attorney general files homicide charges against ex-President Alberto Fujimori
- September 5 - Young Left formed in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
- September 6 - United States v. Microsoft: The United States Justice Department announces that it was no longer seeking to break-up software maker Microsoft and will instead seek a lesser antitrust penalty
- September 9 - Suicide bomber wounds Ahmed Shah Massoud, military commander of Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. He dies September 14
- September 10 - Norwegian parliamentary election, 2001
- September 11 - Almost 3,000 killed in the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attack on the World Trade Center in New York City, The Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, and rural Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
- September 17 - The New York Stock Exchange reopens following the terrorist attacks in New York.
- September 18 - The 2001 anthrax attacks commence as anthrax letters are mailed from Princeton, New Jersey to ABC News, CBS News, NBC News, the New York Post, and the National Enquirer.

October

- October 2 - Bankruptcy of Swissair.
- October 4 - First case of anthrax in the US (attack) is announced by federal officials.
- October 4 - Siberia Airlines Flight 1812 crashes over the Black Sea en route from Tel Aviv Israel to Novosibirsk Russia - 78 dead.
- October 5 - Tom Ridge resigns as Governor of Pennsylvania to become the first director of the newly created United States Office of Homeland Security.
- October 7 - The American attack on Afghanistan begins. The United Kingdom participates.
- October 8 - MD-87 of SAS collides first with a private plane and then a building in Milano airport - 100 dead
- October 8 - The first comic of Tsunami Channel goes online. It would later go on to be the #1 comic of Keenspace (in terms of page views) until moving to its own server.
- October 9 - The 2001 anthrax attacks continue as anthrax letters are mailed from Princeton, New Jersey to Senators Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Patrick Leahy of Vermont.
- October 10 - War on Terrorism: US President George W. Bush presents a list of 22 most wanted terrorists
- October 12 - War on Terrorism: Prompted by a request by US President George W. Bush, an episode of America's Most Wanted aired featuring 22 most wanted terrorists
- October 15 - NASA's Galileo spacecraft passes within 112 miles of Jupiter's moon Io
- October 19 - SIEV-X sinks en route to Christmas Island
- October 20 - The Concert for New York City, "a celebration of the strength, resilience, and pride of New York and America" is held featuring performances by The Who, Paul McCartney, David Bowie, Billy Joel, Destiny's Child, Eric Clapton, Adam Sandler, Bon Jovi, Elton John and many more.
- October 23 - Apple Computer releases the now famous iPod.
- October 23 - Principal Financial Group files its initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange.
- October 25 - Microsoft releases Windows XP

November

- November - The Doha Declaration relaxes the grip of international intellectual property law by a bit.
- November 4 - Hurricane Michelle hits Cuba destroying crops and thousands of homes.
- November 4 - The Police Service of Northern Ireland is established, replacing the discredited RUC.
- November 7 - Bankruptcy of Belgium's SABENA Airlines.
- November 7 - The super-sonic commercial aircraft Concorde resumes flying after a 15-month break.
- November 10 - China is admitted to the World Trade Organization after 15 years of negotiations.
- November 10 - John Howard, prime minister of Australia, is elected to a third term.
- November 11 - Mark McGwire announces his retirement from professional baseball.
- November 12 - In New York City, American Airlines Flight 587 crashes minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport, killing all 260 on-board
- November 12 - 2001 Attack on Afghanistan: Taliban forces abandon Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, ahead of advancing Northern Alliance troops (Northern Alliance fighters took Kabul on November 14)
- November 13 - Doha Round: The World Trade Organization ends a four-day ministerial conference in Doha, Qatar.
- November 13 - Symbionese Liberation Army member Kathleen Soliah (Sara Jane Olsen) withdraws her previous guilty plea.
- November 13 - War on Terrorism: In the first such act since World War II, US President George W. Bush signs an executive order allowing military tribunals against any foreigners suspected of having connections to terrorist acts or planned acts on the United States
- November 22 - Pope John Paul II sends the first papal email from a laptop in his office.
- November 30 - Beatle George Harrison dies after a long battle with cancer

December

- December 2 - Enron files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection five days after Dynegy canceled a US$8.4 billion buyout bid. At the time this was the largest bankruptcy in the history of the United States.
- December 3 - Officials announce that one of the Taliban prisoners captured after the prison uprising at Mazar-e Sharif is John Walker Lindh, an American citizen.
- December 11 - The United States government indicts Zacarias Moussaoui for involvement in the attacks on September 11th.
- December 13 - The Indian Parliament is attacked by terrorists, killing 14 people. This brings India and Pakistan to the brink of war.
- December 13 - U.S. President George W. Bush announces the United States' withdrawal from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
- December 14 - Annular solar eclipse
- December 19 - A new world-record high barometric pressure of 1085.6 hPa (32.06 inHg) was set at Tosontsengel, Hövsgöl Aymag, Mongolia.
- December 19 - Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring was released into theaters.
- December 21 - Japanese television performer Masashi Tashiro got No. 1 temporarily in the Internet vote of Time's Person of the Year.
- December 22 - Hamid Karzai is sworn in as head of the interim government in Afghanistan.
- December 22 - A Paris-Miami flight is diverted to Boston after passenger Richard Reid attempts to light his shoe, filled with explosives, on fire.
- December 27 - The People's Republic of China is granted permanent normal trade status with the United States.
- December 27 - Typhoon Vamei forms within 1.5 degrees of the equator. No other tropical cyclone in recorded history has come as close to the equator.

Births

- June 13 - Scott & Zachary Benes, American actors

Deaths

For more deaths see: Deaths in 2001

January-February

- January 1 - Ray Walston, American actor (b. 1914)
- January 2 - Teri Diver, American actress (b. 1971)
- January 3 - José Greco, Italian-born flamenco dancer (b. 1918)
- January 5 - Nancy Parsons, American actress (b. 1942)
- January 12 - William Hewlett, American businessman (b. 1913)
- January 28 - Curt Blefary, baseball player (b. 1943)
- January 30, Jean-Pierre Aumont, French actor (b. 1911)
- January 30 - Johnnie Johnson, English pilot (b. 1915)
- January 31, Gordon R. Dickson, Canadian writer (b. 1923)
- February 4 - Iannis Xenakis, Greek composer (b. 1922)
- February 7 - Dale Evans, American actress and singer (b. 1912)
- February 7 - Anne Morrow Lindbergh, American author and aviator (b. 1906)
- February 9 - Herbert Simon, American economist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1916)
- February 12 - Kristina Söderbaum, German actress and photographer (b. 1912)
- February 16 - Bob Buhl, baseball player (b. 1928)
- February 18 - Balthus, French painter (b. 1908)
- February 18 - Dale Earnhardt, American race car driver (b. 1951)
- February 19 - Priscilla Davis, American socialite (b. 1942)
- February 19 - Stanley Kramer, American film director (b. 1913)
- February 19 - Charles Trenet, French singer (b. 1913)
- February 24 - Claude Elwood Shannon, American mathematician (b. 1916)
- February 25 - Sir Donald Bradman, Australian cricketer (b. 1908)

March-April

- March 4 - Glenn Hughes, American singer (b. 1950)
- March 4 - Harold Stassen, American politician (b. 1907)
- March 11 - Russ Haas, American professional wrestler (b. 1974)
- March 12 - Morton Downey Jr., American television personality (b. 1933)
- March 12 - Robert Ludlum, American author (b. 1927)
- March 12 - Ann Sothern, American actress (b. 1909)
- March 18 - John Phillips, American singer (b. 1935)
- March 21 - Norma Macmillan, Canadian voice actress (b. 1921)
- March 22 - William Hanna, American animation studio executive
- March 31 - Clifford Shull, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1915)
- April 7 - David Graf, American actor (b. 1950)
- April 7 - Beatrice Straight, American actress (b. 1914)
- April 10 - Willie Stargell - American baseball player (b. 1940)
- April 11 - Harry Secombe, Welsh entertainer (b. 1921)
- April 12 - Harvey Ball, American designer (b. 1921)
- April 14 - Hiroshi Teshigahara, Japanese director (b. 1927)
- April 15 - Joey Ramone (Jeffrey Hyman), American musician and singer (The Ramones) (b. 1951)
- April 20 - Giuseppe Sinopoli, Italian conductor and composer (b. 1946)

May-June

- May 5 - Clifton Hillegass, American author and creator of Cliff Notes (b. 1918)
- May 9 - James E. Myers, American songwriter (b. 1919)
- May 11 - Douglas Adams, English author (heart attack) (b. 1952)
- May 12 - Perry Como, American singer (b. 1912)
- May 13 - R.K. Narayan, Indian novelist (b. 1906)
- May 20 - Renato Carosone, Italian musician and singer (b. 1920)
- May 27 - Ramon Bieri, American actor (b. 1929)
- May 28 - Francisco Varela, Chilean biologist and philosopher (b. 1946)
- June 1 - Hank Ketcham, American cartoonist (b. 1920)
- June 1 - Queen Aiswarya of Nepal (assassinated (b. 1949)
- June 1 - King Birendra of Nepal (assassinated) (b. 1945)
- June 2 - Imogene Coca, American actress (b. 1908)
- June 2 - Joey Maxim, American boxer (b. 1922)
- June 3 - Anthony Quinn, Mexican actor (b. 1915)
- June 4 - Prince Dipendra of Nepal (b. 1971)
- June 4 - John Hartford, American musician and composer (b. 1937)
- June 10 - Princess Leila of Iran (b. 1970)
- June 11 - Timothy McVeigh, American terrorist (executed) (b. 1968)
- June 17 - Donald J. Cram, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1919)
- June 21 - John Lee Hooker, American musician (b. 1917)
- June 21 - Carroll O'Connor, American actor (b. 1924)
- June 26 - Peter von Zahn, German journalist (b. 1913)
- June 27 - Tove Jansson, Finnish author (b. 1914)
- June 27 - Jack Lemmon, American actor and director (b. 1925)
- June 28 - Mortimer Adler, American philosopher (b. 1902)
- June 28 - Joan Sims, British actress (b. 1930)
- June 30 - Chet Atkins, American musician (b. 1924)

July-August

- July 1 - Nikolay Basov, Russian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1922)
- July 5 - Hannelore Kohl, wife of chancellor of Germany Helmut Kohl (suicide) (b. 1933)
- July 11 - Herman Brood, Dutch musician and painter (suicide) (b. 1946)
- July 18 - Fabio Taglioni, Italian automotive engineer (b. 1920)
- July 20 - Milt Gabler, American record producer (b. 1911)
- July 27 - Leon Wilkeson, American musician (b. 1952)
- July 29 - Edward Gierek, Polish politician (b. 1913)
- July 29 - Wau Holland, German hacker (b. 1951)
- August 1 - Poul Anderson, American author (b. 1926)
- August 1 - Korey Stringer, American football player (b. 1974)
- August 3 - Christopher Hewett, British actor (b. 1922)
- August 6 - Jorge Amado, Brazilian writer (b. 1912)
- August 15 - Richard Chelimo, Kenyan athlete (b. 1972)
- August 20 - Fred Hoyle, British astronomer and science fiction writer (b. 1915)
- August 25 - Aaliyah, American singer and actress (plane crash) (b. 1979)

September-October

- September 2 - Christiaan Barnard, South African heart surgeon (b. 1922)
- September 3 - Pauline Kael, American film critic (b. 1919)
- September 3 - Thuy Trang, Vietnamese-born actress (b. 1973)
- September 7 - Spede Pasanen, Finnish television personality (b. 1930)
- September 9 - Ahmed Shah Massoud, Afghani military commander (b. 1953)
- September 11 - Casualties of the September 11, 2001 attacks
- September 11 - Barbara K. Olson, American television commentator (b. 1955)
- 1968 science fiction film directed by Stanley Kubrick. The story is based in part on various short stories by co-screenwriter Arthur C. Clarke, most notably "The Sentinel" (1951). Kubrick and Clarke collaborated on the screenplay, from which Kubrick created the movie and Clarke wrote the novel version (which eventually grew into the so-called Space Odyssey series of books). For an elaboration of their collaborative work on this project, see The Lost Worlds of 2001, Arthur C. Clarke, Signet., 1972. The film is notable for combining episodes contrasting high levels of scientific and technical realism with transcendental mysticism. As Arthur C. Clarke wrote in 1972, "Quite early in the game I went around saying, not very loudly, 'MGM doesn't know this yet, but they're paying for the first $10,000,000 religious movie.'" This film won the Academy Award for visual effects in 1968.

Production

Release

Reaction

Cast

Synopsis

1968 NOTE: Due to the fact that the film conveys almost all ideas visually and ambiguously, it can be interpreted in many ways. The following synopsis is merely one interpretation. In early conversations, director Stanley Kubrick and writer Arthur C. Clarke jokingly called their project How the Solar System Was Won, an allusion to the epic 1962 Cinerama film How the West Was Won, which presents a generation-spanning historical epic told in distinct episodes. Like How the West Was Won, 2001 is composed of distinct episodes. Three of the four major sections are introduced with the use of title cards: the lack of a title card between the first and second sections listed below has been seen by some to imply that Dr. Floyd's trip to the Moon and the discovery of TMA-1 merely continue the action of Moon Watcher's discovery of the monolith in the Dawn of Man sequences, without introducing a new phase in the development of humanity. The four sections are:
- The Dawn of Man :Early ape men become endowed with their first intelligence after encountering a black monolith.
- TMA-1 – (untitled on screen) [set in 1999] :Four million years later, a similar monolith is discovered buried beneath the lunar surface.
- Jupiter Mission, 18 Months Later [set in 2001] :The American spacecraft DISCOVERY 1 embarks on the first manned attempt to reach Jupiter.
- Jupiter and Beyond the Infinite :An experience in another time and dimension. In the background to the story in the book, an ancient and unseen alien race uses a mechanism with the appearance of a large black monolith to investigate worlds all across the galaxy and, if possible, to encourage the development of intelligent life. The film shows one such monolith appearing briefly in ancient Africa, four million B.C., where it influences a group of hominids to learn how to use weapons, the first tools. hominids The film then leaps millions of years to the year 1999 (via a startling, widely famous, and much-parodied jump cut) from a murder-weapon thigh bone, tossed high in the air by an ape-man, to satellites orbiting the Earth. The film then shows humans travelling to an orbiting space station and then on to Clavius base on the Moon to investigate a magnetic anomaly in the Tycho crater, dubbed TMA-1 (Tycho Magnetic Anomaly #1). When excavations there uncover a second monolith and expose it to sunlight, it emits a powerful signal aimed at Jupiter. As Kubrick told interviewer Joseph Gelmis, "you have a second artifact buried deep on the lunar surface and programmed to signal word of man's first baby steps into the universe—a kind of cosmic burglar alarm." The movie then focuses on a manned mission to Jupiter to investigate the signal's receiver, taking place eighteen months later in the year 2001. The ship is manned by a crew of two astronauts, David Bowman and Frank Poole, and an on-board computer called HAL 9000, designed to function as an artificial intelligence, which sees through multiple distinctive fish-eye cameras located around the spacecraft and speaks with a warm, mannered human-like voice. The three scientists sent to investigate the signal's destination have been placed in suspended animation. The live crew—unlike Mission Control, HAL, and the sleeping scientists—are unaware of the discovery of the Tycho monolith or the nature of their mission. On the outbound trip, after discussing apparent anomalies in the ship's mission with the ship's captain, David Bowman, HAL reports an unverifiable error in the ship's antenna control system. After the apparently malfunctioning unit is retrieved it is found to be without error suggesting that the fault lies with the onboard HAL9000. suspended animationAn earthbased HAL9000 also disagreed with the onboard HAL9000's conclusion meaning that one (or both) could be in error. Bowman and Poole discuss the possibility that HAL might be malfunctioning and should therefore have his higher mental functions disabled. HAL discovers their plans, and because of contradictions in his mission plans and directives, decides to eliminate all the humans on board. Kubrick explained, "In the specific case of HAL, he had an acute emotional crisis because he could not accept evidence of his own fallibility... Such a machine could eventually become as incomprehensible as a human being, and could, of course, have a nervous breakdown—as HAL did in the film." To this end, HAL first kills Frank Poole by teleoperating a space-pod whilst Poole is on extra-vehicular activity to replace the communications unit. While Bowman attempts to recover Poole's body, HAL kills the hibernating crew by shutting down their life support systems and then refuses to allow Bowman back into the ship. These events gave rise to the catch phrases "Open the pod bay doors, please, HAL" and "I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that", when Bowman requests that HAL open the ship. catch phrase Bowman manages to outwit HAL and regains entry to the ship, and proceeds to shut down HAL's mental faculties one by one. HAL's gradual shutdown triggers an incremental regression into his 'childhood': he plaintively informs Bowman that he can feel his mind 'going', and, eventually, he is reduced to singing the music hall song Daisy Bell, which he was taught by his instructor, Doctor Chandra. HAL´s disconnection triggers a pre-recorded video informing Bowman of the truth about the mission. Months later, he proceeds to complete it in one of the most memorable film conclusions ever. In a special-effects-laden sequence he travels through a stargate and arrives in what appears to be a hotel room. Kubrick explained, "When the surviving astronaut, Bowman, ultimately reaches Jupiter, this artifact sweeps him into a force field or star gate that hurls him on a journey through inner and outer space and finally transports him to another part of the galaxy, where he's placed in a human zoo approximating a hospital terrestrial environment drawn out of his own dreams and imagination. In a timeless state, his life passes from middle age to senescence to death." The creators are never seen directly: Bowman arrives in the hotel room, which has since become a science fiction cliché for situations where a vastly powerful being must construct a benign environment for a human. He undergoes a transcendence, ending the story as a "star child" with some of the godlike powers of the monolith creators. According to Kubrick, "He is reborn, an enhanced being, a star child, an angel, a superman, if you like, and returns to earth prepared for the next leap forward of man's evolutionary destiny." However, many interpret the imagery towards the end of the film as ambiguous and metaphoric, ignoring the literal account in Clarke's novelization.

Selected plot elements

Music

transcendence Music plays a crucial part in 2001, and not only because of the relatively sparse dialogue. From very early on in production, Kubrick decided that he wanted the film to be a primarily non-verbal experience, one that did not rely on the traditional techniques of narrative cinema, and in which music would play a vital role in evoking particular moods. In many respects, 2001 harks back to the central power that music had in the era of silent film. The film is remarkable for its innovative use of classical music taken from existing commercial records. Major feature films were (and still are) typically accompanied by elaborate film scores and/or songs written especially for them by professional composers. But although Kubrick started out by commissioning an original orchestral score, he later abandoned this, opting instead for pre-recorded tracks sourced from existing recordings, becoming one of the first major movie directors to do so, and beginning a trend that has now become commonplace. In an interview with Michel Ciment, Kubrick explained: :"However good our best film composers may be, they are not a Beethoven, a Mozart or a Brahms. Why use music which is less good when there is such a multitude of great orchestral music available from the past and from our own time? When you are editing a film, it's very helpful to be able to try out different pieces of music to see how they work with the scene...Well, with a little more care and thought, these temporary tracks can become the final score." 2001 uses works by several classical composers. It features music by Aram Khachaturian (from the Gayaneh ballet suite) and famously used Johann Strauss II's best known waltz, 'On The Beautiful Blue Danube', during the spectacular space-station rendezvous and lunar landing sequences. 2001 is especially remembered for its use of the opening from Richard Strauss's Also sprach Zarathustra (or "Thus spake Zarathustra" in English), which has become inextricably associated with the film and its imagery and themes. The film's soundtrack also did much to introduce the modern classical composer György Ligeti to a wider public, using extracts from his Requiem, Atmospheres, Lux Aeterna and (in an altered form) Aventures. In the early stages of production, Kubrick had actually commissioned a score from noted Hollywood composer Alex North, who had written the stirring score for Spartacus and also worked on Dr. Strangelove. But on 2001 Kubrick did much of the filming and editing, using as his guides the classical recordings which eventually became the music track. In March of 1966 MGM became concerned about 2001's progress and Kubrick put together a showreel of footage to the adhoc soundtrack of classical recordings. The studio bosses were delighted with the results and Kubrick decided to use these "guide pieces" as the final musical soundtrack, and he abandoned North's score. Unfortunately Kubrick failed to inform North that his music had not been used, and to his great dismay, North did not discover this until he saw the movie at the première. North's soundtrack has since been recorded commercially and was released shortly before his death. Similarly, Ligeti was unaware that his music was in the film until alerted by friends. He was at first unhappy about some of the music used, and threatened legal action over Kubrick's use of an electronically "treated" recording of Aventures in the "interstellar hotel" scene near the end of the film. Hal's haunting version of the popular song "Daisy Daisy" (Daisy Bell) was inspired by computer synthesized arrangement by Max Mathews, which Arthur C. Clarke had heard at Bell Laboratories.

Dialogue

Alongside its use of music, the dialogue in 2001 is another notable feature, although the relative lack of dialogue and conventional narrative cues has baffled many viewers. One of the film's most striking features is that there is no dialogue whatsoever for the first twenty minutes or the entire last segment (23 minutes) of the film—the entire narrative of these sections is carried by images, actions, sound effects, and two title cards. Only when the film moves into the postulated "present" of 2001 do we encounter characters who speak. By the time shooting began, Kubrick had deliberately jettisoned much of the intended dialogue and narration, and what remains is notable for its apparently banal nature—an announcement about the lost cashmere sweater, the awkwardly polite chit-chat between Floyd and the Russian scientists, or his comments about the sandwiches en route to the monolith site. The exchanges between Poole and Bowman on board the "Discovery" are similarly flat, unemotional and generally lack any major narrative content. Kubrick clearly intended that the subtext of these exchanges—what is not said, that is—should be the real, meaningful content. It may be noted that, at one point during the film, HAL lip-reads a conversation between Poole and Bowman (they have secured themselves in one of the ship's pods for this conversation, wishing HAL not to hear them, his apparent failure being the object of their discussion). This further indicates the centrality of silence and 'subtextual speaking' to the film.

Narrative through sound

Kubrick's unique treatment of narrative in 2001 is perhaps best exemplified by the scene in which the HAL-9000 computer murders the three hibernating astronauts while Bowman is outside the ship trying to rescue Poole. The inhuman nature of the murders is conveyed with chilling simplicity, in a scene that contains only three elements. When HAL disconnects the life support systems, we see a flashing warning sign, COMPUTER MALFUNCTION, shown full-screen and accompanied only by the sound of a shrill alarm beep; this is intercut with static shots of the hibernating astronauts, encased in their sarcophagus-like pods, and close-up full-screen shots of the life-signs monitor of each astronaut. As the astronauts begin to die, the warning changes to LIFE FUNCTIONS CRITICAL and we see the vital signs on the monitors beginning to level out. Finally, when the three sleeping astronauts are dead, there is only silence and the ominously banal flashing sign, LIFE FUNCTIONS TERMINATED. Other than the alarm sound and the constant background hiss of the ship's environmental system, the entire scene is enacted with no dialogue, no music, and no physical movement of any kind.

Interpretation of the Film

HAL

HAL's killing of almost all of the astronauts in the film, while well known in popular culture even among people who have not seen "2001," is quite a shocking plot twist. We are told that HAL is infallible early in the film, and HAL establishes itself as competent and an entity that in its own words "enjoy[s] working with humans" and "has a stimulating relationship" with the two conscious astronauts. There are early signs, however, that all is not well with HAL: when playing chess with one of the astronauts, he claims that the game is over and then describes the remaining moves. His analysis is not quite correct: his opponent would not have to make one of the moves he describes, and he outlines one of the moves from the wrong perspective. Since Kubrick was a chess expert, and the game an actual match (an obscure one played years before by two relatively unknown players), this has to be a deliberate error and a clue for those who can spot it that all is not well with HAL. That being so, it is slightly at odds with Kubrick's own explanation for HAL's breakdown (see next para), because HAL had not then wrongly diagnosed the AE35 unit. Kubrick suggested that HAL suffered a nervous breakdown due to his faulty diagnosis of the AE35 unit. Alternatively, Clarke has suggested in interviews, in his original novel, and in a rough draft of the shooting script that HAL's orders to lie to the astronauts (more specifically, concealing the true nature of the mission) drove him crazy. The novel does include the phrase "He [HAL] had been living a lie"—a difficult situation for an entity programmed to be as reliable as possible. (Immediately before misdiagnosing the AE35 unit, HAL seems to hint to the intractable Bowman that there is more to the mission than a simple human expedition to Jupiter-space. Perhaps before then, at the time of the chess error, he was becoming nervous about the mission given that the alien artifact might have been beyond even his levels of comprehension, which fact alone would threaten his self-stated infallibility.) A more developed explanation, similar to the one attributed to Clarke above, hinted at in the follow-up film 2010: The Year We Make Contact, is that while HAL was under orders to deny the true mission with the crew, he was programmed at a deep level to be completely accurate and infallible. This conflict between two key directives led to him taking any measures to prevent Bowman and Poole finding out about this deception. Once Poole had been killed, others were eliminated to remove any witnesses to his failure to complete the mission. One interesting aspect of HAL's plight is that he, as the supposedly perfect computer, actually behaves in the most human fashion of all of the characters. He has reached human intelligence levels, and seems to have developed human traits of paranoia, jealousy and other emotions. By contrast, the human characters act like machines, cooly performing their tasks in a mechanical fashion, whether they be mundane tasks of operating their craft or even under extreme duress as Dave must be following HAL's murder of Frank.

Scientific accuracy

2010: The Year We Make Contact In general, the film is extremely realistic: it is one of the few science-fiction films to accurately portray space (an approximate vacuum) as having no sound and to have spaceships producing no sound while travelling through space. Much has also been made of the reality of 2001 with regard to its accurate portrayal of weightlessness on board the Discovery. The film itself draws attention to this, with impressive tracking shots inside the rotating "wheel" which provides artificial gravity, contrasting it with the weightlessness outside the wheel such as during the repair or the HAL disconnection scenes. The scenes in the pod bay where the astronauts are walking may be explained by a 'velcro'-like coating of the floor, which explains the oddly slow pace of the walk. The film does, however, have a number of minor failures of scientific accuracy such as:
- The height of lunar mountains was overestimated, as the film was made before the lunar expeditions of the Apollo program, and because meteoric erosion was underestimated.
- The gravity in Clavius base simulates that of Earth's, despite being near the lunar surface.
- The thermal radiators on Discovery One, originally intended to be included, were eventually removed from the design because Kubrick felt they looked too much like wings.
- In the EVA shots of "Discovery One," the background stars are seen to be slowly moving in relation to the ship. This is inaccurate -- the stars are too far away and the ship's speed too slow in relation to them for them to appear to move. Kubrick was aware of the inaccuracy of these shots but ignored the issue for artistic license, because if presented accurately the shots lacked visual movement, looking like still images.
- The dust blown up by the exhaust of the lunar shuttle is seen to billow up from the landing pad, rather than radiate out in straight lines, as would happen in the near-vacuum of the lunar surface.
- A further inaccuracy seemingly ignored by many commentators is the varying phases of the Earth as seen from the Moon during the landing manoeuvres of the Aries 1B moonship (an error of continuity as well as science). However, there are various places in the film where planets "magically" align, for artistic purposes, in defiance of reality.
- In the sequence in which David Bowman blows the hatch on his space pod to regain entry to Discovery's airlock, there is a shot with Dave rebounding in the airlock chamber, while his space pod is still sitting just outside the airlock door. Since the pod is not fixed to Discovery, the blowing of the hatch would have caused the pod to move away on the thrust of its escaping atmosphere—though rather slowly, given a rough estimation of the mass and speed of ejected air, and mass of the pod. This being said, it is not impossible that the ejection procedure involves automatic compensation by the thruster of the pod, as in stationkeeping.
- There is a somewhat famous, though small, technical error when Heywood Floyd is flying to the moon. Supposedly in a weightless state, he sips through a straw, and when he lets go of it, the fluid slides back into the container. This is not necessarily an error, however. Although there would be no gravitational force to pull the fluid in space, Floyd might have created a slight vacuum in the container when his lips were on the straw. This could have been sufficient to pull the liquid back into the container. Another explaination for this might be that the tips of the straws seem to be outfitted with some types of small valves which, ideally, would prevent the liquid from escaping once the sipping was over.
- Though the crew quarters in the spaceship Discovery are arranged in a rotating wheel to simulate gravity, the wheel's small radius would require a fairly rapid rpm (five to ten rpm's depending on the actual radius) to produce earth-like gravity. It is suggested that the human body becomes dizzy, nausiated and disoriented when exposed to high Coriolis forces, and few if any human's could become accustomed to high levels of rotation. In addition, the amount of gravity exerted on the human body would probably vary between the feet, waist and head.

Predictions

Some of the film's predictions of the then future turned out to be inaccurate:
- Space travel is incorrectly portrayed as being commonplace by 2001. In the film, colonies have been established on the moon, manned missions to Jupiter are feasible, and technology is available to place humans in "suspended animation"
- HAL's speech, understanding and self-determining abilities exceed the actual year 2001 state of the art by orders of magnitude.
- The expense of long-distance telephone calls (Floyd's brief call to his daughter costs him $1.70).
- The survival of Pan-Am airlines to the year 2001. Accurate predictions, however, include:
- Ubiquitous computers.
- Flat-screen computer monitors (these were simulated by rear projection in the film).
- Small, portable, flat-screen televisions.
- In-flight television screens with a wide aspect.
- The tedium of space travel.
- Glass cockpits in spacecraft.
- The proliferation of TV stations (the BBC's channels numbering at least 12).
- Telephone numbers with more digits than in the 1960s.
- The survival of corporations like IBM, Bell, and Hilton to the year 2001.
- The ability of a computer to easily beat a human at a game of chess. The ship's computer interfaces, with numerous small screens displaying FORTRAN code and merely schematic drawings, are often seen as a failure to predict multiple "windows" and graphical user interfaces. However, as embedded systems applications often have spartan interfaces, this claim is disputed.

Acclaim

Upon release, 2001 received mostly positive reviews, and quickly gained a cult following (its psychedelic visual imagery was quickly embraced by the counterculture). Roger Ebert gave the film four stars in his original review, believing the film "succeeds magnificently on a cosmic scale" [http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19680412/REVIEWS/804120301/1023] Yet the movie also had its detractors. Critic Pauline Kael said it was "a monumentally unimaginative movie"[http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19680101/CRITICALDEBATE/40305008], and Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic called it "a film that is so dull, it even dulls our interest in the technical ingenuity for the sake of which Kubrick has allowed it to become dull"[http://www.krusch.com/kubrick/Q16.html]. 2001 earned one Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. It was nominated for Best Art Direction, Best Director (Kubrick), and Original Screenplay (Kubrick, Clarke). The film was not nominated, however, for Costume Design, despite the fact that Planet of the Apes did receive a nomination for its ape suits, which are generally considered less convincing than those in 2001. 2001: A Space Odyssey is consistently on the Internet Movie Database's list of top 250 films, was number 22 on AFI's 100 Years, 100 Movies, number 40 on its 100 Years, 100 Thrills included on its 100 Years, 100 Quotes ("Open the pod bay doors, HAL."), and been deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

Sequels

Novels

Clarke went on to write three sequel novels. Though the first of his sequel novels were adapted into a film, to date there has yet to be any serious discussion of filmmakers adapting either of the other two for the screen.
- 2010: Odyssey Two (1982)
- 2061: Odyssey Three (1987)
- 3001: The Final Odyssey (1997)

Films

A sequel to the film, titled 2010: The Year We Make Contact was based on Clarke's 1982 novel 2010: Odyssey Two and was released in 1984. However, Kubrick was not involved in the production of this film, which was presented literally rather than "mystically", and generally did not have the impact of the original. It has been reported, however, that Clarke saw the sequel film as a fitting adaptation of his sequel novel.

Comics

Beginning in 1976, Marvel Comics published both a Jack Kirby-written and drawn adaptation of the film and a Kirby-created 10-issue monthly series "expanding" on the ideas of the film and novel. For more information, 2001: A Space Odyssey (comics).

Spoofs

Many an influential and popular work of art are subject to imitation and parody, and "2001" is no exception: 2001: A Space Odyssey (comics) parodying the starchild from 2001.]]
- Various episodes of The Simpsons have spoofed many different parts of the movie, especially [1F13] "Deep Space Homer", which contains many references to 2001, not the least of which the famous potato chip-eating scene. Another example is the episode where Homer was a trucker and he was driving a truck with a built-in device that normally would get him out of trouble, but he was approaching the Convoy and it said, "I'm afraid I can't let you do this, Red!"
- Mad Magazine did their obligatory takeoff, titled 201: (Min. of) A Space Idiocy (the words Min. and of were printed within the colon of the title). The actual film ran 139 minutes, after the 156 minute premiere version was recut. Appearing among the ape-men in the first scene is Fred Flintstone, in a furry costume. In a nod to the numerous corporate logos appearing in the movie, nearly every panel includes a brand name, and instead of going through a complicated disconnection procedure, Dave simply pulls out HAL's power plug. The monolith is revealed to be a book, titled How to Make an Incomprehensible Science Fiction Movie and Several Million Dollars, written by Stanley Kubrick.
- Terry Gilliam spoofed the film in an animation for an episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus in which an ape man after seeing the monolith throws a bone into the air which then collides with an orbiting spacecraft that crashes to the ground killing the ape man.
- History of the World, Part I, Mel Brooks' satire of the history of humanity, begins with a scene similar to 2001, except that the ape-men are more self-absorbed. The movie Simon, starring Alan Arkin also mimicked the "ape using a bone as a weapon" sequence.
- The opening of Ken Shapiro's cult favorite The Groove Tube begins with an almost spot-on recreation of the "Dawn of Man" sequence (almost...one of the apes is playing solitaire with animal-skin "playing cards"!). The monolith is revealed to be a 1960s-vintage console TV set, "Move On Up" by Curtis Mayfield replaces the Ligeti-style chorale on the soundtrack, one of the apes invents music by banging a bone on the ground, and in all the excitement one of the dancing apes accidentally rubs two sticks together and discovers fire!
- The opening strains of Richard Strauss' Thus Spake Zarathustra were prominently used to bring Elvis Presley on stage in his concert tours towards the end of his career. They have also been used in countless TV commercials and other media events.
- A "Hägar the Horrible" comic strip from 1985 (when 2010: Odyssey Two was playing in theatres) shows Hagar and Lucky Eddie encountering a huge black monolith, wondering if it might be there to show them new knowledge and higher planes of existence—then when it falls on them a moment later, wondering if it might be a trap.
- The HAL9000 brainroom is often spoofed in such cartoons as South Park and Futurama.
- The film Zoolander features a segment in which two of the main characters reenact the scene in which the monolith is discovered by the ape men, with the monolith replaced by a computer. During this sequence, Richard Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra is played.
- In the SpongeBob SquarePants episode "Frankendoodle",a giant pencil appears in a similar way as the monolith, and SpongeBob and Patrick react similarily to the early humans in the movie,
- The 2005 film based on the book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory also contains a lengthy sequence that parodies the monolith from 2001 and features music used in the movie (Also Sprach Zarathustra), as well as what appears to be actual footage of the "apes discovering the monolith sequence" from the beginning of the movie (although it is possible that the footage was instead reenacted). In the movie, the monolith is replaced by a Wonka Bar teleported though the television. The eerie, distinctive wailing music from the film is audible, and later on the beginning of the "Moon-Watcher discovers tools" sequence is seen.
- A short, light-hearted stop-motion animation spoof of the behavior of some of the film's characters (as well as some slapstick) has been created using lego blocks and figures, called One: A Space Odyssey.
- The Cartoon series "Recess" did an episode spoofing, where a robot named SAL 3000 takes over the school (while being deactivated it sings a song similar to "daisy")
- Recently on "The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy" Eris sticks her head into a bowl of punch and when she comes out she screams "Open the pod gates Hal".
- The 1980's Sierra computer game SpaceQuest II starts in an interstellar garbage scow containing many spacecraft from sci-fi movies, and TV shows. For example there is the Jupiter 2 from Lost in Space, the ACME rocket from The Road Runner Show and many others including a pod from 2001. If you examine the pod there is some graffiti that reads "For a good time, don't call HAL".
- In the movie Spaceballs, the 5 minute period where the ship slowly floats by is supposedly a spoof of the Discovery from 2001.
- The Canadian sketch-comedy show, SCTV, spoofed 2001 on more than one occasion. One skit featured a talk show interview with the HAL 9000 computer. Another skit depicted a bad B-movie sequel to 2001, starring Ernest Borgnine and Art Garfunkel (both played by SCTV cast members). This second spoof was aired before the release of the actual sequel, 2010, and was not based on that film.
- In Good bye, Lenin!, Denis, the friend of Alex, made a wedding movie in which there is a scene where a flying flowers bouquet changes to a cake.
- In the movie "clueless" there is also a scene in which a cellphone is shown in a similar way as the monolith is, also featuring "Also Sprach Zarathustra"
- In the beginning of the movie 2001: A Space Travesty (An obvious play on the true title), there is a scene with a howling ape-man and a monolith in which the narrator says "And then God came, and He spoke," as a hand of God appears on the top of the screen. God says "Shut up, you stupid monkey." and pushes the monolith over, crushing the ape-man.
- In Land of Confusion, a video by the British rock group Genesis, a bone is thrown up in the air, the camera following the movement as in the opening scene of 2001. As it comes down, it becomes a phone which the singer picks up and in which he starts talking.
- In the Transformers: Cybertron episode "Landmine", when Hotshot is on the racetrack on Earth and is about to give away his true identity as a Cybertronian, Optimus Prime says "This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardise it!"
- In one episode of Eek! the Cat, when on a spaceship, Eek says, "Open the pod bay doors, HAL!" and then there is a HAL that says "I'm sorry Dave, but I'm afraid I can't do that!" Eek replies with, "Dave? Who's Dave? I'm Eek!" and then HAL says, "Oh, sorry."
- Fans of ABC's hit Lost have compared the scene in the season one episode Whatever the Case May Be where Sawyer, in an attempt to open the mysterious suitcase throws said suitcase from a tree to open it via impact velocity to the opening scenes of 2001: A Space Odyssey where the man-apes are shown smashing objects against rocks.
- In the Fox Broadcasting Company's 1996-1999 series titled Millenium, [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115270/] the main character, Frank Black, uses the 2001 quote, "Open the pod bay doors, please, HAL" [http://www.moviesounds.com/2001/opendoor1.mp3] as his voice password to gain access to his computer.
- Airplane II: The Sequel spoofs many parts of 2001 including a computer named "ROK" that tries to kill the crew. Several lines are also taken from 2001.
- In the PC Game "Duke Nukem 3D", by 3D Realms, there is a level where the hero of the game fights aliens in the moon. There is a cave where he runs to find a black monolith. And he can enter the monolith to be teleported to another part of the level.

Trivia

- Stanley Kubrick and his team tried several variants of the alien artifacts. One of the early favored designs was a tetrahedron, but Kubrick later rejected this because people would believe there was a connection with the pyramids. A transparent version of the familiar rectangular monolith was also constructed out of perspex, but it proved too difficult to light and shoot effectively and Kubrick then had the prop remade in its final form, which was cast in black lucite.
- Vivian Kubrick, his daughter, had an uncredited guest role as Squirt (Floyd's daughter).
- After seeing a documentary entitled To the Moon and Beyond at the 1964 New York World's Fair, Kubrick hired one of its special effects technicians, Douglas Trumbull, to work on 2001.
- It has been claimed that the psychedelic "stargate sequence" that concludes the film, entitled "Jupiter and Beyond the Infinite", matches perfectly with the Pink Floyd song, "Echoes", just as Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon is believed to sychronise well with the movie The Wizard of Oz. [http://www.synchronicityarkive.com/display.php?view=2]
- The first portion of the psychedelic "stargate sequence" was made using Slit-Scan photography, a camera technique in which bands of color from a thin slit are projected onto photographic film. [http://www.underview.com/2001/how/slitscan.html] The images used for this sequence can be viewed in their original form using Slit-Scan unraveling techniques. [http://seriss.com/people/erco/2001/] Some of the revealed images appear to be photographs from nature (flowers, coral, etc.) and geometric light shapes.
- It has been frequently noted that "HAL" is "IBM", shifted one letter back (to indicate that he does Big Blue one better). Clarke insists that this is a coincidence; HAL is an amalgam of "heuristic" and "algorithmic," the two main processes of learning. However, the light blue color around the word resembles IBM's own blue color. See HAL 9000.
- HAL/S is an aerospace-oriented computer language used in the Space Shuttle.
- The book's description of the moon Iapetus curiously closely describes another Saturnian moon, Mimas; this was a coincidence, as close-up images of Saturn's moons did not become available until 1980. According to Clarke, in the foreword to the 30th anniversary edition of 2001, this destination was removed from the movie version because Kubrick felt the special effects created to depict Saturn and its rings were not realistic enough. Special effects supervisor Douglas Trumbull eventually re-used much of his early designs for Saturn in his 1972 film Silent Running.
- 2001 was filmed at the same time and in the same studios as the 1967 James Bond film You Only Live Twice, and Arthur C. Clarke is believed to have made a brief non-speaking cameo appearance in one scene of the latter film. In addition, the TV series The Prisoner was also being filmed next door, and series star/executive producer Patrick McGoohan borrowed a piece of special effects footage made for 2001 (namely an image of stars in the night sky) for use in a scene for his show.
- On the morning of January 1, 2001, visitors of Seattle, Washington's Magnuson Park discovered a metallic monolith atop Kite Hill. The oblong object measured approximately three feet wide by nine feet tall and appeared to be hollow. It did not stand for long. Sometime during the wee hours of January 3, the monolith disappeared as mysteriously as it had arrived. At the same time, artist and Blue Moon Tavern regular Caleb Schaber revealed that he and a band of anonymous collaborators calling themselves "Some People" had fabricated the device and several smaller versions placed around Seattle.
- Almost all of the American actors featured were expatriates who happened to be living in London, making it cheaper to hire them.
- Comedian Ronnie Corbett was employed for the make up tests for the Ape Men; it is reported that the results were too disturbing, and a much revised approach is seen in the film. Corbett did not act in the film.
- The "Dawn of Man" scenes (except for "Moonwatcher" demolishing the tapir skeleton with a bone) were all filmed in the studio using a system of front projection for the backgrounds as this would not show up on the Ape costumes. A technical glitch gives this away during the scene with the Leopard: when it turns its head towards the camera its eyes light up. This may have been a fortuitous glitch when later scenes depict another predator, HAL, himself surveying his prey with a glowing eye.
- With the exception of two baby chimpanzees, all of the apes in the beginning of the film were played by mimes, dancers and actors in costumes.
- Many different techniques were tried to achieve the effect of the pen floating in zero gravity on the flight to the space station. In the end a sheet of clear perspex was placed in front of the camera to which the pen was glued. The actress playing the crew attendant simply pulled the pen off the plastic. Small scratches in the plastic occassionaly can be seen on some high definition sets playing a DVD copy. A similar technique was used in filming 2010, when Heywood Floyd (Roy Scheider) demonstrates how the Alexei Leonov can escape Jupiter space ahead of the launch schedule.
- The line of dialogue "See you next Wednesday", spoken by Frank Poole's parents in the transmitted birthday greeting, has become a famous in-joke in the films of John Landis.
- The living quarters for the Discovery was built by aircraft manufacturer Vickers-Armstrong inside a 12-meter by two-meter drum designed to rotate at five km per hour. A camera could operate through a slot in the centre of the set while Kubrick directed the action from outside, using a closed-circuit TV system. It cost $750,000, nearly 10% of the whole budget, but due to cuts made by Kubrick is only used to its full effect in a small number of scenes.
- The English actor Nigel Davenport was hired to read the dialogue for HAL but Kubrick dismissed him as the accent was too distracting. Martin Balsam was also tried for the voice of HAL but Kubrick found his voice too emotional. Sometime during post-production Douglas Rain was hired to voice HAL. It is believed that Keir Dullea (David Bowman) and Rain have never actually met in person.
- The original scripted ending has the Star Child set off the orbiting nuclear devices seen (though not explained) in the "Blue Danube" sequence. Kubrick concluded this was too similar to the ending of Dr. Strangelove and so opted for the more ambiguous and optimistic ending scene. The author of a "Making of 2001" book explained this, and added the quip, "We WON'T Meet Again!"
- At Kubrick's request, first assistant director Derek Cracknell had his baby daughter Sarah screen-tested to be the Star Child. The footage ultimately went unused, and a fake baby appears in the finished film. Sarah Cracknell, however, would go on to a different sort of stardom as singer with the British indie band Saint Etienne. When asked in interviews why her footage was not used, Sarah has joked that she looked "too cute".
- The main working title for the film was Journey Beyond the Stars. Kubrick came up with the present title 8 months into productions after going over many other suggested titles like Universe, Tunnel to the Stars, How The Solar System Was Won, and Planetfall. [http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/amk/doc/0073.html]
- The version of Also Sprach Zarathustra used in the film was performed by the Vienna Philharmonic, conducted by Herbert von Karajan, and originally released on Decca. It is uncredited in 2001 because Decca didn't want to be associated with a "sci-fi" movie (although it did license the piece for the film). Deutsche Grammophon, who supplied the rest of the music in the film, was happy to be credited and ended up with the best-selling soundtrack album (throughout Europe; in the US the album was released on MGM Records). However, on that album DG was forced to substitute Karajan's Zarathustra for a version by the Berlin Philharmonic, conducted by Karl Böhm.
- In the French version of the film, HAL is refered to as CARL, for "Cerveau Analytique de Recherche et de Liaison" ("Analytic Research and Communication Brain"), and "Daisy Bell", the song HAL sings, is replaced by "Au Clair de la Lune".
- In the German version of the film, "Daisy Bell", the song HAL sings, is replaced by Hänschen Klein.
- George Lucas, known for creating homages to earlier films in his own films, stated in his DVD commentary to his most recent film Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, that he made a homage to the 2001 Clavius Base. It is when the establishing shot of Polis Massa is seen. Polis Massa was specifically designed to be an asteroid base that looked very similar to the Clavius Base seen in 2001. In fact, two people in space suits are shown in Revenge of the Sith in similar positions on the asteroid as those in 2001.
- Both Elvis and Ric Flair were known to have used the opening music from the film as their entrance music; Elvis in his singing performances, and Ric Flair at his wrestling competitions.

DVD release

Ric Flair 2001: A Space Odyssey was released on DVD on June 12, 2001. Presented in its original theatrical aspect ratio of 2.35:1, the film was digitally remastered from the original 70mm print, and the audio was remixed in 5.1 surround sound.

References

External links

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- [http://metaphilm.com/philm.php?id=449_0_2_0_M In depth analysis of the film's deeper meaning]
- [http://www.kubrick2001.com/ Flash animation offering an analysis of the film]
- [http://www.palantir.net/2001/ 2001: A Space Odyssey Internet Resource Archive]
- [http://www.mfiles.co.uk/Reviews/alex-norths-2001-a-space-odyssey.htm Notes on Alex North's 2001 soundtrack]
- [http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/2001/ Reproduction of the original printed programme]
- [http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/mono03.shtml Original news article about Magnuson Park monolith]
- [http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/amk/doc/0057.html Original screenplay]
- [http://www.talkingpix.co.uk/Two%20Views%20of%202001.html Two Views of 2001]
- [http://www.talkingpix.co.uk/ArticleMinehead.html A Space Odyssey in Minehead] 2001: A Space Odyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey Category:Jupiter in fiction Category:Famous numbers 2001: A Space Odyssey ja:2001年宇宙の旅 th:2001 จอมจักรวาล

Dr. Dre

:This article is about the Los Angeles rapper and producer Dr. Dre. For the New York radio and television presenter, see Doctor Dre Dr. Dre (born Andre Romel Young on February 18, 1965, in Los Angeles, California) is an African-American record producer, rapper, and record executive, one of the most successful and well-known producers in the field of hip hop music. Dre is best-known as for his collaborations with West Coast hip hop artists such as Snoop Dogg, Warren G, and Tupac Shakur, and also as a former member of pioneering gangsta rap group N.W.A. He is also notable for being the co-founder of Death Row Records (with Suge Knight); and the founder of Aftermath Entertainment, a label distributed through Interscope Records that features multi-platinum artists such as Eminem, 50 Cent, and more recently Busta Rhymes, Eve, Stat Quo, The Game and of course Dr. Dre himself.

Biography

Dr. Dre started his producing career as a member of the World Class Wreckin' Cru during the first half of the 1980s. In 1986, he and fellow World Class Wreckin' Cru member DJ Yella were two of the founding members of N.W.A, a highly successful and controversial group that created the prototype for much of what was termed "gangsta rap" in the 1990s. Dr. Dre enjoyed significant success in NWA. After a dispute with Eazy E, a founding member of N.W.A. and Ruthless Records, Dre left the group at the peak of its popularity in 1991 to form Death Row Records with Suge Knight. Dr. Dre released his first solo single, "Deep Cover,"(AKA 187) in the spring of 1992. This was the introduction of and ultimately the beginning of his collaboration with rapper Snoop Doggy Dogg (known as simply "Snoop Dogg" following his departure from Death Row Records,) a young man who had recorded some homemade tapes with Dre's stepbrother Warren G. Warren G played Dre some of Snoop's mixtapes and Dre arranged a meeting with the young man, beginning a lifelong association. Snoop's voice appeared on Dre's 1992 debut album The Chronic as much as Dre's did. Thanks to the single "Nuthin' But a 'G' Thang," and hits like "Let Me Ride" and "Fuck Wit Dre Day (And Everybody's Celebratin')", The Chronic became a multi-platinum seller, making it virtually impossible to hear mainstream hip-hop that wasn't affected in some way by Dr. Dre. Shortly after its release, the Chronic became one of the biggest-selling hip hop albums in history, and was followed shortly by a string of multi-platinum albums from Dre’s protégés, including Snoop Dogg’s debut album Doggystyle and Warren G’s G-Funk Era. The Chronic is widely credited as being the first appearance of Dr. Dre's original creation; the hiphop "skit track." The following year, Dr. Dre produced Snoop Dogg's debut album Doggystyle, with similar subject matter and musical style. Doggystyle achieved phenomenal success, being the first debut album for an artist to debut at #1 on the Billboard charts. In 1996, the song "California Love," a highly successful collaboration with Death Row artist Tupac Shakur, helped further establish Death Row and Dr. Dre as a major force in the music industry. By the end of the year, however, the success of Death Row had taken a reverse turn, following the death of Tupac Shakur and racketeering charges against Suge Knight. Foreseeing the label's collapse, Dr. Dre left Death Row to form his own Aftermath Entertainment label. The Dr. Dre Presents ... The Aftermath album, released at the end of the year, featured songs by the newly signed Aftermath artists, and a solo track "Been There, Done That". The track was intended as a symbolic good-bye to gangsta rap, in which Dre suggested that he is moving on to another level of music and lifestyle. In 1997, Dr. Dre signed aspiring Detroit rapper Eminem to his label, producing his controversial album The Slim Shady LP in 1999, followed by the even more successful and controversial The Marshall Mathers LP in 2000. The latter featured slightly less involvement by Dr. Dre. By the time The Eminem Show was released in 2002, Eminem was producing the bulk of his output himself. Dre released his second solo album, Dr. Dre 2001 (sometimes referred to by fans as "The Chronic 2001: No Seeds"), or more often simply '2001' in 1999. Once again, the album featured about as much of Dre's voice as the voices of numerous collaborators, including Devin the Dude, Hittman, Snoop Dogg, and Eminem. The album was highly successful, thus reaffirming a recurring theme featured in its lyrics, stating that Dre is still a force to be reckoned with, despite the lack of major releases in the previous few years. The album followed a new musical direction, characterised by high-pitched piano and string melodies over a deep and rich bassline. The style was also prominent in his following production work for other artists, including hits such as "Let Me Blow Ya Mind" by Eve and Gwen Stefani (whom he would produce again on the Stefani and Eve track "Rich Girl"), "Break Ya Neck" by Busta Rhymes, and "Family Affair" by Mary J Blige. Dr. Dre has also appeared in the movies Set It Off, The Wash and Training Day, though he later stated that he does not intend to pursue a career in acting. A song of his, "Bad Intentions" (featuring Knoc-Turn'Al), was featured on the soundtrack to The Wash. In 2003, Dr. Dre and Eminem produced the major-label debut Get Rich or Die Tryin' for Queens rapper 50 Cent, featuring the Dre-produced hit single "In Da Club." The release of Detox, which was to be Dre's final solo album, was planned for 2004. The project was declared to be cancelled for a while, as Dre decided to put all his effort into producing the artists on his Aftermath label, including Eminem, 50 Cent, Eve, The Game, Stat Quo, and Busta Rhymes; former N.W.A member Ice Cube is currently negotiating a contract with the label. However, in November 2004, Dre and Interscope confirmed that Detox was still in the works and is currently scheduled to be released in Fall 2005. On the Eminem song "Encore", featuring Dre himself, Eminem mentions that the Eminem crew will "make" him do the album. Dre will also be producing Snoop Dogg's next album, The Blue Carpet Treatment which will be released in 2006.

Albums Discography

With N.W.A

- N.W.A. and the Posse, Ruthless Records, 1987.
- Straight Outta Compton, Ruthless Records, 1989.
- 100 Miles and Runnin' , Ruthless Records, 1990.
- Efil4zaggin ("Niggaz4life" spelt backwards), Ruthless Records, 1991.

Solo

- The Chronic, Death Row Records, 1992 #3 US 6X Platinum
- Concrete Roots Hitman Music, 1994 Exec. Prod.DJ Flash
- Greatest Hits, Central Station , 1996
- Dr. Dre Presents...The Aftermath, Aftermath Records, 1996
- First Round Knock Out, Triple X, 2005
- Back 'N The Day, Blue Dolphin, 1996
- Dr. Dre 2001, Aftermath Records, 1999 #2 US 5X Platinum, #4 UK
- Maximum Dr. Dre, Orchard, 2001
- Chronicle: Best of the Work, Death Row Records, 2002
- Greatest Hits V.2, Central Station, 2004
- Detox, Aftermath Records, 2006.

Mixtapes

- Detox - Millennium Of Aftermath (by DJ Rukiz), Pickwick, 2005. #183 UK

Singles Discography

- "Surgery" (World Class Wreckin Cru) (1984)
- "Rapping 100 Speakers" (Daniel Sofer/Unknown DJ/Dr. Dre) (1984)
- "Juice" (World Class Wreckin Cru) (1985)
- "World Class (Remix)" (World Class Wreckin Cru) (1985)
- "House Calls" (World Class Wreckin Cru) (1987)
- "Turn Out The Lights" (World Class Wreckin Cru) (1987)
- "Illegal" (CIA/Dr. Dre) (1987)
- "Dope Man/Panic Zone" (NWA) (1987)
- "Deep Cover" (feat. Snoop Doggy Dogg) (1992)
- "Nuthin' but a 'G' Thang" (1993) #2 US; #31 UK (1994 release, and double A-Side with "Let Me Ride" in the UK)
- "Fuck Wit Dre Day (And Everybody's Celebratin')" (1993) #8 US
- "Let Me Ride" (1993) #34 US
- "Keep Their Heads Ringin'" (1995) #10 US; #25 UK
- "California Love" (2Pac feat. Dr. Dre) (1996) (also featuring talk box-filtered lyrics by Roger Troutman) #1 US, #6 UK, #4 AUS
- "No Diggity" (Blackstreet feat. Dr. Dre) (1996) #9 UK, #21 AUS
- "Zoom" (with LL Cool J) (1998) #15 UK
- "Guilty Conscience" (Eminem feat. Dr. Dre) (1999) #5 UK
- "Still D.R.E." (feat. Snoop Doggy Dogg) (2000) #6 UK
- "Forgot About Dre" (feat. Eminem) (2000) #25 US; #7 UK
- "The Next Episode" (feat. Snoop Dogg) (2000) #23 US; #3 UK
- "Bad Intentions" (feat. Knoc-Turn'al) (2002) #4 UK
- "Knoc" (Knoc-Turn'al with Dr. Dre & Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott) (2002) #98 US
- "Symphony In X Major" (Xzibit feat. Dr. Dre) (2003) #43 AUS
- "Encore" (Eminem feat. Dr. Dre & 50 Cent) (2004) #25 US

External links

- [http://www.dre2001.com/ Official Site]
- [http://aftermath-entertainment.com/ Aftermath Records]
- [http://aftermathmusic.com Aftermath Entertainment]
- [http://www.bandnews.org/band/Dr.+Dre Dr. Dre News]
- [http://www.dubcc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30148.0 Dr. Dre Productions C.V. on Dubcc.com]
- [http://www.drdre.us Dr Dre]
- [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0236564/ Dr. Dre] on IMDb Category:1965 births Category:African American musicians Category:Aftermath Entertainment Category:American music industry executives Category:American rappers Category:California musicians Category:Hip hop producers Category:American_record_producers Dr. Dre Category:Grammy Award Winners Category:MTV Music Award Winners

2001 (album)

2001 is a 1999 West Coast hip hop album by Dr. Dre, featuring prominent guest appearances from Snoop Dogg, Hittman, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, and others. Originally to have been entitled The Chronic 2001 (the name was changed because of litigation with Dr. Dre's former label Death Row Records), the album is the decade/century/millennium ending sequel to Dr. Dre's classic 1992 album The Chronic. It brought the West Coast Hip-Hop scene back to relevance after years of obscurity, and legitimized Eminem, who then proceeded to sky rocket to become one of the biggest mainstream rap stars ever. The Album debuted at number 2 on Billboard Charts. According to Billboard the album has sold more than seven million albums in the U.S. The album was well-received by most critics, if not on quite the same level as Dre's smash debut The Chronic. However, some complained that several of the rappers who featured prominently on the album (such as Hittman, Ms. Roq, Kurupt, and Six-Two) were not particularly talented and viewed them as poor cover-ups for Dre's lack of MC skills. The same critics generally considered the album's production top-notch and innovative, though, and praised Snoop Dogg and particularly Eminem's contributions to the album. Dre faced a couple of legal difficulties as a result of this album's content. George Lucas sued him over the use of the THX boom in the album's intro, and the London-based music publisher Minder Music Ltd. was awarded $1.5 million in a federal copyright infringement lawsuit against the rapper, claiming the bass line for "Let's Get High" was stolen from a 1980 tune called "Backstrokin'."

Track listing

#"Lolo" (intro, featuring Xzibit and Tray-D) - 0:40 #"The Watcher" - 3:28 #"Fuck You" (featuring Devin a.k.a The Dude and Snoop Dogg) - 3:25 #"Still D.R.E." (featuring Snoop Dogg) - 4:28 #"Big Ego's" (featuring Hittman) - 4:01 #"Xxplosive" (featuring Hittman, Kurupt, Nate Dogg and Six-Two) - 3:35 #"What's The Difference" (featuring Eminem and Xzibit) - 4:04 #"Bar One" (featuring Tracy Nelson, Ms. Roq and Eddie Griffin) - 0:51 #"Light Speed" (featuring Hittman) - 2:41 #"Forgot About Dre" (featuring Eminem) - 3:42 #"The Next Episode" (featuring Snoop Dogg and Nate Dogg) - 2:42 #"Let's Get High" (featuring Hittman, Kurupt and Ms. Roq) - 2:27 #"Bitch Niggaz" (featuring Snoop Dogg, Hittman and Six-Two) - 4:14 #"The Car Bomb" (featuring Mel-Man and Shari Henry) - 1:01 #"Murder Ink" (featuring Hittman and Ms. Roq) - 2:28 #"Ed-ucation" (featuring Eddie Griffin) - 1:32 #"Some L.A. Niggaz" (featuring Defari, Xzibit, Knoc-Turn'al, Time Bomb, King T, M.C. Ren and Kokane) - 4:25 #"Pause 4 Porno" (featuring Jake Steed) - 1:33 #"Housewife" (featuring Kurupt and Hittman) - 4:03 #"Ackrite" (featuring Hittman) - 3:40 #"Bang Bang" (featuring Knoc-turn'al and Hittman) - 3:42 #"The Message" (featuring Mary J. Blige and Rell) - 5:29 Category:Dr. Dre albums Category:1999 albums

21st century

The 21st century is the century that began on 1 January 2001 and will last to 31 December 2100. Frequently common usage regards the 21st century as spanning 2000 to 2099, though this method of counting ignores the fact that there was no year 0. In 2000 the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) implicitly backed the common usage by defining a calendar that places the origin of the counting in a year zero.

Overview

The 21st century has had an influence on culture since well before it began. Speculation about future, social, cultural, and technological trends frequently centered on the year 2000, starting with late-19th century essays and novels (often of a utopian nature) such as Edward Bellamy's Looking Backward. It's been said that the event horizon of Western culture was steadily shrinking in this period, since as late as the 1990s people were still often focusing on the year 2000 in their discussions of the future. Religious beliefs in a "millennial apocalypse" were supplemented by genuine concerns about the Y2k computer "bug" and about possible terrorist attacks centered on the year-2000 celebrations, but the actual turn of the millennium (both the popularly-celebrated one in 2000 and the "purist" one in 2001) went by in a fairly anticlimactic manner. However, the years since have continued in the tumultuous manner people of the 20th century were accustomed to expect, with wars, terrorism, and other conflicts, as well as continued advances in science and technology including the continuing expansion of the use of computers and the Internet (despite the "tech bubble burst" where the overexuberance of early Internet companies was deflated). So far in the 21st century, the main historical trends have been the violent conflict between Western Civilization and extremist Muslim Fundamentalism, the search for solutions to global warming, the continued growth of the European Community and the rapid emergence of China and India as global industrial powers. More Y2k-style computer date failures are due before the end of the 21st century; the Unix datestamps, consisting of a count of the number of seconds since 1970, may overflow in 2038, while the family of operating systems descended from MS-DOS (including the various versions of Microsoft Windows) can't handle dates beyond 2099.

Important developments, events, achievements

Politics

- 2003 International Criminal Court opens
- 2004 EU Enlargement: 10 countries join
- 2005 UN Security Council decides war criminals in Darfur will be tried by the International Criminal Court (Resolution 1593) [http://www.un.org/Docs/sc/unsc_resolutions05.htm]
- 2003 - 2005 A series of non-violent revolutions known as the color revolutions overthrew authoritarian regimes in Georgia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan and Lebanon.

Science and technology

- 2002 Mars Odyssey arrives in orbit around Mars.
- 2003 Space Shuttle Columbia disaster February 1
- 2003 Dolly the sheep dies prematurely February 14
- 2003 Chinese space program launches its first manned space flight, Shenzhou 5 on October 15.
- 2003 Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) spreads around the globe.
- 2004 Mars rovers discover evidence of likely flowing water on Mars. Both are still in service as of 2005.
- 2004 Cassini-Huygens probe arrives at Saturn.
- 2004 SpaceShipOne makes first privately-funded human spaceflight, June 21
- 2005 Huygens probe lands on Titan, the largest of Saturn's moons, January 14
- 2005 Deep Impact probe impacts Comet Tempel 1 July 4.

Conflicts and civil unrest

- September 11, 2001 attacks
- 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan
- 12 October 2002 Bali bombing
- 2003 Invasion of Iraq
- 11 March 2004 Madrid train bombings
- September 2004 Beslan hostage crisis
- 7 July 2005 London bombings
- 2005 civil unrest in France

Worldwide deaths from war and terror attacks

- Second Congo War, approximately 1.8 million deaths (3.8 million since 1998)
- Darfur conflict, approximately 200,000 deaths
- U.S. Invasion in Iraq, most estimates claim 30,000 – 50,000 Iraqi and 2,300 coalition deaths. The Lancet recently estimated 100,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the invasion. [http://www.countthecasualties.org.uk/docs/robertsetal.pdf]
- Civil War in Côte d'Ivoire, 3,000 deaths
- September 11, 2001 attacks, 2,993 deaths Furthermore, there are several wars and dictatorships continuing from the 20th century. In most cases, the death toll is unclear. See also [http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/wars21c.htm].

Natural disasters

- Earthquake in Bam, Iran on December 27, 2003 killed more than 26,000 people.
- 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake. On December 26 an undersea earthquake in the Indian Ocean created a large tsunami, which impacted land across the region and caused approximately 310,000 deaths in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand and other countries in the region.
- 2005 U.S Gulf Coast Hurricane Katrina - The Category 4 hurricane impacts the Gulf Coast, flooding New Orleans in Louisiana, most of Mississippi, Tennessee, and Alabama. The current number of fatalities stands at 1,277. This hurricane surpassed Hurricane Andrew in cost of damage, becoming the costliest natural disaster in U.S history.
- Earthquake in Kashmir on October 8, 2005. An earthquake in Kashmir has so far claimed over 80,000 lives in India and Pakistan.

Sport

- 2000- 2000 Summer Olympics held in Sydney, Australia.
- 2001- NASCAR (American stock car) driver Dale Earnhardt dies after hitting the wall on the last lap of the Daytona 500. Earnhard's son- Dale Earnhardt Jr. claimed a tearful victory in the next race held at Daytona, less than four months later.
- 2001- In baseball, Barry Bonds breaks Mark McGwire's single-season home run record with 73.
- 2002- In soccer, Brazil win the Football World Cup becoming the first team to win the trophy 5 times.
- 2002- 2002 Winter Olympics held in Salt Lake City, Utah
- 2003- Vancouver, Canada elected host city for the 2010 Olympic Winter Games
- 2003- In baseball. Chicago Cubs fan Steve Bartman interferes with a foul ball during Game 6 of the National League Championship Series. Rather than the Cubs recording the out- and probably the win- the Florida Marlins won Game 6 and Game 7 en route to their second-ever World Series win.
- 2004- In American football, the Pittsburgh Steelers go 15-1 in the regular season, the first American Football Conference ("AFC") team to do so (The Steelers fell short of the Super Bowl with a loss to the New England Patriots in the AFC title game). This is also the first time a rookie National Football League quarterback (Ben Roethlisberger) has gone undefeated in his first season. Roethlisberger won Rookie of the Year.
- 2004- American Lance Armstrong wins his 6th consecutive Tour de France, becoming the first cyclist to win it six times.
- 2004- Greece wins the European Football (soccer) Championship for the first time.
- 2004- The Boston Red Sox baseball team win their first World Series in 86 years, defeating the St. Louis Cardinals 4 games to 0.
- 2004- 2004 Summer Olympics held in Athens, Greece.
- 2005- England's Liverpool F.C. overcome a 3-0 halftime deficit to Italy's A.C. Milan to win soccer's 2004/2005 UEFA Champions League. Liverpool win 4-3 on penalties. It was Liverpool's fifth Champions League victory.
- 2005- American cyclist Lance Armstrong wins his 7th consecutive Tour de France and retires.
- 2005- the 100 meters sprint record is broken by Jamaican Asafa Powell with a time of 9.77 seconds.
- 2005- The Chicago White Sox baseball team win their first World Series in 88 years, defeating the Houston Astros 4 games to 0.
- 2005- The Sydney Swans win Australian (rules) Football League premiership after a 72-year "drought".
- 2005- London elected host city for the 2012 Summer Olympics
- 2006- 2006 Winter Olympics to be held in Torino, Italy

Issues and concerns

Some of the things that have dominated discussion and debate in this century include:
- Globalization. Advances in telecommunications and transportation, the expansion of capitalism and democracy, and free trade agreements have resulted in unprecedented global economic and cultural integration. This has caused (and is continuing to cause) huge economic and cultural shifts which have been the subject of considerable controversy.
- Overpopulation. The United Nations [http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/02/24/un.population/ estimates] that world population will reach 9.1 billion by mid-century. Such growth raises questions of ecological sustainability and creates many economic and political disruptions. In response, many countries have adopted policies which either force or encourage their citizens to have fewer children, and others have limited immigration. Considerable debate exists over what the ultimate carrying capacity of the planet may be; whether or not population growth containment policies are necessary; to what degree growth can safely occur thanks to increased economic and ecological efficiency; and how markets should accommodate demographic shifts. Evidence forms that developed countries (such as Japan) suffer population implosion, and the population debate is strongly tied with poverty.
- Poverty. Poverty remains the root cause of many of the world's other ills, including famine, disease, and insufficient education. Poverty contains many self-reinforcing elements (for instance, poverty can make education an unaffordable luxury, which tends to result in continuing poverty) that various aid groups hope to rectify in this century.
- Disease. AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria each kill over a million people annually. HIV remains without a cure or vaccine, and is growing rapidly in India and much of the African continent. Antibiotic resistance is a growing concern for organisms such as tuberculosis. Other diseases, such as SARS, ebola and flu variations, are also causes for concern. The World Health Organization has [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3524824.stm warned] of a possible coming flu pandemic resulting from bird flu mutations.
- War and Terrorism. Active conflicts continue around the world, including civil wars in Democratic Republic of the Congo, Indonesia, Chechnya, Côte d'Ivoire, Somalia, Nepal, Senegal, Colombia, and what some called a genocide in Darfur, Sudan. The 9/11 terrorist attacks triggered invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. The War on Terrorism has seen controversies over civil liberties, accusations of torture, continued terrorist attacks and ongoing instability, violence and military occupation. Violence continues in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Considerable concern remains about nuclear proliferation, especially in Iran and North Korea, and the availability of weapons of mass destruction to rogue groups.
- Climate change. Some scientists expect that significant anthropogenic climate change will occur during the 21st century, resulting in unprecedented economic and ecological costs. Others dispute the severity of the problem. Trends such as global warming, pollution, biodiversity loss and resource depletion all are growing factors that will contribute to significant issues in this century. Resources in immediate danger of depletion include water, oil, and natural gas.
- Global power. Issues surrounding the cultural, economic, and military dominance of the United States and its role in the world community have become even more pointed given its recent military activities, problematic relations with the United Nations, disagreement over several international treaties, and its economic policies with regard to globalization. Integration of the European Union and the African Union have proceeded.
- Intellectual property. The increasing popularity of digital formats for entertainment media such as movies and music, and the ease of copying and distributing it via the Internet and peer-to-peer networks, has raised concerns in the media industry about copyright infringement. Much debate is proceeding about the proper bounds between protection of copyright, trademark and patent rights versus fair use and the public domain, where some argue that such laws have shifted greatly towards intellectual property owners and away from the interests of the general public in recent years, while others say that such legal change is needed to deal with the threat of new technologies against the rights of authors and artists (or, as others put it, against the outmoded business models of the current entertainment industry). Domain name "cybersquatting" and access to patented drugs to combat epidemics in third-world countries are other IP concerns.
- Technology developments show no sign of ending. Communications and control technology continues to augment the intelligence of individual humans, collections of humans, and machines. Cultures are forced into the position of sharply defining humanity and determining boundaries on desire, thought, communication, behavior, and manufacturing. It is predicted that by the middle of this century there will be a Technological Singularity when artificial intelligences are created that are smarter than humans. As these then create even smarter AI's technological change will accelerate in ways that are impossible for us to foresee.
- Energy is becoming scarce and more expensive, due to the esclating demand for petroleum ("oil") and oil-based products such as gasoline and kerosene, unmatched by production. Discovery of new oil fields has not been sufficient to sustain current levels of production, and some fear that the earth may be running out of economically viable oil. While complete depletion will not happen in the near future, some fear that a peak in production will cause an end to the trend of economic expansion in modern society, perhaps resulting in a collapse of modern civilization itself. Others believe that alternative sources of energy will prevent this disaster.
- Civilization is subject to increasing pressures due to overpopulation and culture clash. Samuel Huntington has spoken of a crash that may lead to extended wars and global instability. At the same time, there is increasing concern of decadence in Western arts and sciences among the leading intelects of the time, from Jacques Barzun to John Horgan´s "End of Science" to the columnist Spengler of Asia Times (who took his pseudonym from Oswald Spengler). The United Nations lists global issues on its agenda [http://www.un.org/issues/ here] and lists a set of [http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/ Millennium Goals] to attempt to address some of these issues.

Significant people

Influential people in politics as of 2005

(in alphabetical order)
- Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian President
- King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia
- Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations
- Jan Peter Balkenende, Prime Minister of the Netherlands
- José Manuel Durão Barroso, President of the European Commission
- Silvio Berlusconi, Italian Prime Minister
- Tony Blair, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
- George W. Bush, President of the United States of America
- Fidel Castro, President of Cuba
- Jacques Chirac, President of France
- Hugo Chávez, President of Venezuela
- Jean Chrétien, former Prime Minister of Canada
- Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, President of Italy
- Luigi R. Einaudi, Secretary-General of the Organization of American States
- Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkish Prime Minister
- Vicente Fox, President of Mexico
- Lawrence Gonzi, Maltese Prime Minister
- John Howard, Prime Minister of Australia
- Hu Jintao, President of the People's Republic of China
- Abdul Kalam, President of India
- Hamid Karzai, President of Afghanistan
- Mohammad Khatami, President of Iran
- Kim Jong-il, General Secretary of the Korean Workers' Party and chairman of the National Defense Commission of North Korea
- Junichiro Koizumi, Prime Minister of Japan
- Aleksander Kwaśniewski, President of Poland
- Paul Martin, Prime Minister of Canada
- Thabo Mbeki, South African president and current leader of the African Union
- Angela Merkel, German Bundeskanzler (chancellor)
- Pervez Musharraf Pakistani President
- Osama bin Laden, Al-Qaeda leader
- Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, President of the Russian Federation
- Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Prime Minister of Denmark
- Condoleezza Rice, United States Secretary of State
- Karl Rove, President Bush's senior advisor, chief political strategist, and deputy chief of staff in charge of policy.
- Saddam Hussein, deposed President of Iraq, currently held by US forces
- Gerhard Schröder, former German Bundeskanzler (chancellor)
- Ariel Sharon, Prime Minister of Israel
- Luis Inácio da Silva, President of Brazil
- Dr. Manmohan Singh, Indian Prime Minister
- Javier Solana, Foreign policy chief of the European Union
- Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga, President of Latvia
- Ong Keng Yong, Secretary-General of ASEAN
- Viktor Yushchenko, President of Ukraine
- José María Aznar, Former President of Spain
- José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, President of Spain

Astronomical events and predictions

- Tuesday, June 8, 2004: Transit of Venus occurs after 122 years
- Full eclipse of moon during World Series, 2004
- November 8, 2006: Transit of Mercury
- 2009: Triple conjunction Jupiter-Neptune
- 2010/2011: Triple conjunction Jupiter-Uranus
- Wednesday, June 6, 2012: Transit of Venus to occur a second time this century
- May 9, 2016: Transit of Mercury
- Monday, August 21, 2017: First total solar eclipse of the 21st century for the United States, and the first visible in the continental US since February 26, 1979.
- November 11: Transit of Mercury
- 2024 (plus or minus 5 years): Next predicted return of Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks.
- 2025/2026: Triple conjunction Saturn-Neptune
- Friday, April 13, 2029: The asteroid 99942 Apophis (previously better known by its provisional designation 2004 MN₄) will pass within 30,000 km (18,600 mi) of the Earth.
- November 13, 2032: Transit of Mercury
- 2037/2038: Triple conjunction Jupiter-Uranus
- November 7, 2039: Transit of Mercury
- 2041/2042: Triple conjunction Mars-Uranus
- October 1, 2044: Occultation of Regulus by Venus. The last was on July 7, 1959. After 2044 the next occultation of Regulus by Venus will occur on October 21, 3187, although some sources claim it will occur again on October 6, 2271.
- 2047/2048: Triple conjunction Jupiter-Neptune
- May 7, 2049: Transit of Mercury
- November 9, 2052: Transit of Mercury
- 2061: Next return of Comet Halley.
- 2063: Triple conjunction Mars-Uranus
- November 11, 2065: Transit of Mercury
- November 22, 2065: At 12:45 UTC, Venus will occult Jupiter. This event will be the first occultation of a planet by another since January 3, 1818. Unfortunately this event will be very difficult to observe, because the elongation of Venus and Jupiter from the Sun on that date will be only 7 degrees.
- 2066: Triple conjunction Jupiter-Uranus
- July 15, 2067: At 11:56 UTC, Mercury will occult Neptune. Unfortunately this rare event will be very difficult to observe.
- 2071/2072: Triple conjunction Mars-Neptune
- November 14, 2078: Transit of Mercury
- 2079: Triple conjunction Saturn-Uranus
- August 11, 2079: At 01:30 UTC, Mercury will occult Mars
- Friday, November 10, 2084: Transit of Earth as seen from Mars
- November 7, 2085: Transit of Mercury
- 2085/2086: Triple conjunction Jupiter-Neptune
- October 27, 2088: At 13:43 UTC, Mercury will occult Jupiter
- 2088/2089: Triple conjunction Mars-Neptune
- 2093: Triple conjunction Jupiter-Uranus
- April 7, 2094: At 10:48 UTC, Mercury will occult Jupiter
- May 8, 2095: Transit of Mercury
- November 10, 2098: Transit of Mercury

Scientific Predictions

- Human Genetic Engineering becomes possible.
- Development of Artificial Intelligence.
- Technological Singularity
- Every human body part capable of being either cloned or replaced with an artificial replacement, or both.
- Global Warming accelerates
- Development of anti-matter propulsion rockets and travel close to the speed of light, leading to the colonization of the Tau Ceti system using space habitats fabricated by nanites from asteroidal and comet material.

Socio-Political Predictions

- A woman once told Winston Churchill: "By the year 2100, women will rule the world." Churchill asked: "Still?"
- Several leaders in politics, religion, etc., have set goals for the elimination of anti-Semitism, dictatorship, disease, homosexuality, hunger, illiteracy, lack of drinkable water, over-population, poverty, racism, tyranny and war in the 21st century.
- Near the end of the 21st century, people will still be arguing whether 2100 is the last year of the 21st century or the first of the 22nd.

Science Fiction set in the remaining years of the 21st Century

Television and film

- The events of Stargate SG-1 continue into the early 21st century.
- Stargate Atlantis is set in the early 21st century.
- Transformers: The Movie: is set in the year 2005. The subsequent Generation 2 Transformers series takes place after the events of the movie.
- The Japanese anime show The Super Dimension Fortress Macross spans the years 1999 to 2012 (its final episode takes place in January of 2012, and a direct to video epilogue featurette takes place in September 2012). Its prequel and sequels take place in 2008 (Macross Zero), 2040 (Macross Plus) and 2045 (Macross 7). A dramatized historical fiction movie about the First Space War, The Super Dimension Fortress Macross: Do You Remember Love?, premieres in 2031.
- The American cartoon show Robotech, composed from the footage of three unrelated anime series (including Macross, above) spans the years 1999 to 2015, 2030-2031 and 2044-2045.
- Part of Back to the Future Part II is set in 2015.
- The Japanese anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion is also set in 2015.
- The modern classic film Blade Runner takes place in November, 2019.
- Both parts of the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Past Tense" take place in 2024.
- The anime universe of Ghost in the Shell, its sequel Ghost in the Shell: Innocence, and anime television series based on the same premise (Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GiG), are centered somewhere around 2029.
- The Terminator is set up during the early years of the 21st century in terms of the wars between humans & Skynet. Some of the interveing years are dealt with by the, at the moment 2, sequels, Terminator 2: Judgment Day & Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines with the whole franchise building to a conclusion of the War in 2029.
- Demolition Man is set in 2032.
- I, Robot was set in 2035.
- Minority Report was set in 2054.
- The 1998 remake of Lost in Space was set in 2058.
- Most of Star Trek: First Contact takes place in 2063. In Star Trek canon, the human Zefram Cochrane develops faster-than-light travel and makes first contact with an alien race during this year.
- Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within Is set in 2068.
- The Japanese anime show Cowboy Bebop is set in 2071.
- The Nickelodeon cartoon My Life as a Teenage Robot is set in 2072.
- Equilibrium is set in 2072.
- Total Recall is set in 2084.
- In Star Trek: Insurrection, it is discovered that the Ba'ku moved to the Briar Patch at some point in this century.
- The Jetsons is supposed to take place in the late 21st century.
- Due to the time-travel nature of its stories, Doctor Who has taken place at various points during the 21st century.

Computer and video games

- Uplink is set on the internet of the year 2010.
- Perfect Dark is set in 2023.
- The races in San Francisco Rush 2049 take place in 2049.
- The events of Deus Ex take place in 2052.
- The levels "Breaking and Entering" and "You Genius, U-Genix" in TimeSplitters: Future Perfect take place in 2052.
- System Shock is set in 2072.
- Future Cop: LAPD takes place in the year 2098.
- The discovery of the Zohar in Xenosaga takes place in 20XX.
- The Great War of the Fallout universe starts on October 23, 2077; nuclear bombs are launched, nobody knows who the aggressor was.
- The Classic Mega Man franchise supposedly begins in 200X (circa 2008?). Megaman 3 introduces the 20XX numbering scheme (circa 2010?)
- The events of Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne occur in 20XX.
- In Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction, the 2nd Korean War starts early in this century

Novels

- Tad Williams' Otherland series is set at some undefined point in the 21st century
- Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age is also set in the 21st century, after some disaster befell the centralized telephone network. This led people to build a decentralized network, which they used to transfer money, thus destroying normal methods of taxation and bringing down most large governments.
- Red Mars of Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy begins in 2027.
- Some books by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky are set in 21st century

Decades and years

External links

- [http://www.longbets.org/ Long Bets] Foundation to promote long-term thinking
- [http://www.longnow.org/ Long Now] Long-term cultural institution Category:Centuries Category:Postmodernism als:21. Jahrhundert ko:21세기 ja:21世紀 nb:21. århundre simple:21st century th:คริสต์ศตวรรษที่ 21

3rd millennium

(2nd millennium – 3rd millennium – 4th millennium – other millennia) ---- The third millennium is the third period of one thousand years in the Common Era. However, there are two opinions on the start and end dates.

Start and End Dates

January 1 2001 - December 31 3000

For those who start counting their calendar from January 1 1, then the third millennium began on January 1, 2001 and will end on December 31, 3000 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar.

January 1 2000 - December 31 2999

In the sense of the Common Era calendar, the third millennium began on January 1, 2000 and will end on December 31, 2999. The majority of the celebrations for the start of the third millennium occurred at midnight on December 31 1999 / January 1 2000. The first decade of the new millennium (see below) contains the year 2000.

Events

- September 11, 2001 attacks are one of the few events of the progressing 3rd Millennium that have had significant and polarizing effects on international affairs and relations.
- Some millennialists and Christian anarchists predict the third millennium will be the millennium of peace, when mankind finally learns to live in harmony with each other and nature.

Centuries and Decades

21st century	2000s	2010s	2020s	2030s	2040s	2050s	2060s	2070s	2080s	2090s
22nd century	2100s	2110s	2120s	2130s	2140s	2150s	2160s	2170s	2180s	2190s
23rd century	2200s	2210s	2220s	2230s	2240s	2250s	2260s	2270s	2280s	2290s
24th century	2300s	2310s	2320s	2330s	2340s	2350s	2360s	2370s	2380s	2390s
25th century	2400s	2410s	2420s	2430s	2440s	2450s	2460s	2470s	2480s	2490s
26th century	2500s	2510s	2520s	2530s	2540s	2550s	2560s	2570s	2580s	2590s
27th century	2600s	2610s	2620s	2630s	2640s	2650s	2660s	2670s	2680s	2690s
28th century	2700s	2710s	2720s	2730s	2740s	2750s	2760s	2770s	2780s	2790s
29th century	2800s	2810s	2820s	2830s	2840s	2850s	2860s	2870s	2880s	2890s
30th century	2900s	2910s	2920s	2930s	2940s	2950s	2960s	2970s	2980s	2990s

External link

- [http://www.hermetic.ch/cal_stud/newmill.htm A website arguing that the new millennium began on January 1, 2000] Category:Prophecy ja:3千年紀

2000

This article is about the year 2000. For other uses of 2000, see 2000 (number) or 2000 (breakdancing move). 2000 (MM) is a leap year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. Popular culture also holds the year 2000 as the first year of the 21st century and the 3rd millennium. By strict interpretation of the Gregorian Calendar, however, this distinction falls to the year 2001. This is due to the fact that the first century began with the year 1, and there does not exist a year zero. The first century (or first 100 years AD) was from January 1, in the year one (1 AD) through December 31, in the year one-hundred (100 AD). The second century began on January 1, in the year one-hundred and one (101 AD). The year 2000 is also marked as:
- The International Year for a Culture of Peace.
- The World Mathematical Year. See also Wikipedia's almanac of events for this year.

Events

January

- January 1 - Millennium celebrations take place throughout the world. Y2K passes without the serious, widespread computer failures and malfunctions that had been predicted.
- January 5-January 8 - The 2000 al-Qaida Summit
- January 6 - The last remaining Pyrenean Ibex is found dead.
- January 10 - America On-line announces an agreement to buy Time Warner for $162 billion. This is the largest-ever corporate merger.
- January 11 - the armed wing of Islamic Salvation Front concludes its negotiations with the government for an amnesty and disbands in Algeria.
- January 11 - The trawler Solway Harvester sinks off the Isle of Man.
- January 14 - A United Nations tribunal sentences five Bosnian Croats up to 25 years for the 1993 killing of over 100 Bosnian Muslims in a Bosnian village.
- January 16 - In Sacramento, California a commercial truck carrying evaporated milk is driven into the state capitol building killing the driver.
- January 24 - God's Army, Karen militia group led by twins Johnny and Luther Htoo, take 700 hostages at a Thai hospital near the Burmese border.
- January 30 - St. Louis Rams 23 defeat the Tennessee Titans 16 to win the Super_Bowl_XXXIV
- January 30 - Off the coast of Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya Airways Flight 431 crashes into the Atlantic Ocean, killing 169. Within a day, Alaska Airlines Flight 261 crashes off the California coast into the Pacific Ocean, killing 88.
- January 31 - Dr. Harold Shipman in sentenced to life in prison for murder of at least 15 of his patients out of 365 suspected victims.

February

- February 4 - German extortionist Klaus-Peter Sabotta is jailed for life for attempted murder and extortion in connection with sabotage of German railway lines.
- February 6 - Tarja Halonen is elected the first Finnish female president.
- February 13 - Final original Peanuts comic strip is published.
- February 14 - The spacecraft NEAR Shoemaker entered orbit around asteroid 433 Eros, the first spacecraft to orbit an asteroid.

March

- March 1 - The Constitution of Finland is rewritten.
- March 2 - Hans Blix assumes the position of Executive Chairman of UNMOVIC.
- March 8 - Tokyo train disaster.
- March 9 - FBI arrests suspected purveyor of art forgeries, Ely Sakhai, in New York City.
- March 10 - The NASDAQ Composite Index reaches an all-time high of 5048. ([http://dynamic.nasdaq.com/dynamic/IndexChart.asp?symbol=IXIC&desc=NASDAQ+Composite&sec=nasdaq&site=nasdaq&months=84])
- March 18 - 2000 Taiwanese presidential election: Chen Shui-bian is elected President of the Republic of China (Taiwan).
- March 20 - Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, a former Black Panther, is captured after gun battle that left a sheriff's deputy dead.
- March 21 - Pope John Paul II began the first office visit by a Roman Catholic pontiff to Israel.
- March 21 - US Supreme Court ruled the goverment lacked authority to regulate tobacco as an addictive drug, throwing out the Clinton administration's main anti-smoking initiative.
- March 26 - Presidential elections in Russia: Vladimir Putin elected President.
- March 30 - America's Cup 2000 retained by Team New Zealand near Auckland. Prada Challenge 2000 lost 0-5 in a "best-of-9".

April

April.]]
- April 1 - Japanese prime minister Keizo Obuchi suffers a stroke and falls into a coma.
- April 3 - United States v. Microsoft: Microsoft is ruled to have violated United States antitrust laws by keeping "an oppressive thumb" on its competitors.
- April 5 - Yoshiro Mori replaces Obuchi as prime minister of Japan.
- April 7 - Attack submarine ex-Trepang completes being recycled.
- April 16 - Tuanku Syed Putra ibni Almarhum Syed Hassan Jamalullail, Raja of Perlis dies after a reign of 55 years. He was the longest reigning monarch in the world since the death of Prince Franz Joseph II of Liechtenstein.
- April 17 - Tuanku Syed Sirajuddin becomes Raja of Perlis.
- April 22 - In a predawn raid, federal agents seize six-year old Elián González from his relatives' home in Miami, Florida and fly him to his Cuban father in Washington, DC ending one of the most publicized custody battles in US history.
- April 25 - The State of Vermont passes HB847, legalizing Civil Unions for same-sex couples.

May

- May 3 - A rare conjunction occurs on the New Moon including all seven of the traditional celestial bodies known from ancient times up until 1781 with the discovery of Uranus. The May 2000 conjunction consisted of: the Sun and Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.
- May 3 - Computer pioneer Datapoint Corporation files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
- May 12 - The Tate Modern opens in London.
- May 13 - In Enschede a heavy fireworks explosion kills 20 and leaves an entire neighborhood in ruins.
- May 18 - Boo.com collapses due to lack of funds after six months.
- May 25 - Israel withdraws IDF troops from southern Lebanon after 22 years.
- May 28 - The volcano Mount Cameroon erupts.

June

- June 1 - Mark Mendlan, professional wrestler known by his ring name "Kid Gorgeous," is killed while wrestling at a show in New Hampshire.
- June 7 - U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson of the 4th circuit ordered the breakup of Microsoft Corp.
- June 10 - The New Jersey Devils defeat the Dallas Stars 4 games to 2 to win the 2000 Stanley Cup Finals.
- June 10 - The 2000 European Football Championship begins, hosted jointly by Belgium and the Netherlands.
- June 21 - Section 28, a law preventing the promotion of homosexuality is repealed by the Scottish Parliament.
- June 23 - Palace Backpackers Hostel fire in Childers, Queensland, Australia, kills 15 people.
- June 30 - During a set of the band Pearl Jam at the Roskilde Festival near Copenhagen, 9 die and 26 are injured in the crowd.

July

July
- July 2 - France beat Italy 2-1 to win the 2000 European Football Championship with a golden goal.
- July 2 - Presidential election of Mexico. Vicente Fox wins the Presidency as candidate of the rightist PAN (National Action Party).
- July 10 - In southern Nigeria, a leaking petroleum pipeline explodes killing about 250 villagers who were scavenging gasoline
- July 10 - Death of Denis O Conor Donn, died 10th July 2000, aged 88; succeded by his son, Desmond as The O Connor Donn
- July 18 - Alex Salmond resigns as the leader of the Scottish National Party
- July 25 - A Concorde carrying Air France Flight 4590 crashes just after takeoff from Paris killing all 109 aboard and 5 on the ground.

August

- August 1 - The Santa Cruz Operation announced that it will sell its Server Software and Services Divisions, as well as UnixWare and OpenServer technologies, to Caldera Systems,Inc.
- August 8 - Confederate submarine H.L. Hunley is raised to the surface after 136 years on the ocean floor.
- August 12 - The Russian submarine Kursk sinks in the Barents Sea, resulting in the deaths of all 118 men on board.
- August 14 - The first comic of Megatokyo goes online. This webcomic will later become one of the most popular comics on the web (in terms of page views) and spawn numerous imitators.
- August 25 - the Emulex hoax - wire services publish fraudulent bad news about Emulex
- August 27 - The Ostankino Tower in Moscow catches fire, three people are killed.

September

- September 5 - Tuvalu joins the United Nations.
- September 6 - In New York City, the United Nations Millennium Summit begins with more than 180 world leaders present.
- September 6 - The last wholly Swedish-owned arms manufacturer, Bofors, is sold to American arms manufacturer United Defense
- September 7–14 - The UK fuel protests take place, with refineries blockaded, and supply to the country's network of petrol stations halted.
- September 8 - Albania officially joins the World Trade Organization.
- September 15 - The 2000 Summer Olympics are opened in Sydney, Australia.
- September 16 - Ukrainian journalist Georgiy Gongadze is last seen alive; this day is taken as the commemoration date of his death.
- September 24 - The American Family Association begins lobbying the U.S. Congress to eradicate the National Endowment for the Arts for funding the controversial book One of the Guys by Robert Clark Young
- September 26 - Anti-globalization protests in Prague (some 15,000 protesters) turned violent during the IMF and World Bank summits.
- September 28 - Ariel Sharon leads several hundred armed Israelis in a visit to the Temple Mount. Palestinian civil disorder increases into the Al-Aqsa Intifada.
- September 29 - The Long Kesh prison in Northern Ireland is closed.

October

- October 2 NBC Today Show expanded it to three hours (7:00–10:00 A.M. Eastern Time/Pacific Time; 6:00–9:00 A.M. Central Time/Mountain Time)
- October 5 - President Slobodan Milošević leaves office after widespread demonstrations throughout Serbia and the withdrawal of Russian support.
- October 11 - 250 million gallons of coal sludge spill in Martin County, Kentucky. Considered a greater environmental disaster than the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
- October 12 - In Aden, Yemen, the USS Cole is badly damaged by two suicide bombers who placed a small boat laden with explosives along-side the United States Navy destroyer, killing 17 crew members and wounding at least 39.
- October 21 15 Arab leaders convened in Cairo, Egypt, for their first summit in four years; the Libyan delegation walked out, angry over signs the summit would stop short of calling for breaking ties with Israel.
- October 22 – Mainichi Shinbun exposes Japanese archeologist Shinichi Fujimura as a fraud; Japanese archaeologists had based their treatises of his findings.
- October 26 - Pakistani authorities announce that their police have found an apparently ancient mummy of a persian princess in the province of Baluchistan. Iran, Pakistan and the Taliban all claim the mummy until Pakistan announces it is a forgery in April 17 2001
- October 31 - Singapore Airlines Flight 006 collides with construction equipment in the Chiang Kai Shek International Airport - 83 dead.
- October 31 - The last Jeremy clone has shut down.

November

November
- November - Iraq disarmament crisis: Iraq rejects new U.N. Security Council weapons inspections proposals
- November 1 - Yugoslavia's new democratic government joined the United Nations after eight years of U.N. ostracism under former strongman Slobodan Milosevic.
- November 3 - Widespread flooding throughout England and Wales after days of heavy rain
- November 4 - President Clinton vetoed a bill that would have criminalized the leaking of government secrets.
- November 7 - U.S. presidential election, 2000: Republican challenger George W. Bush defeats Democrat Vice President Al Gore, but the final outcome is not known for over a month because of disputed votes in Florida.
- November 7 - Criminal gang raids the Millennium Dome to steal The Millennium Star diamond but police surveillance catches them in the act
- November 7 - Hillary Rodham Clinton is elected to the United States Senate, becoming the first First Lady of the United States to win public office
- November 11 - Kaprun disaster, Austria, where 155 skiers and snowboarders die when a cable car catches fire in an alpine tunnel.
- November 13 - Richard C. Duncan presents his paper, "The Peak Of World Oil Production And The Road To The Olduvai Gorge", on the Olduvai theory (about the collapse of the industrial civilization), at the Summit 2000 Pardee Keynote Symposia of the Geological Society of America)
- November 14 - Netscape version 6.0 is launched following two years of open source development creating a stable Mozilla web browser upon which it is based
- November 16 - Bill Clinton becomes the first sitting US President to visit Vietnam
- November 17 - Catastrophical landslide in Log pod Mangartom,Slovenia, kills 7, and causes millions of SIT of damage. It is one of the worst catastrophies in Slovenia in the past 100 years.
- November 17 - Alberto Fujimori is removed from office as president of Peru
- November 27 - Canada - Parliamentary elections - Jean Chrétien re-elected as Prime Minister as Liberal Party increases majority in House of Commons
- November 28 - Ukrainian politician Oleksander Moroz touches off the Cassette Scandal by publicly accusing President Leonid Kuchma of involvement in the murder of journalist Georgiy Gongadze.

December

- December 1 - Mexico - Vicente Fox becomes the first opposition President to take office since Francisco I. Madero in 1911. He wins the Presidency as candidate of the rightist PAN (National Action Party).
- December 28 - U.S. retail giant Montgomery Ward announces it is going out of business after 128 years.
- December 30 - Rizal Day Bombings: A series of bombs explode in various places in Metro Manila, Philippines, within a span of a few hours killing 22 and injuring about a hundred.

Unknown Date

- Limited reintroduction of routinely armed police in the UK for the first time since 1936.
- Scientists at University of Szeged's laboratory were first in the world to produce artificial heredity material.
- Millie I. Webb elected president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

Births

- February 23 - Max & Sam Christy, American actors
- March 15- Amy and Emily Walton, English actresses
- April 25 - Jacob & Joshua Rips, American actors
- October 6 - Amanda Pace, American actress
- October 20 - Cooper and Oliver Guynes, American actors
- November 8 - Madison and Marissa Poer, actresses

Deaths

January

- January 2 - Patrick O'Brian, English writer (b. 1914)
- January 15 - Fran Ryan, American actress (b. 1916)
- January 19 - Bettino Craxi, Prime Minister of Italy (b. 1934)
- January 19 - Hedy Lamarr, Austrian actress (b. 1913)

February

- February 9 - Beau Jack, American boxer (b. 1921)
- February 11 - Roger Vadim, French film director (b. 1928)
- February 12 - Jalacy "Screamin' Jay" Hawkins, American musician (b. 1929)
- February 12 - Tom Landry, American football coach (b. 1924)
- February 12 - Charles M. Schulz, American comic strip artist (b. 1921)
- February 23 - Sir Stanley Matthews, English footballer (b. 1915)

April

- April 6 - Habib Bourguiba, President of Tunisia (b. 1903)
- April 16 - Tuanku Syed Putra ibni Almarhum Syed Hassan Jamalullail, King of Malaysia (b. 1920)
- April 25 - David Merrick, American stage producer (b. 1911)
- April 29 - Phạm Văn Ðồng, Prime Minister of Vietnam (b. 1906)

May

- May 11 - Paula Wessely, Austrian actress (b. 1907)
- May 12 - Adam Petty, American race car driver (b. 1980)
- May 14 - Keizo Obuchi, Prime Minister of Japan (b. 1937)
- May 17 - Donald Coggan, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1909)
- May 19 - Yevgeny Khrunov, cosmonaut

Australia

The Commonwealth of Australia is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the world's smallest continent and a number of islands in the Southern, Indian and Pacific Oceans. Australia's neighbouring countries are Indonesia, East Timor and Papua New Guinea to the north, the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and New Caledonia to the northeast, and New Zealand to the southeast. The continent of Australia has been inhabited for over 40,000 years by Indigenous Australians. After sporadic visits by fishermen from the north and by European explorers and merchants starting in the 17th century, the eastern half of the continent was claimed by the British in 1770 and officially settled as the penal colony of New South Wales on 26 January 1788. As the population grew and new areas were explored, another five largely self-governing Crown Colonies were successively established over the course of the 19th century. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated and the Commonwealth of Australia was formed. Since federation, Australia has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system and remains a Commonwealth Realm. The current population of around 20.4 million is concentrated mainly in the large coastal cities of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.

Origin and history of the name

The name Australia is derived from the Latin australis, meaning southern. Legends of an "unknown southern land" (terra australis incognita) date back to the Roman times and were commonplace in mediæval geography, but they were not based on any actual knowledge of the continent. The Dutch adjectival form Australische ("Australian," in the sense of "southern") was used by Dutch officials in Batavia to refer to the newly discovered land to the south as early as 1638. The first English language writer to use the word "Australia" was Alexander Dalrymple in An Historical Collection of Voyages and Discoveries in the South Pacific Ocean, published in 1771. He used the term to refer to the entire South Pacific region, not specifically to the Australian continent. In 1793, George Shaw and Sir James Smith published Zoology and Botany of New Holland, in which they wrote of "the vast island, or rather continent, of Australia, Australasia or New Holland." New Holland was established on this site.]] The name "Australia" was popularised by the 1814 work A Voyage to Terra Australis by the navigator Matthew Flinders. Despite its title, which reflected the view of the Admiralty, Flinders used the word "Australia" in the book, which was widely read and gave the term general currency. Governor Lachlan Macquarie of New South Wales subsequently used the word in his dispatches to England. In 1817 he recommended that it be officially adopted. In 1824, the British Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially as Australia.

History

England, claiming the land for Britain in 1770. This replica was built in Fremantle in 1988 for Australia's bicentenary.]] The first human habitation of Australia is estimated to have occurred between 42,000 and 48,000 years ago. The first Australians were the ancestors of the current Indigenous Australians; they arrived via land bridges and short sea-crossings from present-day India or Southeast Asia. Most of these people were hunter-gatherers, with a complex oral culture and spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, inhabited the Torres Strait Islands and parts of far-north Queensland; they possess distinct cultural practices and practised subsistence agriculture. The first undisputed recorded European sighting of the Australian continent was made by the Dutch navigator Willem Jansz, who sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in 1606. During the 17th century, the Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines of what they called New Holland, but made no attempt at settlement. In 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast of Australia, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Britain. The expedition's discoveries provided impetus for the establishment of a penal colony there following the loss of the American colonies that had previously filled that role. penal colony was Australia's largest penal colony.]] The British Crown Colony of New South Wales started with the establishment of a settlement at Port Jackson by Captain Arthur Phillip on 26 January 1788. This date was later to become Australia's national day, Australia Day. Van Diemen's Land, now known as Tasmania, was settled in 1803 and became a separate colony in 1825. Britain formally claimed the western part of Australia in 1829. Separate colonies were created from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory (NT) was founded in 1863 as part of the Province of South Australia. Victoria and South Australia were founded as "free colonies"—that is, they were never penal colonies, although the former did receive some convicts from Tasmania. Western Australia was also founded "free", but later accepted transported convicts due to an acute labour shortage. The transportation of convicts to Australia was phased out between 1840 and 1868. The Indigenous Australian population, estimated at about 350,000 at the time of European settlement, declined steeply for 150 years following settlement, mainly because of infectious disease, and forced migration, the removal of children and other colonial government policies, that some historians and Indigenous Australians have argued could be considered to constitute genocide by today's understanding. Such interpretations of Aboriginal history are disputed by some as being exaggerated or fabricated for political or ideological reasons. Following the 1967 referendum, the Federal government gained the power to implement policies and make laws with respect to Aborigines. Traditional ownership of land—native title—was not recognised until the High Court case Mabo v Queensland (No 2) overturned the notion of Australia as terra nullius at the time of European occupation. terra nullius ceremony in Port Melbourne, Victoria, 25 April 2005. Ceremonies such as this are held in virtually every suburb and town in Australia.]] A gold rush began in Australia in the early 1850s, and the Eureka Stockade rebellion in 1854 was an early expression of nationalist sentiment. Between 1855 and 1890, the six colonies individually gained responsible government, managing most of their own affairs while remaining part of the British Empire. The Colonial Office in London retained control of some matters, notably foreign affairs, defence and international shipping. On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting, and the Commonwealth of Australia was born, as a Dominion of the British Empire. The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) was formed from New South Wales in 1911 to provide a location for the proposed new federal capital of Canberra (Melbourne was the capital from 1901 to 1927). The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the Commonwealth in 1911. Australia willingly participated in World War I; many Australians regard the defeat of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) at Gallipoli as the birth of the nation—its first major military action. Much like Gallipoli the Kokoda Track Campaign is regarded by many as a nation defining battle from World War II. The Statute of Westminster 1931 formally ended most of the constitutional links between Australia and Britain, but Australia did not adopt the Statute until 1942. The shock of Britain's defeat in Asia in 1942 and the threat of Japanese invasion caused Australia to turn to the United States as a new ally and protector. Since 1951, Australia has been a formal military ally of the US under the auspices of the ANZUS treaty. After World War II, Australia encouraged mass immigration from Europe; since the 1970s and the abolition of the White Australia policy, immigration from Asia and other parts of the world was also encouraged. As a result, Australia's demography, culture and image of itself were radically transformed. The final constitutional ties between Australia and Britain ended in 1986 with the passing of the Australia Act 1986, ending any British role in the Australian States, and ending judicial appeals to the UK Privy Council. Although Australian voters rejected a move to become a republic in 1999 by a 55% majority, Australia's links to its British past are increasingly tenuous. Since the election of the Whitlam Government in 1972, there has been an increasing focus on the nation's future as a part of the Asia-Pacific region.

Politics

Whitlam Government was opened in 1988 replacing the provisional Parliament House building opened in 1927.]] The Commonwealth of Australia is a constitutional monarchy and has a parliamentary system of government. Queen Elizabeth II is the Queen of Australia, a role that is distinct from her position as Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom. The Queen is nominally represented by the Governor-General; although the Constitution gives extensive executive powers to the Governor-General, these are normally exercised only on the advice of the Prime Minister. The most notable exercise of the Governor-General's reserve powers outside the Prime Minister's direction was the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in the constitutional crisis of 1975. There are three branches of government.
- The legislature: the Commonwealth Parliament, comprising the Queen, the Senate (the Red house), and the House of Representatives (the Green house); the Queen is represented by the Governor-General, who in practice exercises little or no power over the Parliament.
- The executive: the Federal Executive Council (the Governor-General as advised by the executive councillors); in practice, the councillors are the prime minister and ministers of state, whose advice the Governor-General accepts, with rare exceptions.
- The judiciary: the High Court of Australia and other federal courts. The State courts became formally independent from the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council when the Australia Act was passed in 1986. The bicameral Commonwealth Parliament consists of the Queen, the Senate (the upper house) of 76 senators, and a House of Representatives (the lower house) of 150 members. Members of the lower house are elected from single-member constituencies, commonly known as 'electorates' or 'seats'. Seats in the House of Representatives are allocated to states on the basis of population. In the Senate, each state, regardless of population, is represented by 12 senators, with the ACT and the NT each electing two. Elections for both chambers are held every three years; typically only half of the Senate seats are put to each election, because senators have overlapping six-year terms. The party with majority support in the House of Representatives forms Government, with its leader becoming Prime Minister. There are three major political parties: the Labor Party, the Liberal Party and the National Party. Independent members and several minor parties—including the Greens, Family First and the Australian Democrats—have achieved representation in Australian parliaments, mostly in upper houses, although their influence has been marginal. Since the 1996 election, the Liberal/National Coalition led by the Prime Minister, John Howard, has been in power in Canberra. In the 2004 election, the Coalition won control of the Senate, the first time that a party (or coalition of governing parties) has done so while in government in more than 20 years. The Labor Party is in power in every state and territory. Voting is compulsory in each state and territory and at the federal level.

States and territories

Voting is compulsory Australia consists of six states, two major mainland territories, and other minor territories. The states are New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia. The two major mainland territories are the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory. In most respects, the territories function similarly to the states, but the Commonwealth Parliament can override any legislation of their parliaments. By contrast, federal legislation overrides state legislation only with respect to certain areas as set out in Section 51 of the Constitution; all residual legislative powers are retained by the state parliaments, including powers over hospitals, education, police, the judiciary, roads, public transport and local government. Each state and territory has its own legislature (unicameral in the case of the Northern Territory, the ACT and Queensland, and bicameral in the remaining states). The lower house is known as the Legislative Assembly (House of Assembly in South Australia and Tasmania) and the upper house the Legislative Council. The heads of the governments in each state and territory are called premiers and chief ministers, respectively. The Queen is represented in each state by a governor; an administrator in the Northern Territory, and the Governor-General in the ACT, have analogous roles. Australia also has several minor territories; the federal government administers a separate area within New South Wales, the Jervis Bay Territory, as a naval base and sea port for the national capital. In addition Australia has the following, inhabited, external territories: Norfolk Island, Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and several largely uninhabited external territories: Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Coral Sea Islands, Heard Island and McDonald Islands and the Australian Antarctic Territory.

Foreign relations and military

Over recent decades, Australia's foreign relations have been driven by a close association with the United States, through the ANZUS pact and by a desire to develop relationships with Asia and the Pacific, particularly through ASEAN and the Pacific Islands Forum. In 2005 Australia secured an inaugural seat at the East Asia Summit following its accession to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation. Australia is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, in which the Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings provide the main forum for co-operation. Much of Australia's diplomatic energy is focused on international trade liberalisation. Australia led the formation of the Cairns Group and APEC, and is a member of the OECD and the WTO. Australia has pursued several major bilateral free trade agreements, most recently the US–Australia Free Trade Agreement. Australia is a founding member of the United Nations, and maintains an international aid program under which some 60 countries receive assistance. The 2005–06 budget provides A$2.5bn for development assistance; as a percentage of GDP, this contribution is less than that of the UN Millennium Development Goals. Australia's armed forces—the Australian Defence Force (ADF)—comprise the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), the Australian Army, and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). All branches of the ADF have been involved in UN and regional peacekeeping (most recently in East Timor, the Solomon Islands and Sudan), disaster relief, and armed conflict, including the 2003 Invasion of Iraq. The government appoints the chief of the Defence Force from one of the armed services; the current chief is Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston. In 2005–06, the defence budget is A$17.5bn.

Geography and climate

Angus Houston Australia's 7,686,850 km² (2,967,909 mi²) landmass is on the Indo-Australian Plate. Surrounded by the Indian, Southern and Pacific oceans, Australia is separated from Asia by the Arafura and Timor seas. Australia has a total 25,760 km (16,007 mi) of coastline and claims an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone of 8,148,250 km² or 3,146,057 mi² (excluding the Australian Antarctic Territory). Climate is highly influenced by ocean currents, including the El Niño southern oscillation, which is correlated with periodic drought, and the seasonal tropical low pressure system that produces cyclones in northern Australia. By far the largest part of Australia is desert or semi-arid. Australia is the driest inhabited continent, the flattest, and has the oldest and least fertile soils. Only the south-east and south-west corners of the continent have a temperate climate. The northern part of the country, with a tropical climate, has a vegetation consisting of rainforest, woodland, grassland and desert. The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast and extends for over 2,000 km (1,250 mi). The world's two largest monoliths are located in Australia, Mount Augustus in Western Australia is the largest and Uluru in central Australia is the second largest. At 2,228 m (7,310 ft), Mount Kosciuszko on the Great Dividing Range is the highest mountain on the Australian mainland, although Mawson Peak on the remote Australian territory of Heard Island is taller at 2,745 m (9,006 ft).

Flora and fauna

Heard Island of the wallaby is currently being sequenced; when the sequencing is completed, it will be a major contribution to marsupial biology.]] Although most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, it covers a diverse range of habitats, from alpine heaths to tropical rainforests. Because of the great age and consequent low levels of fertility of the continent, its extremely variable weather patterns, and its long-term geographic isolation, much of Australia's biota is unique and diverse. About 85% of flowering plants, 84% of mammals, more than 45% of birds, and 89% of in-shore, temperate-zone fish are endemic. Many of Australia's ecoregions, and the species within those regions, are threatened by human activities and introduced plant and animal species. The federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 is a legal framework used for the protection of threatened species. Numerous protected areas have been created to protect and preserve Australia's unique ecosystems, 64 wetlands are registered under the Ramsar Convention, and 16 World Heritage Sites have been established. Australia was ranked 13th in the World on the 2005 Environmental Sustainability Index. Environmental Sustainability Index.]] Most Australian plant species are evergreen and many are adapted to fire and drought, including the eucalypts and acacias. Australia has a rich variety of endemic legume species that thrive in nutrient-poor soils because of their symbiosis with Rhizobia bacteria and mycorrhizal fungi. Well-known Australian fauna include monotremes (the platypus and echidna), and a host of marsupials, including the koala, kangaroo, wombat, and birds such as the emu, cockatoo, and kookaburra. The dingo was introduced by Austronesian people that traded with Indigenous Australians around 4000 BCE. Many plant and animal species became extinct soon after human settlement, including the Australian megafauna; many more have become extinct since European settlement, among them the Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger).

Economy

Thylacine Australia has a prosperous, Western-style mixed economy, with a per capita GDP slightly higher than those of the UK, Germany and France. The country was ranked third in the United Nations' 2005 Human Development Index and sixth in The Economist worldwide quality-of-life index 2005. In recent years, the Australian economy has been resilient in the face of global economic downturn. Rising output in the domestic economy has been offsetting the global slump, and business and consumer confidence remains robust. Australia's emphasis on reform is another key factor behind the economy's strength. In the 1980s, the Labor Party, led by Prime Minister Bob Hawke and Treasurer Paul Keating, started the process of modernising the Australian economy by floating the Australian dollar in 1983, and deregulating the financial system. Since 1996, the Howard government has continued the process of micro-economic reform, including the partial deregulation of the labour market and the privatisation of state-owned businesses, most notably in the telecommunications industry. Substantial reform of the indirect tax system was achieved in July 2000 with the introduction of a 10% Goods and Services Tax, which has slightly reduced the heavy reliance on personal and company income tax that still characterises Australia's tax system. The Australian economy has not suffered a recession since the early 1990s. As of July 2005, unemployment was 5.0% with 10,030,300 persons employed. The service sector of the economy, including tourism, education, and financial services, comprises 69% of GDP. Agriculture and natural-resources represent only 3% and 5% of GDP, respectively, but contribute substantially to Australia's export performance. Australia's largest export markets include Japan, China, the United States, South Korea and New Zealand. Areas of concern to some economists include the chronically high current account deficit and also high levels of net foreign debt.

Demographics

current account deficit Most of the estimated 20.4 million Australians are descended from 19th- and 20th-century immigrants, the majority from Britain and Ireland. Australia's population has quadrupled since the end of World War I , spurred by an ambitious immigration program. In 2001, the five largest groups of the 27.4% of Australians who were born overseas were from the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Italy, Vietnam and China. Following the abolition of the White Australia policy, numerous government initiatives have been established to encourage and promote racial harmony based on a policy of multiculturalism. Australia’s population has increased by about 60 times since European settlement. The self-declared indigenous population—including Torres Strait Islanders, who are of Melanesian descent—was 410,003 (2.2% of the total population) in 2001, a significant increase from the 1977 census, which showed an indigenous population of 115,953. Indigenous Australians have higher rates of imprisonment and unemployment, lower levels of education and life expectancies for males and females that are 17 years lower than those of other Australians. Perceived racial inequality is an ongoing political and human rights issue for Australians. human rights.]] In common with many other developed countries, Australia is experiencing a demographic shift towards an older population, with more retirees and fewer people of working age. A large number of Australians (759,849 for the period 2002–03) live outside their home country. Australia has maintained one of the most active immigration programs in the world to boost population growth. Most immigrants are skilled; the quota includes categories for family members and refugees. English is the official language, and is spoken and written in a distinct variety known as Australian English. According to the 2001 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for around 80% of the population. The next most common languages spoken at home are Chinese (2.1%), Italian (1.9%) and Greek (1.4%). A considerable proportion of first- and second-generation migrants are bilingual. It is believed that there were between 200 and 300 Australian Aboriginal languages at the time of first European contact. Only about 70 of these languages have survived, and all but 20 of these are now endangered. An indigenous language remains the main language for about 50,000 (0.02%) people. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the main language of about 6,500 deaf people. The Australian Constitution guarantees the separation of church and state; there is no state religion. The 2001 census identified that 68% of Australians call themselves Christian: 27% identifying themselves as Roman Catholic and 21% as Anglican. Five per cent of Australians identify themselves as followers of non-Christian religions, and 26% as non-religious. Like many Western countries, the level of active participation in church worship is much lower than this; weekly attendance at church services is about 1.5 million, about 7.5% of the population. School attendance is compulsory throughout Australia between the ages of 6–15 years (16 years in South Australia and Tasmania), contributing to an adult literacy rate that is assumed to be 99%. Government grants have supported the establishment of Australia's 38 universities, and although several private universities have been established, the majority receive government funding. There is a state-based system of vocational training colleges, known as TAFE Institutes, and many trades conduct apprenticeships for training new tradespeople. Approximately 58% of Australians between the ages of 25 and 64 have vocational or tertiary qualifications.

Culture

apprenticeship.]] The primary basis of Australian culture up until the mid-20th century was Anglo-Celtic, although distinctive Australian features had been evolving from the environment and indigenous culture. Over the past 50 years, Australian culture has been strongly influenced by American popular culture (particularly television and cinema), large-scale immigration from non-English-speaking countries, and Australia's Asian neighbours. Australia has a long history of visual arts, starting with the cave and bark paintings of its indigenous peoples. From the time of European settlement, a common theme in Australian art has been the Australian landscape, seen in the works of Arthur Streeton, Arthur Boyd and Albert Namatjira, among others. The traditions of indigenous Australians are largely transmitted orally and are closely tied to ceremony and the telling of the stories of the Dreamtime. Australian Aboriginal music, dance and art have a palpable influence on contemporary Australian visual and performing arts. Australia has an active tradition of music, ballet and theatre; many of its performing arts companies receive public funding through the federal government's Australia Council. There is a symphony orchestra in each capital city, and a national opera company, Opera Australia, first made prominent by the renowned diva Dame Joan Sutherland; Australian music includes classical, jazz, and many popular music genres. Australian literature has also been influenced by the landscape; the works of writers such as Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson captured the experience of the Australian bush. The character of colonial Australia, as embodied in early literature, resonates with modern Australia and its perceived emphasis on egalitarianism, mateship, and anti-authoritarianism. In 1973, Patrick White was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, the only Australian to have achieved this; he is recognised as one of the great English-language writers of the 20th century. Australian English is a major variety of the language; its grammar and spelling are largely based on those of British English, overlaid with a rich vernacular of unique lexical items and phrases, some of which have found their way into standard English. Australia has two public broadcasters (the ABC and SBS), three commercial television networks, three pay TV services, and numerous public, non-profit television and radio stations. Australia's film industry has achieved critical and commercial successes. Each major city has daily newspapers, and there are two national daily newspapers, The Australian and The Australian Financial Review. According to Reporters Without Borders in 2005, Australia is in 31st position on a list of countries ranked by press freedom, behind New Zealand (9th) and the United Kingdom (28th) but ahead of the United States. This ranking is primarily due to the limited diversity of commercial media ownership in Australia. Most Australian print media in particular is under the control of either News Corporation or John Fairfax Holdings. John Fairfax Holdings Sport is an important part of Australian culture, assisted by a climate that favours outdoor activities; 23.5% Australians over the age of 15 regularly participate in organised sporting activities. At an international level, Australia has particularly strong teams in cricket, field hockey, netball, rugby league, rugby union, and performs well in cycling and swimming. Australia has participated in every summer Olympic Games of the modern era, and every Commonwealth Games. Australia has hosted the 1956 and 2000 Summer Olympics, and has ranked among the top five medal-takers since 2000. It has also hosted the 1938, 1962 and 1982 Commonwealth Games, and will host the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne. Australian rules football is one of the most popular national sports, albeit it, one that is only played in Australia; players gain some international prominence through International Rules which is an annual meeting between the Australian code and Irish Gaelic Football. Corporate and government sponsorship of many sports and élite athletes is common in Australia. Televised sport is popular; some of the highest rating television programs include the summer Olympic Games and the grand finals of local and international football competitions.

References

Gillespie, R. (2002). Dating the first Australians. Radiocarbon 44:455-472
Smith, L. (1980), The Aboriginal Population of Australia, Australian National University Press, Canberra
Tatz, C. (1999). [http://www.aiatsis.gov.au/rsrch/rsrch_dp/genocide.htm Genocide in Australia], AIATSIS Research Discussion Papers No 8, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, Canberra
Windschuttle, K. (2001). [http://www.newcriterion.com/archive/20/sept01/keith.htm# The Fabrication of Aboriginal History], The New Criterion Vol. 20, No. 1, September 20.
Bean, C. Ed. (1941). [http://www.awm.gov.au/histories/ww1/1/index.asp Volume I - The Story of Anzac: the first phase], First World War Official Histories 11th Edition.
Australian Electoral Commission (2000). [http://www.aec.gov.au/_content/when/referendums/1999_report/index.htm 1999 Referendum Reports and Statistics]
Parliamentary Library (1997). [http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rn/1997-98/98rn25.htm The Reserve Powers of the Governor-General]
Australian Government. (2005). [http://www.budget.gov.au/ Budget 2005-2006]
Department of the Environment and Heritage. [http://www.deh.gov.au/biodiversity/about-biodiversity.html About Biodiversity]
Macfarlane, I. J. (1998). [http://www.rba.gov.au/PublicationsAndResearch/Bulletin/bu_oct98/bu_1098_2.pdf Australian Monetary Policy in the Last Quarter of the Twentieth Century]. Reserve Bank of Australia Bulletin, October
Parham, D. (2002). [http://www.pc.gov.au/research/confproc/mrrag/mrrag.pdf Microeconomic reforms and the revival in Australia’s growth in productivity and living standards]. Conference of Economists, Adelaide, 1 October
Australian Bureau of Statistics. Labour Force Australia. Cat#6202
Australian Bureau of Statistics. [http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/94713ad445ff1425ca25682000192af2/1a79e7ae231704f8ca256f720082feb9!OpenDocument Year Book Australia 2005]
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (2003). Advancing the National Interest, [http://www.dfat.gov.au/ani/appendix_one.pdf Appenidix 1]
Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2001 Census, [http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@census.nsf/ddc9b4f92657325cca256c3e000bdbaf/7dd97c937216e32fca256bbe008371f0!OpenDocument A Snapshot of Australia]
Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affiars. (2005). [http://www.immi.gov.au/facts/06evolution.htm The Evolution of Australia's Multicultural Policy]
Parliament of Australia, Senate (2005). [http://www.aph.gov.au/Senate/committee/legcon_ctte/expats03/ Inquiry into Australian Expatriates]
[http://www.ncls.org.au/default.aspx?docid=2250&track=82083 NCLS releases latest estimates of church attendance], National Church Life Survey, Media release, 28 February 2004
Australian Film Commission. What are Australians Watching?, [http://www.afc.gov.au/gtp/freetv.html Free-to-Air, 1999-2004 TV]
Australian Bureau of Statistics, [http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/68180154bf128d91ca2569d000164365?OpenDocument Population Growth - Australia’s Population Growth]

External links

- [http://wikitravel.org/en/Australia Wikitravel guide to Australia]
- [http://www.gov.au/ Australian Government Entry Portal]
- [http://www.australia.gov.au/ Commonwealth Government Online]
- [http://www.immi.gov.au/ Department of Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA)]
- [http://www.dfat.gov.au/geo/australia/index.html DFAT: Country Information]
- [http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=-27.000000,133.000000&spn=38.871300,61.703613&t=h&hl=en Satellite images of Australia] (Google Maps)
- [http://www.nla.gov.au/ National Library of Australia]
- [http://www.nma.gov.au/ National Museum of Australia]
- [http://www.australia.com/ Official Australia Tourism Website]
- [http://www.bom.gov.au/ Bureau of Meteorology]
- [http://www.m2006.com.au/ Official website of the Melbourne 2006 Commonwealth Games] A Category:Continents Category:Island nations Category:Members of the Commonwealth of Nations Category:Monarchies Category:Oceanic countries zh-min-nan:Ò-tāi-lī-a ko:오스트레일리아 ms:Australia ja:オーストラリア simple:Australia th:ประเทศออสเตรเลีย

Volunteer

The term volunteer is contested -- there is no one agreed-to definition, and the term is frequently debated. Some say a volunteer is someone who performs or offers to perform service out of his or her own free will, without payment, usually in support of a non-profit organisation, mission-based initiative or community. Others say the term volunteer can apply to someone who receives a stipend for his or her service, as long as the volunteer is engaged in full-time service and has no other paid job. The term is usually used for such service to non-profit organisations, civil society organizations or even initiatives that originate in the public sector (schools, city offices, etc.), but not for those who work for free for a for-profit business. Some people volunteer formally, through a non-profit organisation/charity. Other people volunteer informally, helping a sick neighbor, for instance. Some volunteer for clinical trials or other medical research, and may even donate their bodies to science after their death. The year 2001 was the [http://www.worldvolunteerweb.org/events/iyv/index.htm International Year of the Volunteer], as designated by the United Nations. Every 5 December is [http://www.worldvolunteerweb.org/ivd International Volunteer Day], also designated by the United Nations. 2005 is the [http://www.yearofthevolunteer.org/ United Kingdom Year of the Volunteer].

International Volunteer

= An international volunteer is a person who volunteers outside of his or her own country. Some international volunteers, usually those who will spend a year or more in the field, receive a small stipend, and agree not to engage in any other jobs during their full-time volunteer assignment. Short-term international volunteers usually receive no stipend, and sometimes must even pay all of their own transportation and housing expenses. A few organisations that place and support international volunteers:
- [http://www.unv.org United Nations Volunteers]
- Peace Corp (for USA citizens only)
- [http://www.vso.org.uk/ VSO] (for citizens of the United Kingdom only)
- [http://www.australianvolunteers.com/home Australia VSO]
- [http://www.vsocanada.org VSO Canada]

Online Volunteer

An online volunteer is a person who contributes time and effort with an organization through an online connection, rather than or in addition to onsite service. The practice of donating time online goes by other names, such as virtual volunteering, cyber service, telementoring, e-volunteering, and cyber volunteering. The practice was first researched and detailed by the Virtual Volunteering Project [http://www.serviceleader.org/old/vv/]. Online volunteers do a variety of tasks, such as translating documents, proofreading books, editing or preparing proposals, designing logos, researching information, developing strategic plans, reviewing budgets, creating web pages, designing flash presentations, moderating online discussion groups and managing other online volunteers. Online volunteers usually support organizations in their own community, and often in addition to onsite service. There are also online volunteers who support organizations entirely remotely. Resources focused primarily on helping people to find online volunteering opportunities:
- [http://www.onlinevolunteering.org/ United Nations Volunteers Online Volunteering]
- [http://www.happiness.org Happiness Foundation]

ICT Volunteer

An ICT volunteer is someone who uses Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) as a central part of his or her service, or, who advocates for ICT access for under-serviced communities. Some organisations relating to ICT Volunteering:
- Geekcorps
- Digital Divide Network
- [http://www.netcorps-cyberjeunes.org/ NetCorps], open only for volunteers holding Canadian citizenship
- [http://www.unites.org/ United Nations Information Technology Service (UNITeS)], coordinated by [http://www.unv.org United Nations Volunteers]

Mandated Volunteer

In recent years mandated volunteering has been on the rise and it shows no signs of stopping anytime soon. In 2002, the median number of hours annually spent on volunteer services for 16-25 year olds was 38 hours. Since 1976 there has been a 13% increase in the number of high school seniors involved in volunteering. Mandated volunteering is most often found to be used as a requirement to graduate for high school students, an alternative to jail time, or as a requirement in order to maintain membership in an organization. The definition of mandated volunteering is complicated. If you look up the words separately then it is defined as required services which is performed by someone out of his or her own free will, often without compensation. This definition is an oxymoron. Despite the recent statistic that only 5% of youth attribute their volunteer activities to a school requirement, mandated volunteering is full of contradicting and controversial ideas. Approximately 41% of volunteers began after being approached by an organization or school. In a 2002 survey, sponsored jointly by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement and the Council for Excellence in Government, participants were asked their opinion on mandating volunteer activities for high school graduation. Those who were in the age ranges 15-17, 18-20, 21-22 had 66%, 53%, and 49% opposition rates respectively. The age group 23-25 found the proposal favorable by 49%. There were not significant differences in opinion between different ethnic groups and sexes. If the people to be participating in the volunteering oppose it, then will they put forth their best effort or will they be resentful? Is the quality of work from mandated volunteers equal to the quality of work from internally motivated volunteers? Suellen Carlson, the Director of Volunteers, at Lutheran Social Services in New York does not believe so, “I no longer do someone else's job for them. The judge will have to find another way to punish someone other than punishing me in the process. I don't want to chase anyone, get nasty phone calls from someone who has to get in so many hours by a certain time (usually within the next couple of days). I am not interested in surly teenagers who are only putting in their time (and, whose mother has usually made the first call),” Not everyone is as strongly against mandated volunteers as Suellen Carlson is. Hillary Roberts, the President at Project Linus at the NJ Inc. believes that mandated volunteers can be an asset, but need to be treated differently than self motivated volunteers. This includes putting them on jobs that does not require training and on more short-term assignments. Linda Graff, the President and Senior Associate at Linda Graff and Assoc., Inc., in Ontario, Canada, talked about the mandated volunteering required for graduation that affected the 2000 students in her area who had not completed 40 hours of community service. She believes that “mandatory service of any sort is not volunteering but is often called that. What message are we conveying about volunteering? When we offer the option of volunteering or jail time to an offender are we not saying, ‘Which punishment would you like to choose today?’” She continues to talk about governments worldwide that are seizing volunteering and using it to meet political, social and economic needs. “They most often do so without understanding volunteering, without understanding the implications of their programs, and without consulting those who really know about volunteering. For example, what bright spark in government decided 40 hours of mandatory service was a good idea for high school students? The work is supposed to be "meaningful". By the time the student is interviewed, screened (however much might be necessary for the setting), oriented, trained and placed, how much of the 40 hours is left to do something meaningful? IN the interim the organization bears the expense of all of the front end work to get the student involved, and the overworked manager of volunteers has to do all of the paper work for the education system ... with no compensation.” However, it has been found that there are benefits in mandated volunteering. A study done on data from the 2000 National survey of giving, volunteering, and participating found that membership in volunteer organizations is more likely to stimulate higher levels of electoral turnout and attentiveness to news and current affairs. The conductors of the study went on to say that, ”Governments should consider recruiting more young newcomers into the voluntary sector and reforming high school graduation requirements to include mandatory student memberships in volunteer organizations.” Although only 6% of young people report volunteering for political organizations in comparison to the 67% that volunteer at youth organizations, volunteering can be linked to higher levels of electoral turnout, political interest and trust among immigrants. Other characteristics that are more likely to occur in volunteers is a feeling of being connected to their community, less risky behavior, and better performance in school than their non volunteering counterparts. It is estimated that 15.5 million youth or 55%, aged 12 to 18, participate in volunteering activities. This is twice the rate of the 29% of adults that volunteer. Members of families that include volunteers are more likely to be involved in volunteering themselves. The likelihood that a young person will volunteer is directly proportional to their connections to the social institutions of family, religious congregations, and schools according to the Youth Volunteering and Civic Engagement Survey that was conducted between January and March of 2005. Robert Grimm, the director of the Corporation’s Office of research and policy development noted that not only do these factors predict whether an individual will participate in volunteering but also to what extent. Youth that attend religious services are twice as likely to volunteer than those who do not. These affiliations also affect where their services are being carried out. 74% of youth volunteers carry out their activities in part through a religious organization (34%), a school-based group (18%), or a leadership organization (12%). The results these studies make it seem as if volunteering doesn’t make people more involved but more involved people are likely to volunteer. There can be benefits to mandated volunteering, these can be found in those who participate in service learning. The likelihood that the volunteer will enjoy and return to the activity that they are participating in is higher if they are getting something out of it. Those whose volunteering hours include menial tasks are less likely to engage in volunteering in the future than those who feel as if their work is making a difference. Service learning, which combines academic instruction and community service, accounts for 65% of the 38% of youth that report of engaging in community service as part of a school activity. This way not only is the volunteer helping the community but is also receiving knowledge that can help them in their future. The first lady, Laura Bush, visited the Church of Epiphany where she joined students from Cardozo High school. The students were volunteers in the Youth Service Opportunities Project. Mrs. Bush announced a federal study finding that youth volunteers outnumbered adult 2:1. “I think it’s really, really good news, and I’m very, very proud. I’m proud of this generation. We know that volunteering can be taught, that helping people is something you can learn to do. And now we know that so many young people in the United States have learned that,” said Mrs. Bush.

- Big Brothers Big Sisters of America
- :Category:Voluntary organisations
- Amateur
- Hospital volunteer (candystriper)
- Volunteer fire department
- Volunteer Rescue Association
- Non-governmental organization
- Private voluntary organization
- Hiwi
- CCIVS

External links (not already listed above)

- [http://hosted.bbbsa.org/big/index.asp.com Volunteer Big Brothers Big Sisters]
- [http://www.idealist.org Idealist.org] -- Volunteer opportunities around the world
- [http://www.volunteer.org.nz Global Volunteer Network] -- Volunteer Opportunities in 19 Countries
- [http://www.biosphere-expeditions.org Biosphere Expeditions] -- International wildlife conservation volunteer opportunities
- [http://www.civicactions.com/advokit Volunteer Management System]
- [http://volunteermatch.org Volunteer Match] -- database
- [http://www.volunteertoday.com/ Volunteer Today] -- The Electronic Gazette for Volunteerism
- [http://www.affero.com/ Volunteer Rating System]
- [http://www.do-it.org.uk do-it.org.uk] -- database of UK volunteering opportunities
- [http://www.timebank.org.uk/ TimeBank UK volunteering]
- [http://www.ivolunteer.org.in/ iVolunteer ] (India)
- [http://www.ivoindia.org/ volunteer overseas ] (India)
- [http://www.thai-experience.org/ Thai-Experience.org: Volunteer in Thailand ]
- [http://www.cavr.org/ Canadian Administrators of Volunteer Resources (CAVR)]
- [http://www.volunteer.ca/ Volunteer Canada]
- [http://www.worldvolunteerweb.org World Volunteer Web]
- [http://www.volunteertibet.org VolunteerTibet]
- [http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CYBERVPM/ CYBERVPM], an online discussion group for those who manage volunteers, primarily in the USA
- [http://groups.yahoo.com/group/UKVPMs/ UKVPMs], an online discussion group for those who manage volunteers in the United Kingdom
- [http://groups.yahoo.com/group/OZVPM/ OZVPM], an online discussion group for those who manage volunteers in Australia, New Zealand, and anywhere "down under" ja:ボランティア category:occupations Category:Voluntary organisations

January 1

January 1 is the first day of the calendar year in both the Julian and Gregorian calendars. Here a calendar year refers to the order in which the months are displayed, January to December. The first day of the medieval Julian year was usually a day other than January 1. This day was adopted as the first day of the Julian year by all Western European countries except England between about 1450 and 1600. The Gregorian calendar as promulgated in 1582 did not specify that January 1 was to be either New Year's Day or the first day of its numbered year. Although England began its numbered year on March 25 (Lady Day or Annunciation Day), between the 13th century and 1752, January 1 was called New Year's Day, and was, with Christmas and occasionally Twelfth Night, a holiday when gifts were exchanged. 364 days (365 in leap years) remain in the year after this day.

Events

- 45 BC - The Julian calendar first takes effect.
- 404 - Last known gladiator competition in Rome takes place.
- 630 - Prophet Muhammad sets out toward Mecca with the army that will capture it bloodlessly.
- 990 - Kievan Rus' adopts the Julian calendar.
- 1438 - Albert II of Habsburg is crowned King of Hungary.
- 1600 - Scotland begins using the Julian calendar.
- 1651 - Charles II crowned King of Scotland
- 1673 - Regular mail delivery begins between New York and Boston.
- 1700 - Russia begins using the Julian calendar.
- 1707 - John V is crowned King of Portugal
- 1738 - Bouvet Island is discovered by French explorer Jean-Baptiste Charles Bouvet de Lozier.
- 1788 - First edition of The Times of London, previously The Daily Universal Register, is published.
- 1797 - Albany replaces New York City as the capital on New York.
- 1801 - Legislative union of Kingdom of Great Britain and Kingdom of Ireland is completed to form United Kingdom.
- 1801 - The first known asteroid, 1 Ceres, is discovered by Giuseppe Piazzi.
- 1804 - French rule ends in Haiti.
- 1808 - Importation of slaves into the United States is banned.
- 1818 - Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus is published.
- 1855 - London, Ontario is incorporated as a city.
- 1861 - Porfirio Diaz conquers Mexico City.
- 1863 - American Civil War: The Emancipation Proclamation takes effect.
- 1863 - The first claim under the Homestead Act is made by Daniel Freeman for a farm in Nebraska.
- 1880 - Ferdinand de Lesseps begins French construction of the Panama Canal.
- 1887 - Queen Victoria was proclaimed empress of India in Delhi.
- 1892 - Ellis Island opens to begin accepting immigrants to the United States.
- 1893 - Japan begins using the Gregorian calendar.
- 1894 - The Manchester Ship Canal, England, was officially opened to traffic.
- 1898 - New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York. The four initial boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and The Bronx, are joined on January 25th by Staten Island to create the modern city of five boroughs.
- 1899 - Spanish rule ends in Cuba.
- 1901 - Nigeria becomes a British protectorate.
- 1901 - The British colonies of New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia federate as the Commonwealth of Australia; Edmund Barton becomes first Prime Minister.
- 1901 - The first official Mummers Parade is held.
- 1902 - The first Rose Bowl game is played in Pasadena, California.
- 1908 - For the first time, a ball is dropped in New York City's Times Square to signify the start of the New Year.
- 1911 - Northern Territory is separated from South Australia and transferred to Commonwealth control.
- 1912 - The Republic of China is established.
- 1916 - German troops abandon Yaoundé and their Kamerun colony to British forces and begin the long march to Spanish Guinea.
- 1934 - Alcatraz Island becomes a U.S. federal prison.
- 1934 - Nazi Germany passes the "Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Offspring".
- 1935 - Bucknell University wins the first Orange Bowl 26-0 over the University of Miami.
- 1937 - Anastasio Somoza becomes President of Nicaragua.
- 1937 - The first Cotton Bowl game is played in Dallas, Texas.
- 1939 - The Vienna New Year's Concert is first held.
- 1942 - The Declaration by the United Nations is signed by twenty-six nations.
- 1948 - British railways are nationalised to form British Rail.
- 1948 - After partition, India declines to pay the agreed share of Rs.550 million in cash balances to Pakistan.
- 1948 - Enrico De Nicola formally becomes President of the Italian Republic, but refuses to be a candidate for the first constitutional election the following May.
- 1949 - UN Cease-fire orders to operate in Kashmir from one minute before midnight. War between India and Pakistan stops accordingly.
- 1956 - The Republic of the Sudan achieves independence from the Egyptian Republic and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
- 1958 - The European Community is established.
- 1959 - Fulgencio Batista, President of the Republic of Cuba, is overthrown by Fidel Castro's forces.
- 1960 - The Republic of Cameroon achieves independence from France and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
- 1962 - Western Samoa achieves independence from New Zealand; its name is changed to the Independent State of Western Samoa.
- 1964 - The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland is divided into the independent republics of Zambia and Malawi, and the British-controlled Rhodesia.
- 1969 - Marien Ngouabi formally becomes the President of the Republic of Congo.
- 1970 - The Unix epoch begins at 00:00:00 UTC.
- 1971 - Cigarette advertisements are banned on American television.
- 1973 - The Kingdom of Denmark, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the Republic of Ireland are admitted into the European Community.
- 1976 - NBC introduces its new logo: an abstract N, similar to the Nebraska Educational Television Network logo.
- 1978 - Air India Flight 855 Boeing 747 explodes and crashes into the sea off the coast of Bombay, killing 213.
- 1979 - Formal diplomatic relations are established between the People's Republic of China and the United States of America.
- 1981 - The Republic of Greece is admitted into the European Community.
- 1981 - The Republic of Palau achieves self-government; it is not yet independent from the United States of America.
- 1983 - The ARPANET officially changes to using the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.
- 1984 - AT&T is broken up into twenty-two independent units.
- 1984 - The Sultanate of Brunei becomes independent of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
- 1985 - The Internet's Domain Name System is created.
- 1985 - The first British mobile phone call is made by Ernie Wise to Vodafone.
- 1986 - Aruba becomes independent of Curaçao, though it remains in free association with the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
- 1986 - Spain and Portugal are admitted into the European Community.
- 1988 - The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America comes into existence, creating the largest Lutheran denomination in the United States of America.
- 1993 - Velvet Divorce: Czechoslovakia is divided into the Slovak Republic and the Czech Republic.
- 1993 - A single market within the European Community is introduced.
- 1993 - Pakistan is elected member of the 15-nation UN Security Council.
- 1994 - The Zapatista Army of National Liberation initiates twelve days of armed conflict in the Mexican State of Chiapas.
- 1994 - The North American Free Trade Agreement comes into effect.
- 1995 - The World Trade Organization comes into effect.
- 1995 - The Kingdom of Sweden and the republics of Austria and Finland are admitted into the European Union.
- 1995 - The Conference for Security and Co-operation in Europe becomes the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
- 1996 - Curaçao gains limited self-government, though it remains within free association with the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
- 1997 - The Republic of Zaïre officially joins the World Trade Organization, as Zaïre.
- 1998 - Smoking is banned in all bars and restaurants in the State of California.
- 1999 - The Euro currency is introduced.
- 2002 - Euro banknotes and coins become legal tender in twelve of the European Union's member states.
- 2002 - The Republic of China officially joins the World Trade Organization, as Chinese Taipei.
- 2002 - The Open Skies mutual surveillance treaty, initially signed in 1992, officially enters into force.
- 2003 - Luís Inácio Lula da Silva becomes president of the Federative Republic of Brazil.
- 2004 - Pervez Musharraf receives a vote of confidence to continue as the President of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan from Parliament and the provincial assemblies.

Births

- 766 - Ali ar-Rida, Shia Imam (d. 818)
- 1431 - Pope Alexander VI (d. 1503)
- 1449 - Lorenzo de Medici, Italian statesman (d. 1492)
- 1484 - Huldrych Zwingli, Swiss Protestant leader (d. 1531)
- 1516 - Margareta Leijonhufvud, queen of Gustav I of Sweden (d. 1551)
- 1557 - Stephen Bocskay, Prince of Transylvania (d. 1606)
- 1600 - Friedrich Spanheim, Dutch theologian (d. 1649)
- 1614 - John Wilkins, English Bishop of Chester (d. 1672)
- 1618 - Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Spanish painter (d. 1682)
- 1638 - Emperor Go-Sai of Japan (d. 1685)
- 1648 - Elkanah Settle, English writer (d. 1724)
- 1655 - Christian Thomasius, German jurist (d. 1728)
- 1684 - Arnold Drakenborch, Dutch classical scholar (d. 1748)
- 1704 - Soame Jenyns, English writer (d. 1787)
- 1711 - Franz Freiherr von der Trenck, Austrian soldier (d. 1749)
- 1714 - Kristijonas Donelaitis, Lithuanian poet (d. 1780)
- 1735 - Paul Revere, American silversmith and patriot (d. 1818)
- 1750 - Frederick Muhlenberg, first speaker of the United States House of Representatives (d. 1801)
- 1752 - Betsy Ross, American seamstress (d. 1836)
- 1774 - André Marie Constant Duméril, French zoologist (d. 1860)
- 1793 - Francesco Guardi, Italian artist (b. 1712)
- 1823 - Sándor Petőfi, Hungarian poet and revolutionary (d. 1849)
- 1833 - Robert Lawson, New Zealand architect (d. 1902)
- 1839 - Ouida, English writer (d. 1908)
- 1854 - Sir James George Frazer, Scottish anthropologist (d. 1941)
- 1860 - George Washington Carver, American educator, inventor, and botanist (d. 1943)
- 1863 - Pierre de Coubertin, French initiator of the modern Olympic Games (d. 1937)
- 1864 - Alfred Stieglitz, American photographer (d. 1946)
- 1873 - Mariano Azuela, Mexican novelist (d. 1952)
- 1874 - Gustave Whitehead, German-American inventor (d. 1927)
- 1876 - Harriet Brooks, Canadian physicist (d. 1933)
- 1879 - E. M. Forster, English novelist (d. 1970)
- 1887 - Wilhelm Canaris, German admiral (d. 1945)
- 1890 - Anton Melik, Slovenian geographer (d. 1966)
- 1892 - Artur Rodzinski, Croatian conductor (d. 1958)
- 1894 - Satyendra Nath Bose, Indian mathematician (d. 1974)
- 1895 - J. Edgar Hoover, American Federal Bureau of Investigation director (d. 1972)
- 1900 - Xavier Cugat, Catalan-Cuban musician, bandleader (d. 1990)
- 1902 - Buster Nupen, South African cricketer (d. 1977)
- 1904 - Fazal Ilahi Chaudhry, Pakistani politician (d. 1982)
- 1906 - Giovanni D'Anzi, Italian songwriter (d. 1974)
- 1909 - Dana Andrews, American actor (d. 1992)
- 1909 - Barry M. Goldwater, U.S. Senator from Arizona and Presidential candidate (d. 1998)
- 1911 - Hank Greenberg, baseball player (d. 1986)
- 1912 - Kim Philby, British spy (d. 1988)
- 1917 - Jule Gregory Charney, meteorologist (d. 1981)
- 1917 - Albert Mol, Dutch actor (d. 2004)
- 1919 - J. D. Salinger, American novelist
- 1920 - Virgilio Savona, Italian singer and songwriter (Quartetto Cetra)
- 1921 - Isma'il Raji' al-Faruqi, Palestinian-born philosopher and comparative religion scholar (d. 1986)
- 1922 - Rocky Graziano, American boxer (d. 1990)
- 1925 - Stymie Beard, American actor (d. 1981)
- 1927 - Vernon L. Smith, American economist, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1927 - Doak Walker, American football star (d 1998)
- 1928 - Ernest Tidyman, American writer (d. 1984)
- 1933 - Frederick Lowy, Canadian medical educator, ethicist, and university president
- 1933 - Joe Orton, English writer (d. 1967)
- 1940 - Frank Langella American actor
- 1942 - Martin Frost, American politician
- 1942 - Country Joe McDonald, American musician (Country Joe and the Fish)
- 1942 - Gennadi Sarafanov, cosmonaut
- 1943 - Don Novello, American actor, comedian, and writer
- 1945 - Jacky Ickx, Belgian race car driver
- 1946 - Rivelino, Brazilian football player
- 1953 - Greg Carmichael, British guitarist
- 1957 - Luis Guzmán, Puerto Rican actor
- 1958 - Grandmaster Flash, West Indian-born singer
- 1959 - Azali Assoumani, Comorese president
- 1961 - Mark Wingett, British actor
- 1964 - Dedee Pfeiffer, American actress
- 1966 - Embeth Davidtz, American actress
- 1968 - Davor Šuker, Croatian footballer
- 1969 - Verne Troyer - American actor
- 1970 - Gabriel Jarret, American actor
- 1972 - Neve McIntosh, Scottish actress
- 1975 - Joe Cannon, American soccer player
- 1977 - Hasan Salihamidžić, Bosnian footballer
- 1978 - Erica Durance, Canadian actress
- 1978 - Jared Fogle, American calibate
- 1978 - Paramahamsa Sri Nithyananda, Indian spiritual guru
- 1978 - Nina Bott, German actress
- 1979 - Brody Dalle, Australian singer (The Distillers)
- 1979 - Koichi Domoto, Japanese artist
- 1980 - Elin Nordegren, Swedish model
- 1981 - Zsolt Baumgartner, Hungarian race car driver
- 1981 - Abdulkadir Kocak, Turkish boxer
- 1982 - David Nalbandian, Argentinian tennis player
- 1985 - Steve Davis, Irish footballer

Deaths

- 379 - Saint Basil of Caesarea (b. 330)
- 404 - Saint Telemachus
- 874 - Hasan al-Askari, eleventh Shia Imam (b. 846)
- 898 - Odo, Count of Paris (b. 860)
- 1204 - King Haakon III of Norway
- 1384 - King Charles II of Navarre (b. 1332)
- 1515 - King Louis XII of France (b. 1462)
- 1554 - Pedro de Valdivia, Spanish conquistador
- 1559 - Christian III of Denmark and Norway (b. 1503)
- 1560 - Joachim Du Bellay, French poet
- 1617 - Hendrik Goltzius, Dutch painter (b. 1558)
- 1679 - Jan Steen, Dutch painter
- 1716 - William Wycherley, English dramatist
- 1730 - Samuel Sewall, English-born judge (b. 1652)
- 1742 - Peregrine Bertie, 2nd Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven, English statesman (b. 1686)
- 1748 - Johann Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician (b. 1667)
- 1766 - James Francis Edward Stuart, "The Old Pretender" (b. 1688)
- 1782 - Johann Christian Bach, German composer (b. 1735)
- 1789 - Fletcher Norton, 1st Baron Grantley, English politician (b. 1716)
- 1793 - Francesco Guardi, Venetian painter (b. 1712)
- 1800 - Louis-Jean-Marie Daubenton, French naturalist (b. 1716)
- 1817 - Martin Heinrich Klaproth, German chemist (b. 1743)
- 1892 - Roswell B. Mason, Mayor of Chicago (b. 1805)
- 1894 - Heinrich Hertz, German physicist (b. 1857)
- 1933 - Harriet Brooks, Canadian physicist (b. 1876)
- 1944 - Charles Turner, Australian cricketer (b. 1862)
- 1953 - Hank Williams, American singer (b. 1923)
- 1958 - Edward Weston, American photographer (b. 1886)
- 1960 - Margaret Sullavan, American actress (b. 1911)
- 1964 - Bechara El Khoury, President of Lebanon (b. 1890)
- 1972 - Maurice Chevalier, French actor and singer (b. 1888)
- 1981 - Beulah Bondi, American actress (b. 1888)
- 1986 - Alfredo Binda, Italian cyclist (b. 1902)
- 1992 - Grace Hopper, American computer pioneer (b. 1906)
- 1994 - Lord Arthur Espie Porritt, Governor-General of New Zealand (b. 1900)
- 1994 - Cesar Romero, American actor (b. 1907)
- 1995 - Fred West, British serial killer (suicide) (b. 1941)
- 1995 - Eugene Wigner, Hungarian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1902)
- 1996 - Arleigh Burke, U.S. admiral (b. 1901)
- 1997 - Townes Van Zandt, American musician (b. 1944)
- 1998 - Helen Wills Moody, American tennis player (b. 1905)
- 2001 - Ray Walston, American actor (b. 1914)
- 2003 - Joe Foss, American politician and fighter pilot (b. 1915)
- 2005 - Shirley Chisholm, first black U.S. Congresswoman (b. 1924)
- 2005 - Hugh John Frederick Lawson, 6th Baron Burnham, British newspaperman and politician (b. 1931)
- 2005 - Bob Matsui, U.S. Congressman (b. 1941)

Holidays and observances

- The seventh day and eighth night of Christmas in Western Christianity.
- Many countries around the world using Gregorian Calendar - New Year's Day; often celebrated at 0:00 with fireworks.
- Catholicism - Holy Day of Obligation Octave of Christmas, Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God (New calendar).
- Catholicism - Feast of the Circumcision (Old calendar).
- Catholicism - National Migration Week begins (varying official support by the office of U.S. President, not strictly religious)
- Haiti Independence Day
- Taiwan Founding of Republic of China.
- Sudan Independence Day
- Cuba Liberation Day
- Slovakia: Establishment of Slovak Republic.
- Last day of Kwanzaa
- Vienna New Year's Concert
- Pasadena, California - The Tournament of Roses parade and, traditionally, the Rose Bowl football championship
- World Day for Prayer for Peace

External links

- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/1 BBC: On This Day] ---- December 31 - January 2 - December 1 - February 1 — listing of all days ko:1월 1일 ms:1 Januari ja:1月1日 simple:January 1 th:1 มกราคม

Monolith

:For the computer game company, see Monolith Productions. :For the Japanese computer game company, see Monolith Soft. A monolith is a monument or natural feature such as a mountain, consisting of a single massive stone or rock. Erosion usually exposes these formations, which are most often made of very hard and solid metamorphic rock. A common cultural reference is to the Monolith from the book and film 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick. These fictional monoliths are a group of artifacts built by an alien civilization. Their purpose in the story is to aid in the development of species: a monolith utilised at the dawn of humankind was a major reason for accelerating and directing the evolution of man to its current level of development. The word derives from the Latin word monolithus from the Greek word μονόλιϑος (monolithos), derived from μόνος ("one" or "lonely") and λίϑος ("stone"). Greek

Natural monoliths

The three largest are: #Mount Augustus, in Australia #La Pena de Bernal, in Mexico #Stone Mountain, in Stone Mountain Park, Stone Mountain, a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia, USA Others include:

North America

- Bottleneck Peak and Moon, Sids Mountain, Utah
- Devils Tower National Monument, Wyoming
- El Capitan, Yosemite National Park, California
- Haystack Rock, Cannon Beach, Oregon
- Stawamus Chief, Squamish, British_Columbia, Canada
- Enchanted Rock, Llano County, Texas

Europe

- Frau Holle Stone, near Fulda, Germany
- Humber Stone, Humberstone, near Leicester, England.
- King Arthur's Stone (Cornwall)
- Logan Stone (Trereen, Cornwall)
- Odin Stone (Stenhouse, Orkney; destroyed in 1814)
- Rock of Gibraltar

Australia

- Mount Coolum, Queensland, Australia

South America

- Towers of Paine, Chile

Antarctica

- Scullin monolith Many of these have legends attached.

Manmade monoliths

- Obelisks - see this article for a list
- Ogham Stone, Dingle Peninsula, Ireland
- Adam and Eve Stones, Avebury, Wiltshire, England
- Merlin Stone, Avebury Stone Circle, Wiltshire, England
- Manzanar National Historic Landmark, USA

2001 - A Space Odyssey

2001: A Space Odyssey is an influential 1968 science fiction film directed by Stanley Kubrick. The story is based in part on various short stories by co-screenwriter Arthur C. Clarke, most notably "The Sentinel" (1951). Kubrick and Clarke collaborated on the screenplay, from which Kubrick created the movie and Clarke wrote the novel version (which eventually grew into the so-called Space Odyssey series of books). For an elaboration of their collaborative work on this project, see The Lost Worlds of 2001, Arthur C. Clarke, Signet., 1972. The film is notable for combining episodes contrasting high levels of scientific and technical realism with transcendental mysticism. As Arthur C. Clarke wrote in 1972, "Quite early in the game I went around saying, not very loudly, 'MGM doesn't know this yet, but they're paying for the first $10,000,000 religious movie.'" This film won the Academy Award for visual effects in 1968.

Production

Release

Reaction

Cast

Synopsis

Selected plot elements

Music

Dialogue

Narrative through sound

Interpretation of the Film

HAL

Scientific accuracy

Predictions

Acclaim

Sequels

Novels

Films

Comics

Spoofs

Trivia

DVD release

References

External links

January 6

January 6 is the 6th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. 359 days (360 in leap years) remain in the year after this day.

Events

- 1066 - Harold Godwinson crowned King of England
- 1205 - Philip of Swabia becomes King of the Romans
- 1540 - King Henry VIII of England marries Anne of Cleves.
- 1579 - The Union of Atrecht was signed
- 1661 - The fifth monarchy men unsuccessfully attempt to seize control of London.
- 1690 - Joseph, son of Emperor Leopold I becomes King of the Romans
- 1720 - The Committee of Inquiry on the South Sea Bubble publishes its findings
- 1853 - American President-Elect Franklin Pierce, wife Jane, and son Ben are involved in a train wreck near Andover, Massachusetts. Franklin and Jane survive but eleven-year-old Ben is killed.
- 1858 - Samuel Morse first successfully tested the electrical telegraph.
- 1887 - `Abd-allah II of Harar opens the Battle of Chelenqo with an attack on the camp of the Shewan army of Negus Menelik II early in the morning; prepared for the assault, the Negus orders a counter-attack which routs the enemy, resulting with the capture of Harar a few days later.
- 1893 - Washington National Cathedral is chartered by Congress. The charter is signed by President Benjamin Harrison.
- 1870 - The inauguration of the Musikverein (Vienna).
- 1900 - It is reported that millions are starving in India.
- Boers attack Ladysmith, South Africa - over 1,000 people killed
- 1907 - Maria Montessori opens her first school and daycare center for working class children in Rome.
- 1912 - New Mexico is admitted as the 47th U.S. state.
- 1929 - King Alexander of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes suspends his country's constitution (the so-called January 6th Dictatorship, Šestojanuarska diktatura.)
- 1930 - The first diesel-engine automobile trip is completed (Indianapolis, Indiana, to New York City).
- 1931 - Thomas Edison submits his last patent application.
- 1936 - Supreme Court of the United States rules the 1933 Agricultural Adjustment Act unconstitutional in the case United States v. Butler et al.; Porky Pig premieres
- 1940 - Actor William Powell marries his 3rd and final wife, actress Diana Lewis
- Mass execution of Poles, committed by Germans in the city of Poznan, Warthegau.
- 1941 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivers his Four Freedoms Speech in the State of the Union Address.
- 1942 - Pan American Airlines becomes the first commercial airline to have a flight go around the world.
- 1946 - William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw) hanged for treason at the age of 39
- 1950 - The United Kingdom recognizes the People's Republic of China. The Republic of China severs diplomatic relations with Britain in response.
- 1961 - A fire at the Thomas Hotel in San Francisco kills 20 people.
- 1967 - United States Marine Corps and ARVN troops launch "Operation Deckhouse Five" in the Mekong River delta.
- 1973 - Schoolhouse Rock premieres on American television
- 1974 - In response to the energy crisis, daylight saving time commences nearly four months early in the United States.
- 1975 - The American soap opera Another World becomes the first soap opera in the world to air hour-long regularly scheduled episodes.
- 1978 - The Hungarian Holy crown (also known as Stephen_I_of_Hungary crown) returned to Hungary from the United_States, where was held after the WW_II.
- 1982 - William Bonin convicted of being the "freeway killer".
- 1992 - The United Nations Security Council votes unanimously condemning Israel's treatment of Palestinians.
- 1994 - Nancy Kerrigan is clubbed on the right leg by an assailant under orders from figure skating rival Tonya Harding.
- 1995 - A chemical fire in an apartment complex in Manila, Philippines, leads to the discovery of plans for Project Bojinka, a mass-terrorist attack.
- 1996 - 1996 Gaithersburg Metrorail Accident on the Washington Metro system kills one in Montgomery County, Maryland, during the Blizzard of 1996.
- 1998 - The Lunar Prospector spacecraft is launched to survey the moon's surface.
- 1999 - Bob Newhart receives a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
- 2001 - Al Gore, as President of the U.S. Senate, tallies the electoral votes and certifies George W. Bush as the winner of U.S. presidential election, 2000.
- 2005 - Mississippi Civil Rights Workers Murders: Edgar Ray Killen is arrested as a suspect for the 1964 murders of three Civil Rights workers.

Births

- 1367 - King Richard II of England (d. 1400)
- 1412 - Joan of Arc, French warrior and Catholic saint (d. 1431)
- 1418 - Christopher of Bavaria, King of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden (d. 1448)
- 1486 - Martin Agricola, German composer (d. 1556)
- 1488 - Helius Eobanus Hessus, German poet (d. 1540)
- 1525 - Caspar Peucer, German reformer (d. 1602)
- 1561 - Thomas Fincke, Danish mathematician and physicist (d. 1656)
- 1587 - Gaspar de Guzmán y Pimentel, Count-Duke of Olivares, Spanish statesman (d. 1645)
- 1595 - Claude Favre de Vaugelas, French man of letters (d. 1650)
- 1617 - Kristoffer Gabel, Danish statesman (d. 1673)
- 1706 (O.S.) - Benjamin Franklin, American statesman (d. 1790)
- 1714 - Percivall Pott, English physician and surgeon (d. 1788)
- 1822 - Heinrich Schliemann, German archaeologist (d. 1890)
- 1832 - Gustave Doré, French painter and sculptor (d. 1883)
- 1838 - Max Bruch, German composer (d. 1920)
- 1872 - Alexander Scriabin, Russian composer (d. 1915)
- 1878 - Carl Sandburg, American poet and historian (d. 1967)
- 1880 - Tom Mix, American actor (d. 1940)
- 1882 - Fan S. Noli, Albanian bishop, poet, and political figure (d. 1965)
- 1882 - Sam Rayburn, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives (d. 1961)
- 1883 - Khalil Gibran, Lebanese writer and painter (d. 1931)
- 1898 - James Fitzmaurice, Irish aviation pioneer (d. 1965)
- 1899 - Phyllis Haver, American actress (d. 1960)
- 1903 - Maurice Abravanel, Greek-born conductor (d. 1993)
- 1910 - Morris Wright, American writer (d. 1998)
- 1910 - Loretta Young, American actress (d. 2000)
- 1913 - Edward Gierek, Polish politician (d. 2001)
- 1914 - Danny Thomas, American singer, actor, and comedian (d. 1991)
- 1915 - Alan Watts, English writer, philosopher (d. 1973)
- 1920 - Sun Myung Moon, Korean evangelist
- 1920 - John Maynard Smith, English bioligist (d. 2004)
- 1920 - Early Wynn, baseball player (d. 1999)
- 1923 - Jacobo Timerman, Argentine writer (d. 1999)
- 1924 - Earl Scruggs, American musician
- 1925 - John De Lorean, American auto maker (d. 2005)
- 1926 - Ralph Branca, baseball player
- 1926 - Kid Gavilan, Cuban boxer (d. 2003)
- 1929 - Babrak Karmal, Afghani politician (d. 1996)
- 1930 - Vic Tayback, American actor
- 1931 - Capucine, French actress (d. 1990)
- 1931 - E. L. Doctorow, American author
- 1931 - Dickie Moore, Canadian hockey player
- 1932 - Stuart A. Rice, American chemist
- 1933 - Oleg Makarov, cosmonaut (d. 2003)
- 1933 - Emil Steinberger, Swiss comedian
- 1936 - Julio María Sanguinetti Coirolo, President of Uruguay
- 1940 - Penny Lernoux, American journalist and author (d. 1989)
- 1940 - Van McCoy, American musician (d. 1979)
- 1943 - Terry Venables, English football manager
- 1944 - Bonnie Franklin, American actress
- 1944 - Rolf M. Zinkernagel, Swiss immunologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
- 1946 - Syd Barrett, English guitarist and singer
- 1947 - Sandy Denny, English vocalist (d. 1978)
- 1951 - Kim Wilson, American musician
- 1953 - Malcolm Young, Scottish guitarist (AC/DC)
- 1954 - Hans Robert Hiegel, German architect
- 1954 - Anthony Minghella, British director
- 1955 - Rowan Atkinson, English comedian and actor
- 1957 - Nancy Lopez, American golfer
- 1959 - Kapil Dev, Indian cricketer
- 1959 - Kathy Sledge, American singer
- 1960 - Nigella Lawson, British chef and writer
- 1960 - Howie Long, American football star
- 1962 - Michael Houser, American musician (Widespread Panic) (d. 2002)
- 1964 - Henry Maske, German boxer
- 1964 - Rafael Vidal, Venezuelan athlete (d. 2005)
- 1966 - Fernando Carrillo, Venezuelan actor
- 1968 - John Singleton, American film director and writer
- 1970 - Julie Chen, American television presenter and newsreader
- 1970 - Gabrielle Reece, American volleyball player and model
- 1974 - Nicole DeHuff. American actress (d. 2005)
- 1976 - Danny Pintauro, American actor
- 1980 - Steed Malbranque, French footballer
- 1981 - Mike Jones, American rapper

Deaths

- 1088 - Berengar of Tours, French theologian
- 1448 - Christopher of Bavaria, King of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden (b. 1418)
- 1537 - Alessandro de' Medici, Duke of Florence (b. 1510)
- 1537 - Baldassare Peruzzi, Italian architect and painter (b. 1481)
- 1616 - Philip Henslowe, English theatrical entrepreneur
- 1689 - Bishop Seth Ward, English mathematician and astronomer (b. 1671)
- 1711 - Philipp van Almonde, Dutch admiral (b. 1646)
- 1718 - Giovanni Vincenzo Gravina, Italian writer and jurist (b. 1664)
- 1718 - Richard Hoare, English goldsmith and banker (b. 1648)
- 1724 - Chikamatsu Monzaemon, Japanese dramatist (b. 1653)
- 1731 - Étienne François Geoffroy, French chemist (b. 1672)
- 1734 - John Dennis, English critic and dramatist (b. 1657)
- 1840 - Fanny Burney, English novelist and diarist (b. 1752)
- 1852 - Louis Braille, French teacher of the blind (b. 1809)
- 1855 - Giacomo Beltrami, Italian explorer (b. 1779)
- 1884 - Gregor Johann Mendel, Austrian geneticist (b. 1822)
- 1885 - Peter Christian Asbjørnsen, Norwegian writer and scientist (b. 1812)
- 1918 - Georg Cantor, German mathematician (b. 1845)
- 1919 - Max Heindel, Danish astrologer and mystic (b. 1865)
- 1919 - Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1858)
- 1928 - Alvin Kraenzlein, American athlete (b. 1876)
- 1937 - Brother Andre, Canadian religious figure (b. 1845)
- 1942 - Henri de Baillet-Latour, Belgian International Olympic Committee president (b. 1876)
- 1945 - Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian mineralogist (b. 1863)
- 1949 - Victor Fleming, American director (b. 1883)
- 1981 - A.J. Cronin, Scottish writer (b. 1896)
- 1990 - Ian Charleson, Scottish actor (b. 1949)
- 1990 - Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov, Russian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1904)
- 1992 - Dizzy Gillespie, American jazz trumpeter (b. 1917)
- 1993 - Rudolf Nureyev, Russian ballet dancer (b. 1938)
- 1995 - Joe Slovo, South African politician (b. 1926)
- 1996 - Yahya Ayyash, Palestinian leader (b. 1966)
- 2000 - Don Martin, American cartoonist (b. 1931)
- 2004 - Pierre Charles, Prime Minister of Dominica (b. 1954)
- 2004 - Charles Dumas, American athlete (b. 1937)
- 2004 - Francesco Scavullo, American photographer (b. 1921)
- 2005 - Lois Hole, Lieutenant Governor of Alberta (b. 1933)
- 2005 - Louis Robichaud, Premier of New Brunswick (b. 1925)

Holidays and observances

- Ancient Latvia - Zvaigznes Diena observed
- Christianity (except Eastern Orthodox who follow the Julian Calendar) - Epiphany of the Lord (a.k.a. "Twelfth Day of Christmas" and Three Kings Day in some areas).
- In the Irish Calendar- Little Christmas or "Women's Christmas" and/or Twelfth Day.
- Rastafari movement - Celebration of the ceremonial birthday of Haile Selassie
- Armenian Christmas

External links

- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/6 BBC: On This Day] ---- January 5 - January 7 - December 6 - February 6 — listing of all days ko:1월 6일 ja:1月6日 simple:January 6 th:6 มกราคม

Vice President of the United States

The Vice President of the United States is the second-highest executive official of the United States government, the person who, in the words of Adlai Stevenson, is "a heartbeat from the presidency." As first in the presidential line of succession, the Vice President becomes the new President of the United States upon the death, resignation, or removal of the President. The Vice President also serves as the President of the Senate, and may break any tie votes in that chamber. The government jargon that often acronymizes the President of the United States as POTUS similarly applies VPOTUS to the Vice President. More casually, the title is abbreviated Veep. The current Vice President of the United States is Dick Cheney.

Constitutional requirements

Dick Cheney To hold the office, the Vice President must satisfy the same constitutional qualifications as the President; that is, the Vice President must be a natural-born citizen of the United States, at least thirty-five years of age and a resident of the United States for 14 years. Traditionally, the Vice President-Elect takes office just before the President-Elect. Unlike the President, the Constitution does not specify an oath of office for the Vice President. Several variants of the oath have been used since 1789; the current form, which is also recited by Senators, Representatives and other government officers, has been used since 1884: :I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.

Election

Dick Cheney Under the original terms of the Constitution, the members of the U.S. Electoral College voted only for office of President rather than for both President and Vice President. The person receiving the greatest number of votes (provided that such a number was a majority of electors) would be President, while the individual who was in second place became Vice President. If no one received a majority of votes, then the U.S. House of Representatives would choose between the five highest vote-getters, with each state getting one vote. In such a case, the person who received the highest number of votes but was not chosen President would become Vice President. If there was ever a tie for second, then the U.S. Senate would choose the Vice President. The original plan, however, did not forsee the development of political parties. In the election of 1796, for instance, Federalist John Adams came in first, and Democratic-Republican Thomas Jefferson came second. Thus, the President and Vice President were from different parties. An even greater problem occurred in the election of 1800, when Democratic-Republicans Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied the vote. While it was intended that Jefferson was the Presidential contender and Burr was the Vice Presidential one, the electors did not and could not differentiate between the two under the system of the time. After 35 unsuccessful votes in the U.S. House of Representatives, Thomas Jefferson finally won on the 36th ballot and Burr became Vice President. U.S. House of Representatives The tumultuous affair led to the adoption of Amendment XII in 1804, which directed the electors to use separate ballots to vote for the President and Vice President. While this solved the problem at hand, it ultimately had the effect of lowering the prestige of the Vice Presidency, as the Vice President was no longer the second choice for President. The Constitution also prohibits electors from voting for both a Presidential and Vice Presidential candidate from the same state as themselves. In theory, this might deny a Vice Presidential candidate with the most electoral votes the absolute majority required to secure election, even if the Presidential candidate is elected, and place the Vice Presidential election in the hands of the Senate. In practice, this requirement is easily circumvented by having the candidate for Vice President change the state of residency as was done by Dick Cheney who changed his legal residency from Texas to Wyoming in order to run for election as Vice President alongside George W. Bush. Formally, the Vice Presidential candidate is nominated by the party convention. However, it has long been the custom that the Vice Presidential candidate has been effectively named by the Presidential candidate. Often, the Presidential candidate will name a Vice Presidential candidate to bring geographic or ideological balance to the ticket or to appeal to a particular constituency.

Role of the Vice President

George W. Bush

President of the Senate

As President of the Senate (Article I, Section 3), the Vice President oversees procedural matters and may cast a tie-breaking vote. There is a strong convention within the U.S. Senate that the Vice President not use his position as President of the Senate to influence the passage of legislation or act in a partisan manner, except in the case of breaking tie votes. As president of the Senate, Adams cast twenty-nine tie-breaking votes—a record that no successor has ever threatened. His votes protected the president's sole authority over the removal of appointees, influenced the location of the national capital, and prevented war with Great Britain. On at least one occasion he persuaded senators to vote against legislation that he opposed, and he frequently lectured the Senate on procedural and policy matters. Adams' political views and his active role in the Senate made him a natural target for critics of the Washington administration. Toward the end of his first term, as a result of a threatened resolution that would have silenced him except for procedural and policy matters, he began to exercise more restraint in the hope of realizing the goal shared by many of his successors: election in his own right as president of the United States. In practice, the Vice President rarely presides over day-to-day matters in the Senate; in his place, the Senate chooses a President pro tempore (or "president for a time") to preside in the Vice President's absence, and the Senate maintains a Duty Roster for the post so that no single Senator serves in the post more than any other. One duty required of President of the Senate is presiding over the U.S. Electoral College. This is the process of the counting and presentation of the Presidential and Vice Presidential electoral votes in the presence of both houses of Congress, on January 6 of the year following a U.S. presidential election. In this capacity, only four Vice Presidents have been able to announce their own election to the Presidency: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, and George H. W. Bush. Though he was President of the Senate, Vice President John C. Calhoun believed he would have more power as a Senator. When he was elected to the Senate from his native South Carolina, he became the first Vice President to resign the office.

Growth of the office

For much of its existence, the office of Vice President was seen as a little more than a minor position. John Adams, the first Vice President, described it as "the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived." Even 150 years later, 32nd Vice President John Nance Garner famously described the office as "not worth a pitcher of warm piss" (at the time reported with the bowdlerization "spit"). Thomas R. Marshall, the 28th Vice President, lamented: "Once there were two brothers. One went away to sea; the other was elected Vice President of the United States. And nothing was heard of either of them again." When the Whig Party was looking for a vice president on Zachary Taylor's ticket, they approached Daniel Webster who said of the offer "I do not intend to be buried until I am dead." The natural stepping stone to the Presidency was long considered to be the office of Secretary of State. It has only been fairly recently that this notion has reversed; indeed, the notion was still very much alive when Harry Truman became the Vice President for Franklin Roosevelt. For many years, the Vice President was given few responsibilities. After John Adams attended a meeting of the President's Cabinet in 1791, no Vice President did so again until Thomas Marshall stood in for President Woodrow Wilson while he travelled to Europe in 1918 and 1919. Marshall's successor, Calvin Coolidge, was invited to meetings by President Warren G. Harding. The next Vice President, Charles G. Dawes, was not invited after declaring that "the precedent might prove injurious to the country." Vice President Charles Curtis was also precluded from attending by President Herbert Hoover. Herbert Hoover In 1933, Roosevelt raised the stature of the office by renewing the practice of inviting the Vice President to cabinet meetings, which has been maintained by every President since. Roosevelt's first Vice President, John Nance Garner broke with him at the start of the second term, on the Court-packing issue, and became Roosevelt's leading political enbemy. Garner's successor, Henry Wallace was given major responsibilities during the war, proved incompetent, and was relieved of actual power. Roosevelt kept his last Vice President Harry Truman uninformed on all war and postwar issues, such as the atomic bomb. The need to keep Vice Presidents informed on national security issues became clear, and Congress made the Vice President one of four statutory members of the National Security Council in 1949. Richard Nixon reinvented the office of Vice-President. Although he had no formal power, he had the attention of the media and the Republican party. Eisenhower ordered him to preside at Cabinet meetings in his absence. Nixon demonstrated for the first time that the office could be a springboard to the White House; most Vice Presidents since have followed his lead and sought the presidency. (Nelson Rockefeller did not, and it is widely believed that Dick Cheney will not.) Nixon was the first Vice President actually to step in to run the government temporarily: when Eisenhower suffered a heart attack on September 24, 1955; ileitis in June 1956; and a stroke in November 1957.

Modern role

The formal powers and role of the Vice President are limited to the Presidency of the Senate, including a casting vote in the event of a deadlock. This was important in the first half of 2001, as the Senators were divided 50-50 between Republicans and Democrats and thus Dick Cheney's tie-breaking vote gave the Republicans the Senate majority. Their other functions are as a drafter and spokesperson for the administration's policy, as an adviser to the President, as Chairman of the Board of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), as a Member of the board of the Smithsonian Institution, and as a symbol of American concern or support. Their influence in this role depends almost entirely on the characteristics of the particular administration. Cheney, for instance, is widely regarded as one of George W. Bush's closest confidantes. Al Gore was an important advisor to President Bill Clinton on matters of foreign policy and the environment. Often, Vice Presidents will take harder-line stands on issues to ensure the support of the party's base while deflecting partisan criticism away from the President. They often meet heads of state or attend state funerals in other countries, at times when the administration wishes to demonstrate concern or support without having to actually send the President to do so. Normally, candidates for President will name a candidate for Vice President when they are assured of the party's nomination. Since the Presidential candidate is now generally known before the party convention, this announcement is now typically made in the first day or so of the party convention. Generally, the choice of running mate is ultimately made by the Presidential candidate alone (although with considerable counsel from advisors) and often is done to create balance on a ticket. It is common for the Vice Presidential candidate to come from a different region of the country than the President or appeal to a slightly different ideological wing of the party. The 12th Amendment discourages the Vice President from legally residing in the same state as the President, as Electors must vote for at least one candidate not in the same state as themselves. However, the ease of changing one's state of residence (as Richard Cheney did in 2000) minimizes the effect of this provision. In recent years, the Vice Presidency has frequently been used to launch bids for the Presidency. Of the 13 presidential elections from 1956 to 2004, 9 featured the incumbent President; the other 4 (1960, 1968, 1988, 2000) all featured the incumbent Vice President. Former Vice Presidents also ran, in 1984 (Walter Mondale), and in 1968 (Richard Nixon, against the incumbent Vice President Hubert Humphrey). Since 1974, the official residence of the Vice President and his family has been Number One Observatory Circle, on the grounds of the United States Naval Observatory in Washington, DC.

Succession and the 25th Amendment

Washington, DC.]] The U.S. Constitution provides that should the President die or become disabled while in office, the "powers and duties" of the office are transferred to the Vice President. It remained unclear as to whether the Vice President actually became the new President or merely Acting President. This was first tested in 1841 with the death of President William Harrison. Harrison's Vice President, John Tyler, asserted that he should gain the full Presidential office, powers, and title. Despite some strong calls against it, Tyler took the oath of office, becoming the tenth President. Tyler's claim was not challenged legally, and so the precedent of full succession was established. The Constitution still left several questions unanswered, however. If the Vice President died in office, resigned, or succeeded to the Presidency, there was no process for selecting a replacement, so the office of Vice President remained vacant until the next Presidential election. Additionally, the assassination of President Kennedy on November 22 1963 provoked the question of who has the power to declare that an incapacitated President is unable to discharge his duties. This question prompted the adoption of Amendment XXV to the U.S. Constitution in 1967. Amendment XXV (R) swears in President Gerald Ford (L) following the resignation of President Richard Nixon.]] Section 2 of the 25th Amendment provides that "Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress." Gerald Ford was the first Vice President selected by this method, after the resignation of Vice President Spiro Agnew in 1974; after succeeding to the Presidency, Ford nominated Nelson Rockefeller as Vice President. Section 3 of the amendment provides means for the Vice President to become Acting President upon the temporary disability of the President. This provision has been invoked twice: on July 13, 1985 when Ronald Reagan underwent surgery to remove cancerous polyps from his colon, and again on June 29, 2002 when George W. Bush underwent a colonoscopy procedure requiring sedation. Prior to this amendment, Vice President Richard Nixon informally replaced President Dwight Eisenhower three times for a period of weeks each time when Eisenhower was ill.

Vice Presidents of the United States

Prior to ratification of the 25th Amendment in 1967, no provision existed for filling a vacancy in the office of Vice President; as a result, the position was left vacant 16 times until the next ensuing election and inauguration. Since the adoption of the 25th Amendment, the office has been vacant twice while awaiting confirmation of the new Vice President by both houses of Congress.

Notes

¹ Arriving in New York City before President-elect George Washington, Adams was sworn as Vice President nine days before the President.
² Died in office
³ Resigned from office
⁴ Succeeded to Presidency upon death or resignation of President
⁵ The only Vice President to be sworn in outside of the United States (in Havana, Cuba), with special dispensation from Congress.
⁶ Became Vice President under provisions of 25th Amendment
⁷ Acted as President under provisions of 25th Amendment

Vice Presidential facts

Two served under two different Presidents

25th Amendment
- George Clinton under Thomas Jefferson and James Madison
- John C. Calhoun under John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson

Seven died in office

- George Clinton in 1812
- Elbridge Gerry in 1814
- William Rufus de Vane King in 1853
- Henry Wilson in 1875
- Thomas Hendricks in 1885
- Garret Hobart in 1899
- James Sherman in 1912

Two resigned

- John C. Calhoun resigned in 1832 to take a seat in the Senate, having been chosen to fill a vacancy.
- Spiro Agnew resigned in 1973 upon pleading no contest to charges of accepting bribes while governor of Maryland.

Nine succeeded to the Presidency

# John Tyler became President when William Harrison died. Chose not to seek full term. # Millard Fillmore became President when Zachary Taylor died. Chose not to seek full term. Four years later, ran and lost. # Andrew Johnson became President when Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. Chose not to seek full term. # Chester Arthur became President when James Garfield was assassinated. Sought a full term, but was not re-nominated. # Theodore Roosevelt became President when William McKinley was assassinated; then was elected to full term. Didn't seek re-election. Four years later, ran and lost. # Calvin Coolidge became President when Warren Harding died; then was elected to full term. Did not seek re-election. # Harry Truman became President when Franklin Roosevelt died; then was elected to full term. Did not seek re-election. # Lyndon Johnson became President when John Kennedy was assassinated; then was elected to full term. Did not seek re-election. # Gerald Ford became President when Richard Nixon resigned; then lost election to full term.

Four sitting Vice Presidents were elected President

# John Adams (1789-1797) was elected President in 1796. # Thomas Jefferson (1797-1801) was elected President in 1800. # Martin Van Buren (1833-1837) was elected President in 1836. # George H. W. Bush (1981-1989) was elected President in 1988.

One former Vice President was elected President

# Richard Nixon (1953-1961) was elected President in 1968. Actually, as discussed above, nine Vice Presidents succeeded to the Presidency on the death of the President. This made them former Vice Presidents. Four of those nine were subsequently elected President. Furthermore, in 1804, President (and former Vice President) Thomas Jefferson was elected President. However, Nixon was the only non-sitting Vice President to be later elected to the Presidency.

Two have been Acting President

# George H. W. Bush acted as President for Ronald Reagan on July 13, 1985. # Dick Cheney acted as President for George W. Bush on June 29, 2002. They officially acted as President due to presidential incapacity under the 25th Amendment.

Five former Vice Presidents are still alive

25th Amendment # Gerald Ford # Walter Mondale # George H. W. Bush # Dan Quayle # Al Gore

Three were named Johnson

# Richard Johnson # Andrew Johnson # Lyndon Johnson

Seven served two full terms

# John Adams # Daniel Tompkins # Thomas Marshall # John Garner # Richard Nixon # George H.W. Bush # Al Gore Al Gore

Note on spelling

Vice President may also be spelled Vice-President or Vice president or Vice-president. Because the modern usage is Vice President, it will be used here for consistency.

External links

- [http://www.whitehouse.gov/vicepresident/ Official White House website for the Vice President]

Al Gore

:For the Senior Al Gore, see Albert Gore, Sr. Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is a former American politician and current businessman, who served as the 45th Vice President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He was selected as the running mate of Bill Clinton, to the surprise of many as the two were both young and were from the same region of the nation. He ran for President in 2000 following Bill Clinton's two four-year terms, but he was narrowly defeated by the Republican candidate George W. Bush in a bitterly contested election that included multiple recounts and a 5-4 Supreme Court decision that effectively handed the election to Bush. While Gore received the most popular votes, over 500,000 more than Bush, the states Bush won gave him a majority in the U.S. Electoral College. The election remains one of the most divisive and controversial topics in recent American politics. Gore currently serves as President of the American television channel Current and Chairman of Generation Investment Management, sits on the board of directors of Apple Computer, and serves as an unofficial advisor to Google's senior management. He chose to endorse Howard Dean [the former Governor of Vermont and the current Chairman of the Democratic National Committee] instead of and without informing first his running mate in 2000, Joseph Lieberman [Democratic Senator from Connecticut]. Although speculation about a possible presidential run in 2008 still continues, he has repeatedly stated that he does not plan to return to politics.

Early and personal life

Family

Al Gore was born in Washington, DC to Albert A. Gore Sr. and Pauline LaFon Gore. Since his father was a veteran Democratic senator from Tennessee, Al Gore Jr. divided his childhood between Washington, DC and Carthage, Tennessee. During the school year, the younger Gore lived in a hotel in Washington, where he attended the Sheridan School, and later the elite St. Albans School; during summer vacations, he lived in Carthage, where he worked on the Gore family farm. :For more information on Gore's academic records, see [http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A37397-2000Mar18] In 1965, Gore enrolled at Harvard College, where he majored in government. His roommate (in Dunster House) was actor Tommy Lee Jones. Gore graduated from Harvard in June of 1969 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. In 1970, Gore married Mary Elizabeth Aitcheson (Tipper Gore), whom he had first met many years before at his high school senior prom (St. Albans School in Washington, DC). They have four children: Karenna (born August 6, 1973), married to Drew Schiff; Kristin (born June 5, 1977); Sarah (born January 7, 1979); and Al III (born October 19, 1982). The Gores also have two grandchildren: Wyatt (born July 4, 1999) and Anna Schiff. The Gores now reside in Nashville, Tennessee, USA, and own a small farm near Carthage, Tennessee. The family attends New Salem Missionary Baptist Church in Carthage.

Vietnam War service

Vietnam and journalism

Although opposed to the Vietnam War, on August 7, 1969, Gore enlisted in the army to participate in the Vietnam War effort. After completing training as a military journalist, Gore shipped to Vietnam in early 1971. He served as an Army war correspondent until May 24 of that year, slightly less than two years after he enlisted. After returning from Vietnam, Gore spent five years as a reporter for the Tennessean, a newspaper headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. During this time, Gore also attended Vanderbilt Divinity School and Law School, although he did not complete a degree at either, choosing instead to run for an open seat in Tennessee's 3rd Congressional District. Gore's mother was a member of Vanderbilt Law School's first class to accept women.

Military service

Vanderbilt Gore served in the Army from August 1969 to May 1971. The chronology of his military service is as follows:
- August 1969: Enlisted at the Newark, New Jersey recruiting office.
- August to October 1969: 8 weeks of basic training at Fort Dix, New Jersey
- Late October 1969 to December 1970: Fort Rucker, Alabama, on-the-job occupational training at the Army Flier newspaper.
- January 1971 to May 1971: field reporter in Vietnam, part of the 20th Engineer Brigade, stationed primarily at Bien Hoa Air Base near Saigon.
- May 24, 1971: Discharged, after granting of routine early discharge request, as part of general troop reductions. Gore stated many times that he opposed the Vietnam War, but chose to enlist anyway. Some observers have noted that Gore could have avoided Vietnam in a number of ways. Gore considered all these options, but said that his sense of civic duty compelled him to serve. Some have suggested that Gore already foresaw that military service might be advantageous in his future career in politics. Gore was not shipped immediately to Vietnam after completing basic training, spending most of his term in Fort Rucker. During the 2000 presidential election, some conservatives accused Al Gore of insufficient military service, because he was "only" a journalist and spent only five months in Vietnam, which some sources have characterized as "less than half the standard 12 month Vietnam tour." Although it is true that he was a journalist, Gore served in the Army only 75 fewer days than the standard two-year term (the entire 20th Engineers was to be deactivated and shipped home that fall). Because Gore served as a journalist, he was never exposed to front-line combat. Although some allege that his famous father's influence helped him to obtain this position, most military analysts agree that any man who enlisted with a Harvard degree had a good chance of being assigned a support specialty rather than an infantry position (even at the war's height, 88% of all servicemen were assigned to noncombatant specialties). However Gore's decision to enlist for a two year term did mean that he would not be able to select his assignment, a choice which was available to three year enlistees, and that he was technically at risk of a combat assignment even though in actuality the chances of such were infinitesimal. According to Newsweek journalist Bill Turque's biography Inventing Al Gore (which does not shy away from criticism and scandals, such as charging Gore with smoking marijuana far more frequently than he admits), :Dess Stokes, staff sergeant at the Newark Armed Forces Entrance and Examination Station on the day he walked in, doesn't remember any communication from superiors about Gore. A kid with Gore's background (a 134 IQ and a Harvard degree), he said, didn't need to be a senator's son with high-level contacts to get the military job he wanted. Once in Vietnam, some also allege that Gore received special treatment as a former Senator's son (Gore Sr. lost the 1970 election, and was no longer a Senator by the time Gore arrived in Vietnam). According to combat photographer H. Alan Leo, Gore was protected from dangerous situations at the request of Brigadier General Kenneth B. Cooper, the 20th Engineer Brigades Commander. Leo stated that Gore's trips into the field were safe, and that Gore "could have worn a tuxedo." These remarks seem to contradict Gore's many public statements; :"I carried an M-16. I pulled my turn on the perimeter at night and walked through the elephant grass and I was fired upon."(Baltimore Sun) :"I took my turn regularly on the perimeter in these little firebases out in the boonies. Something would move, we'd fire first and ask questions later." (Vanity Fair) :"I was shot at. I spent most of my time in the field." (Washington Post) :"I used to fly these things (combat helicopters) with the doors open, sitting on the ledge with our feet hanging down. If you flew low and fast, they wouldn't have as much time to shoot you."(Weekly Standard) For his part, Gore has stated that he knew Leo but rarely traveled with him in Vietnam, and that he never felt that he was being given special protection. On the other hand, Leo's testimony is that Cooper gave the orders before Gore arrived, so Gore would not know about them. The question of whether Leo frequently traveled with Gore or not still has not been conclusively answered. Turque's book, however, states that :[Cooper] said that he has no recollection of even meeting Leo, much less discussing Gore's safety with him. ... :The evidence indicates that if there was an official effort to guarantee Gore's safety, it was uneven at best. His clippings from the Castle Courier, the newspaper of the U.S. Army Engineering Command, and other publications suggest that he pulled his weight, which in his case meant choppering around to report features about the good works of the 20th Engineers... When Smith said he was scheduled to leave for R&R in Hawaii, the sergeant called for volunteers. Gore stepped up and spent a cold night in a foxhole. "Al did what everybody else did," said Mike O'Hara, the photographer who shot the Khe Sanh assignment... :Regulations allowed for early release of personnel to teach or attend school if their services were deemed "not essential to the mission," and Gore certainly qualified. Gore stated in 1988 that his experience in Vietnam :didn't change my conclusions about the war being a terrible mistake, but it struck me that opponents to the war, including myself, really did not take into account the fact that there were an awful lot of South Vietnamese who desperately wanted to hang on to what they called freedom. Coming face to face with those sentiments expressed by people who did the laundry and ran the restaurants and worked in the fields was something I was naively unprepared for.

Early political career

1988.]] In the spring of 1976, Gore quit law school to run for the U.S. House, in Tennessee's Fourth District. Gore defeated Stanley Rogers in the Democratic primary, then ran unopposed and was elected to his first Congressional post. He was re-elected three times, in 1978, 1980, and 1982. In 1984 Gore did not run for the House; instead he successfully ran for a seat in the Senate, which had been vacated by Republican Majority Leader Howard Baker. Gore served as a Senator from Tennessee until 1992, when he was elected Vice President. On March 19, 1979, Gore became the first person to appear on C-SPAN, making a speech in the House chambers. In 1988, Gore ran for President but failed to obtain the Democratic nomination, which went instead to Michael Dukakis. On April 3, 1989, Gore's six-year-old son Albert was nearly killed in an automobile accident while leaving the Baltimore Orioles opening game. Because of this and the resulting lengthy healing process, his father chose to stay near him during the recovery instead of laying the foundation for a presidential primary campaign against eventual nominee Bill Clinton. Gore started writing Earth in the Balance, his book on environmental conservation, during his son's recovery. Earth in the Balance became the first book written by a sitting senator to make The New York Times best-seller list since John F. Kennedy's Profiles in Courage. While in Congress, Gore was a member of the following committees: Armed Services (Defense Industry and Technology Projection Forces and Regional Defense; Strategic Forces and Nuclear Deterrence); Commerce, Science and Transportation (Communications; Consumer; Science, Technology and Space- chairman 1992; Surface Transportation; National Ocean Policy Study); Joint Committee on Printing; Joint Economic Committee; Rules and Administration.

Vice Presidency

Rules and Administration Bill Clinton chose then-U.S. Senator Al Gore to be his running mate on July 9, 1992. After winning the U.S. presidential election, 1992, Al Gore was inaugurated as the 45th Vice President of the United States on January 20, 1993. Clinton and Gore were re-elected to a second term in the U.S. presidential election, 1996. During his time as Vice President, Al Gore was mostly a behind the scenes player. However, many experts consider him to be one of the most active and influential Vice Presidents in U.S. history. This was evident as Gore had weekly lunches with Clinton to keep each other abreast of current developments, although he later revealed that it was he who insisted on having those weekly lunches in the first place. One of Gore's major accomplishments as Vice President was the National Performance Review, which pointed out waste, fraud, and other abuse in the federal government and stressed the need for cutting the size of the bureaucracy and the number of regulations. His book later helped guide President Clinton when he down sized the federal government. [http://clinton2.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OVP/speeches/interego.html] In 1993 Gore debated Ross Perot on CNN's Larry King Live on the issue of free trade. He is widely believed to have won the debate hands down, and public opinion polls taken after the debate showed that a majority of Americans agreed with his point of view and supported NAFTA. Some claim that this performance may have been responsible for the passing of NAFTA in the House of Representatives, where it passed 234-200. [http://clinton5.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OVP/initiatives/reinventing_government.html] As Vice President, Gore instituted a federal program calling for all schools and libraries to be wired to the Internet. This was a culmination of work that he had started several years before. While serving in the Senate, Gore had introduced legislation which called for the creation of a new federal research center for educational computing to support an "information systems highway". [http://clinton5.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OVP/initiatives/technology.html] This later served as the tenuous basis for mocking from his opponents that he'd claimed to have "invented the Internet". During Gore's tenure as Vice President, he was a strong proponent for environmental protection. While a senator working on his book Earth in the Balance, Gore had traveled around the world on numerous fact-finding missions. On Earth Day 1994, Gore launched the worldwide GLOBE program, an innovative hands-on, school-based education and science activity that made extensive use of the Internet to increase student awareness of their environment and contribute research data for scientists. The insight he gained on issues such as global warming, the depletion of the ozone layer, and the destruction of rain forests is said to have played a major role in policy making for the Clinton administration. In the late nineties, Gore strongly pushed for the passage of the Kyoto Treaty, which called for reduction in green house emissions. [http://web.archive.org/web/20001207090900/www.algore.com/speeches/speeches_kyoto_120897.html], [http://clinton5.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OVP/initiatives/environment.html] Because of President Clinton's inexperience and Gore's service in Vietnam and in the Senate, Clinton would often look to Gore for advice in the area of foreign policy. Gore was one of the first to call for action to remove Yugoslav President Slobodan Milošević from power in 1998. Gore also supported Operation Desert Fox, the bombing campaign against Iraq in response to Saddam Hussein's unwillingness to cooperate with UN inspectors. [http://clinton5.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OVP/initiatives/foreign_policy.html] During the Clinton/Gore administration, Americans enjoyed eight years of relative peace along with the longest economic expansion in history. It is likely that the prosperity which occurred in the Clinton/Gore years is due to Alan Greenspan-endorsed Clinton and Gore's economic plan which limped through Congress without one Republican vote, and Vice President Gore casting the tie breaking vote in the Senate. Gore attributes the following economic achievements to his administration's economic plan: [http://clinton5.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OVP/initiatives/economy.html]: Clinton and Gore's economic plan
- More than 22 million new jobs
- Highest homeownership in American history
- Lowest unemployment in 30 years
- Paid off $360 billion of the national debt
- Lowest poverty rate in 20 years
- Higher incomes at all levels
- Converted the largest budget deficit, up to that time, in American history to the largest surplus
- Lowest government spending in three decades
- Lowest federal income tax burden in 35 years
- More families own stock than ever before Upon the end of his tenure as Vice President, Gore was considered by some one of the most active, powerful, and popular Vice Presidents in US history.

2000 presidential election

Clinton and Gore's economic plan After two terms as Vice President, Gore ran for President. In the Democratic primaries, Gore faced an early challenge from Bill Bradley. Gore's nomination was never really in doubt and Bradley withdrew from the race in early March 2000 after failing to win any state primary or caucus. In August 2000, Gore surprised many when he selected United States Senator Joe Lieberman to be his vice-presidential running mate. Lieberman, who is a more conservative Democrat than Gore, had publicly blasted President Clinton for the Monica Lewinsky affair. Many pundits saw Gore's choice of Lieberman as another way of trying to distance himself from the scandal-prone Clinton White House. Lieberman was also the first Jewish nominee on a major party's national ticket. During the entire U.S. presidential election, 2000, Gore was neck and neck in the polls with Republican Governor of Texas George W. Bush. On Election Day, the results were so close that the outcome of the race took over a month to resolve, highlighted by the premature declaration of a winner on election night, and an extremely close result in the state of Florida. On election night, news network first called Florida for Gore, then Fox News decided to call it for Bush and all of the other news stations followed their decision. The race was ultimately decided by a razor thin margin of only 537 popular votes in Florida -- an astonishingly close margin out of some 105 million votes cast nationwide. Florida's 25 electoral votes were awarded to George W. Bush only after numerous court challenges. Al Gore publicly conceded the election after the Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore voted 7 to 2 to declare the ongoing recount procedure unconstitutional, on the grounds that it was not being carried out statewide, and 5 to 4 to ban further recounts using other procedures.Bush v. Gore Gore strongly disagreed with the Court's decision, but decided "for the sake of our unity of the people and the strength of our democracy, I offer my concession." He had previously made a concession phone call to Bush the night of the election, but quickly retracted it after learning just how close the election was. Following the election, a subsequent recount conducted by various U.S. news media organizations indicated that Mr. Bush would have won using the partial recount method of 4 strongly Democratic areas advocated by Mr. Gore, but that Mr. Gore would have won given a full recount of the state. [http://www.bushwatch.com/gorebush.htm][http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/florida.ballots/stories/main.html]. The states that ultimately voted for Gore over Bush in the 2000 elections were New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, Washington DC, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, New Mexico, California, Oregon, Washington, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Minnesota and Hawaii giving Gore 269 electoral votes to Bush's 273. The Florida election has been closely scrutinized since the election. Critics have pointed out that the Governor of Florida, Jeb Bush [Brother of George w. Bush] and the Secretary of State of Florida, a particularly partisan Katherine Harris, did play a part in ensuring that the state was in the red column of the Republicans come election day. Several irregularities are thought to have favored Bush; others may have given Gore an edge. Irregularities on the Bush side included the notorious Palm Beach "butterfly ballots", which produced an unexpectedly large number of votes for third-party candidate Pat Buchanan, and a purge of some 50,000 alleged felons from the Florida voting rolls that included many voters who were eligible to vote under Florida law. Many Bush supporters, however, believed that an unfair advantage was given to Gore when all major news networks, early on, prematurely projected Gore as the winner of Florida's 25 electoral votes at 7:52 PM Eastern Time. This happened before the polls closed in 10 small Florida counties in the heavily Republican western panhandle which are in the Central Time Zone, and thus closed at 7 PM Central Time (8 PM Eastern). Some have thought that this depressed the pro-Bush vote in that area. http://archives.cnn.com/2001/ALLPOLITICS/stories/02/02/cnn.report/cnn.pdf] During the numerous recounts (which made the phrase "hanging chads" infamous in the American vocabulary), there were also allegations of both pro-Bush and pro-Gore tampering by low-level operatives in the controversial counties. [http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2000/11/26/230955.shtml] It is unclear what effect, if any, this may have had. And while the Gore camp, fought (with some success) to keep overseas absentee votes out in counties thought to be pro-Bush, Bush operatives similarly (albeit while drawing less attention to their efforts) prevented the counting of overseas absentee votes in strong Democratic counties. Both sides contended that the votes were cast after Election Day, and since many of the envelopes did not have cancelled stamps, it was not clear when the votes were cast. Reports later surfaced that many overseas voters attempted to vote only after learning of the closeness of the Florida vote. Pat BuchananSome commentators still see such irregularities, and the legal maneuvering around the recounts as casting doubt on the legitimacy of the vote; as a matter of law, however, the issue was settled, albeit controversially again, when the U.S. Congress accepted Florida's electoral delegation, only after a challenge to the Florida electors was presented in the congressional chambers on January 6, 2001 by members of the Congressional Black Caucus. Member after member went up decrying the lack of a senator who would be willing to co-sponsor the challenge without any effect. They thus failed to bring the challenge to a debate. Concern about the possible disenfranchisement of voters in the Florida vote led to widespread calls for electoral reform in the United States, and ultimately to the passage of the Help America Vote Act, which authorized the United States federal government to provide funds to the states to replace their mechanical voting equipment with electronic voting equipment. However, this has led to new controversies, because of the security weaknesses of the computer systems, the lack of paper-based methods of secure verification, and the necessity to rely on the trustworthiness of the manufacturers whose employees also count those votes. Although Gore won the nationwide popular vote by more than 500,000 votes, he lost the election by five electoral votes (with one DC Elector, pledged to Gore, casting a blank ballot to protest the District's lack of representation in Congress). electronic voting.]] Gore received a stinging rebuke from the voters in his home state of Tennesee when Tennessee chose Bush over Gore, making him the first presidential candidate since South Dakota Democratic Senator George McGovern in 1972 to lose his home state in a presidential election. This rebuke reportedly 'tortured' Gore well after the election.[http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=17728] Joe Lieberman later criticized Al Gore for adopting a populist theme during their 2000 campaign. Lieberman said he objected to Gore's "people vs. the powerful" message, believing is that was not the best strategy for Democrats to use to recapture the White House.[http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=28519] While running for president in 2000, Al Gore was used as a voice actor for the television show Futurama. He played himself again in another episode after the campaign was over. For more information on Al Gore's 2000 campaign, see: Al Gore presidential campaign, 2000 For more information on the 2000 election, see: U.S. presidential election, 2000 For other information, see: Al Gore controversies

Post vice-presidency

Private citizen

Al Gore controversies.]] Following his election loss, Gore accepted visiting professorships at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, Middle Tennessee State University, University of California Los Angeles, and Fisk University. In late 2001, Al Gore became a Senior Advisor to Google and Vice Chairman of Los Angeles-based financial firm Metropolitan West Financial LLC. On September 23, 2002 Gore spoke in San Francisco to The Commonwealth Club saying: "We know that [Saddam] has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country. Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power"[http://www.commonwealthclub.org/archive/02/02-09gore-speech.html] Following the November 5, 2002 midterm elections Gore re-emerged into the public eye with a 14-city book tour and a well-orchestrated "full Gore" media blitz which included a pair of policy speeches. On September 23, Gore delivered a speech on the impending War with Iraq and the War on Terrorism that generated a fair amount of commentary. Less than two weeks later, on October 2, he made a speech on Bush's handling of the economy to the Brookings Institution. Also, during this time period Gore guest starred on several programs such as The Late Show with David Letterman and Saturday Night Live, appearing much more relaxed and funnier as a private citizen than he did while holding public office. Saturday Night Live stars Martin Sheen and John Spencer.]] In 2003 Gore joined the board of directors of Apple Computer. On the political front, Gore kept his promise of staying involved in public debate when he offered his criticism and advice to the Bush Administration on key topics such as the Occupation of Iraq, USA Patriot Act, and environmental issues, most notably global warming. Gore also continued to visit campuses across the nation lecturing on issues such as race, media, and democracy. On April 10, 2004, Gore met with the 9-11 Commission in private to give his testimony on what his administration did to prevent terror attacks. In a statement after the three-hour session, the commission said he was candid and forthcoming, and it thanked him for his "continued cooperation." [http://asia.news.yahoo.com/040409/ap/d81rfbt80.html] In the summer of 2004, Gore teamed up with MoveOn.org, to promote the new science fiction film, The Day After Tomorrow. Although Gore said the movie was a far-fetched example of global warming, he said the movie would escalate public debate on the issue. On April 27, 2005, Gore gave an hour-long speech lambasting the GOP's effort to do away with the legislative filibuster. In response to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who for weeks had repeated threats to impose the "nuclear option" if Senate Democrats did not stop blocking judicial nominees via the filibuster, Gore said, "Their grand design is an all-powerful executive using a weakened legislature to fashion a compliant judiciary in its own image. The Senate has confirmed 205 or over 95 percent of President Bush's nominees. Democrats have held up only 10 nominees, less than 5 percent. Compare that with the 60 Clinton nominees who were blocked by Republican obstruction between 1995 and 2000. What is involved here is a power grab," Gore said. Gore also took aim at what he called "religious zealots" who claim special knowledge of God’s will in American politics. He went on to say, "They even claim that those of us who disagree with their point of view are waging war against ‘people of faith.’ How dare they!" This was Gore's first major policy speech of 2005 and also the first one since the defeat of Democratic hopeful John Kerry in late 2004. In May 2005, Gore was awarded a lifetime achievement award for three decades of contributions to the Internet. The Webby Awards, which are widely hailed as the Oscars of the web, "wanted to set the record straight" about Al Gore and the Internet once and for all. Tiffany Shlain, the awards' founder and chairwoman said, "It's just one of those instances someone did amazing work for three decades as congressman, senator and vice president and it got spun around into this political mess," Shlain said. [http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2005-05-04-gore-webby_x.htm] In September 2005, Gore chartered two aircraft to evacuate 270 evacuees from New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. [http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-katrina-gore,1,535141.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines&ctrack=1&cset=true] He was highly critical of the government and federal response in the days after the hurricane. Speaking at an economic forum in Stockholm, Sweden in October 2005, Gore again stated that he has no intention of ever running for president again in response to questions from reporters. However, Gore said he could not rule the possibilit out completely saying, "I do not completely rule out some future interest, but I do not expect to have that." When asked how the U.S. would have been different if he had become president, Gore stated, "We would not have invaded a country that didn't attack us," he said, referring to Iraq. "We would not have taken money from the working families and given it to the most wealthy families." "We would not be trying to control and intimidate the news media. We would not be routinely torturing people," Gore said. [http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/10/12/politics/main938098.shtml] In the past few years, Gore has remained busy traveling the world speaking and participating in events mainly aimed towards global warming awareness and prevention.

Television network

Sweden On May 4, 2004, INdTV Holdings, a company co-founded by Gore and Joel Hyatt, purchased cable news channel NewsWorld International from Vivendi Universal. The new network will not have political leanings, Gore said, but will serve as an "independent voice" for a target audience of people between 18 and 34 "who want to learn about the world in a voice they recognize and a view they recognize as their own." The network was relaunched under the name Current on August 1, 2005.

Investment firm

In late 2004, it was announced that Al Gore had launched and will chair an investment firm to seek out companies taking a responsible view on big global issues like climate change. Gore's group, Generation Investment Management, was created to assist the growing demand for an investment style which can bring returns by blending traditional equity research with a focus on more intangible non-financial factors such as social and environmental responsibility and corporate governance.

2004 presidential election

Generation Investment Management Initially, Al Gore was touted as a logical opponent of George W. Bush in the 2004 United States Presidential Election. "Re-elect Gore!" was a common slogan among many Democrats who felt the former Vice President had been unfairly cheated out of the presidency, on the grounds that he had won the popular vote and (in the opinion of many) should have won the Electoral College vote. On December 16, 2002 however, Gore announced that he would not run in 2004, saying that it was time for "fresh faces" and "new ideas" to emerge from the Democrats. When he appeared on a 60 Minutes interview, Gore said that he felt if he had run, the focus of the election would be the rematch rather than the issues. Gore's former running mate, Joe Lieberman quickly announced his own candidacy for the presidency, which he had vowed he would not do if Gore ran. Despite Gore taking himself out of the race, a handful of his supporters formed a national campaign to "draft" him into running. However, that effort largely came to an end when Gore publicly endorsed Vermont Governor Howard Dean (over his former running mate Joe Lieberman) weeks before the first primary of the election cycle. There was still some effort to encourage write-in votes for Gore in the primaries by a different group of Gore supporters who were separate from the draft movement. Although Gore did receive a small number of votes in New Hampshire and New Mexico, that effort was halted when John Kerry pulled into the lead for the nomination. Gore's endorsement of Dean was helpful to the latter in legitimizing him in the eyes of the establishment faction of the Democratic Party, but it also led the media to dub Dean as the clear front-runner, with the result that his opponents devoted more of their emphasis to opposing him. On January 15, 2004, Al Gore gave a major policy address in New York City on climate change and the Bush administration's approach to the environment. Accompanied by slides and projector, Gore slammed the Bush administration's attitude towards global warming saying, "There are many who still do not believe that global warming is a problem at all. And it's no wonder: because they are the targets of a massive and well-organized campaign of disinformation lavishly funded by polluters who are determined to prevent any action to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming, out of a fear that their profits might be affected if they had to stop dumping so much pollution into the atmosphere." (However, that day happened to be the coldest day in New York City history. The cold weather in New York helped make this speech especially controversial.) On February 9, 2004, on the eve of the Tennessee primary, Gore gave what many consider his harshest criticism of the president yet when he accused George W. Bush of betraying the country by using the 9/11 attacks as a justification for the invasion of Iraq. "He betrayed this country!" Mr. Gore shouted into the microphone. "He played on our fears! He took America on an ill-conceived foreign adventure dangerous to our troops, an adventure preordained and planned before 9/11 ever took place!" Gore also urged all Democrats to unite behind their eventual nominee proclaiming, "Any one of these candidates is far better than George W. Bush." In March 2004 Gore, along with former Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, united behind Kerry as the presumptive Democratic nominee. Jimmy Carter On April 28, 2004, Gore announced that he would be donating $6 million to various Democratic Party groups. Drawing from his funds left over from his 2000 presidential campaign, Gore pledged to donate $4 million to the Democratic National Committee. The party's Senate and House committees would each get $1 million, and the party from Gore's home state of Tennessee would receive $250,000. In addition, Gore announced that all of the surplus funds in his "Recount Fund" from the 2000 election controversy that resulted in the Supreme Court halting the counting of the ballots, a total of $240,000, will be donated to the Florida Democratic Party. In his speech, Gore stressed the importance of voting and having every vote counted, a point that foreshadowed the 2004 U.S. election voting controversies. On May 26, 2004, Gore gave a highly critical speech on the Iraq crisis and the Bush Administration. In the speech, Gore demanded Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith, and Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Stephen Cambone all resign for encouraging policies that led to the abuse of Iraqi prisoners and fanned hatred of Americans abroad. During the fiery speech, which lasted more than an hour, Gore called the Bush administration's Iraq war plan "incompetent" and called George W. Bush the most dishonest president since Richard Nixon, who resigned the office of the presidency in 1974 following the Watergate scandal. Gore also decried the abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib Prison in Iraq, saying, "What happened at that prison, it is now clear, is not the result of random acts of a few bad apples. It was the natural consequence of the Bush Administration policy." As the first major speaker at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, Gore held himself out as a living reminder that every vote counts. "Let's make sure not only that the Supreme Court does not pick the next president, but also that this president is not the one who picks the next Supreme Court," said Gore. Gore directed remarks to supporters of third-party presidential candidate Ralph Nader, who abandoned the Democratic Party four years ago, asking them, "Do you still believe that there was no difference between the candidates?" On October 18, 2004, Al Gore delivered his final major policy speech of the 2004 political season. In an hour long presentation, Gore concluded that, "I'm convinced that most of the president's frequent departures from fact-based analysis have much more to do with right-wing political and economic ideology than with the Bible."

Views and controversies

Al Gore's views are categorized as being those of a liberal. Gore is a strong supporter of abortion rights, free trade, and strong environmental policy. He was a vocal opponent of the 2003 invasion of Iraq [http://www.commonwealthclub.org/archive/02/02-09gore-speech.html]. Though Gore has gradually moved politically further left; he was once a moderate-to-conservative lawmaker. Early in his career, he was pro-life; his Congressional voting record was rated by the National Right to Life Committee as 84% anti-abortion. Through the late 1980s, Gore maintained that abortion destroyed innocent human life. He had adopted a pro-choice position by 1988, when he sought the Democratic presidential nomination. Critics have called his change as stemming from political expedience rather than conviction. Gore has also been involved in a number of controversies. His views on environmental policy have sometimes been cast as politically radical, especially during his 2000 presidential campaign. Additionally, critics charged Gore with illegal fundraising at a Buddhist temple and illegal use of his government office and telephone for political fundraising in violation of the Hatch Act, although he was never indicted on such a charge. Concerning the internet, Gore's [http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/03/09/president.2000/transcript.gore/ statement during a CNN interview] on March 9, 1999 with Wolf Blitzer that he "took the initiative in creating the Internet" to describe his sponsorship of the [http://www.mit.edu/afs/net.mit.edu/dev/mit/jis/OldFiles/nrenbill.txt High Performance Computing Act of 1991] which advanced the growth of the internet, was ridiculed significantly by the media. His statement was later defended by Internet pioneers such as Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf, however [http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/200009/msg00052.html].

External links

"The SNS Project" and
- [http://lib1.isd.ornl.gov:8087/cgi/psearch_sns_new.cgi?beg_num=1&end_num=50&sval=list&res_type=images&photo_num=&keywords=gore&connect4=AND&beg_yr=1999&end_yr=2005&sval2=list&submit=Submit&ips=25 Al Gore]

General sites

- [http://www.ElectGore2008.com/ ElectGore2008.com - Elect Al Gore in 2008]
- [http://www.RunAlGore.com/ Al Gore For President - ]
- [http://www.algoresupportcenter.com/ Al Gore Support Center 2008 - The Home of Hardcore Gore Supporters]
- [http://www.algore-08.com/ Al Gore '08 - Organize, Discuss, Act]
- [http://www.current.tv Current TV]
- [http://www.patriotsforgore.com/ Patriots for Al Gore PAC]
- [http://clinton5.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OVP/VP.html The Official NARA Online Office Of Vice President Gore (1993-2001)]
- [http://clinton3.nara.gov/WH/Accomplishments/ Clinton-Gore Administration Accomplishments]
- [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/campaigns/wh2000/stories/goremain100399.htm The Life of Al Gore - Washington Post]
- [http://www.issues2002.org/Gore.htm Al Gore on the Issues]
- [http://www.freemedia.at/Boston_Congress_Report/boston3.htm A New Approach for a New Century, International Press Institute World Congress, April 2000]
- [http://www.newsmeat.com/washington_political_donations/Al_Gore.php Political Donations Made by Al Gore]

Recent speeches by Al Gore

- [http://algore-08.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=300&Itemid=84 Gore Speaks On The Threat To Democracy]
- [http://algore-08.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=289&Itemid=84 Gore's Speech To The Sierra Club]
- [http://s8.invisionfree.com/Al_Gore_Support/index.php?showtopic=2474&st=0&#entry7932723 Gore Slams GOP's Efforts To End Filibuster]
- [http://www.xpatusa.com/Al_Gore2.htm Gore Charges The Bush Administration With A Failed Presidency]
- [http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/politics/campaign/26TEXT-GORE.html Gore's Remarks At The 2004 Democratic Convention]
- [http://s8.invisionfree.com/Al_Gore_Support/index.php?showtopic=100 Gore Says Bush Lied To Push For War In Iraq]
- [http://www.moveonpac.org/gore/ Gore Calls for the Resignation of the Bush Team]
- [http://www.moveon.org/front/gore.html Gore Speaks on the Use of "Fear" in Politics] - [http://algoresupport.proboards19.com/index.cgi?board=newsalerts&action=display&num=1076373683&start=0 (another version)]
- [http://www.moveon.org/gore3/speech.html Gore Speaks on Global Warming and the Environment]
- [http://www.moveon.org/gore/speech.html Gore Calls for the Repeal of the Patriot Act]
- [http://www.moveon.org/gore-speech.html Gore Blasts Bush for Mis Leading America]
- [http://www.commonwealthclub.org/archive/02/02-09gore-speech.html Gore Speaks On The Build Up To War With Iraq and The War On Terror]
- [http://www.gwu.edu/~action/2004/gore/gore100202sp.html Gore Speaks On Matching our Nation's Economic Course to Our Current Realities]

Al Gore's Current

- [http://www.current.tv Official website of the television station Current]

Al Gore and the Internet

- [http://clinton1.nara.gov/White_House/EOP/OVP/other/superhig.html Remarks as Delivered by Vice President Al Gore to The Superhighway Summit, UCLA (1994)] & [http://www.clintonfoundation.org/legacy/011194-remarks-by-the-vp-on-television.htm Another URL with the speech]
- [http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue5_10/wiggins Al Gore and the Creation of the Internet]
- [http://www.snopes.com/quotes/internet.htm Snopes analyzes the statement that Gore claimed to "invent" the Internet]
- [http://www.politechbot.com/p-01394.html Full Text of Vint Cerf and Robert Kahn's Email on Gore and the Internet]
- [http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,18390,00.html A Wired News Piece on Al Gore's Claimed Contribution to the Internet]

Al Gore myths and media bias

- [http://www.algoresupportcenter.com/goretruth.html Gore Myths Page]
- [http://www.eriposte.com/media/bias/media_bias_gore.htm Media Bias Against Al Gore Exposed]
- [http://www.larryelder.com/Gore/goredubiousrecord.htm Gore's Dubious Academic Record]

Al Gore's early career in journalism

- [http://archives.cjr.org/year/93/1/gore.asp Columbia Journalism Review on Gore's journalistic past] Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Al Gore, Al Gore, Al Gore, Albert Arnold Jr. Gore, Al ja:ア

U.S. Electoral College

The United States Electoral College is the electoral college which chooses the President and Vice President of the United States at the conclusion of each Presidential election. The Electoral College was established by Article Two, Section One of the U.S. Constitution and meets every four years with electors from each state. The electoral process was modified in 1804 with the ratification of the 12th Amendment and again in 1961 with the ratification of the 23rd Amendment. 23rd Amendment For a historic overview of the U.S. Electoral College election maps, see U.S. presidential election maps.

How it works

Election for President of the United States and Vice President of the United States is indirect, for which voting takes place every four years on Election Day. Although ballots typically list the names of the presidential candidates, voters within the 50 states and the District of Columbia actually choose electors when they vote for President and Vice President. These electors in turn cast the official votes for those two offices. In most states and in D.C., the plurality winner of the popular vote for President within that state receives all of the state's electors, while all other candidates receive none. Only in Maine and Nebraska does the election follow a model more closely based on Congressional Elections: For each congressional district in those two states, the plurality winner of that district receives one district elector ("Representative-like" elector, so to speak), while the two at-large electors ("Senator-like" electors) are given to the plurality winner of the whole state. This method has been used in Maine since 1972 and Nebraska since 1996, though neither has ever split its electoral votes. Each state's electors meet in their respective state capitals in December, 41 days following the election, at which time they cast their electoral votes. Thus the Electoral College never meets as one body. The electoral votes are then sealed and sent to the President of the Senate (i.e. the sitting Vice President of the United States), who retains them until the new Congress convenes in January. At that time, the votes are opened and counted in the presence of both houses of Congress. The candidate who receives a majority of electoral votes for President becomes President, and the candidate who receives a majority of electoral votes for Vice President becomes Vice President. If no candidate receives an absolute electoral majority for President, then the new House of Representatives is required to go into session immediately to vote for President. In this case, the top three electoral vote getters for President are the candidates for the House of Representatives to select from, and the House votes en-bloc by state for this purpose (that is, one vote per state, which is determined by the majority decision of the delegation from that state; if a state delegation is evenly split that state is considered as abstaining). This vote would be repeated if necessary until one candidate receives the votes of more than half the state delegations—at least 26 state votes, given the current number, 50, of states in the union. If no candidate receives an absolute majority of electoral votes for Vice President, then the United States Senate must do the same, with the top two vote getters for that office as candidates. The Senate votes in the normal manner in this case, not by States. It is unclear if the sitting Vice President would be entitled to cast his usual tie-breaking vote if the Senate should be evenly split on the matter. If the House of Representatives has not chosen a winner in time for the inauguration (noon on January 20), then the Constitution of the United States specifies that the new Vice President becomes Acting President until the House selects a President. If the winner of the Vice Presidential election is not known by then either, then under the Presidential Succession Act of 1947, the Speaker of the House of Representatives would become Acting President until the House selects a President or the Senate selects a Vice President. It is unclear what would happen if a President has been selected but the Senate remains deadlocked on a Vice President past Inauguration Day. On the one hand, the Twelfth Amendment specifies that the Senate should choose the Vice President, and it does not admit of a time limit on the selection process. On the other hand, the Twenty-Fifth Amendment allows the President to nominate a Vice President if a vacancy should occur. As of 2005, the House of Representatives has elected the President on two occasions, in 1801 and in 1825. The Senate has chosen the Vice President once, in 1837.

Alloting electors to the states

The number of electors assigned to each state is equal to the total number of Senators (always 2) and Representatives that the state has in Congress. No federal officer or employee, including Senators and Representatives, may serve as an elector, though electors may be elected state officials, party leaders, or persons who have a personal or political affiliation with a Presidential candidate. With the adoption of the Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1961, the District of Columbia is treated as a state for purposes of electoral votes, but can in no event choose more electors than the least populous state (however that latter clause does not currently make any difference; even if it did not exist, there would not be enough population in the District by a wide margin to give it any more than 3 electors). There are currently 538 electoral votes available in each presidential election (100 Senators + 435 Representatives + 3 votes for D.C. = 538 electoral votes). Therefore, candidates must receive a majority of 270 electoral votes to become President and Vice President. In theory even in a pure two-party race, a candidate could win the election by receiving only 23% of all popular votes, if these were distributed in an ideal way (for him/her)—i.e. if they won enough small states by the narrowest possible margin and got no votes at all in the larger states. The fact that there is an even number of electoral votes available since the passing of the 23rd Amendment makes a 269/269 tie conceivable, although none has occurred yet. In that case the election would be thrown into the House of Representatives even though only two candidates received any electoral votes. In most states, the names of the electors do not appear on the ballot at all; instead, a notation on the ballot indicates that voters are selecting the "electors for" followed by the names of the candidates for President and for Vice President. All but two states (Maine and Nebraska) use a winner-take-all system. The candidate with a plurality of votes gains all of the state's electors. The two exceptions allot the electors to areas within the state. In many states, the electors are legally free to cast their votes for anyone they choose, although in some states to vote for someone other than their pledged candidate is a misdemeanor, in others a felony, and in a few it is merely illegal without penalty. In practice, however, electors very rarely vote for a candidate they are not pledged to (as they are chosen by the political parties specifically for voting for that candidate), except as a form of protest vote. Individuals choosing to do this are often referred to as "faithless electors" about which, more below. It is uncommon to know in advance that an elector may be inclined to vote in such a fashion, and such deviations usually come as a surprise. Of course, if an Electoral College tie were looming on the horizon after Election Day, more electors might see a reason to switch sides, simply to avoid the election being thrown into the House of Representatives.

History

Scholars continue to debate the reasons for the adoption of the Electoral College. Some believe it was created to protect small states. Others believe that the Founding Fathers intended to create a system of indirect election whereby the electors would come to a carefully considered decision to nominate a selection of good candidates and then the House of Representatives would again make a careful consideration of the names presented. Others still believe the system of electing the President was given little thought beyond a desire to have George Washington as the first President, pointing in particular to the extremely casual way in which the Vice President was selected, and that Congress was intended to be the most important part of the Federal government. Still others hold that it was devised as a compromise between the election of a President by the states and by the Congress. Initially the electors were selected by the state legislatures, and it was not until later that states started holding a popular poll for the presidential elections to determine how they would cast their votes. Yet another theory contends that the Framers strongly opposed the development of political parties, as evidenced by the total absence of any reference to parties in the Constitution, and were aware of the difficulties in mass communication, and were attempting to devise a system that would function well with neither cheap, instantaneous, nationwide communication nor a strong political party system. The Electoral College may have been implemented to negotiate compromises in cases of a split vote where each state was pushing its own native son. The U.S. presidential primary and the emergence of a two-party system has largely rendered this historical. One lasting theory is that the Electoral College helps soften the effect of votes from densely populated centers (major U.S. cities and the District of Columbia) which may steer away from the concerns of the rest of the country. Others have noted that the Electoral College enabled the Founding Fathers to deftly incorporate the Connecticut Compromise and three-fifths compromise into the system of choosing the President and Vice President, thereby sparing the convention further acrimony over the issue of state representation. Regardless of why the system was chosen, the term "Electoral College" is not used in the U.S. Constitution, and it wasn't until the early 1800s that it came into general usage as the unofficial designation for the group of citizens selected to cast votes for President and Vice President. It was first written into Federal law in 1845, and today the term appears in 3 U.S.C. section 4, in the section heading and in the text as "college of electors." Section 1, Article II of the Constitution says, "Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector." It then goes on to describe how the electors vote for President. Originally, each elector voted for two persons, with no designation for President or Vice President. The person receiving the greatest number of votes (provided that such a number was a majority of electors) would be President, while the individual who was in second place became Vice President (and did not need the backing of the majority of electors; in theory the Vice President could have been elected with the support of as few as two electors if every other elector either cast the sole vote for a candidate, voted for a virtually unanimous choice for President or did not cast their second vote). If no one had received a majority of votes, then the House of Representatives would choose between the five highest vote-getters, with each state casting one vote. In such a case, the person who received the highest number of votes but was not chosen President would become Vice President. If there was ever a tie for second, then the Senate would choose the Vice President. 1845 The original plan, while working extremely well in the absence of political parties and organized presidential campaigns, broke down almost immediately once they developed. In 1796, for instance, rumors of conspiracies led to some Federalist electors only using one of their two votes so that their Presidential candidate John Adams came in first, but the Democrat-Republican candidate for President Thomas Jefferson placed second. Thus, the President and Vice President were from different parties. Although a situation like that is arguably not a problem, the situation that occurred in 1800 was most certainly a problem: Republicans (that is, the 18th- and early 19th-century party, later known as Democratic Republicans, that eventually became the modern Democratic party) Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied the vote. Jefferson was the intended presidential contender, while Burr was the Vice Presidential one. However, electors did not differentiate between the two, nor could they under the system of the time, and all electors supporting them cast one vote for each. The electors for the Federalists, however, arranged it so that one elector voted for the Federalist presidential candidate but not for the Vice Presidential candidate. They voted instead for another person altogether. The election was thrown into the House of Representatives, which was controlled by the Federalists. The House voted 35 times, with Alexander Hamilton offering his support to Thomas Jefferson with the condition that Jefferson support certain Federalist policies and office-holders. Jefferson won on the thirty-sixth ballot after Delaware's only Representative, James Bayard—a Burr supporter—abstained in exchange for the terms Hamilton had originally offered. Burr became Vice President. For this, and numerous other reasons, Burr held a grudge against Hamilton, whom he later killed in a duel. James Bayard, William H. Crawford, and Henry Clay, dated February 9, 1825.]] To address the problem of the 1800 election, the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution was passed. It made some minor and major changes to the Constitution. First, electors would no longer cast two ballots for President. Instead, they would cast one vote for President and a separate vote for Vice President. The individual receiving a majority of votes in a particular election would be elected. If no one received a majority in the presidential election, then the House of Representatives would choose between the top three, again voting by state. Similarly, the Senate chooses between the top two in the case of the Vice President. Under the new rules, the House of Representatives did elect the President on one more occasion: the 1824 four-way race between Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, William H. Crawford, and Henry Clay resulted in no candidate receiving an absolute majority of electoral votes. The House elected Adams on the first ballot, even though Jackson received the most electoral and popular votes. Under the provisions of the Constitution there is no requirement for a state to poll its voters. The state legislature can in theory appoint the electors as it likes, and, until 1860, South Carolina did just this. Furthermore, in 1788 the concept of "democracy" was widely seen as analogous to mob-rule, while the idea of political parties was equally frowned upon, and so the idea of a directly elected head of state was anathema to many. The Federalist Papers suggest that it was commonly assumed by the Founding Fathers that most Presidents would be selected by the House of Representatives, and the order of the articles of Constitution, in which Congress is established in Article I and the presidency in Article II, supports this view.

Faithless electors

A faithless elector is one who casts an electoral vote for someone other than who they have pledged to elect. On 158 occasions, electors have cast their votes for president or vice president in a different manner than that prescribed by the legislature of the state they represent. Of those, 71 votes were changed because the original candidate died before the elector was able to cast a vote. Two votes were not cast at all when electors chose to abstain from casting their electoral vote for any candidate. The remaining 85 were changed by the elector's personal interest or perhaps by accident. Usually, the faithless electors act alone. An exception was in 1836 when 23 Virginia electors changed their vote together. Still, no faithless elector has ever changed the outcome of any election. There are laws to punish faithless electors in 24 states. While no faithless elector has ever been punished, the constitutionality of state pledge laws was brought before the Supreme Court in 1952 (Ray v. Blair, 343 US 214). The court ruled in favor of state's right to legally require electors to vote as pledged, as well as remove electors who refuse to pledge. As stated in the ruling, electors are acting as a function of the state, not the federal government. Therefore, states have the right to govern electors.

Electoral votes

There are a total of 538 electoral votes. For each state, the number of electors is the number of legislators that the state has in Congress. There are 435 members in the House of Representatives and 100 members in the Senate, adding up to 535 votes. The remaining three electors are from the District of Columbia. According to the 23rd Amendment, the District receives either the number of electoral votes that it would receive if it were a state, or the smallest number of electoral votes of any state, whichever is smaller. Since each state has two senators, the number of electors for the state is two more than the number of representatives for the state. Because the number of representatives for each state is determined decennially by the United States Census, the electoral votes for each state are also effectively determined by the Census every ten years. The electoral vote distribution for the 2004 and 2008 elections is as follows.

Alphabetically

Alabama - 9
Alaska - 3
Arizona - 10
Arkansas - 6
California - 55
Colorado - 9
Connecticut - 7
D.C. - 3
Delaware - 3
Florida - 27
Georgia - 15

Hawaii - 4
Idaho - 4
Illinois - 21
Indiana - 11
Iowa - 7
Kansas - 6
Kentucky - 8
Louisiana - 9
Maine - 4
Maryland - 10

Massachusetts - 12
Michigan - 17
Minnesota - 10
Mississippi - 6
Missouri - 11
Montana - 3
Nebraska - 5
Nevada - 5
New Hampshire - 4
New Jersey - 15

New Mexico - 5
New York - 31
North Carolina - 15
North Dakota - 3
Ohio - 20
Oklahoma - 7
Oregon - 7
Pennsylvania - 21
Rhode Island - 4
South Carolina - 8

South Dakota - 3
Tennessee - 11
Texas - 34
Utah - 5
Vermont - 3
Virginia - 13
Washington - 11
West Virginia - 5
Wisconsin - 10
Wyoming - 3

Numerically

California - 55
Texas - 34
New York - 31
Florida - 27
Illinois - 21
Pennsylvania - 21
Ohio - 20
Michigan - 17
Georgia - 15
New Jersey - 15
North Carolina - 15

Virginia - 13
Massachusetts - 12
Indiana - 11
Missouri - 11
Tennessee - 11
Washington - 11
Arizona - 10
Maryland - 10
Minnesota - 10
Wisconsin - 10

Alabama - 9
Colorado - 9
Louisiana - 9
Kentucky - 8
South Carolina - 8
Connecticut - 7
Iowa - 7
Oklahoma - 7
Oregon - 7
Arkansas - 6

Kansas - 6
Mississippi - 6
Nebraska - 5
Nevada - 5
New Mexico - 5
Utah - 5
West Virginia - 5
Hawaii - 4
Idaho - 4
Maine - 4

New Hampshire - 4
Rhode Island - 4
Alaska - 3
Delaware - 3
D.C. - 3
Montana - 3
North Dakota - 3
South Dakota - 3
Vermont - 3
Wyoming - 3

Pros and Cons

Supporters of the College

More fairness for rural America and greater diversity of represented groups

Supporters of the College claim that the system protects rural communities and smaller states from the interests of urban centers and large states. Without the Electoral College, with the vote based on majority rule, it would be possible to win a strict majority of votes by campaigning only in a few densely populated areas of the country. A candidate could theoretically focus resources, time, and political capital solely on winning votes in a handful of large cities in order to win the election. It is felt that this pressure would lead to voters in the sparsely populated West being completely ignored. Thus, the intent of the College is to favor a candidate whose appeal is more broadly distributed on a geographical basis across the nation. Opponents claim the focus on "swing states" in the current system is equally problematic.

Easier recounts

In the event of an extremely close election, such as the 2000 presidential election, having the Electoral College makes doing a recount much easier, since it may only be necessary to recount in a single state, rather than the entire nation.

Less incentive for election fraud

Electoral College supporters also believe that the system serves to dampen the consequences of potential election fraud. Fraudulent votes manufactured in one state can only affect the distribution of that state's limited number of electoral votes, any votes beyond a majority in that state have no further effect nationwide. In a pure direct election any number of fraudulent votes would have a direct impact on the results nationwide. However, opponents claim that in an Electoral College model, voting fraud is a larger problem. In a popular vote system, it is claimed, fraudulent votes could become essentially neutralized by the large amount of legal votes across the nation, while with the College, with state-sized contests, fraudulent votes could garner a larger effect.

The philosophy of federalism

Many conservatives defend the Electoral College not out of necessarily practical arguments, but out of the argument that the Electoral College is a symbol of federalism. These defenders, such as United States Senator Mitch McConnell, point out that American states are semi-sovereign, not mere administrative units. They claim that the electoral college reinforces that residual sovereignty. Conceding that the Electoral College violates the principle of "one man, one vote," federalist defenders of the College remind that the United States Senate violates "one man, one vote" even more seriously. Finally, these defenders of the College assert that the United States is a "republic, not a democracy."

Detractors of the College

U.S. Senators Hillary Clinton and Arlen Specter both called for the abolition of the Electoral College in 2000 after the electoral debacle; however, this motion went nowhere. Most electoral reform plans in the US include ways to abolish the Electoral College.

Disenfranchisement and inequality of voters

Supporters of direct election argue that it would give everyone an equal vote, regardless of what state they live in, and oppose giving disproportionately amplified voting power to voters in small states. In contrast, the Electoral College disenfranchises those voters in every state who cast their votes for the candidate receiving fewer votes in that state. And it also partly disenfranchises voters in larger states by reducing their proportional contribution to the final election result. For example, in 1988 the combined voting age population of the six least populous states (Alaska, Delaware, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming) plus the District of Columbia was 3,119,000, and carrying 21 Electoral votes between them. The State of Florida, which had 9,614,000 persons of voting age carried exactly the same number of Electoral College votes: 21. Each Floridian's potential vote, then, carried about one third the weight of a potential vote in the other states listed. Proponents counter that electoral votes are worth more when they are bunched up together. In other words, 21 electors are worth more than 7 sets of 3 electors, because 21 EVs could easily turn the result of the election, while a person voting in a 3-electoral vote state would not have such a proportionally large effect on the result.

Losing the popular vote

In the elections of 1824, 1876, 1888, and 2000, the candidate who received a plurality of the popular vote did not become president. It has been claimed that this disfranchises the people. Proponents counter that the Electoral College asks candidates to garner more widespread support across the Union; a popular vote system could elect a person who wins by a large margin in a few states over another person who wins by small margins in most states. The latter candidate, they argue, has to appeal to a broader array of interests than the former and is less likely to be a demagogue or extremist.

Focus on large swing states

While attention is often given to the granting of a disproportionate number of electoral votes to smaller states, often overlooked is another part of the electoral system: most states use a winner-take-all system, in which the candidate with the most votes in that state receives all of the state's electoral votes. Candidates will pay more attention to larger states without a clear favorite. California, Texas, and New York, in spite of having the largest populations, are usually considered safe for a particular party, and will therefore be ignored by candidates (except for fundraising efforts). Small states such as New Mexico which are winnable for both major parties, but yield a small number of electoral votes also tend to be ignored by candidates. Large "swing states" like Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania are usually considered winnable for both major parties and a large number of electoral votes turn on their results, and so candidates tend to disproportionately spend more time on these close states, at the expense of the voters in "safe states" or small states. Proponents claim, however, that adoption of the popular vote would simply shift the disproportionate focus to large cities at the expense of rural areas.

Paradoxical effects of the House size

One little-known (and undesirable) quality of the Electoral College system is the fact that in close elections, the exact number of seats in the House of Representatives becomes a crucial factor in deciding the outcome. The current House size of 435 seats was fixed by federal law in 1910, not by the constitution, and Congress could change it at will. Since the number of Senators is fixed by the constitution to exactly twice the number of States, enlarging the House would lessen the advantage of smaller states in Presidential elections, while downsizing it would strengthen their advantage. If we take the popular votes cast at the Election of 2000 and the population figures of the 1990 U.S. Census with the consequential apportionment of House seats to the states as a given, George W. Bush would have won the election for all House sizes less than 491, while Al Gore would have won for all house sizes greater than 598 (except at 655, which gives a tie). In between those two numbers, the winner unsystematically oscillates back and forth many times -- of the 105 house sizes between those numbers, there is a 269/269 tie 23 times, Bush wins 53 times and Gore wins 29 times. The effect is comparable to the Alabama paradox which caused states to actually lose House seats by increasing the House size in certain circumstances, and which led to the introduction of a more mathematically sound method of reapportionment in the late 19th century.

Untrue hidden assumption of local uniformity

Detractors claim that the Electoral College assumes that voters within states vote monolithically, when in fact this is not the case. Many states are often deeply divided over how to vote in a Presidential election. A key element of democracy is that voters disagree among themselves on what they consider their interests, and this happens within states as well as between states. Thus, for example, in the 2000 election, New Hampshire (a small state) gave 48% of its votes to Bush, and 47% to Gore. According to the pro-Electoral College model, as a small state, New Hampshire necessarily voted for its own local interests in supporting Bush. This in itself skews the campaign process, as candidates focus their efforts on states whose electoral votes are in question, rather than individual voters whose ballots are in play, and may contribute to broader sectional divisions. Proponents of proportional representation claim that this critique supports proportional representation because it reflects such innate divisions and pluralities in electorates.

Unfair disadvantage for third parties

Opponents also argue that the method by which most states allot their electoral votes tends to favor a two-party system. Even when a third-party candidate receives a significant number of popular votes, he may not receive a plurality in any state and may not garner even a single electoral vote, as was the case of Ross Perot, who won 18% of the popular vote in the 1992 elections. Proponents usually counter by stating that a third-party candidate with enough votes to win will usually be able to garner some electoral votes, and these electors might even hold the balance of power. Additionally, third parties with a strong regional bias could actually find their strength enhanced by the Electoral College. Some proponents of proportional representation claim that, because third parties generally start as regional phenomena and because the Electoral College is a form of regional allocation, the Electoral College would enhance the power of third parties if electoral votes were allocated by proportional representation.

Elections ending up decided by Congress

Another aspect of the Electoral College with which its detractors find fault is the situation that could arise if no candidate won a majority of electoral votes. Third party candidates won electoral votes in several elections of the 20th century, including 1912, 1948, 1960, 1968, and 1972. It is quite possible in a three-way race that no candidate would reach the magic 270 number. Even in a two-way race, it is possible for neither candidate to win a majority by tying 269-269. If no candidate hit 270, the election would go to the House, where the Constitution provides that each state delegation would have one vote, regardless of its population. This gives small states an even stronger advantage than they have in the College. If the House election tied, or if enough delegations split evenly, the situation would become more complicated. In this situation, section 3 of the 20th amendment would take control. Assuming that the Senate were able to choose a Vice President-elect, he would become the acting President until the Congress could choose a President. If the Senate were unable to choose a Vice President-elect, then the Speaker of the House, as next in line in the order of succession to the presidency, would act as President until either a President-elect or Vice President-elect could be determined.

Excludes American citizens from outside the states and the District of Columbia

If an American citizen has their residency in one of the unincorporated territories of the United States (i.e., American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands), he or she cannot vote for electors for President. This is part and parcel of a more general disfranchisement — these citizens also cannot vote for a representative or senator — but it would be easier to allow these citizens to vote in a direct election than through the Electoral College.

Supporters of an Electoral College with modified rules

Some proponents argue that the greatest objections to the Electoral College can be acceptably mitigated by modifying the rules by which votes are allocated.

Proportional vote

The primary proposal of this type is for states to implement a proportional vote system. Under such a system, electors would be selected in proportion to the votes cast for their candidate or party, rather than being selected to represent only the plurality vote. As an example, consider the 2000 election, in which the George W. Bush / Richard Cheney (Republican) and Albert Gore Jr. / Joseph Lieberman (Democrat) tickets were the primary contenders, with the Ralph Nader / Winona LaDuke (Green) ticket taking a small but noteworthy minority. In California, the approximate proportion of votes for these tickets was 41.65 percent Bush/Cheney, 53.45 percent Gore/Lieberman, and 3.82 percent Nader/LaDuke. Under the current system, all 54 electoral votes were for Gore/Lieberman. Under a simple proportional system, the votes might be distributed as 23 Bush/Cheney, 29 Gore/Lieberman, and 2 Nader/LaDuke. As a practical matter, this system would be very difficult to implement. According to the Constitution, the state legislatures decide how electors are chosen. It is usually against the interest of an individual state to switch to a method of proportional allocation because it reduces that state's influence in the Electoral College. For example, in 2004, the state of Colorado voted down an initiative on its 2004 ballot, Amendment 36, which would have instituted a system of proportional allocation of electors beginning immediately with the 2004 election. If it had been successful, it would have ended Colorado's status as a swing state. Instead of candidates vying for all nine of Colorado's votes, they would be going for one, assuming the most likely outcome of a 5-4 split one way or the other. A perceived problem with dividing electoral votes proportionally is that it would be harder for a candidate to achieve a majority of the electoral vote, since a proportional system would enable a third party candidate to win electoral votes. If this system had been used in 1992 and 1996, and all electors had voted as pledged, there would have been no winner at all, and the House of Representatives would have chosen the president, whilst the Senate selected the Vice-President. In 1996 Robert Dole would almost certainly have been the House winner, and Jack Kemp the Senate, as well, despite receiving significantly fewer votes than Bill Clinton and Al Gore. In 2000, Al Gore would have received 269 electoral votes, George W. Bush 263, and Ralph Nader 6. If all electors voted as pledged, the Presidential race would have gone to the House, and Bush likely would have won, but the Vice Presidential decision in the Senate would have likely split 51-50 for Lieberman, with Al Gore casting the deciding vote.

Maine-Nebraska method

Other observers argue that the current electoral rules of Maine and Nebraska should be extended nationwide. As previously noted, the winner in those two states is only guaranteed two electoral votes, with the winner of each Congressional district in the state receiving one electoral vote. Using the California example again, Gore won 33 of the state's Congressional districts and the state overall, while Bush won 19 Congressional districts. The state's electoral votes would then have gone 35-19 for Gore. However, this kind of allocation would still make it possible for the loser of the popular vote to become president. If every state used the Maine-Nebraska system, George W. Bush would have won in 2000 by an even larger Electoral College majority than he did with winner-take-all. Also, dividing electoral votes by House district winners would create yet another incentive for partisan gerrymandering. In 1960, if a district system had been used Richard Nixon would have been elected, despite losing the popular vote. Another perceived problem with this suggestion is that it would actually further increase the advantage of small states. In winner-take-all, the small states' disproportionally high number of electors is partially offset by the fact that large states with their big electoral blocks are such a highly desirable boon to a candidate that large swing states actually receive much more attention during the campaign than smaller states. In proportional representation or Maine-Nebraska, this advantage of the large states would be gone. Yet another argument with both Maine-Nebraska and proportional representation is that even if it is considered superior as a nationwide system, winner-take-all generally maximizes the power of an individual state and thus while it might be in the interest of the nation, it is not in the interest of the state to adopt any other system. Since the U.S. constitution gives the states the power to chose their method of appointing the electors, nationwide Maine-Nebraska without a constitutional amendment mandating it seems unlikely, and the passage of such an amendment seems equally unlikely since the House delegations of the largest states (against whose interests such a system would be), taken together, easily surpass the one third of the House size that is needed to block a constitutional amendment.

Abolishing the non-proportional electors ("drop two")

Another proposed reform is to make the number of electors that each state has the same as its number of Representatives (effectively the same as the current system, except taking two electoral votes from each state). This plan, sometimes called "drop two," would still over-represent the very smallest states — those who receive their one seat in the House only because every state receives at least one — but would make the over-representation much less significant. If such a system had been in place in 2000, Al Gore would have won in the Electoral College 225-211. Proponents of this suggestion say that this will preserve the Electoral College's benefits and make the system more democratic at the same time. Others say this will remove the extra power given to the small states intended to make elections fairer and there would still exist the phenomenon of non-swing states being ignored.

Popular vote bonus method

Some have advocated retaining the Electoral College, but allotting a certain number of electoral votes to whichever candidate wins the popular vote. This method could encourage voters in non-swing states to cast ballots, since their votes could still help their candidate win the popular vote. A common suggestion for implementing this variation is to award a block of electoral votes equal to half the number of electoral votes cast by the most populous state to the popular vote winner. Under such a system, Gore would have won in the College, 293-271, with the 27 "at large" electoral votes (equal to half of California's 54) awarded to Gore. Adoption of this method would theoretically prevent the winner of the popular vote from losing the election.

Alternative systems

Majority vs. plurality

The Electoral College requires a majority vote in order for a victor to be declared. In the case of a hypothetical direct election with multiple candidates, the question of majority versus plurality comes into play. In many recent American presidential elections (1948, 1960, 1968, 1992, 1996, and 2000), no single candidate achieved an absolute majority of the popular vote. Some nations with direct presidential voting, such as France, have a second round of voting if no candidate achieves a majority of votes in the first round; in the second round, the election is restricted to the two candidates with the highest number of votes. Some have argued that the French system creates problems of its own; it is possible that the initial vote becomes divided up between so many candidates that someone who is highly undesirable to most voters can make it to the second round of voting, as occurred in 2002 with the rise of candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen to the runoff election. One solution to this problem would be to implement an alternative election system, such as instant runoff voting, approval voting, or condorcet voting. However critics of those methods contend that they are too difficult to understand for a sizable portion of the population, and would thus result in many people casting spoiled ballots or ballots that do not correspond to what they actually want to vote for.

Weighted direct voting

Another possibility is to have direct voting, but give smaller states more weight per vote to more or less match the current small-state favoritism. Small states may be more motivated to support a constitutional voting system change as long as they keep their favoritism. For example, an individual in a populous state may be assigned 0.91 votes, while somebody from a small state may be assigned 1.08 votes. Under this system, candidates would have more incentive to campaign in all states. However since such a system would make the small state advantage more directly obvious to the general public than the current system, it is unlikely to receive support in the large states. In addition, many Electoral College opponents would consider this system contradictory to the entire point of abolishing the Electoral College: the principle of one person, one vote.

Political probabilities

Many critics of the Electoral College admit that discarding the Electoral College would be extremely difficult. After the 2000 election, the National Commission on Federal Election Reform, headed by former presidents Carter and Ford, did not even consider abolition of the Electoral College. When asked why the Commission did not consider Electoral College reform, Carter, a past skeptic of the College replied "I think it is a waste of time to talk about changing the Electoral College. I would predict that 200 years from now, we will still have the Electoral College." [http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2004/10/17/peculiar_institution?mode=PF] Despite the difficulty of amending the Constitution, it appears that large majorities of Americans favor a direct popular vote. In a 1968 Gallup survey, 81% of Americans favored a direct popular vote, 12% favored retention, and 7% had no opinion. In 1992, pollsters asked Americans this question, "If Perot runs, there is a chance that no presidential candidate will get enough electoral votes to win. If that happens, the Constitution gives the House of Representatives the power to decide who will be the next President. Do you think that is a fair way to choose the President, or should the Constitution be changed?" 31% said it was a fair way, and 61% said the Constitution should be changed. By some counts, there have been over seven hundred proposed amendments to the Constitution to change or abolish the Electoral College. In 1969, in the wake of an election where a third party candidate almost sent the election to the House of Representatives, an amendment to do away with the Electoral College passed the House of Representatives with 83% of the vote, 338-70. Richard Nixon favored the amendment, and so did three-quarters of state legislatures. Republican Senator Howard Baker denounced the Electoral College with "Any system which favors one citizen over another or one state over another is ... inconsistent with the most fundamental concept of a democratic society." Predictably, the amendment failed in the Senate (though it did have a majority of Senate votes); however, it was not small states who blocked the reform but rather Southern states, who saw the Electoral College as part of states' rights. Regardless of how opponents of the system feel, it is unlikely that the system will soon be changed. Changing the system requires amending the Constitution, and amending the Constitution requires ratification of three-fourths of the States. It is commonly thought that smaller states would be unlikely to ratify such an amendment, as their votes would count for less under direct popular vote than under the current electoral college system. Some believe abolishing the Electoral College would strengthen third parties. However, this is unlikely. Under an electoral college system, third parties may thrive in noncompetitive states because voters do not have to worry that voting for a third party would cause the "least bad" major party candidate to lose. Under a strictly democratic system, every vote in every state might be the decisive one. A greater impediment to third parties is the plurality winner-take-all system. Debate over the merit of the Electoral College came to a head after the 2000 Presidential election, with some politicians, such as Senator Hillary Clinton, calling for a Constitutional amendment abolishing the system. Clinton conceded that the chances of enacting such a change were slim, and the idea has not been vigorously pursued since the 2000 election.

External links

- [http://www.fec.gov/pdf/eleccoll.pdf The Electoral College] - by William C. Kimberling, Deputy Director FEC Office of Election Administration
- [http://www.lwv.org/where/promoting/electoral_college.html League of Women Voters] - A web page from the League of Women Voters advocating direct election and the abolition of the Electoral College
- [http://www.avagara.com/e_c/index.htm The Electoral College Zine] - A web site supporting retention of the Electoral College, including an article giving a mathematical analysis(See below)
- [http://www.johnwcooper.com/papers/electoralcollege.htm Electoral College: Is this a democratic way to pick a president?]- Defense of the electoral college and representative democracies from a senior at Michigan's Ross School of Business
- [http://www.avagara.com/e_c/reference/00012001.htm Math Against Tyranny] - an article describing MIT researcher Alan Natapoff's analysis favoring an electoral college system
- [http://www.thirty-thousand.org/pages/Neubauer-Zeitlin.htm Outcomes of Presidential Elections and the House Size] - The Neubauer-Zeitlin analysis shows that the winner of the 2000 presidential election was determined in 1941 when the House size was fixed at 435. Had the House size been set at 500, then Gore would have won the 2000 election.
- [http://www.eleves.ens.fr:8080/home/madore/misc/us-voting.html US presidential electoral system] - A mathematical analysis of the US presidential system, showing that this system is biased toward populous states, giving a citizen of California roughly four times more power than one of Montana in the choice of the US president.
- [http://www.november2004.com Electoral College Vote Calculator] - A tool for determining which combinations of states a candidate can win to become President.
- [http://uselectionatlas.org/INFORMATION/INFORMATION/electcollege_history.php Origin and History] - shorter version of the origin and history of the US Electoral College.
- http://www.presidentelect.org/index.html
- http://unfutz.blogspot.com/2004/10/electoral-college-survey-1030.html
- [http://thismatter.com/articles/voting.htm Voting, Elections, Democracy, Republicanism, and the Electoral College] Discusses voting, elections, democracy, republicanism, and the Electoral College. Includes a procedural guide to the Electoral College, parts of the Constitution and constitutional amendments regarding voting and elections, and includes the original paper by Alexander Hamilton, "Federalist No. 68 - The Mode of Electing the President", which illustrates much of the founding fathers' original thinking regarding the Electoral College.
- [http://www.indepthinfo.com/articles/electoral-college.shtml Electoral College] Electoral College Category:Electoral systems

January 11

January 11 is the 11th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 354 days remaining (355 in leap years).

Events

- 532 - Nika riots in Constantinople.
- 1158 - Vladislav II becomes King of Bohemia.
- 1569 - First recorded lottery in England.
- 1571 - Austrian nobility is granted freedom of religion.
- 1693 - Eruption of Mt. Etna.
- 1759 - In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the first American life insurance company is incorporated.
- 1787 - William Herschel discovers Titania and Oberon, two moons of Uranus.
- 1805 - Michigan Territory is created.
- 1861 - Alabama secedes from the United States.
- 1863 - American Civil War: Battle of Arkansas Post - General John McClernand and Admiral David Porter capture the Arkansas River for the Union.
- 1867 - Benito Juárez becomes Mexican president again.
- 1879 - Anglo-Zulu War begins.
- 1880 - Total solar eclipse blackens the sky of San Francisco one day after the funeral of Emperor Norton.
- 1908 - Grand Canyon National Monument is created.
- 1919 - Romania annexes Transylvania.
- 1922 - First use of insulin to treat diabetes in a human patient.
- 1923 - Troops from France and Belgium occupy the Ruhr area to force Germany to pay its reparation payments.
- 1935 - Amelia Earhart is the first woman to fly solo from Hawaii to California.
- 1938 - Frances Moulton is the first woman to become president of a US national bank.
- 1942 - Japan declares war on the Netherlands and invades the Netherlands East Indies.
- The Japanese capture Kuala Lumpur.
- 1943 - The United States and United Kingdom give up territorial rights in China.
- 1946 - Enver Hoxha declares the People's Republic of Albania with himself as dictator.
- Porfirio Barba-Jacob's ashes go back to Colombia.
- 1949 - First recorded case of snowfall in Los Angeles, California.
- 1957 - The African Convention is founded in Dakar.
- 1962 - Eruption of the Huascaran volcano in Peru; 4,000 deaths.
- 1963 - The Whisky A Go-Go night club in Los Angeles, the first disco in the USA, is opened.
- 1964 - United States Surgeon General Luther Leonidas Terry reports smoking may be hazardous to health. First such statement from US government.
- 1972 - East Pakistan becomes Bangladesh.
- 1973 - Beginning of the Watergate burglars trial.
- 1974 - The world's first surviving set of sextuplets are born to Susan Rosenkowitz in Cape Town, South Africa.
- 1980 - Nigel Short, 14, is the youngest chess player to be awarded the degree of International Master.
- 1982 - A cold snap sends temperatures to record lows in dozens of cities throughout the Midwestern United States.
- 1990 - 300,000 march in favor of Lithuanian independence.
- 1991 - Ric Flair defeats Sting to become the first WCW Champion.
- 1992 - Paul Simon is the first major artist to tour South Africa after the end of the cultural boycott.
- 1994 - Irish Government announces the end of a 15-year broadcasting ban on the IRA and its political arm Sinn Fein
- 1996 - Haiti becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.
- 1998 - Sidi-Hamed massacre in Algeria; over 100 people killed.
- 2001 - The Federal Trade Commission approved the merger of AOL and Time Warner to form AOL Time Warner.

Births

1322 to 1899

- 1322 - Emperor Komyo of Japan (d. 1380)
- 1359 - Emperor Go-En'yu of Japan (d. 1393)
- 1503 - Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola, Italian artist (d. 1540)
- 1591 - Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex, English Civil War general (d. 1646)
- 1630 - John Rogers, American President of Harvard (b. 1684)
- 1671 - François-Marie, 1st duc de Broglie, French military leader (d. 1745)
- 1757 - Samuel Bentham, English mechanical engineer (d. 1831)
- 1757 - Alexander Hamilton, first United States Secretary of the Treasury (d. 1804)
- 1800 - Nat Turner, American slave (d. 1831)
- 1807 - Ezra Cornell, American businessman and university founder (d. 1874)
- 1815 - John A. Macdonald, first Prime Minister of Canada (d. 1891)
- 1856 - Christian Sinding, Norwegian composer (d. 1941)
- 1858 - Harry Gordon Selfridge, American retailer (d. 1947)
- 1859 - Lord George Nathaniel Curzon, British statesman, Viceroy of India (d. 1925)
- 1860 - Marie Bashkirtseff, Ukrainian artist (d. 1884)
- 1875 - Reinhold Glière, Russian composer (d. 1956)
- 1876 - Elmer Flick, American baseball player (d. 1971)
- 1885 - Alice Paul, American women's rights activist (d. 1977)
- 1887 - Aldo Leopold, American ecologist (d. 1948)

1900 to 1999

- 1902 - Maurice Duruflé, French composer (d. 1986)
- 1903 - Alan Paton, South African writer (d. 1988)
- 1906 - Albert Hofmann, Swiss chemist
- 1908 - Lionel Stander, American actor (d. 1994)
- 1911 - Zenko Suzuki, Prime Minister of Japan (d. 2004)
- 1921 - Juanita M. Kreps, former US Secretary of commerce
- 1923 - Carroll Shelby, American automobile designer
- 1924 - Roger Guillemin, French neuroendocrinologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
- 1924 - Sam B. Hall, American politician (d. 1994)
- 1924 - Slim Harpo, American musician (d. 1970)
- 1925 - Grant Tinker, American television executive
- 1926 - Lev Demin, cosmonaut (d. 1998)
- 1930 - Rod Taylor, Australian actor
- 1934 - Jean Chrétien, twentieth Prime Minister of Canada
- 1938 - Arthur Scargill British labor leader
- 1941 - Gérson, Brazilian football player
- 1942 - Clarence Clemons, American musician (E Street Band)
- 1943 - Jim Hightower, American radio host and author
- 1944 - John Piper, American theologian
- 1944 - Shibu Soren, Indian politician
- 1946 - Naomi Judd, American singer
- 1952 - Ben Crenshaw, American golfer
- 1952 - Lee Ritenour, musician and composer
- 1956 - Robert Earl Keen, American singer
- 1957 - Bryan Robson, English footballer and manager
- 1958 - Vicki Peterson, American musician
- 1960 - Stanley Tucci, American actor
- 1961 - Jasper Fforde, British author
- 1962 - Susan Lindauer, American peace activist and accused spy
- 1963 - Dean Reynolds, English snooker player
- 1966 - Marc Acito, American novelist and humorist
- 1966 - Kelley Law, Canadian curler
- 1968 - Tom Dumont, American musician, Alison Lewis. British Writer and Humanitist
- 1971 - Mary J. Blige, American singer
- 1972 - Marc Blucas, American actor
- 1972 - Amanda Peet, American actress
- 1973 - Rahul Dravid, Indian cricketer
- 1977 - Shomari Buchanan, American football player
- 1978 - Emile Heskey, English footballer
- 1980 - Mike Williams, American football player

Deaths

314 to 1899

- 314 - St. Miltiades
- 705 - John VI
- 812 - Stauracius, Byzantine Emperor
- 1055 - Constantine IX Monomachos, Byzantine Emperor
- 1494 - Domenico Ghirlandaio, Italian artist (b. 1449)
- 1495 - Pedro González de Mendoza, Spanish cardinal and statesman (b. 1428)
- 1641 - Juan Martínez de Jáuregui y Aguilar, Spanish poet (b. 1583)
- 1696 - Charles Albanel, French missionary explorer in Canada (b. 1616)
- 1703 - Johann Georg Graevius, German classical scholar and critic (b. 1632)
- 1713 - Pierre Jurieu, French protestant leader (b. 1637)
- 1762 - Louis-François Roubiliac, French sculptor (b. 1695)
- 1763 - Caspar Abel, German theologian, historian, and poet (b. 1676)
- 1771 - Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d'Argens, French writer (b. 1704)
- 1791 - William Williams Pantycelyn, Welsh hymnist (b. 1717)
- 1801 - Domenico Cimarosa, Italian composer (b. 1749)
- 1843 - Francis Scott Key, American lawyer (b. 1779)
- 1882 - Theodor Schwann, German physiologist (b. 1810)

1900 to 1999

- 1901 - Vasily Kalinnikov, Russian composer (b. 1866)
- 1902 - Johnny Briggs, English cricketer (b. 1862)
- 1905 - Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter, Hasidic rabbi (b. 1847)
- 1923 - King Constantine I of Greece (b. 1868)
- 1928 - Thomas Hardy, English writer (b. 1840)
- 1941 - Emanuel Lasker, German chess player (b. 1868)
- 1958 - Edna Purviance, American actress (b. 1895)
- 1966 - Alberto Giacometti, Swiss sculptor (b. 1901)
- 1966 - Hannes Kolehmainen, Finnish runner (b. 1889)
- 1968 - Isidor Isaac Rabi, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1898) Alison Lewis British Crystal Healer
- 1970 - Richmal Crompton, British author (b. 1890)
- 1980 - Barbara Pym, English novelist (b. 1913)
- 1981 - Beulah Bondi, American actress (b. 1888)
- 1983 - Shri Ghanshyam Das Birla, Indian industrialist and educator (b. 1894)
- 1988 - Pappy Boyington, American aviator (b. 1912)
- 1991 - Carl David Anderson, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1905)
- 1998 - Klaus Tennstedt, German conductor (b. 1926)
- 1999 - Fabrizio de André, Italian singer (b. 1940)

2000 onwards

- 2000 - Ivan Combe, American inventor (b. 1911)
- 2000 - Bob Lemon, baseball player (b. 1920)
- 2001 - Sir Denys Lasdun, English architect (b. 1914)
- 2003 - Mickey Finn, English drummer (T. Rex)
- 2003 - Maurice Pialat, French actor and director (b. 1925)
- 2003 - Richard Simmons, American actor (b. 1913)
- 2005 - Spencer Dryden, American drummer (Jefferson Airplane) (b. 1938)
- 2005 - James Griffin, American musician (Bread) (b. 1943)
- 2005 - Miriam Hyde, Australian composer (b. 1913)

Holidays and observances

- Albania - Republic Day (1946)
- Japan - Kagami-Biraki (Rice Cakes Festival)
- Morocco - The Independence manifesto day
- Nepal - Unity Day
- Roman Empire - First day of Carmentalia in honor of Carmen
- Feast of the Baptism of Jesus

External links

- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/11 BBC: On This Day] ---- January 10 - January 12 - December 11 - February 11 — listing of all days ko:1월 11일 ms:11 Januari ja:1月11日 simple:January 11 th:11 มกราคม

Federal Trade Commission

] The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an Independent Agency of the United States Government, established in 1914. The FTC enforces federal antitrust and consumer protection laws by investigating complaints against individual companies initiated by consumers, businesses, congressional inquiries, or reports in the media. The commission seeks to ensure that the nation's markets function competitively by eliminating practices deemed unfair or deceptive. The FTC is responsible for civil enforcement of antitrust laws, while the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice has the power to bring both civil and criminal action in antitrust matters.

External links

- [http://www.ftc.gov FTC Home Page] Category:United States federal agencies Category:Independent Agencies of the United States Government

Merger

The phrase mergers and acquisitions or M&A refers to the aspect of corporate finance strategy and management dealing with the merging and acquiring of different companies as well as other assets. Usually mergers occur in a friendly setting where executives from the respective companies participate in a due diligence process to ensure a successful combination of all parts. Historically, though, mergers have often failed to add significantly to shareholder value. On other occasions, acquisitions can happen through hostile takeover by purchasing the majority of outstanding shares of a company in the open stock market. In the United States, business laws vary from state to state whereby some companies have limited protection against hostile takeover. One form of protection against hostile takeover is the so-called "poison pill". See Delaware corporations.

Financing M&A

Technically, what differentiates a merger from an acquisition is how it is financed. Various methods of financing an M&A deal exist:

Merger

A "merger" or "merger of equals" is often financed by an all stock deal (a stock swap). An all stock deal occurs when all of the owners of stocks of either company get the same amount of stock in the new combined company. The term "demerger" is sometimes used to indicate the effective opposite of a merger, where one company splits into two, the second often being a separately listed stock company if the parent was a stock company.
Acquisition
An acquisition (of un-equals, one large buying one small) can involve a cash and debt combination, or just cash, or a combination of cash and stock of the purchasing entity, or just stock. The Sears-Kmart acquisition is an example of a cash deal. In addition, the acquisition can take the form of a purchase of the stock or other equity interests of the target entity, or the acquisition of all or substantially all of its assets.
High-yield
In some cases, a company may acquire another company by issuing high-yield debt (high interest yield, "junk" rated bonds) to raise funds (often referred to as a leveraged buyout). The reason the debt carry a high yield is the risk involved. The owner can not or does not want to risk his own money in the deal, but third party companies are willing to finance the deal for a high cost of capital (a high interest yield). The combined company will be the borrower of the high-yield debt and it will be on its balance sheet. This may result in the combined company having a low shareholders' equity to loan capital ratio (equity ratio).
Examples
In a 1985 merger between Pantry Pride and Revlon, Pantry Pride had to issue 2.1 billion dollars of high-yield debt to buy Revlon. The target Revlon was worth 5 times the acquirer.
Motives behind M&A
These motives are considered to add shareholder value:
- Economies of scale: This refers to the fact that the combined company can often reduce duplicate departments or operations, lowering the costs of the company relative to theoretically the same revenue stream, thus increasing profit.
- Increased revenue/Increased Market Share: This motive assumes that the company will be absorbing a major competitor and increasing its power (by capturing increased market share) to set prices.
- Cross Selling: For example, a bank buying a stock broker could then sell its banking products to the stock broker's customers, while the broker can sign up the bank's customers for brokerage accounts. Or, a manufacturer can acquire and sell complementary products.
- Synergy: Better use of complementary resources.
- Taxes: A profitable company can buy a loss maker to use the target's tax write-offs.
- Geographical or other diversification: This is designed to smooth the earnings results of a company, which over the long term smooths the stock price of a company, giving conservative investors more confidence in investing in the company. However, this does not always deliver value to shareholders (see below). These motives are considered to not add shareholder value:
- Diversification: While this may hedge a company against an downturn in an individual industry it fails to deliver value, since it is possible for individual shareholders to acchieve the same hedge by diversifying their portfolios at a much lower cost than those associated with a merger.
- Overextension: Tend to make the organization fuzzy and unmanageable.
- Manager's hubris: Oftentimes the executives of a company will just buy others because doing so is newsworthy and increases the profile of the company.
- Empire Building: Managers have larger companies to manage and hence more power
- Manager's Compensation: In the past, certain executive management teams had their payout based on the total amount of profit of the company, instead of the profit per share, which would give the team a perverse incentive to buy companies to increase the total profit while decreasing the profit per share (which hurts the owners of the company, the shareholders); although some empirical studies show that compensation is rather linked to profitablity and not mere profits of the company.
- Bootstrapping: Example: how ITT executed its merger.
M&A and Investment Banking
Historically, Investment Banks (intermediaries which assist companies in selling ownership of themselves as stock or borrowing money directly from investors in the form of bonds) have been closely associated with merger and acquisition activity since a merger or acquisition is a sales opportunity for the Investment Bank. If the company wants to merge with another, it must attain a fair market value for its shares to be swapped which would involve an investment bank. If it wants to buy the other company with borrowed money, it would most likely borrow directly from investors in the form of bonds through a private placement, engineered by the investment bank. Thus, Investment Banks position themselves to act as advisors on mergers and aqusitions and usually charge large fees for doing so. This system however, gives an incentive to Investment Banks to try to stimulate as much M&A activity as possible, even though the result might not be good for the shareholders of the acquiring company, possibly a conflict of interest. The amount of influence this has is unclear since this activity is usually secret and since the majority of merger proposals do not go through.
M&A marketplace difficulties
No marketplace currently exists for the mergers and acquisitions of privately-owned small to mid-sized companies. Market participants often wish to maintain a level of secrecy about their efforts to buy or sell such companies. Their concern for secrecy usually arises from the possible negative reactions a company's employees, bankers, suppliers, customers and others might have if the effort or interest to seek a transaction were to become known. This need for secrecy has thus far thwarted the emergence of a public forum or marketplace to serve as a clearinghouse for this large volume of business. At present, the process by which a company is bought or sold can prove difficult, slow and expensive. A transaction typically requires six to nine months and involves many steps. Locating parties with whom to conduct a transaction forms one step in the overall process and perhaps the most difficult one. Qualified and interested buyers of multimillion dollar corporations are hard to find. Even more difficulties attend bringing a number of potential buyers forward simultaneously during negotiations. Potential acquirers in industry simply cannot effectively "monitor" the economy at large for acquisition opportunities even though some may fit well within their company's operations or plans. An industry of professional "middlemen" (known variously as intermediaries, business brokers, and investment bankers) exists to facilitate M&A transactions. These professionals do not provide their services cheaply and generally resort to previously-established personal contacts, direct-calling campaigns, and placing advertisements in various media. In servicing their clients they attempt to create a one-time market for a one-time transaction. Many but not all transactions use intermediaries on one or both sides. Despite best intentions, intermediaries can operate inefficiently because of the slow and limiting nature of having to rely heavily on telephone communications. Many phone calls fail to contact with the intended party. Busy executives tend to be impatient when dealing with sales calls concerning opportunities in which they have no interest. These marketing problems typify any private negotiated markets. The market inefficiencies can prove detrimental for this important sector of the economy. Beyond the intermediaries' high fees, the current process for mergers and acquisitions has the effect of causing private companies to initially sell their shares at a significant discount relative to what the same company might sell for were it already publicly traded. An important and large sector of the entire economy is held back by the difficulty in conducting corporate M&A (and also in raising equity or debt capital). Furthermore, it is likely that since privately-held companies are so difficult to sell they are not sold as often as they might or should be. Previous attempts to streamline the M&A process through computers have failed to succeed on a large scale because they have provided mere "bulletin boards" - static information that advertises one firm's opportunities. Users must still seek other sources for opportunities just as if the bulletin board were not electronic. A multiple listings service concept has not been applicable to M&A due to the need for confidentiality. Consequently, there is a need for a method and apparatus for efficiently executing M&A transactions without compromising the confidentiality of parties involved and without the unauthorized release of information. One part of the M&A process which can be improved significantly using networked computers is the improved access to "data rooms" during the due diligence process.
Levels and flows
Worldwide Completed Mergers & Acquisitions reported by Thomson Financial ([http://www.thomson.com/financial/investbank/fi_investbank_league_tablearchive_mergers.jsp]) ($ trillion)
- 2004: 1.516 (Q4 2004 report)
- 2003: 1.149 (Q4 2003 report)
- 2002: 1.337 (Q4 2003 report) 1.316 (Q4 2002 report)
- 2001: 2.186 (Q4 2002 report) Worldwide Announced Mergers & Acquisitions
- 2004: 1.949 (Q4 2004 report)
- 2003: 1.333 (Q4 2003 report)
- 2002: 1.207 (Q4 2003 report) 1.230 (Q4 2002 report)
- 2001: 1.701 (Q4 2002 report)
Merger
In business or economics a merger is a combination of two companies into one larger company. Such actions are commonly voluntary and involve stock swap or cash payment to the target. Stock swap is often used as it allows the shareholders of the two companies to share the risk involved in the deal. A merger can resemble a takeover but result in a new company name (often combining the names of the original companies) and in new branding; in some cases, terming the combination a "merger" rather than an acquisition is done purely for political or marketing reasons.
Classifications of mergers

- Horizontal mergers take place where the two merging companies produce similar product in the same industry.
- Vertical mergers occur when two firms, each working at different stages in the production of the same good, combine.
- Conglomerate mergers take place when the two firms operate in different industries. A unique type of merger called a reverse merger is used as a way of going public without the expense and time required by an IPO.
Issues
The occurrence of a merger often raises concerns in anti-trust circles. Devices such as the Herfindahl index can analyze the impact of a merger on a market and what, if any, action could prevent it. Regulatory bodies such as the European Commission and the United States Department of Justice may investigate anti-trust cases for monopolies dangers, and have the power to block mergers. The completion of a merger does not ensure the success of the resulting organization; indeed, many (in some industries, the majority) mergers result in a net loss of value due to problems. Correcting problems caused by incompatibility—whether of technology, equipment, or corporate culture— diverts resources away from new investment, and these problems may be exacerbated by inadequate research or by concealment of losses or liabilities at one of the partners. Overlapping subsidiaries or redundant staff may be allowed to continue, creating inefficiency, and conversely the new management may cut too many operations or personnel, losing expertise and disrupting employee culture. These problems are similar to those encountered in takeovers. For the merger to not be considered a failure, it must increase shareholder value faster than if the companies were separate, or prevent the deterioration of shareholder value more than if the companies were separate.
Major Mergers & Acquisitions since 1990
Acquirer and target, announcement date, deal size, share and cash payment.
United States

- AOL Time Warner; America Online and Time Warner (US$166 billion excluding debt, Stock: 100%, Cash: 0%) ([http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/business/aol_time_index.html PBS coverage], [http://money.cnn.com/2000/01/10/deals/aol_warner/ CNN])
- ExxonMobil; Exxon and Mobil Oil (Dec. 1998, $77 billion, Stock: 100%, Cash: 0%) ([http://www.sunsonline.org/trade/process/followup/1998/12030298.htm Suns Online], [http://money.cnn.com/1998/12/01/deals/exxon/ CNN])
- Citigroup; Citicorp and Travelers Group (1999, $73 billion, Stock: 100%, Cash: 0%) ([http://www.cs.cornell.edu/ugrad/travelers.htm Cornell], [http://www.citigroup.com/citigroup/fin/faq.htm#01 Citigroup FAQ])
- J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank One (announced January 14, 2004) ($59 billion, Stock: 100%, Cash: 0%) ([http://www.snl.com/bank/manda/20040114.asp SNL])
- Procter & Gamble buy Gilette (2005, $54 billion) ([http://www.thestreet.com/stocks/manufacturing/10205915.html])
- Bank of America; with FleetBoston Financial (2003, $47 billion) ([http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/10/27/national/main580134.shtml])
- MCI Communications; with WorldCom; created MCI WorldCom (1997) ($44 billion, Stock: 100%, Cash: 0%) ([http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/public/press_releases/1998/1829.htm Department of Justice], [http://global.mci.com/about/news/news2.xml?newsid=6051&mode=long&lang=en&width=530&root=/about/ MCI.com])
- ChevronTexaco; Chevron and Texaco ($35 billion) ([http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/finance/mergers/ctindex.html])
- DaimlerChrysler; Daimler Benz and Chrysler (Announced May 1998 - Final 1998) ($35 billion) ([http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/americas/9805/07/benz.chrysler.merger/])
- Vivendi Universal; Vivendi and Seagram (agreed 19 June 2000) ($32 billion, Stock: 100%, Cash: 0%) ([http://www.adetocqueville.com/cgi-binloc/searchTTC.cgi?displayZop+4652 The Tocqueville Connection], [http://www.stblaw.com/Lists/list24.htm Law firm])
- Hewlett-Packard; with Compaq (Announced Sept. 2001 - Final May 2002) ($25 billion) ([http://news.com.com/2009-1001-272520.html?legacy=cnet])
- Walt Disney Company; with Capital Cities/ABC (1995) ($19 billion)
- Kmart; with Sears, Roebuck (Announced Nov. 17, 2004) ($11 billion, 55% stock, 45% cash) ([http://www.investorguide.com/cgi-bin/stockarchives.cgi?date=111704 Investorguide])
- Monsanto; with Pharmacia & Upjohn
- NBC Universal; NBC and Universal
- Pfizer; with Warner-Lambert
- Total; with Petrofina, and Elf Aquitaine
- JDS Uniphase; with SDL
- Union Pacific Railroad; with Southern Pacific Railroad
- Sprint; with Nextel
- Verizon; Bell Atlantic, GTE, and AirTouch Cellular
- G4; with TechTV, purchased for $300 Million by Comcast.
Europe

- Vodafone; with Mannesmann (completed February 2000) ($130 billion) ([http://www.telecomvisions.com/current/man.php])
- BP; with Amoco (completed August 1998) ($110bn)
Japan

See also

- [http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Mergers_and_Acquisitions Wikiversity:Mergers and Acquisitions]: The Wikiversity Graduate Level Department offering courses on Mergers and Acquisitions
- Divestiture
- Multiple voting rights
- Poison pill
- Takeover
- Spin off (the opposite of a merger)
Accounting

- Pooling of interests
- Purchase acquisition
Data

- Thomson Financial League Tables
Lists

- List of bank mergers
External links

Academic Research Institutions

- [http://www.manda-institute.org Institute of Mergers, Acquisitions and Alliances (MANDA)]
Blogs

- [http://www.buyoutblog.com Buyout Blog]
- [http://ukbusiness.blogspot.com Breaking News on UK Businesses For Sale, Divestments & Acquisitions]
Merger Direct

- [http://www.mergerdirect.com Direct process of merger and acquisition transactions (M&A]
European Union market

- [http://news.ft.com/cms/s/f4c1628c-401c-11d9-bd0e-00000e2511c8.html FT.com / World / US - EU agrees rules to ease cross-border mergers - November 26 2004]
- [http://money.cnn.com/services/tickerheadlines/djh/200411251414DOWJONESDJONLINE000741.htm EU Approves Rules For Cross-Border Mergers - November 25, 2004]
- [http://www.ceps.be/Article.php?article_id=101 CEPS Articles] - The Challenge of the 13th
Legislation in American and European Jurisdictions

- [http://www.dbj.co.at/phps/start.php?noie=&lang=de&content=publikationen_show.php&navi=publikationen&publikation_nr=236 - Article on Austrian Merger Control law]
- [http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=628182 Control Premiums and Minority Discounts in Mergers and Acqusitions]
Notes and references
# Category:Corporate finance ja:M&A

America Online

America Online, or AOL for short, is a U.S.-based online service provider, Internet service provider, and media company. Based in Dulles, Virginia, a community in Loudoun County, Virginia, with regional headquarters installations in many cities around the world, it is by far the most successful proprietary online service, with more than 32 million subscribers at one point in the US, Canada, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Latin America (declared bankrupt in 2004), and Japan. In early 2005, AOL Hong Kong stopped its service. In the fall of 2004, AOL reported total subscribers had dropped to 24 million, a drop of over a quarter of its subscribers.[http://isp-planet.com/research/rankings/2003/usa_insight_q32003.html] For many Americans through the mid to late 1990s, AOL was the Internet, but the rise of high-speed Internet access from cable and telephone companies as well as the increasing sophistication of the public in handling browsers and other Internet utilities has cut into its user base. In 2000 AOL and Time Warner announced plans to merge, and the deal was approved by the Federal Trade Commission on January 11 2001. News reports in the fall of 2005 indicated a renewed interest in buying out AOL. Suitors such as Microsoft, Google, Yahoo and Comcast have had discussions with Time Warner about a possible purchase.

History

Time Warner AOL began as a short-lived venture called Control Video Corporation (or CVC), founded by William von Meister. Its sole product was an online service called Gameline for the Atari 2600 video game console after von Meister's idea of buying music on demand was rejected by Warner Brothers. (Klein, 2003) Subscribers bought a modem from the company for $49.95 and paid a one-time $15 setup fee. Gameline permitted subscribers to temporarily download games and keep track of high scores, at a cost of approximately $1 an hour. In 1983 the company nearly went bankrupt, and an investor in Control Video, Frank Caufield, had a friend of his, Jim Kimsey, brought in as a manufacturing consultant. That same year, Steve Case was hired as a part-time consultant; later on that year, he joined the company as a full-time marketing employee upon the joint recommendations of von Meister and Kimsey. Kimsey went on to become the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the newly-renamed Quantum Computer Services in 1985 after von Meister was quietly dropped from the company. Case himself rose quickly through the ranks; Kimsey promoted him to vice-president of marketing not long after becoming CEO, and later promoted him further to executive vice-president in 1987. Kimsey soon began to groom Case to ascend to the rank of CEO when he himself retired, which Case did in 1991. Kimsey changed the company's strategy, and in 1985 launched a sort of mega-BBS for Commodore 64 and 128 computers, originally called Quantum Link ("Q-Link" for short). In August 1988, Quantum launched PC Link, a service for IBM-compatible PCs developed in a joint venture with the Tandy Corporation. In May 1988, Quantum and Apple launched AppleLink Personal Edition for Apple II and Macintosh computers. After the two companies parted ways in October 1989, Quantum changed the service's name to America Online. [http://www.thocp.net/timeline/1989.htm], [http://apple2history.org/history/ah22.html] In February 1991 AOL for DOS was launched using a GeoWorks interface followed a year later by AOL for Windows. In October 1991, Quantum changed its name to America Online. These changes coincided with growth in pay-based BBS services, like Prodigy, CompuServe, and GEnie. AOL discontinued Q-Link and PC Link in the fall of 1994.

Massive growth

Case drove AOL as the online service for people unfamiliar with computers, in particular contrast to CompuServe, which had long served the technical community. AOL was the first service with a graphical user interface (GUI) instead of command lines, and was well ahead of the competition in emphasizing communication among members as a feature. In particular was the Chat Room, which allowed a large group of people with similar interests to convene and hold conversations, including:
- Private rooms — created by any user. Hold up to 27 people.
- Conference rooms — created with permission of AOL. Hold up to 48 people and often moderated.
- Auditoriums — created with permission of AOL. Consisted of a stage and an unlimited number of rows. What happened on the stage was viewable by everybody in the auditorium but what happened within individual rows, of up to 27 people, was viewable only by the people within those rows. Under Case's guidance, AOL committed to including online games in its mix of products even when it was only a Commodore 64 service. It hosted the first Play by email game from any service Quantum Space (1989-1991); the first graphical online community (Club Caribe from LucasArts); and the first graphical MMORPG, Neverwinter Nights from Stormfront Studios (1991-1997). AOL quickly surpassed GEnie, and by the mid-1990s, it passed Prodigy (which for several years allowed AOL advertising) and CompuServe. Originally, AOL charged its users an hourly fee, but in 1996 this changed and a flat rate of $19.99 a month was charged. Within three years, AOL's userbase would grow to 10 million people. AOL was relatively late in providing access to the open Internet. Originally, only some Internet features were accessible through a proprietary interface but eventually it became possible to run other Internet software while logged in through AOL. They were the first online service to seamlessly integrate a web browser into content. AOL introduced the concept of Buddy Lists, leveraging their one-on-one instant messaging technology. In recent years, its traditional dial-up service has been declining in subscribers and popularity. In an attempt to combat this, the AOL for Broadband service, which delivers AOL content and chatrooms but no Internet access to users who have an existing high-speed Internet connection, was launched, but in 2004 the company pulled back from this plan. Since its merger with Time Warner, the value of AOL has dropped from its $200 billion high and it has seen a similar losses among its subscription rate. It has since attempted to reposition itself as a content provider similar to companies such as Yahoo!. In 2005, AOL broadcast the Live 8 concert live over the Internet, and thousands of users downloaded clips of the concert over the following months. This was part of AOL's plan to reposition itself a content provider, as opposed to an Internet service provider which delivered content only to subscribers in what was termed a "walled garden." More recently, AOL has announced plans to offer subscribers classic television programs for free with commercials inserted. Programs available include Wonder Woman and Eight is Enough.

CD-ROM distribution

AOL has tirelessly pushed itself through regularly mailing sign-up diskettes and CD-ROMs to over 100 million households, helping forge dominant growth. The long campaign has produced a backlash, including a program called No More AOL CDs that seeks to gather one million unwanted AOL CDs and dump them at AOL headquarters. Other organizations have objected under both environmental and privacy grounds. Environmentalists say that AOL's CDs are largely unwanted and result in massive non-biodegradable plastic waste. However, AOL's mailings have never violated the law, and always interest some people. AOL has also always provided means for people to remove themselves from AOL mailing lists, though No More AOL CDs has documented claims that these removal attempts are sometimes ineffective. Others view AOL disks as valuable collectible items due to the vast number of CD-ROM design variations.

AOL users' reputation

People using AOL (often referred to as "AOLers") have a reputation online for being excessively noobish— ignorant of netiquette. This is in part due to the fact that AOL is aimed towards users who are new to the Internet. To a segment of the online population, an e-mail address ending in aol.com is a sign of ignorance, to be avoided at all costs. Some web, game, and chat servers even go as far as to ban the AOL hostmask, preventing AOL users from logging on. However, this reputation doesn't stop aol.com addresses from being widely used, even in serious business contexts; it is still commonplace in advertisements in non-computer-related publications to see lines like "See our website at www.whatever.com, or e-mail us at whatever@aol.com," to the puzzlement of those who believe an address in the company's own domain would be more logical and professional. AOL further provoked disdain from other Internet users during the early 1990s, when AOL began to provide access to the Usenet bulletin board system for its users. This led to a flood of relatively net-illiterate, commercial, young and immature users into what had previously been the almost exclusive domain of scientists, academics and technical personnel associated with universities and computer companies. The new AOL contingent immediately gained a reputation as pests in Usenet's numerous forums, making near-constant requests for pornography, bootlegged software and hacking information. (See: "Me too.") AOL e-mail accounts used to be only accessed using a nonstandard proprietary protocol not supported by other vendors' e-mail programs, compelling users, in the past, to use AOL's own mail program and be subject to its quirks and limitations. One consequence of the past practice is that when people receive e-mails from AOL users, the address, not the name of the user, is displayed, since the user's real name is not added in the manner that most other mail programs do it. In instances where the AOL user has chosen an alphanumeric alias, eg: "jwds75@aol.com" rather than "John Smith", the identity of the user is less clear to the recipient. Also in the past, users of the AOL client software were unable to click on hyperlinks in the text. Many experienced Internet users remain unaware that these inherent limitations of the AOL software are not due to any possible lack of computer skills by AOL users. In a different vein, AOL users also have a reputation in some online communities for disruptive activities. AOL makes use of aggressive web caching proxy servers that effectively makes it impossible for a website, (such as a wiki), to block an abusive user without excluding large segments of the entire AOL community. Combined with the fact that their free service offers make it all too easy to join, many Internet trolls take advantage of this and choose AOL as a preferred means of hiding their true identity, in a manner that is almost as effective as using an anonymous proxy. This has only served to further harm the reputation of AOL users as a whole and is a large part of why some places implement a policy of banning all AOL users.

Controversies

Community Leaders

Prior to the middle of 2005, AOL used volunteers called Community Leaders, or CLs, to monitor chatrooms, message boards, and libraries. Some community leaders were recruited for content design and maintenance using a proprietary language and interface called RAINMAN, although most content maintenance was performed by partner and internal employees. In 1999, Kelly Hallissey and Brian Williams, former Community Leaders and founders of anti-AOL website filed a class action lawsuit against AOL citing violations of U.S. labor laws in its usage of CLs. The Department of Labor investigated but came to no conclusions, closing their investigation in 2001. In light of these events, AOL drastically began reducing the responsibilities and privileges of its volunteers in 2000. The program was eventually ended on June 8 2005. Current Community Leaders at the time were offered 12 months of credit on their accounts.

Billing disputes

AOL has faced a number of lawsuits over claims that it has been slow to stop billing people after their accounts have been cancelled, either by the company or the user. In addition, AOL changed its method of calculating used minutes in response to a class action lawsuit. Previously, AOL would add fifteen seconds to the time a user was connected to the service and round up to the next whole minute (thus, a person who used the service for 11 minutes and 46 seconds would be charged for 13 minutes). AOL claimed this was to account for sign on/sign off time, but because this practice was not made known to its customers, the lawsuit won (some also pointed out that signing on and off did not always take 15 seconds, especially when connecting via another ISP). AOL disclosed its connection time calculation methods to all of its customers and credited them with extra free hours. In addition, the AOL software would notify the user of exactly how long they were connected and how many minutes they were being charged for.

Account cancellation

In response to approximately 300 consumer complaints, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer’s office began an inquiry of AOL’s customer service policies. The investigation revealed that the company had an elaborate system for rewarding employees who purported to retain or "save" subscribers who had called to cancel their Internet service. In many instances, such retention was done against subscribers’ wishes, or without their consent. Under the system, consumer service personnel received bonuses worth tens of thousands of dollars if they could successfully dissuade or "save" half of the people who called to cancel service. For several years, AOL had instituted minimum retention or "save" percentages, which consumer representatives were expected to meet. These bonuses, and the minimum "save" rates accompanying them, had the effect of employees not honoring cancellations, or otherwise making cancellation unduly difficult for consumers. Many consumers complained that AOL personnel ignored their demands to cancel service and stop billing.

Company purchases

As it grew, AOL purchased many other software companies, including:
- BookLink bought in December 1994.
- NaviSoft's NaviServer (later to become AOLserver) in 1994.
- ImagiNation Network (I.N.N.) from AT&T in 1996.
- CompuServe in February 1998.
- Mirabilis (maker of ICQ) in 1998.
- PLS text-search software in 1998,
- Nullsoft (maker of Winamp), in 1999 for $86 million
- Netscape, in 1999 for $4.2 billion.
- Mapquest in 1999.
- Tegic in December 1999.
- Singingfish search engine, November 2003.
- [http://advertising.com Advertising.com], an Internet advertising agency, in June 2004.
- [http://mailblocks.com MailBlocks], a personal, Web-based email service, in August 2004.
- [http://wildseed.com Wildseed], a privately held mobile software vendor, in August 2005.
- [http://xdrive.com Xdrive], a leading provider of online storage and file sharing services, also in August 2005.
- Weblogs, Inc., a blogging network that runs such sites as Engadget, Autoblog, Cinematical and TVSquad, in October 2005, for $30 million.

Notable persons associated with AOL

- Jim Kimsey (former CEO and board chairman)
- Steve Case (former CEO and board chairman)
- Jan Brandt (former President of Marketing)
- Justin Frankel (Nullsoft founder)
- Ted Leonsis (Vice-Chairman, President AOL Audience Group)
- Michael Powell (during merging with Time Warner)
- Marc Andreessen (Netscape co-founder)
- Jason Smathers (former AOL employee convicted of stealing the Internet provider's entire subscriber list -- over 30 million consumers, and their 90 million screen names -- and selling it to a known spammer.)
- Jason Calacanis (Co-founder of Weblogs, Inc.)

AOL Computer Checkup

AOL Computer Checkup is a service offered by AOL to AOL members. It is a performance and hardware anaylyzer, not unlike the scans in Norton Utilities.

References

- Klein, Alec (2003). Stealing Time: Steve Case, Jerry Levin, and the Collapse of AOL Time Warner. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-5984-X.
- Mehta, Stephanie N. & Vogelstein, Fred (Nov. 14, 2005). "AOL: The Relaunch". Fortune, p. 84–88.

External links

- [http://www.aol.com/ AOL US]
- [http://www.aol.com.br AOL Brasil]
- [http://aol.ca AOL Canada]
- [http://aol.de AOL Germany]
- [http://aol.fr AOL France]
- [http://www.aol.com.mx/ AOL México]
- [http://aol.co.uk AOL UK]
- [http://www.jp.aol.com AOL Japan]
- [http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/Fall2000/McAtee/ AOL: A History]
- [http://staff.jccc.net/lcline/index.htm AOL Disk Collection]
- [http://www.jmusheneaux.com/8000c.htm Important Dates & A Look at AOL's Evolving Interface]
- [http://www.nomoreaolcds.com/ The "No More AOL CDs" campaign]
- [http://groups.google.com/group/alt.aol-sucks Anti-AOL Google group] Category:America Online Category:Time Warner subsidiaries Category:Internet service providers Category:Online service providers ja:AOL

Time Warner

Time Warner Inc. (AOL Time Warner Inc. between 2001 and 2003) (or referred to as TimeWarner) is the world's largest media company with major Internet, publishing, film, telecommunications and television divisions. The company is officially headquartered in New York, New York, United States.

History

Time Warner was created in 1990 by the merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications. This company subsequently acquired Ted Turner's Turner Broadcasting System on October 1996.

AOL Merger

In 2001, a new company called "AOL Time Warner" was created when AOL purchased Time Warner. The deal, announced in 2000, employed an unusual merger structure in which each original company merged into a newly created entity. The Federal Trade Commission approved the deal on January 11, 2001. There has been some speculation about the motivations of each party. Some observers believed that Time Warner was struggling to integrate "new media" into its business. A merger with AOL provided a huge subscriber base of Internet users, along with online marketing know-how. Many business journalists have reported that AOL executives felt that AOL stock was severely overvalued and that a big merger was the only way to prevent a collapse in valuation. The merger faced immediate opposition by consumer groups and other media companies on antitrust grounds. Media companies felt that the vertically integrated AOL Time Warner would unfairly promote its own content within its outlets. This fear existed before the merger, but Time Warner was thought to be a conglomeration of very independent divisions. It was feared that this would change with the influence of AOL executives. Consumer advocates were concerned with the threat of product tying between Time Warner's cable TV systems and AOL's Internet service. Some consumer groups saw a possible attempt to corner the Internet-over-TV market, whereby AOL could force all of the Time Warner cable subscribers to use AOL branded Internet-TV. Smaller internet service providers feared that AOL would tie its Internet service to Time Warner's cable modem service. Some ISPs wanted the opportunity to use Time Warner's cable network as a common carrier for their services, which competed with AOL. AOL and Time Warner pledged not to violate any antitrust regulations. Many observers were shocked that a large, diversified media conglomerate was being acquired by a much smaller company. Market conditions at the time of the merger placed a greater premium on Internet-related stocks than on traditional media stocks. AOL's high market capitalization relative to that of Time Warner made the acquisition possible. The deal has since become a symbol of the Internet Bubble and is widely regarded as a [http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8BOB80O1.htm?campaign_id=apn_home_down&chan=db disaster], with a $2.4 billion shareholder settlement, a further $600 million set aside and a $5 billion price boosting share buyback program announced on 3 August 2005. AOL CEO Steve Case became executive chairman of the new company, while Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin retained the CEO title.

Post-AOL Merger

After the merger, the profitabilty of the ISP division (America Online) decreased. Meanwhile, the market valuation of similar independent internet companies fell dramatically. As a result, the value of the America Online division dropped significantly. This forced a goodwill write down, causing AOL Time Warner to report a loss of 99 billion dollars in 2002--at the time, the largest loss ever reported by a company. In response to the huge loss in 2002, the company dropped the "AOL" from its name, and removed Steve Case as executive chairman. Richard Parsons became the new CEO. Case resigned from the Time Warner board on October 31, 2005.[http://edition.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/10/31/stevde.case.aol/] A number of transactions have since taken place:
- The professional wrestling federation WCW was sold to competitor WWE.
- The Atlanta Hawks, Atlanta Thrashers, and operating rights to Philips Arena were sold in mid-2003.
- The fifty percent share in the cable channel Comedy Central was sold to Viacom.
- Warner Music Group, a music company, was sold to a group of investors led by Edgar Bronfman, Jr. in late 2003.
- AOL/Netscape's longrunning litigation against Microsoft was settled out of court.
- Time Warner announced that it was shutting down its CNNfn financial information channel and disposing of its share in Google (2004). Since 2003, the Time Warner text logo appears in CamelCase form (ala RadioShack).

Services

Time Warner Cable has since expanded and offers the following services: - High-Speed Internet - The service named Road Runner, recently upgraded its speed and now comes with the new AOL 9.0 - Cable - Time Warner Cable has provided a cable service. - Digital Phone - This is a phone service that only cordless phones can be used with this (Note: Digital Phone service information is needed for this part of the article)

Businesses

The following enterprises are part of Time Warner:
- CNN, a world wide news company as well as a cable news channel
- HBO, Cinemax, Turner Classic Movies, cable movie channels
- TBS Superstation, TNT, Cartoon Network, cable channels
- The WB television network (co-owned with Tribune Company)
- America Online and via its Web Properties Group:
- CompuServe (Classic, 2000 and Basic), an Internet service provider
- Mirabilis, makers of the ICQ instant messaging program
- MapQuest, a WWW map and direction site
- Netscape, a web portal and browser vendor, owner of the Open Directory Project and formerly leader of the Mozilla project
- Nullsoft, a software development group best known for Winamp.
- Advertising.com.
- Time Warner Cable, a cable television company
- Time Warner Book Group publishing arm that includes Warner Books and Little, Brown & Co.
- TIME, a weekly news magazine
- People, a weekly celebrity magazine
- Sports Illustrated, a sports magazine
- MAD magazine, a humor magazine
- Fortune, Money Magazine, business and investing magazines
- Warner Bros., a movie studio
- New Line Cinema, a movie studio
- Castle Rock Entertainment, a production company
- Atlanta Braves, a Major League Baseball team
- DC Comics, a comic book company
- Rhino Entertainment, a specialty recording, home video, and production company
- Turner Entertainment, production company largely responsible for the distribution of the classic MGM, RKO, and Warner Bros. film libraries
- Turner Broadcasting System, responsible for managing several cable networks including CNN and Cartoon Network, as well as Turner Entertainment Time Warner also owns several other television channels and magazines, including CNN Headline News and Entertainment Weekly, as well as Timelife books and music. See external links below for a complete list.

Financials

In 2004, Time Warner's market capitalization was US$84 billion (2004). When the AOL-Time Warner merger was announced in January 2000, the combined market capitalization was $280 billion. For fiscal year 2002 the company reported a $99 billion loss on its income statement ([http://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=TWX&annual]) because of $100 billion in non-recurring charges, almost all from a writedown of the goodwill (intangible asset) from the merger in 2000. (The value of the AOL portion of the company had dropped sharply with the collapse of the Internet boom, in the early 2000s.)

Commercial Properties

Time Warner Inc. owns several large properties in New York City; certain buildings in the Rockefeller Center complex and adjacent office towers house its main offices; one of which houses a CNN news studio. In late 2003, Time Warner finished construction of a new twin-tower complex, designed to serve as additional office space, facing Columbus Circle on the southwestern edge of Central Park. Originally called the AOL Time Warner Center, the 755-foot, 55-floor mixed-use property was renamed Time Warner Center when the company itself was renamed.

Board of Directors

As of November 2005.
- James L. Barksdale - Barksdale Management
- Stephen F. Bollenbach - Hilton Hotels
- Frank J. Caufield - Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
- Robert C. Clark - Harvard University
- Jessica P. Einhorn - Johns Hopkins University
- Miles R. Gilburne - ZG Ventures
- Carla A. Hills - Hills & Company
- Reuben Mark - Colgate-Palmolive Company
- Michael A. Miles - Philip Morris Companies (now Altria Group)
- Kenneth J. Novack - former Time Warner - Affiliate Director
- Richard D. Parsons - Chairman of the Board & Chief Executive Officer
- Ted Turner - Turner Broadcasting System
- Francis T. Vincent, Jr. - Vincent Enterprises
- Deborah C. Wright - Carver Bancorp

External links

- [http://www.timewarner.com/ Time Warner corporate website]
- [http://www.ketupa.net/time.htm Ketupa - Time Warner] profile
- [http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/timewarner.asp Columbia Journal Review's Who Owns What for Time Warner]
- [http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/business/jan-june00/aol_01-10.html Early analysis of the Time Warner-AOL merger]
- [http://www.interviewat.com/time-warner/ Interview process at Time Warner]
- [http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/102/102518.html Yahoo! - Time Warner Inc. Company Profile] Category:Time Warner Category:Fortune 500 companies Category:Companies based in New York City Time Warner Inc. Category:Companies traded on the New York Stock Exchange ja:タイム・ワーナー

El Salvador

The Republic of El Salvador (Spanish for "The Savior"), which was known prehispanically as Cuscatlán, is a country in Central America with a population of approximately 6.7 million people. It is the most densely populated nation on the American mainland (especially in its capital, San Salvador). It is also the most industrialized country in the region.

History

Main article: History of El Salvador The civilization of El Salvador dates from the pre-Columbian time, around 1500 years B.C.E, according to evidence provided by the ancient ruins of Tazumal and Chalchuapa. The Spanish Admiral Andrés Niño lead an expedition to Central America and disembarked on the Island Meanguera, located in the Gulf of Fonseca, on May 31st, 1522. This was the first Salvadoran territory visited by the Spaniards. In June, 1524, Spanish Captain Pedro de Alvarado began a predatory war against Cuzcatlán (land of precious things) that was populated by the native tribes of the country. After 17 days of bloody battles many natives and Spaniards died, including the legendary indigenous leader Atlacatl. Pedro de Alvarado defeated, and hurt in his left hip, abandoned the fight and ran to Guatemala, telling his brother, Gonzalo de Alvarado, to continue with the conquest of Cuzcatlán. Later, his cousin Diego de Alvarado established the villa of San Salvador on April, 1525. King Carlos I of Spain granted San Salvador the title of city in the year 1546. During the following years, El Salvador developed under Spanish dominion. Towards the end of 1810, a feeling of a need for feedom arose between the people of Central America and the moment to break the chains of slavery arrived at dawn on November 5th, 1811, when the Salvadoran priest, Jose Matías Delgado, sounded the bells of the Iglesia La Merced in San Salvador, making a call for the insurrection. After many internal fights, the Acta de Independencia (Act of Independence) of Central America was signed in Guatemala on September 15th, 1821. On September 15, 1821, El Salvador and the other Central American provinces declared their independence from Spain. In 1823, the United Provinces of Central America was formed by the five Central American states under General Manuel José Arce. When this federation was dissolved in 1838, El Salvador became an independent republic. El Salvador's early history as an independent state was marked by frequent revolutions. From 1872 to 1898 El Salvador was a prime mover in attempts to reestablish an isthmian federation. The governments of El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua formed the Greater Republic of Central America via the Pact of Amapala in 1895. Although Guatemala and Costa Rica considered joining the Greater Republic (which was rechristened the United States of Central America when its constitution went into effect in 1898), neither country joined. This union, which had planned to establish its capital city at Amapala on the Golfo de Fonseca, did not survive a seizure of power in El Salvador in 1898. The enormous profits that coffee yielded as a monoculture export served as an impetus for the process whereby land became concentrated in the hands of an oligarchy of several hundred families. A succession of presidents from the ranks of the Salvadoran oligarchy, nominally both conservative and liberal, throughout the last half of the 19th century generally agreed on the promotion of coffee as the predominant cash crop, on the development of infrastructure (railroads and port facilities) primarily in support of the coffee trade, on the elimination of communal landholdings to facilitate further coffee production, on the passage of anti-vagrancy laws to ensure that displaced campesinos and other rural residents provided sufficient labor for the coffee fincas (plantations), and on the suppression of rural discontent. The coffee industry grew inexorably in El Salvador. As a result the elite provided the bulk of the government's financial support through import duties on goods imported with the foreign currencies that coffee sales earned. This support, coupled with the humbler and more mundane mechanisms of corruption, ensured the coffee growers of overwhelming influence within the government and the military which they used to create the Guardia Nacional (GN) in 1912. The duties of the GN differed from those of the Policia Nacional (PN), mainly in that GN personnel were specifically responsible for providing security on the coffee fincas and effectively suppressing rural dissent. A bloodless coup led by General Tomás Regalado took El Salvador into the 20th century. Regalado's peaceful transfer of power in 1903 to his handpicked successor, Pedro José Escalón, ushered in a period of comparative stability that extended until the Depression-provoked upheaval of 1931–32. In 1930, General Maximiliano Hernández Martínez, the country's Minister of Defense, took power in a coup d'état. Soon after, Martínez, now President, suppressed a 1932 revolt consisting of farmers and Indians in the western part of the country. The revolt was conducted by the newly formed Communist Party and its leader Agustín Farabundo Martí. The military conflict left more than 20,000 people dead in retaliatory massacres, which came to be known as "La Matanza;" this marked the beginning of a series of de facto military dictatorships that would rule El Salvador until 1979, when General Humberto Romero of the Party of National Conciliation (PCN) would be overthrown in a reformist coup. Under the authoritarian rule of Maj. Óscar Osorio (1950–56) and Lt. Col. José María Lemus (1956–60) considerable economic progress was made. Lemus was overthrown by a coup, and after a confused period, a junta composed of leaders of the National Conciliation party came to power in June 1961. The junta's candidate, Lt. Col. Julio Adalberto Rivera, was elected president in 1962. He was succeeded in 1967 by Col. Fidel Sánchez Hernández. Relations with Honduras deteriorated in the late 1960s. There was a border clash in 1967, and a four-day so-called Football war broke out in July 1969. The Salvadoran forces that had invaded Honduras were withdrawn, but not until 1992 was an agreement settling the border controversy with Honduras signed. Following increasing clashes between the FMLN, El Salvadoran Armed Forces (ESAF) and rightist vigilantes known as death squads, a civil war broke out that would last twelve years (1980–1992) and claim the lives of approximately 75,000 people. A ceasefire was established in 1992 when the rebels of the FMLN and the government of President Alfredo Cristiani of the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA), signed "Peace accords" on January 16, 1992 that assured political and military reforms and punishment for all human rights abuses during the civil war; death squad activity was virtually eliminated. However, the accords did not expound on social reforms. El Salvador is known for the many earthquakes that occur within its borders. It has been known popularly as the “Valley of the Hammocks” since colonial times. On January 13, 2001 an earthquake that measured 7.6 on the Richter scale caused a landslide that killed more than 800 people. On February 13, 2001, a second earthquake killed 255 people.

Geography

Main article: Geography of El Salvador See also List of cities in El Salvador

Politics

Main article: Politics of El Salvador, Legislative Assembly of El Salvador, List of political parties in El Salvador El Salvador is a democratic republic governed by a president and an 84-member unicameral Legislative Assembly. The president is elected by universal suffrage and serves for a five year term by absolute majority vote. A second round runoff is required in the event that no candidate receives more than 50% of the first round vote. Members of the assembly (called deputies, diputados), also elected by universal suffrage, serve for three-year terms. The country has an independent judiciary and Supreme Court. The current President of El Salvador is Elías Antonio Saca González, elected on 21 March 2004. He took office on 1 June 2004, and his presidential term ends on 1 June 2009. The current legal system of El Salvador, based on civil and Roman law with traces of common law, came into force with the passage of the constitution on 23 December, 1983.
- La Union
- Zacatecoluca

Political divisions

Many early post-colonial rulers, such as Francisco Morazán and Gerardo Barrios, were of French descent and were hence sympathetic to the Napoleonic code, which was successfully adapted to El Salvador. For this reason, the country has French-style territorial divisions. El Salvador is divided into fourteen departments:

Image:El Salvador departments numbered.png
#Ahuachapán #Cabañas #Chalatenango #Cuscatlán #La Libertad #La Paz #La Unión	Morazán San Miguel San Salvador San Vicente Santa Ana Sonsonate Usulután

Economy

Main article: Economy of El Salvador By 2005, El Salvador became the strongest economy in Central America and the Caribbean. The Salvadoran economy has experienced mixed results from the ARENA government's commitment to free market initiatives and conservative fiscal management that include the privatization of the banking system, telecommunications, public pensions, electrical distribution, and some electrical generation, reduction of import duties, elimination of price controls, and an improved enforcement of intellectual property rights. The GDP variable has been growing at a steady and moderate pace since the signing of peace accords in 1992, in an environment of macroeconomic stability. A problem that the Salvadoran economy faces is the inequality in the distribution of income. In 1999, the richest fifth of the population received 45% of the country's income, while the poorest fifth received only 5.6%. As of December 1999, net international reserves equaled US$1.8 billion or roughly five months of imports. Having this hard currency buffer to work with, the Salvadoran Government undertook a monetary integration plan beginning January 1, 2001, by which the U.S. dollar became legal tender alongside the colón, and all formal accounting was undertaken in U.S. dollars. This way, the government has formally limited its possibility of implementing open market monetary policies to influence short term variables in the economy. Since 2004, the colón stopped circulating and is now never used in the country for any type of transaction; however some stores still have prices in both colones and U.S. dollars. In general, people were unhappy with the shift from the colón to the U.S. dollar, because wages are still the same but the price of everything increased. Things that once cost 5 colones now cost $1, which would be 8.75 colones. Some economists claim this rise in prices would have been caused by inflation regardless even had the shift not been made. Some economists also contend that now, according to Gresham's Law, a reversion to the colón would be disastrous to the economy. Some banks however claim that they still do some transactions en colones, keeping this change from being unconstitutional. The change to the dollar also precipitated a trend toward lower interest rates in El Salvador, helping many to secure credit in order to buy a house or a car; over time, the sense of displeasure with the change has largely disappeared, though the issue resurfaces as a political tool when elections are on the horizon. Among the biggest challenges in El Salvador have been to manage the decline in the coffee sector, which only accounted for 7.0% of exports in 2004, and to develop new growth sectors for a more diversified economy. Currently there are fifteen free trade zones in El Salvador. The largest beneficiary has been the maquila industry, which provides 88,700 jobs directly, and consists primarily of cutting and assembling clothes for export to the United States. El Salvador signed the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), negotiated by the five countries of Central America and the Dominican Republic, with the United States in 2004. In order to take advantage of CAFTA, the Salvadoran government is challenged to conduct policies that guarantee better conditions for entrepreneurs and workers to transfer from declining to growing sectors in the economy. El Salvador has already signed free trade agreements with Mexico, Chile, the Dominican Republic, and Panama, and increased its exports to those countries. El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua also are negotiating a free trade agreement with Canada. Fiscal policy has been the biggest challenge for the Salvadoran government. The 1992 peace accords committed the government to heavy expenditures for transition programs and social services. Although international aid was generous, the government has focused on improving the collection of its current revenues. A 10% value-added tax (VAT), implemented in September 1992, was raised to 13% in July 1995. The VAT is the biggest source of revenue, accounting for about 52.3% of total tax revenues in 2004. Remittances from Salvadorans working in the United States sent to family members are a major source of foreign income and offset the substantial trade deficit of around $2.9 billion. Remittances have increased steadily in the last decade and reached an all-time high of $12.5 billion in 2004—approximately 17.1% of gross domestic product (GDP). This figure is hurting the U.S. economy because that is $12.5 billion dollars not being spent in the U.S., and if one day the U.S. would forbid sending remittances to El Salvador, the entire economy of El Salvador would collapse, and as much as 90% of the population would be homeless. As of April 2004, net international reserves stood at $1.9 billion. In recent years inflation has fallen to single digit levels, and total exports have grown substantially.

Demographics

inflation Main article: Demographics of El Salvador El Salvador's population numbers about 6.7 million people. Around 90% is mestizo (mixed Amerindian and Spanish), some 9% white, and only 1% indigenous. Very few Amerindians have retained their native customs, traditions, or languages. Spanish is the language spoken by virtually all inhabitants. The country's people are largely Roman Catholic (83% of the population), though Protestant groups are growing (15%). The capital city of San Salvador has about 2.1 million people; an estimated 42% of El Salvador's population live in rural areas. According to the most recent United Nations survey, life expectancy for men was 68 years and 74 years for women. Education in El Salvador is free through high school. The national literacy rate is 84.1%. At the beginning of 2004, there were approximately 3.1 million Salvadorans living outside El Salvador, many of whom are immigrants (though not always legally) in the United States. The USA has traditionally been the destination of choice for El Salvadorans looking for greater economic opportunity than their current position can provide. Other countries with notable Salvadoran communities include Canada, Honduras, Guatemala, Belize and Australia. The situation worsened later during the civil war of the decade of the 1980s and from adverse economic and social conditions. Pursuant to peace accords signed in January of 1992 between the FMLN and the ARENA-party-dominated government, the government made a series of economic reforms in the mold of the neoliberal model supported by the USA. This model has given good results on the macroeconomic level but that nevertheless are not reflected in an improvement of the standard of living for the majority of Salvadorans. In 2001 El Salvador adopted, by legislative decree, the U.S. dollar as its official currency, replacing the previous currency called the Colon (Spanish for 'Columbus', as in Christopher Columbus).

Culture

A small part of the population speaks Nahua, the native language. The Roman Catholic religion played an important role in the Salvadoran culture. Painting, ceramics and textile articles are the main manual artistic expressions. Writers Francisco Gavidia (1863–1955) and Manlio Argueta, and poet Roque Dalton are among the most important artists to stem from El Salvador. Notable 20th century personages include the late filmmaker Baltasar Polio and artist Fernando Llort.

Holidays
Date	English Name	Local Name	Remarks
March/April	Holy Week	Semana Santa	Celebrated with carnival-like events in different cities by the large Catholic population
May 1	Labor Day	Día de los trabajadores	International Labour Day
May 10	Mother's Day	Día de la Madre
August 1–7	August Festivals	Fiestas de Agosto	Week long festival in Celebration for the El Salvador del Mundo, patron saint of El Salvador.
September 15	Independence Day	Día de la Independencia	Celebrates independence from Spain, achieved in 1821
October 12	Columbus Day	Día de la Raza	This day commemorates the discovery of the Americas
November 2	Day of the Dead	Día de los Difuntos
December 25	Christmas Day	Navidad

Miscellaneous topics

- List of Salvadorans
- Carlos Hernandez
- Communications in El Salvador
- Football War
- Foreign relations of El Salvador
- Military of El Salvador
- Óscar Romero
- Transportation in El Salvador
- Central American Spanish

External links

- [http://www.rsf.fr/article.php3?id_article=4116 Worldwide press freedom index] Rank 33 out of 139 countries (2 way tie)
- [http://www.tipcom.net/listasal/ Directorio de Sitios Web Salvadoreños] - Salvadoran Website Directory
- [http://www.nuestroblog.com Blogs El Salvador]
- [http://www.digestyc.gob.sv Economic and demographic data]
- [http://www.elsalvadorclasificados.com/ Clasificados Salvadoreños]
- [http://luterano.blogspot.com Tim's El Salvador Blog] - Current Events
- [http://www.brevespacio.com Poetry El Salvador]
- [http://www.ayvevos.com/ Forums & Salvadorian Community ]
- [http://www.unionchurchofsansalvador.org/living.htm Living in San Salvador]
- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4513593.stm El Salvador wildlife]
Government sites
- [http://www.casapres.gob.sv/ Casa Presidencial] (Website of the President)
- [http://www.asamblea.gob.sv/ Asamblea Legislativa] (Website of the Legislative Assembly)
- [http://www.fuerzaarmada.gob.sv/portadafa2.html Ministerio de Defensa Nacional] (Ministry of Defense)
- [http://www.fas.gob.sv Fuerza Aerea Salvadoreña] (Air Force of El Salvador)
- [http://www.marn.gob.sv/ Ministerio de Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales] (Ministry of the Environment and Natural resources)
- [http://www.rree.gob.sv/website/index.html Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores] (Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
- [http://www.minec.gob.sv/ Ministerio de Economía] (Ministry of the Economy)
- [http://www.elsalvadorturismo.gob.sv/ Ministerio de Turismo] (Ministry of Tourism)
- [http://www.csj.gob.sv/idioma.htm Corte Suprema de Justicia] (Supreme Court of Justice)
- [http://www.pddh.gob.sv/ Procuraduría para la Defensa de los Derechos Humanos] (Office of the judge advocate general for the Defense of Human rights) Salvadoran media
- News sites
- [http://www.diariocolatino.com/ Diario Colatino]
- [http://www.apes.org.sv/index.php Asociación de Periodistas de El Salvador]
- [http://www.laprensagrafica.com/portada/default.asp La Prensa Grafica]
- [http://www.elmundo.com.sv/ El Mundo]
- [http://www.elsalvador.com/ El Diario de Hoy]
- [http://www.elfaro.net/ El Faro]
- [http://www.flacso.org.sv/ El Flasco]
- Television sites
- [http://www.tcs246.com/ TCS]
- [http://www.canal12.com.sv/ Canal 12]
- [http://www.canal21tv.com.sv/ Canal 21] Charities and Volunteer Organisations
- [http://www.asaprosar.com/ ASAPROSAR - Salvadoran Association for Rural Health]
- [http://www.angelfire.com/pro/r-to-b/index.html Lifeline El Salvador - Volunteer, Work and Teach English Abroad]
- [http://www.fssca.net/ Foundation for Self-Sufficiency in Central America] Category:Central American countries
- Famous Salvadoran Graphics Designers Include: -Josué Figueroa, an expert at "tag art" zh-min-nan:El Salvador ko:엘살바도르 ms:El Salvador ja:エルサルバドル th:ประเทศเอลซัลวาดอร์

January 15

January 15 is the 15th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 350 days remaining (351 in leap years).

Events

- 69 - Otho seizes power in Rome, proclaiming himself Emperor of Rome, but only survives for three months before committing suicide.
- 1559 - Elizabeth I of England is crowned in Westminster Abbey by Owen Oglethorpe, the Bishop of Carlisle, instead of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
- 1582 - Russia cedes Livonia and Estonia to Poland.
- 1759 - The British Museum opens.
- 1777 - American Revolutionary War: New Connecticut (present day Vermont) declares its independence.
- 1782 - Superintendent of Finance Robert Morris goes before the U.S. Congress to recommend establishment of a national mint and decimal coinage.
- 1844 - University of Notre Dame receives its charter from Indiana.
- 1870 - A political cartoon for the first time symbolizes the United States Democratic Party with a donkey ("A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion" by Thomas Nast for Harper's Weekly).
- 1892 - James Naismith publishes the rules for basketball.
- 1908 - Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, the first Greek-letter organization by and for Black college women is established.
- 1919 - The Boston Molasses Disaster kills 21 people.
- Ignace Paderewski becomes Premier of Poland.
- 1936 - The first building to be completely covered in glass is completed in Toledo, Ohio (the building was for the Owens-Illinois Glass Company).
- 1943 - World War II: Japanese driven off Guadalcanal.
- 1943 - The world's largest office building, The Pentagon, is dedicated (Arlington, Virginia).
- 1947 - "Black Dahlia" Elizabeth Short murdered, Los Angeles California.
- 1951 - Ilse Koch, The "Bitch of Buchenwald", wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, is sentenced to life imprisonment in a court in West Germany.
- 1966- First Military Coup in Nigeria, government of Abubakar Tafawa Balewa is overthrown.
- 1967 - Super Bowl I is played -- The Green Bay Packers defeat the Kansas City Chiefs, 35-10.
- 1969 - The Soviet Union launches Soyuz 5.
- 1970 - After a 32-month fight for independence from Nigeria, Biafra surrenders.
- Muammar al-Qaddafi is proclaimed premier of Libya.
- 1973 - Vietnam War: Citing progress in peace negotiations, President of the United States Richard Nixon announces the suspension of offensive action in North Vietnam.
- 1974 - Happy Days premiers on ABC.
- 1975 - Portugal grants independence to Angola.
- 1976 - Gerald Ford's would-be assassin, Sara Jane Moore, is sentenced to life in prison.
- 1986 - The HBO and Cinemax pay cable television services initiate scrambling of their national satellite feeds on Galaxy 1 with the Videocipher II system.
- 1990 - AT&T's long distance telephone network suffers a cascade switching failure.
- 1991 - The United Nations deadline for the withdrawal of Iraqi forces from occupied Kuwait expires, preparing the way for the start of Operation Desert Storm.
- 1992 - The international community recognizes the independence of Slovenia and Croatia from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
- 1995 - Caretaker, the first episode of Star Trek: Voyager airs, with Captain Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) at the helm.
- 1999 - The Racak incident: 45 Albanians in the Kosovo village of Racak were killed by Yugoslav security forces.
- 2001 - Wikipedia, a Wiki free content encyclopedia, goes online.
- 2006 - Season 5 premiere of 24.

Births

1342 to 1899

- 1342 - Philip II, Duke of Burgundy (d. 1404)
- 1432 - King Afonso V of Portugal (d. 1481)
- 1481 - Ashikaga Yoshizumi, Japanese shogun (b. 1511)
- 1538 - Maeda Toshiie, Japanese general (d. 1599)
- 1622 - Molière, French playwright (d. 1673)
- 1671 - Abraham de la Pryme, English antiquarian (d. 1704)
- 1674 - Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon, French writer (d. 1762)
- 1716 - Philip Livingston, American signer of the Declaration of Independence (d. 1778)
- 1747 - John Aikin, English doctor and writer (d. 1822)
- 1754 - Richard Martin, Irish founder of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (d. 1834)
- 1791 - Franz Grillparzer, Austrian writer (1872)
- 1795 - Alexandr Griboyedov, Russian playwright (d. 1829)
- 1809 - Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, French anarchist (d. 1865)
- 1812 - Peter Christian Asbjørnsen, Norwegian writer and scientist (d. 1885)
- 1842 - Josef Breuer, Austrian psychologist (d. 1925)
- 1850 - Mihai Eminescu, Romanian poet (d. 1889)
- 1863 - Wilhelm Marx, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1946)
- 1866 - Nathan Söderblom, Swedish archbishop, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1931)
- 1869 - Stanisław Wyspiański, Polish dramatist, poet, painter, and architect (d. 1907)
- 1872 - Arsen Kotsoyev, Russian writer (d. 1944)
- 1875 - Tom Burke, American runner (d. 1929)
- 1879 - Mazo de la Roche, Canadian author (d. 1961)
- 1885 - Huang Yuanyong, Chinese writer (d. 1915)
- 1891 - Ray Chapman, baseball player (d. 1920)
- 1891 - Osip Mandelstam, Russian poet and essayist (d. 1938)
- 1892 - Rex Ingram, Irish director and writer (d. 1950)
- 1893 - Ivor Novello, Welsh actor and musician (d. 1951)
- 1895 - Artturi Ilmari Virtanen, Finnish chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1973)
- 1899 - Goodman Ace, American actor, comedian, and writer (d. 1982)

1900 to 1999

- 1901 - Luis Monti, Argentine-Italian footballer
- 1906 - Aristotle Onassis, Greek businessman (d. 1975)
- 1908 - Edward Teller, Hungarian-born physicist (d. 2003)
- 1909 - Jean Bugatti, German-born automobile designer (d. 1939)
- 1909 - Gene Krupa, American drummer (d. 1973)
- 1913 - Lloyd Bridges, American actor (d. 1998)
- 1914 - Hugh Trevor-Roper, Baron Dacre of Glanton, English historian (d. 2003)
- 1916 - Marie LaFarge, French murderer (d. 1852)
- 1917 - Robert Byrd, American politician
- 1918 - Gamal Abdal Nasser, President of Egypt (d. 1970)
- 1920 - John Cardinal O'Connor, American Catholic cardinal (d. 2000)
- 1923 - Lee Teng-hui, Taiwanese politician
- 1926 - Maria Schell, Swiss actress (d. 2005)
- 1927 - Phyllis Coates, actress
- 1927 - Norm Crosby, American comedian
- 1929 - Martin Luther King Jr, American civil rights leader, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1968)
- 1933 - Ernest J. Gaines, American author
- 1937 - Margaret O'Brien, American actress
- 1941 - Captain Beefheart, American singer
- 1942 - Charo, Spanish-born singer and actress
- 1945 - Vince Foster, American lawyer (d. 1993)
- 1947 - Andrea Martin, Canadian actress
- 1948 - Ronnie VanZant, American singer (Lynyrd Skynyrd) (d. 1977)
- 1953 - Kent Hovind, American evangelist
- 1955 - Nigel Benson, British author and illustrator
- 1957 - Julian Sands, English actor
- 1957 - Mario Van Peebles, Mexican actor and director
- 1965 - Adam Jones, American musician (Tool)
- 1968 - Chad Lowe, American actor
- 1971 - Regina King, American actress
- 1972 - Claudia Winkleman, British television presenter
- 1975 - Mary Pierce, American tennis player
- 1976 - Corey Chavous, American football player
- 1981 - El Hadji Diouf, Senegalese footballer
- 1982 - Benjamin Agosto, American skater
- 1982 - Megan Quann, American swimmer
- 1983 - Jermaine Pennant, English footballer
- 1984 - Victor Rasuk, American actor

Deaths

41 to 1899

- 41 - Caligula, Roman Emperor (b. 12)
- 570 - Saint Ides, Irish nun
- 1595 - Murat III, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1546)
- 1672 - John Cosin, English clergyman (b. 1594)
- 1683 - Philip Warwick, English writer and politician (b. 1609)
- 1781 - Marianne Victoria of Borbón, queen regent of Portugal (b. 1718)
- 1790 - John Landen, English mathematician (b. 1719)
- 1804 - Dru Drury, English entomologist (b. 1725)

1900 to 1999

- 1915 - Mary Slessor, Scottish missionary (b. 1848)
- 1919 - Rosa Luxemburg, German politician (b. 1870)
- 1955 - Yves Tanguy, French painter (b. 1900)
- 1964 - Jack Teagarden, American musician (b. 1905)
- 1983 - Meyer Lansky, Russian-born gangster (b. 1902)
- 1987 - Ray Bolger, American actor, singer, and dancer (b. 1904)
- 1988 - Seán MacBride, Irish statesman, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1904)
- 1990 - Gordon Jackson, Scottish actor (b. 1923)
- 1993 - Sammy Cahn, American songwriter (b. 1913)
- 1994 - Harry Nilsson, American musician (b. 1941)
- 1998 - Junior Wells, American musician (b. 1934)

2000 onwards

- 2000 - Zeljko Raznatovic, Serbian leader (b. 1952)
- 2000 - Fran Ryan, American actress (b. 1916)
- 2001 - Ted Mann, American screenwriter (b. 1916)
- 2003 - Doris Fisher, American singer and songwriter (b. 1915)
- 2005 - Deem Bristow, American video game voice actor (b. 1947)
- 2005 - Victoria de los Angeles, Catalan soprano (b. 1923)
- 2005 - Walter Ernsting, German author (b. 1920)
- 2005 - Elizabeth Janeway, American author (b. 1913)
- 2005 - Dan Lee, Canadian animator (b. 1969)
- 2005 - Ruth Warrick, American actress (b. 1915)

Holidays and observances

- Roman Empire - Second day of the Carmentalia in honor of Carmenta
- Roman Catholic Church - Saint Ides, virgin, died Jan. 15, 570
- Malawi - John Chilembwe Day
- North Korea - Hangul Day
- United States - Traditionally, Martin Luther King Day
- Kerala in India - Makaravilakku or Makara Sankranthy at Sabarimala
- Jallikattu in South India
- Wikipedia Day

External links

- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/15 BBC: On This Day] ---- January 14 - January 16 - December 15 - February 15 — listing of all days ko:1월 15일 ja:1月15日 simple:January 15 th:9 มกราคม

Wiki

A wiki (IPA: or (according to Ward Cunningham) is a type of website that allows users to add and edit content and is especially suited for collaborative authoring. The term wiki also sometimes refers to the collaborative software itself (wiki engine) that facilitates the operation of such a website (see wiki software). In essence, a wiki is a simplification of the process of creating HTML pages combined with a system that records each individual change that occurs over time, so that at any time, a page can be reverted to any of its previous states. A wiki system may also provide various tools that allow the user community to easily monitor the constantly changing state of the wiki and discuss the issues that emerge in trying to achieve a consensus about the wiki content. Some wikis, notably Wikipedia, allow almost completely unrestricted access so that people are able to contribute to the site without necessarily having to undergo a process of 'registration' as had usually been required by various other types of interactive web sites such as Internet forums or chat sites. The WikiWikiWeb is named after the "Wiki Wiki" line of Chance RT-52 buses in Honolulu International Airport. The name is based on the Hawaiian term wiki, meaning "quick", "fast", or "to hasten" [http://wehewehe.org/cgi-bin/hdict?e=q-0hdict--00-0-0--010---4----den--0-000lpm--1en-Zz-1---Zz-1-home-wiki--00031-0000escapewin-00&a=q&d=D21021 (Hawaiian dictionary)]. Sometimes wikiwiki (or Wikiwiki) is used instead of wiki [http://wehewehe.org/cgi-bin/hdict?a=q&r=1&hs=1&e=q-0hdict--00-0-0--010---4----den--0-000lpm--1en-Zz-1---Zz-1-home---00031-0000escapewin-00&q=wikiwiki&j=pm&hdid=0&hdds=0 (Hawaiian dictionary)]. Wiki is sometimes interpreted as the backronym for "What I know is", which describes the knowledge contribution, storage and exchange function.

Key characteristics

A wiki enables documents to be written collectively (co-authoring) in a simple markup using a web browser. A single page in a wiki is referred to as a "wiki page", while the entire body of pages, which are usually highly interconnected via hyperlinks, is "the wiki"; in effect, a very simple, easier-to-use database. A defining characteristic of wiki technology is the ease with which pages can be created and updated. Generally, there is no review before modifications are accepted. Most wikis are open to the general public without the need to register any user account. Sometimes session log-in is requested to acquire a "wiki-signature" cookie for autosigning edits. More private wiki servers require user authentication. However, many edits can be made in real-time, and appear almost instantaneously online.

Pages and editing

In a traditional wiki, there are three representations for each page:
- The user-editable "source code", which is also the format stored locally on the server. It usually is plain text, made visible to the user only when the edit operation shows it in a browser form.
- A template (possibly internally generated) that defines layout and elements common to all pages.
- The rendered HTML code produced by the server on the fly from the source text when a particular page is requested. The source format, sometimes known as "wikitext", is augmented with a simplified markup language to indicate various structural and visual conventions. A common example of one such convention is to start a line of text with an asterisk ("
- ") so as to mark it as an item in a bulleted list. Style and syntax can vary a great deal among implementations, some of which also allow HTML tags. The reasoning behind this design is that HTML, with its many cryptic tags, is not especially human-readable. Making typical HTML source visible makes the actual text content very hard to read and edit for most users. It is therefore better to promote plain-text editing with a few simple conventions for structure and style. It is also sometimes viewed as beneficial that users cannot directly use all the functionality that HTML allows, such as JavaScript and Cascading Style Sheets. Consistency in look and feel is also achieved, along with some extra safety for the user. In many wiki implementations, an active hyperlink is exactly as it is shown, unlike in HTML where the invisible hyperlink can have an arbitrary visible anchor text.

(Quotation above from Foundation by Isaac Asimov) Some recent wiki engines use a different method: they allow "WYSIWYG" editing, usually by means of JavaScript or an ActiveX control that translates graphically entered formatting instructions such as "bold" and "italics" into the corresponding HTML tags. In those implementations, saving an edit amounts to submitting a new HTML version of the page to the server, although the user is shielded from this technical detail as the markup is generated transparently. Users who do not have the necessary plugin can generally edit the page, usually by directly editing the raw HTML code.

Standard

While for years the de facto standard was the syntax of the original WikiWikiWeb, currently the formatting instructions vary considerably depending on the wiki engine. Simple wikis allow only basic text formatting, whereas more complex ones have support for tables, images, formulas, or even interactive elements such as polls and games. Many people switch between wiki engines. Because of the difficulty in using several syntaxes, many people are putting considerable effort into defining a wiki markup standard (see efforts by Meatball and [http://tikiwiki.org/tiki-index.php?page=RFCWiki TikiWiki]).

Linking and creating pages

Wikis are a true hypertext medium, with non-linear navigational structures. Each page typically contains a large number of links to other pages. Hierarchical navigation pages often exist in larger wikis, often a consequence of the original page creation process, but they do not have to be used. Links are created using a specific syntax, the so-called "link pattern". Originally, most wikis used CamelCase as a link pattern, produced by capitalizing words in a phrase and removing the spaces between them (the word "CamelCase" is itself an example of CamelCase). While CamelCase makes linking very easy, it also leads to links which are written in a form that deviates from the standard spelling. CamelCase-based wikis are instantly recognizable from the large number of links with names such as "TableOfContents" and "BeginnerQuestions". Note: It is easy for a wiki to render the visible anchor for such links "pretty" by reinserting spaces, and possibly also reverting to lower case. CamelCase has many critics, and wiki developers looked for alternative solutions. The first to introduce so called "free links" using this _(free link format) was Cliki. Various wiki engines use single brackets, curly brackets, underscores, slashes or other characters as a link pattern. Links across different wiki communities are possible using a special link pattern called InterWiki. New pages in a wiki are usually created simply by creating the appropriate links on a topically related page. If the link does not exist, it is typically emphasized as a "broken link". Following that link opens an edit window, which then allows the user to enter the text for the new page. This mechanism ensures that so-called "orphan" pages (which have no links pointing to them) are rarely created, and a generally high level of connectedness is retained..

Searching

Most wikis offer at least a title search, and sometimes a full text search. The scalability of the search depends on whether the wiki engine uses a database or not; indexed database access is necessary for high speed searches on large wikis. On Wikipedia, the so-called "Go button" allows readers to directly view a page that matches the entered search criteria as closely as possible. The MetaWiki search engine was created to enable searches across multiple wikis.

Server-side versus client-side wiki

By far the most common wiki systems are server-side (Wikipedia is a server-side wiki). In essence, the edit, display and control functions are provided on the server through the wikiengine that renders the content into a HTML-based page for display in a web browser. A client-side wiki system only requires the server to "serve" wiki files in much the same way as a web server allows HTML files to be retrieved using HTTP. In this type of wiki system, all the execution required to convert the underlying wiki text into an onscreen formatted display page resides in the client browser. Likewise, the editing tools and functionality reside with the browser. The client-side wiki system parallels HTML in that the page becomes a rendering instruction for the browser to interpret. Client-side wiki systems may be little more than a code plugin to traditional web browsers.

Controlling changes

Wikipedia Wikis generally are designed with the philosophy of making it easy to correct mistakes, rather than making it difficult to make them. Thus while wikis are very open, they provide a means to verify the validity of recent additions to the body of pages. The most prominent, on almost every wiki, is the "Recent Changes" page—a specific list numbering recent edits, or a list of all the edits made within a given timeframe. Some wikis can filter the list to remove minor edits and edits made by automatic importing scripts ("bots"). From the change log, other functions are accessible in most wikis: the Revision History showing previous page versions; and the diff feature, highlighting the changes between two revisions. Using the Revision History, an editor can view and restore a previous version of the article. The diff feature can be used to decide whether or not this is necessary. A regular wiki user can view the diff of an edit listed on the "Recent Changes" page and, if it is an unacceptable edit, consult the history, restoring a previous revision; this process is more or less streamlined, depending on the wiki software used. In case unacceptable edits are missed on the "Recent Changes" page, some wiki engines provide additional content control. It can be monitored to ensure that a page, or a set of pages, keeps its quality. A person willing to maintain pages will be warned of modifications to the pages, allowing him or her to quickly verify the validity of new editions!

Vandalism

The open philosophy of most wikis—of allowing anyone to edit content—does not ensure that editors are well intentioned. Wiki vandalism is a constant problem for wikis, though perhaps overrated. Studies from IBM have shown that most vandalism to Wikipedia is reverted in 5 minutes or less.

History

Wiki software originated in the design pattern community as a way of writing and discussing pattern languages. The WikiWikiWeb was the first wiki, established by Ward Cunningham on March 25, 1995, as a complement to the Portland Pattern Repository. [http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WikiHistory] He invented the wiki name and concept, and implemented the first wiki engine. Some people maintain that only the original wiki should be called Wiki (upper case) or the WikiWikiWeb. Cunningham coined the term wiki after the "wiki wiki" or "quick" shuttle buses at Honolulu Airport. Wiki wiki was the first Hawaiian term he learned on his first visit to the islands, when the airport counter agent directed him to take the wiki wiki bus between terminals. According to Cunningham, "I chose wiki-wiki as an alliterative substitute for 'quick' and thereby avoided naming this stuff quick-web." [http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WikiHistory] See also: List of computer term etymologies. In the late 1990s, wikis increasingly were recognized as a promising way to develop private- and public-knowledge bases, and this potential inspired the founders of the Nupedia encyclopedia project, Jimbo Wales and Larry Sanger, to use wiki technology as a basis for an electronic encyclopedia: Wikipedia was launched in January 2001; it originally was based upon UseMod software, but later switched to its own, open source codebase, now adopted by many other wikis. In the early 2000s, wikis were increasingly adopted in the enterprise as collaborative software. Common uses included project communication, intranets and documentation, initially for technical users. In December 2002, Socialtext launched the first commercial open source wiki solution. Open source wikis such as MediaWiki, Kwiki and TWiki grew to over 1 million downloads on the Sourceforge repository by 2004. Today some companies use wikis as their only collaborative software and as a replacement for static intranets. There is arguably greater use of wikis behind firewalls than on the public internet! In 2005, the Los Angeles Times experimented with using a wiki in the editorial section of its web site. The Wikitorial project was quickly shuttered as vandals quickly defaced it and features to help distribute administration of the site had been disabled.

Wiki communities

The largest wikis are listed at List of largest wikis and [http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?BiggestWiki#Biggest_wikis_by_page_count_on_July_3_2004 Meatball: Biggest wikis]. Today, the English-language Wikipedia is, by far, the world's largest wiki; the German-language Wikipedia is the second-largest, while the other Wikipedias fill many of the remaining slots. Other large wikis include the WikiWikiWeb, Wikitravel, World66 and Susning.nu, a Swedish-language knowledge base. The all-encompassing nature of Wikipedia is a significant factor in its growth, while many other wikis are highly specialized. Some also have attributed Wikipedia's rapid growth to its decision not to use CamelCase. Many public wikis are listed at [http://www.worldwidewiki.net/wiki/SwitchWiki WorldWideWiki: SwitchWiki], which currently lists about 1000 public wiki communities (as of 2004-06-12). One way of finding a wiki on a subject in which someone is interested is to follow the wiki-node network from wiki to wiki, or one could take a Wiki bus tour: TourBusStop. For those interested in creating their own wiki, there are many publicly available "wiki farms", some of which can also make private, password-protected wikis. Socialtext, PeanutButterWiki, [http://seedwiki.com/ SeedWiki], [http://jotspot.com/ JotSpot], [http://communitywiki.org/odd/HomePage OddWiki], WikiCities, and [http://www.wikispaces.org/ Wikispaces] are seven such services; more at List of wiki farms. Wikipolls are also emerging. One site, [http://www.opinionrepublic.com/ Opinion Republic], is an experiment to capture public opinion and then converge on the most broadly accepted opinions. Many wiki communities are private, particularly within enterprises as collaborative software. They are often used as internal documentation for in-house systems and applications. For describing related wikis, there exist WikiNodes — pages on wikis describing related wikis. They are usually organized as neighbors and delegates. A neighbor wiki is simply a wiki that may discuss similar content or may otherwise be of interest. A delegate wiki is a wiki that agrees to have certain content delegated to that wiki.

References

- Aigrain, Philippe (2003). [http://www.debatpublic.net/Members/paigrain/texts/icoic.html The Individual and the Collective in Open Information Communities]. Invited talk at the 16th Bled Electronic Commerce Conference, Bled, Slovenija, June 11 2003.
- Aronsson, Lars (2002). [http://aronsson.se/wikipaper.html Operation of a Large Scale, General Purpose Wiki Website: Experience from susning.nu's first nine months in service]. Paper presented at the 6th International ICCC/IFIP Conference on Electronic Publishing, November 8, 2002, Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic.
- Benkler, Yochai (2002). Coase's penguin, or, Linux and The Nature of the Firm. The Yale Law Journal. v.112, n.3, pp.369–446.
- Cunningham, Ward and Leuf, Bo (2001): The Wiki Way. Quick Collaboration on the Web. Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-201-71499-X.
- Delacroix, Jérôme (2005): Les wikis, espaces de l'intelligence collective, M2 Editions, Paris, ISBN 2-9520514-4-5.
- Jansson, Kurt (2002): [http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benutzer:Kurt_Jansson/Vortrag_auf_dem_19C3 "Wikipedia. Die Freie Enzyklopädie."] Lecture at the 19th Chaos Communications Congress (19C3), December 27, 2002 Berlin, Germany.
- Lange, Christoph (ed., 2005). [http://www.cul.de/wiki.html Wiki - Planen, Einrichten, Verwalten]. Computer- und Literaturverlag, ISBN 3-936546-28-2.
- Mattison, David (2003). [http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/apr03/mattison.shtml "QuickiWiki, Swiki, TWiki, ZWiki, and the Plone Wars: Wiki as PIM and Collaborative Content Tool."] Searcher: The Magazine for Database Professionals, v. 11, no. 4 (April 2003): 32-48
- Möller, Erik (2003). [http://opencultures.t0.or.at/oc/participants/moeller Loud and clear: How Internet media can work]. Presentation at the Open Cultures conference, June 5 & 6, 2003 Vienna, Austria.
- Möller, Erik (2003). [http://www.humanist.de/erik/tdg/ Tanz der Gehirne]. Telepolis, May 9–30. Four parts: (i) "Das Wiki-Prinzip", (ii) "Alle gegen Brockhaus", (iii) "Diderots Traumtagebuch", und (iv) "Diesen Artikel bearbeiten".
- Nakisa, Ramin (2003). [http://www.linuxuser.co.uk/images/stories/pdf/lud29-Collaborative_Software-Wiki.pdf "Wiki Wiki Wah Wah"]. Linux User and Developer v.29, pp.42–48.
- Remy, Melanie. (2002). Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Online Information Review. v.26, n.6, p.434.

External links

- [http://www.evowiki.org/wiki.phtml?title=Wiki_evolution EvoWiki: How wikis evolve]
- [http://www.npost.com/interview.jsp?intID=INT00126 Interview with Jimmy Wales, WikiPedia Founder]
- [http://www.freewiki.info Free Wiki: Wiki Demos, Wiki Screenshots, Wiki Info, Wiki Feeds, Wiki Links - Search for Wikis by Custom Criteria]
- [http://sharewarewiki.com SharewareWiki]
- [http://www.linuxbazis.hu/keres.php?mod=keres&hol=linkek&q=wiki Wiki pages around Linux]
- [http://computer.howstuffworks.com/wiki.htm Wikis] at HowStuffWorks.
- [http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,66382,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_2: "Information Wants to be Liquid"] — Wired magazine article
- [http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?TourBusStop "Tour bus stop.." at MeatballWiki]
- [http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?WikiCommunityList Wiki Community List]
- [http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WikiEngines Wiki Engines]
- [http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wiki_Science Wiki Science]:
- [http://wikibooks.org/wiki/Wiki_Science:How_to_start_a_Wiki How to start a wiki] (on Wikibooks) — help write the book on starting a wiki
- [http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WelcomeVisitors WikiWikiWeb] (the first wiki)
- [http://nrg78.com/ipw-web/b2/index.php?p=23 NRG78] article discussing the role of "enterprise" wikis in capturing and managing corporate memory Category:Internet terminology Category: Groupware Category: Wiki zh-min-nan:Wiki ko:위키위키 ms:Wiki ja:ウィキ simple:Wiki th:วิกิ

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Day

:See also Wikipedia:Wikiday January 15 is known as Wikipedia Day to Wikipedians. On this date in the year 2001, the Wikipedia went public after spending five days on Nupedia (see Project beginnings).

Wikipedia Day 2005

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, turned 4 years old January 15, 2005. The English Wikipedia alone now has more than 500,000 articles. As of today, bets are still open on when the millionth English article will be reached (Wikipedia:Million pool) Fifty-four of the non-English Wikipedias have over 1,000 articles. On 29 December 2004, for the first time, Wikipedia was listed on Alexa's [http://www.alexa.com/site/ds/top_sites?ts_mode=lang&lang=en list] of the top 100 English-language web sites, at #99. On Wikipedia Day 2005, it was listed at rank 87.

Wikipedia Day 2004

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, turned 3 years old January 15, 2004. The English Wikipedia alone now has more than 190,000 articles, and the combined Wikipedias for other languages now exceed the English Wikipedia in size, giving an estimated total of over 420,000 articles in over 40 languages. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Multilingual_statistics#2004_Statistics] The English Wikipedia alone now contains over 56 million words, making it comparable in size with the largest previously existing encyclopedias. 18 of the non-English Wikipedias now have over 1000 articles, which seems to be the "lift-off" point for rapid growth, and non-English growth is expected to accelerate rapidly. A significant factor in aiding the growth of these Wikipedias is that they have almost without exception migrated to use the MediaWiki software. A further conversion challenge still awaits progression in 2004 towards using UTF-8 on all Wikipedias, allowing greater ease of use in articles including multilingual text. Overall article growth continues to increase exponentially, but at a rate less than we estimated last year at this time (we originally estimated in 2001 that it would take 5 or more years to reach our first 100,000 articles in English). This analysis suggests that the "organic" hand-edited growth rate of a mature Wikipedia is slightly less than doubling growth per year, with younger Wikipedias growing somewhat faster. This growth has not been at the expense of quality, as the level of polish and breadth of expertise has continued to grow throughout the Wikipedias. Further software features, such as new automated category indexes, are being developed to allow Wikipedia to scale with this massive growth in content and traffic. The creation of the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation has provided an independent legal foundation for Wikipedia, and has allowed Wikipedia to spin off a number of sister projects, including Wiktionary, Wikiquote and Wikibooks. As the number of articles has increased, so has the amount of traffic from readers, to the point where the servers have begun to struggle to keep up in the face of recent hardware failures. In response to this, a fundraising drive brought in sufficient donations to allow the parts for a new scalable and fault-tolerant server farm to be ordered. The new server farm is anticipated to return Wikipedia to being fast and responsive, and to be able to continue to keep up with the growth in load over the next year. Along with fundraising, Wikipedia is also experimenting with innovations in its self-governance.

Wikipedia Day 2003

With over 130,000 articles spread across 28 languages, Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, turned 2 years old January 15, 2003. Several Wikipedia contributors (Wikipedians), in the collaborative spirit which has brought us so far, have redesigned the Main Page of the English Wikipedia in celebration of Wikipedia's birthday. During the first year of its existence, Wikipedia went from zero to 20,000 articles in the English version and that was considered to be an impressive growth rate. The second year of Wikipedia saw the addition of nearly 80,000 more articles in the English version alone, making it the world's largest Wiki and the world's largest free content encyclopedia. With edits being made 24 hours a day, seven days a week, by hundreds of bright and enthusiastic volunteers from around the world, who knows where we will be one year from today? Wikipedia's original goal was to make 100,000, and at the time we speculated that this might take us five or more years. It is now known that the 100,000 article milestone is just the tip of the iceberg. The power of the collaborative WikiWiki editing model, the freedom that the GNU Free Documentation License gives users, and Wikipedia's strong nonbias policy (the neutral point of view), combined with our goal of creating the world's largest encyclopedia will ensure the continued growth and success of our project. Many people have told Wikipedians that they would fail. "What?" they said, "You let anyone edit anytime they wish? It is preposterous to think that anything of any value could be created that way. You are destined to fail!" It is, however, becoming more and more apparent with each passing day that they are wrong. Wikipedia celebrates Wikipedia Day by continuing to build the world's best encyclopedia!

Time Machine

The Internet Archive has retained copies of many Wikipedia pages from an earlier era. Here is the oldest one archived: [http://web.archive.org/web/20010303221706/www.wikipedia.com/wiki/HomePage February 28, 2001]. Also, there is an archived English [http://nostalgia.wikipedia.com Wikipedia from December 20, 2001].

Celebration

Why not celebrate by writing an encyclopedia article on a topic of your choice? See m:Help:Starting a new page.

George W Bush

__NOEDITSECTION__ George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is the 43rd and current President of the United States since 2001. From 1995 to 2000, Bush served as Governor of the State of Texas. A lifelong member of the Republican Party, Bush was a businessman before entering politics. He helped found the failed Arbusto Energy and later became a managing partner in the Texas Rangers baseball team. Bush was elected the 46th Governor of Texas in 1994 and was re-elected in 1998. He won the Republican nomination in the 2000 presidential election and was elected President amid much controversy. He was reelected in the 2004 presidential election.

Education, military service, and early personal life

2004 presidential election The eldest son of former President George H. W. Bush and his wife Barbara Bush (née Pierce), George Walker Bush was born in New Haven, Connecticut. He identifies himself as a native of Texas, as his family moved there when he was about two years old. He was raised in Midland, Texas and Houston, Texas with his siblings Jeb, Neil, Marvin and Dorothy. After graduating from the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts in June 1964, Bush returned to Connecticut and attended Yale University, receiving a Bachelor of Arts in History in 1968. As a senior, Bush was a member of the secret Skull and Bones society. In May 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War, he entered the Texas Air National Guard. He trained in the guard for two years, during which time he learned to fly. He was promoted to First Lieutenant in November 1970 on the recommendation of his commander Lt. Col. Jerry B. Killian. He served as an F-102 pilot until 1972. In 1974, he obtained permission to end his six-year service obligation six months early in order to attend Harvard Business School, from which he earned his Masters of Business Administration (MBA) in 1975; he is the first U.S. President to hold an MBA. After graduation Bush returned to Texas to enter the oil business. Two years later, he married Laura Welch, a school librarian originally from Midland. They have twin daughters, Barbara and Jenna Bush, born in 1981. Bush is the only U.S. President to be the father of twins.

Military service controversy

Barbara and Jenna Bush Bush's military service record has been a point of controversy, especially during the 2004 presidential election. His critics have alleged that he skipped over a waiting list to receive a National Guard slot, was absent from duty from 1972 to 1973, and was suspended from flying after missing a required physical examination and drug screening. These specific issues came to light during the 2004 Presidential campaign as a result of endeavors by the group Texans for Truth. Bush supporters claim that the surviving documentary evidence regarding Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard, including pay records and the official honorable discharge papers, indicate that Bush served honorably. Skeptics contend that many of the official records can no longer be found, and that the matter is at best ambiguous. Barring the discovery of additional documents that are either exculpatory or incriminating, the issue is unlikely to be settled conclusively.

Substance abuse controversy

On September 4, 1976, near his family's summer home in Kennebunkport, Maine, police arrested Bush for driving under the influence of alcohol. He pleaded guilty, was fined $150, and had his driver's license suspended for 30 days within Maine [http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/11/02/bush.dui] [http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/bushdui1.html]. News of the arrest was published five days before the 2000 presidential election. Bush has described his days before his religious conversion in his 40s as his "nomadic" period of "irresponsible youth" and admitted to drinking "too much" in those years. He says he changed to a sober lifestyle shortly after waking up hung-over after his 40th birthday celebration. He attributed the change partly to a 1985 meeting with the Reverend Billy Graham though by his own admission he did still drink as recently as July 1986 [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/campaigns/wh2000/stories/bushtext072599.htm] [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/campaigns/wh2000/stories/bush072599.htm] [http://www.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/11/02/bush.dui]. In an unfortunate way, Bush is confronted to this day with the problem of alcoholism because his twin daughter Jenna has repeatedly been arrested for alcohol-related offences. [http://archive.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/05/31/twins/print.html] [http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/jenna5.html] Bush has stated he did not use illegal drugs at any time since 1979. An aide clarified this as being 1974.[http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/08/19/president.2000/bush.drug]. According to the main article, a phone conversation revealed that Bush had used marijuana and he apparently did not deny using cocaine. He has denied unsupported allegations by author James Hatfield that family influence was used to expunge the record of an arrest for cocaine possession in 1972, but has refused to discuss whether he used drugs before 1974 [http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v99/n1143/a08.html?4588] [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4282799.stm] [http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6999665].

Religious beliefs and practices

After meeting evangelist Billy Graham in 1985, Bush became much more involved in Christian belief and practice. [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A24634-2004Sep15_2.html] During this period, he left the Bush family's Episcopalian faith to join his wife's United Methodist Church, a denomination that in part represents a more socially conservative worldview (see United Methodist Church "Diversity Within Methodist Beliefs"). Bush is generally recognized as a born-again Christian. In one of the televised debates in the 2000 Republican primaries, all participating candidates were asked to name their favorite philosopher. Bush responded by stating "Jesus Christ" — averring that Christ was the philosopher who had "changed his life".

Professional life

Business

Bush began his oil industry career in 1979 when he established Arbusto Energy, an oil and gas exploration company he financed with his education trust fund surplus and money from other investors, including Dorothy Bush, Lewis Lehrman, William Henry Draper III, Bill Gammell, and James R. Bath, the last of whom represented Salim bin Ladin. In 1984, Bush sold the company, hurt in the wake of the 1979 energy crisis and renamed Bush Exploration Co., to Spectrum 7, another Texas oil and gas exploration firm. Under the terms of the sale, Bush became CEO (Chief Executive Officer). Spectrum 7 lost revenue and was merged into Harken Energy Corporation in 1986, with Bush becoming a director of Harken. After working on his father's successful 1988 presidential campaign, Bush learned from fellow Yale alumnus William DeWitt, Jr., that family friend Eddie Chiles wanted to sell the Texas Rangers baseball franchise. In April 1989, Bush assembled a group of investors from his father's close friends, including fellow fraternity brother Roland W. Betts; the group bought an 86% share of the Rangers for $75 million. Bush received a 2% share by investing $606,302, of which $500,000 was a bank loan. Against the advice of his counsel, Bush repaid the loan by selling $848,000 worth of stock in Harken Energy. Harken reported significant financial losses within a year of this sale, triggering allegations of insider trading. On March 27, 1992, the Securities and Exchange Commission concluded that Bush had a "preexisting plan" to sell, that Bush had a "relatively limited role in Harken management", and that it had not seen evidence of insider trading. [http://www.publicintegrity.org/docs/harken/harken_doc5.pdf] [http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20020717-062330-9990r] [http://www.publicintegrity.org/docs/harken/harken_doc7.pdf] [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/campaigns/wh2000/stories/bush073099.htm] As managing general partner of the Rangers, Bush assisted the team's media relations and the construction of a new stadium. [http://www.joenickp.com/texas/teamplayer.html] His public role generated valuable goodwill and reinforced name recognition throughout Texas that was already high as he had the identical name as his father who was President during this era. [http://espn.go.com/mlb/bush/friday.html]

Political career

Securities and Exchange Commission Bush started his political career assisting his father's 1964 and 1970 campaigns for the U.S Senate neither of which were successful. After a United States National Guard transfer in 1972, he served as political director for an Alabama senate campaign. In 1978, Bush ran for the U.S. House of Representatives but lost to a State Senator, Democrat Kent Hance (now Republican). Ronald Reagan endorsed Bush's opponent in the Republican primary. In 1994, Bush ran for Governor of Texas against the popular incumbent, Democrat Ann Richards. On November 8, 1994, he defeated Richards by a margin of 53% to 46%. That same year, he and his partners sold the Texas Rangers, with Bush realizing a profit of more than $14 million. As Governor, Bush forged a legislative alliance with powerful Lt. Governor Bob Bullock, a longtime Democrat. In 1998 Bush went on to win re-election in a landslide victory with nearly 69% of the vote, becoming the first Texas governor to be elected for two consecutive four-year terms (before 1975, the gubernatorial term of office was two years). [http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1998/11/03/election/governors/texas] During Bush's governorship, he undertook significant legislative changes in criminal justice, tort law, and school financing. Bush took a hard line on capital punishment and received much criticism from advocates who wanted to abolish the death penalty and also those who argued that there were tangible imperfections in the Texas legal system that required a more cautious approach to carrying out the death penalty. Under Bush, Texas's incarceration rate was 1014 inmates per 100,000 in 1999, the second-highest in the nation, owing mainly to lengthy sentences for drug offences. In September 1999, Bush signed the Advance Directives Act which allows a health care facility to discontinue life-sustaining treatment against the wishes of the patient ten days after giving notice. Bush's transformative agenda and family pedigree now provided an opportunity to advance his political career to the national level.

Presidential campaigns

2000 campaign

Advisers convinced George W. Bush that 2000 would be the right time to run for president. He had more than enough money, and the Republican Party lacked any single strong candidate. Before he had even committed to the race, he was the clear favorite in the polls. During Bush's 2000 presidential election campaign, he declared himself a "compassionate conservative", a term coined by University of Texas professor Marvin Olasky. In the general election, Bush's political campaign promised to "restore honor and dignity to the White House" and pledged a huge tax cut intended to return a large part of the projected budget surplus back to the taxpayers. Among other issues, he also advocated allowing religious charity to participate in federally funded programs, promoting the use of education vouchers, supporting oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, maintaining a balanced budget, and restructuring the United States armed forces. United States armed forces Bush lost the New Hampshire primary to Senator John McCain of Arizona, but rebounded to capture 9 of 13 Super Tuesday states, effectively clinching the nomination. Bush then chose Dick Cheney, a former U.S. Representative and Secretary of Defense for Bush's father, as his running mate. After months of campaigning, election night, held November 7, 2000, turned out closer than anticipated. Television networks called the close race first for Gore, then for Bush, and finally too close to call. Al Gore, who had conceded the election in a phone call to Bush, rescinded that concession less than one hour later. When the race was finally adjudicated, Bush was declared to have defeated Democratic candidate Vice President Al Gore, winning 271 electoral votes to Gore's 266, carrying 30 of the 50 states. Gore had received a plurality of the national popular vote of the roughly 105,000,000 votes cast, with Bush receiving 50,456,002 votes (47.9%) and Gore 50,999,897 (48.4%), but this fact is not relevant in deciding U.S. presidential elections. Notable third-party candidates included Green Party candidate Ralph Nader (2,695,696 votes/2.7%), Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan, (449,895/0.4%), and Libertarian candidate Harry Browne (386,024 votes/0.4%). The 2000 election was the first since Benjamin Harrison's 1888 election to produce a winner that did not receive a plurality of the popular vote. It was the first since Rutherford Hayes was elected in 1876 in which the Supreme Court affected the decision. The Florida vote count, which favored Bush in preliminary tallies, was contested over allegations of irregularities in the voting and tabulation processes. Allegations of confusing ballots, defective voting machines, faulty absentee ballots from the military, and the alleged illegal barring of many voters threw the process into chaos. A series of court cases ensued over the legality of county-specific and statewide recounts. After machine and manual recounts in four counties, and with Bush still prevailing, the Florida Supreme Court ordered a statewide manual recount of all counties. The U.S. Supreme Court, upon appeal from the Bush campaign (Bush v. Gore), overturned the decision and halted all recounts. After the ruling, Gore reinstated his concession. Several months later the statewide manual recount of all counties was completed by a group of newspapers and it was determined that Al Gore had won in Florida under four counting standards and had lost to Bush under the other four counting standards. [http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/latimes/89693365.html?did=89693365&FMT=ABS&FMTS=FT&date=Nov+13%2C+2001&author=&pub=Los+Angeles+Times&desc=Ballot-Count+Scenarios+in+Bush-Gore+2000][http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/florida.ballots/stories/main.html] Since the Florida Supreme Court did not precisely define the ballot counting standard to be used in the statewide manual recount of all counties, it remains disputed who would have won the state if the manual recount had not been halted by the U.S. Supreme Court. In the final official count, Bush had won Florida by only 537 votes (2,912,790 for Bush to 2,912,253 for Gore) [http://www.fec.gov/pubrec/2000presgeresults.htm], earning the needed 25 electoral votes and the presidency. Bush was inaugurated January 20, 2001.

2004 campaign

2001 In the 2004 election, Bush carried 31 of 50 states for 286 Electoral College votes. A record voter turnout gave him more popular votes than any previous presidential candidate (62,040,610 votes/50.7%). This was the first time since 1988 that a President received a popular majority. Challenger, Senator John Kerry (Democrat), carried 19 states and the District of Columbia, earning him 251 Electoral College votes (59,028,111 votes/48.3%). A faithless elector, pledged to Kerry, voted for Democratic Vice Presidential running mate, John Edwards, giving him one Electoral College vote. No other candidate won College votes. Notable third-party candidates included Independent Ralph Nader (463,653 votes / 0.4%), and Libertarian Michael Badnarik (397,265 votes/0.3%). Congress debated potential election irregularities, including allegations of voting irregularities in Ohio and electronic voting machine fraud. Bush was inaugurated for his second term on January 20, 2005. The oath of office was administered by Then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist. Bush's inaugural address centered mainly on a theme of spreading freedom and democracy around the world.

Important people in Bush's life and career

George W. Bush is a member of a prominent political family. His father, George H. W. Bush, served as U.S. President for one term and twice as Ronald Reagan's Vice President. His younger brother, Jeb Bush, is the current Governor of Florida. His grandfather, Prescott Bush, was a United States Senator. He also has two other younger brothers, Marvin Bush and Neil Bush, both businessmen. He and John Quincy Adams are the only sons of former Presidents to become President themselves. Bush is very close to his wife Laura, father George H. W. Bush, and mother Barbara Bush. He is also close to his sister Dorothy Bush Koch and brother Marvin Bush. Loyalty to family is an important cornerstone of Bush's attitude to his family relationships, and despite some differences in policy and attitudes, and independent of each other, Bush and his brother Jeb Bush have worked closely to help each other's political career. In his career, Bush values loyalty as the greatest asset, and has developed a close band of advisors deeply loyal to him. In his second term, he has elevated them from personal political jobs to top government positions. Some of the closest and most trusted advisors to Bush in affairs of policy and politics are women. Condoleezza Rice, the U.S. Secretary of State was Bush's close confidant in the first term as National Security Advisor, and a Bush loyalist. Margaret Spellings was Bush's chief domestic policy advisor from his days as Governor of Texas, and now runs the U.S. Department of Education. Moreover, Karen Hughes was one of Bush's most trusted political advisors, playing important roles in all his campaigns from 1994 to 2004. She was briefly White House Counsel, and now is undersecretary of state for public diplomacy — responsible for the specific mission of improving America's image in the world, and particularly with Muslim countries. Harriet Miers was legal counsel and a close loyalist to Bush in Texas and, since Bush's second term commenced, she has served as White House counsel. Bush nominated Miers to the U.S. Supreme Court on October 3, 2005 to fill the shoes of retiring associate justice Sandra Day O'Connor, yet she withdrew her nomination 24 days later after peculiar criticism of Miers via Bush's own conservative base, due to her possession of no prior written legal opinions or any judicial experience whatsoever. Karl Rove has played perhaps the greatest influence on Bush's life and career. Ever since meeting in 1972, Rove built Bush's political campaign machine when he decided to run for Texas's governorship in 1994, and was his closest political advisor. When elected President in 2001, Bush asked Rove to give up his direct mail business and join him full-time in Washington. Officially designated White House political advisor, Rove designed the political strategy to enact Bush's legislative agenda, and guide the political strategy on important national issues of both the White House and the Republican Party, in view to the 2004 re-election campaign. After winning re-election Bush called Rove The Architect of his campaign, and Rove now serves as the Deputy Chief of Staff to the President, for domestic policy and national security. Rove is also responsible for the elevation of Bush loyalist Republicans like Ken Mehlman, Bush's campaign manager and now Chairman of the Republican National Committee. Alberto Gonzales was the Governor's legal counsel in Texas, and later Attorney General. He joined Bush in 2001 in Washington, and in 2005, was appointed U.S. Attorney General, the first Hispanic American ever to run the U.S. Justice Department.

Presidency of the United States

U.S. Justice Department, United States President George W. Bush, and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon after reading statement to the press during the closing moments of the Red Sea Summit in Aqaba, Jordan, on June 4, 2003]]

First Term

Bush's first 100 days were considered less bipartisan than he pledged during the campaign. His most controversial appointment was John Ashcroft as Attorney General. Democrats vigorously opposed Ashcroft for his strong, socially conservative positions on issues like abortion and capital punishment, though they eventually confirmed him. On his first day in office, Bush moved to block federal aid to foreign groups that offered counseling or any other assistance to women in obtaining abortions. Days later, he announced his commitment to channeling more federal aid to faith-based service organizations that critics feared would dissolve the traditional separation of church and state. Republicans lost control of the Senate in June, when Vermont's James Jeffords quit the Republican party to become an independent, but not before five Senate Democrats crossed party lines to approve Bush's $1.35 billion tax cut. Less than three months later, however, the administration released budget projections that showed the projected budget surplus decreasing to nothing over the next years.

Political ideology

During the 2000 election campaign Bush started to use the phrase compassionate conservatism to describe his beliefs. Some conservatives have questioned Bush's commitment to traditional conservative ideals for his willingness to incur large budget deficits by permitting substantial spending increases. Democrats and liberals have claimed that the prefixing of the word "conservative" with the adjective "compassionate" was less a new ideology and more a way of making conservatism seem palatable to independent and swing voters. In his 2005 inaugural address he outlined his vision of foreign policy and claimed plan for democracy promotion, [http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.pdf National Security Strategy of the United States of America (pdf)].

Foreign policy and security

foreign policy.]] During his first presidential visit to Europe in June 2001, European leaders criticized Bush for his rejection of the Kyoto Protocol to reduce global warming. In 2002, Bush rejected the treaty as harmful to economic growth in the United States, stating: "My approach recognizes that economic growth is the solution, not the problem." [http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/02/20020214-5.html] The administration also disputed the scientific basis of the treaty. [http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/06/20010611-2.html] In November 2004, Russia ratified the treaty, meeting the quota of nations required to enforce it without ratification by the United States. Bush's foreign policy campaign platform supported a stronger economic and political relationship with Latin America, especially Mexico, and reduced involvement in "nation-building" and other minor military engagements indirectly related to U.S. interests. However, after the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks (9/11 attacks), the State Department focused primarily on the Middle East.

Terrorism

Middle East, September 14, 2001: "I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon."]] On October 7, 2001, the United States, with international support, launched a war against the Afghani Taliban regime, charged with harboring Osama bin Laden. Subsequent nation-building efforts with the United Nations and Afghan president Hamid Karzai have had mixed results; bin Laden (as of 2005) is still at large. Democratic elections were held on October 9, 2004. Even though international observers called the elections "fairly democratic" at the "overall majority" of polling centers, 15 of the 18 presidential candidates nevertheless threatened to withdraw, alleging flawed registration and validation. [http://fpc.state.gov/fpc/37133.htm] Days after taking office, Bush stated "I am going to go forward with... plans for a missile defense system."[http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/20010126-7.html] To accomplish this deployment, Bush announced on May 1, 2001 his desire to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and deploy a missile defense system with the ability to shield against a limited attack by a rogue state. [http://www.fas.org/nuke/control/abmt/news/010501bush.html] The American Physical Society criticized this policy change, citing doubts about the system's effectiveness. [http://www.aps.org/public_affairs/popa/reports/nmd03.cfm] Bush argued this was justified as the treaty's Cold War benefits were no longer relevant. The official notification of withdrawal from the treaty was announced on 13 December 2001, citing the need to protect against terrorism. While there is past precedent for a President to cancel a treaty, most past cases have involved Congressional authorization. [http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/article02/11.html#2]

Iraq

Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, the Bush administration promoted urgent action in Iraq, stating that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein once again had weapons of mass destruction (WMD), even though Hussein claimed that he destroyed all the chemical and biological weapons he had pre-1991 (he used them on the Kurds in northern Iraq in 1988). Bush also said that Hussein was a threat to U.S. security, destabilized the Middle East, inflamed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and financed terrorists. CIA reports asserted that Saddam Hussein had tried to acquire nuclear material, had not properly accounted for Iraqi biological weapons and chemical weapons material in violation of U.N. sanctions, and that some Iraqi missiles had a range greater than allowed by the UN sanctions. It had been, since 1998, U.S. policy for the president to plan for the removal of Saddam Hussein by a law (the Iraq Liberation Act) passed by the House of Representatives and the Senate and later signed by President Bill Clinton. [http://www.cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd/Iraq_Oct_2002.htm] [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1593607,00.html] President Bill Clinton Asserting that Saddam Hussein could provide terrorists with WMD, Bush urged the United Nations to enforce Iraqi disarmament mandates, precipitating a diplomatic crisis. On November 13, 2002, under UN Security Council Resolution 1441, Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei led UN weapons inspectors in Iraq. Lapses in Iraqi cooperation triggered intense debate over the efficacy of inspections. UN inspection teams departed Iraq upon U.S. advisement given four days prior to full-scale hostilities. [http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2003-03-17-inspectors-iraq_x.htm] Secretary of State Colin Powell urged his colleagues in the Bush administration to avoid a war without clear UN approval. The Bush administration initially sought a UN Security Council resolution authorizing the military force pursuant to [http://www.worldpress.org/specials/iraq/chapterVII.htm Chapter VII] of the United Nations Charter but, facing vigorous opposition from key nations including the public threat of an embarrassing French veto, dropped the bid for UN approval and, with a few other nations designated the "coalition of the willing", prepared for war. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2862343.stm] coalition of the willing, where he delivers his controversial Mission Accomplished! speech to declare victory and the end of major combat operations in Iraq, May 1, 2003.]] Military hostilities commenced on March 20, 2003 to preempt Iraqi WMD deployment and remove Hussein from power. Casus belli included Hussein's hindering weapons inspections, an alleged 1991 assassination attempt on Bush's father George H. W. Bush, breach of a 1991 ceasefire, and violation of numerous Security Council resolutions. Secretary General of the United Nations Kofi Annan and other world leaders questioned the war's legality. Bush declared victory on May 1, 2003, but U.S. deployment and casualties have continued through 2005 despite the capture of Hussein, because of ongoing Iraqi insurgencies. On September 30, 2004, the U.S. Iraq Survey Group Final Report concluded, "ISG has not found evidence that Saddam Husayn (sic) possessed WMD stocks in 2003, but the available evidence from its investigation — including detainee interviews and document exploitation — leaves open the possibility that some weapons existed in Iraq although not of a militarily significant capability." [http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/report/2004/isg-final-report/isg-final-report_vol1_rsi-06.htm] The 9/11 Commission report found no credible evidence that Saddam Hussein possessed WMD, although the report did conclude that Hussein's government was actively attempting to acquire technology that would allow Iraq to produce WMD as soon as U.N. sanctions were lifted. [http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report.pdf] In addition, the 9/11 commission found that despite contacts between Iraq and Al-Qaeda in 1996, "no collaborative relationship" emerged in regards to the attacks on 9/11. [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A47812-2004Jun16.html]

Immigration

Bush proposed an immigration bill that would have greatly expanded the use of guest worker visas. His proposal would match employers with foreign workers for a period up to six years; however, workers would not be eligible for permanent residency ("green cards") or citizenship. The bill is opposed by some Democratic Senators, including Barbara Boxer and Edward M. Kennedy. Bush has also publicly stated he would like to tighten security at the U.S.-Mexico border, which includes speeding up the deportation process, building more jail cells to hold illegal immigrants, and installing more equipment and immigration officers at the border. He does agree with "increasing the number of annual green cards that can lead to citizenship" but does not support giving amnesty to those who are already in the country illegally, ceding that it would only serve as incentive for increased illegal immigration. [http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/11/29/bush.immigration/]

Health

In the State of the Union message in January, 2003, Bush outlined a five-year strategy for global emergency AIDS relief. Bush requested $15 billion for this effort and Congress supported the president's proposal. The emergency relief effort is led by U.S. Ambassador Randall L. Tobias, the Global AIDS Coordinator at the Department of State. $9 billion is allocated for new programs in AIDS relief for 15 countries most affected by HIV/AIDS. Another $5 billion will go to continuing support of AIDS relief in 100 countries where the U.S. already has bilateral programs established. And $1 billion will go to support The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. This budget represents more money contributed to fight AIDS globally than all other donor countries combined.

Trade

Bush's imposition of a tariff on imported steel and on Canadian softwood lumber was controversial in light of his advocacy of free market policies in other areas, and attracted criticism both from his fellow conservatives and from nations affected. The steel tariff was later rescinded under pressure from the World Trade Organization. The softwood lumber dispute is still ongoing.

Development Assistance

The U.S. State Department and Agency for International Development (USAID) published a strategic plan for the 2004-2009 period. The principal aims are established in President Bush’s National Security Strategy: diplomacy, development and defense. President Bush's new policy would increase assistance by 50 percent for countries that take responsibility for their own development “by ruling justly, investing wisely in their people, and encouraging economic freedom.” Development assistance must also be aligned with U.S. foreign policy which means the USAID would support those “countries that are committed to democratic governance, open economies, and wise investment in their people’s education, health, and potential.” [http://www.state.gov/s/d/rm/rls/dosstrat/2004/23503.htm]

Domestic Policy

Faith-based initiatives

In early 2001, Bush worked with Republicans and social conservatives in Congress to pass legislation changing the way the federal government regulated, taxed and funded charities and non-profit initiatives run by religious organizations. Although prior to the legislation it was possible for these organizations to receive federal assistance, the new legislation removed reporting requirements that required the organizations to separate their charitable functions from their religious functions. Bush also created the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. [http://www.whitehouse.gov/government/fbci/] Several organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union have criticized Bush's faith-based initiative program, arguing that it involves government entanglement with religion and favoritism to religion in violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

Diversity and civil rights

Bush is opposed to the legal recognition of gender-neutral marriage, but supports the establishment of civil unions ("I don't think we should deny people rights to a civil union, a legal arrangement" — ABC News October 26, 2004). He has endorsed the Federal Marriage Amendment, a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution that would define marriage as being the union of one man and one woman. Bush reiterated his disagreement with the Republican Party platform that opposed civil unions, and said that the issue of civil unions should be left up to individual states. In his February 2, 2005, State of the Union address he repeated his support for the constitutional amendment. Bush is the first Republican president to appoint an openly gay man to serve in his administration [http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/04/10/MN198145.DTL] (Scott Evertz as director of the Office of National AIDS Policy), and the first president to see one such (succesful) appointment, that of openly gay Ambassador to Romania Michael E. Guest. Bush has claimed to support the executive order issued by President Bill Clinton banning employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, but Scott Bloch, whom Bush chose as Special Counsel in 2003, does not feel he has the legal authority to enforce the ban. [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/24/AR2005052401496.html] During his 2000 campaign trail he met with the Log Cabin Republicans, a first for a Republican Presidential candidate. The organization endorsed him in 2000 but not in 2004. Bush obtained a statistically significant increase in support from African-Americans for a republican candidate during his presidency. Although he only got 9% of the black vote in 2000, he received nearly 12% in 2004, with the increased black vote in Ohio giving the victory to Bush over Kerry. Although Bush expressed appreciation for the Supreme Court's ruling upholding the selection of college applicants for purposes of diversity, his Administration filed briefs against it. Bush has said he opposes government sanctioned and enforced quotas and racial preferences, but that the private and public sector should be encouraged to reach out to accomplished minorities to increase employment diversity. An August 2005 report by the United States Commission on Civil Rights states that "the government fails to seriously consider race-neutral alternatives as the Constitution requires." [http://www.usccr.gov/press/2005/0818list.htm] Chairman Gerald A. Reynolds explained, "Federal agencies do not independently evaluate, conduct research, collect data, or periodically review programs to determine whether race-neutral strategies will provide an adequate alternative to race-conscious programs." Civil rights groups have expressed concern that this report is an attack on affirmative action inconsistent with Grutter v. Bollinger. In his first term, Bush appointed Colin Powell as Secretary of State. Powell was the first African-American man to serve in that position, and was succeeded by Condoleezza Rice: Rice became the first African-American woman to hold the post. In 2005, he appointed Alberto Gonzalez as the United States Attorney General, the first Hispanic to hold that position. In total, Bush has appointed more women and minorities to high-level positions within his administration than any other U.S. President.

Economy

During his first term Bush sought and obtained Congressional approval for three major tax cuts, which increased the standard income tax deduction for married couples, eliminated the estate tax, and reduced marginal tax rates. The cuts are currently scheduled to expire a decade after passage. Bush has asked Congress to make the tax cuts permanent. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the economy suffered from a recession that lasted from March 2001 to November 2001. Federal spending in constant dollars increased under Bush by 26% in his first 4 and a half years. Non-defense spending increased 18% in that time. [http://www.bea.gov/bea/dn/nipaweb/TableView.asp?SelectedTable=102&FirstYear=2003&LastYear=2005&Freq=Qtr] The tax cuts, recession, and increases in outlays all contributed to record budget deficits during the Bush administration. The annual deficit reached record current-dollar levels of $374,000,000,000 in 2003 and $413,000,000,000 in 2004. National debt, the cumulative total of yearly deficits, rose from $5.7 trillion (58% of GDP) to $[http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpenny.htm 7.9 trillion] (68% of GDP) under Bush, as compared to the $2.7 trillion total debt owed when Ronald Reagan left office, which was [http://www.bea.gov/ 52%] of the GDP. According to the "baseline" forecast of federal revenue and spending by the Congressional Budget Office (in its January 2005 Baseline Budget Projections [http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=6060&sequence=2], the budget deficits will decrease over the next several years. In this projection the deficit will fall to 368,000,000,000 (USD) in 2005, 261,000,000,000 (USD) in 2007, and 207,000,000,000 (USD) in 2009, with a small surplus by 2012. The CBO noted, however, that this projection "omits a significant amount of spending that will occur this year -- and possibly for some time to come -- for U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and for other activities related to the global War on Terrorism." The projection also assumes that the Bush tax cuts "will expire as scheduled on December 31, 2010". If, as Bush has urged, the tax cuts were to be extended, then "the budget outlook for 2015 would change from a surplus of 141,000,000,000 (USD) to a deficit of 282,000,000,000 (USD)". Inflation under Bush has remained near historic lows at about 2-3% per year. The recession and a drop in some prices led to concern about deflation from mid-2001 to late-2003. More recently, high oil prices have caused concern about increasing inflation. high oil prices Private employment(seasonally adjusted) decreased under Bush from a peak of 111,680,000 in December 2000 to 108,250,000 in mid-2003. The percentage drop in jobs was the largest since 1981-1983. The economy then added private jobs for 25 consecutive months from (July 2003 to August 2005), but the private employment level remained below the pre-Bush level until June 2005 when it reached 111,828,000. Considering population growth, that still represents a 4.6% decrease in employment since Bush took office. The administration and many economists have suggested that the growth in employment resulted from the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act (JGTRRA), which President George W. Bush signed into law on May 27, 2003.[http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/economy/] June 2005 The Current Population Survey (aka Household Survey) measures the percentage of the population that is employed and unemployed. The result can be multiplied by population estimates to get total employment estimates. This survey has the advantage over the Payroll survey in that it includes self-employed. The Household Survey is less accurate in producing total numbers (since it requires population estimates) an

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Nicolas Coeffeteau (1574 - 1623), French theologian, poet and historian, was born at Saint-Calais. He entered the Dominican order and lectured on philosophy at

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