Year Zero is the fifth studio album by American industrial rock act Nine
Inch Nails (pictured), released on April 17, 2007, by Interscope
Records. Frontman Trent Reznor wrote the music and lyrics while touring
for the group's previous release, With Teeth (2005). Contrasting
Reznor's previously introverted style of songwriting, Year Zero is a
concept album that criticizes contemporary policies of the U.S.
government by presenting a dystopian vision of the year 2022. It is part
of a project which includes a remix album and an alternate reality game
(ARG). The Year Zero ARG expanded upon the album's fictional storyline
by using media such as websites, pre-recorded phone messages, and
murals. Year Zero received very positive reviews, many favorable toward
the ARG. The album produced two singles, "Survivalism" and
"Capital G", the latter released as a promotional single. Disputes
arose between Reznor and Universal Music Group, parent company of
Interscope, over the overseas pricing of the album.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Zero_%28album%29>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1791:
The Priestley Riots (depicted), targeting religious dissenters
such as Joseph Priestley, began in Birmingham, England.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priestley_Riots>
1902:
The medieval St Mark's Campanile in Venice collapsed, also
demolishing the Loggetta del Sansovino.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Mark%27s_Campanile>
1950:
Early in the Korean War, North Korean troops began attacking
the headquarters of the American 24th Infantry Division in Taejon, South
Korea.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Taejon>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
climber:
1. Someone or something that climbs (such as a mountain climber).
2. (figuratively, derogatory) A person who is constantly trying to get
ahead socially.
3. (botany) A plant such as a vine that climbs upwards as it grows by
attaching itself to some support.
4. (cycle racing) A cyclist who specializes in riding especially well on
steep hills or roads.
5. (ornithology) A bird that climbs, such as a parrot or woodpecker;
specifically (archaic), a bird having two toes pointing forward, and two
pointing backward, formerly regarded as being from the order Scansores
or Zygodactyli (now obsolete as the birds formerly in this order have
been reclassified into different orders); a zygodactyl.
6. Something that is used for climbing.
7. (climbing) Synonym of climbing iron (“a kind of crampon attached to
the shoe to aid with climbing”)
8. (intransitive, obsolete) To ascend or mount with effort; to clamber,
to climb.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/climber>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
What the world thought made little difference. Rembrandt had to
paint. Whether he painted well or badly didn’t matter; painting was
the stuff that held him together as a man. The chief value of art,
Vincent, lies in the expression it gives to the artist. Rembrandt
fulfilled what he knew to be his life purpose; that justified him. Even
if his work had been worthless, he would have been a thousand times more
successful than if he had put down his desire and become the richest
merchant in Amsterdam.
--Irving Stone
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Irving_Stone>
Tyler Skaggs (July 13, 1991 – July 1, 2019) was an American left-
handed starting pitcher in professional baseball. He played in Major
League Baseball (MLB) for the Arizona Diamondbacks and Los Angeles
Angels from 2012 until his death. Born in Woodland Hills, California,
Skaggs was a supplemental first-round selection for the Angels in the
2009 MLB draft. Traded to the Diamondbacks in 2010, he made his MLB
debut in 2012. Traded back to the Angels in December 2013, he was fifth
in the team's rotation until an ulnar collateral ligament injury in 2014
and subsequent Tommy John surgery derailed his career. After a
visiting game in 2019, Skaggs was found unresponsive in his hotel room
in Southlake, Texas, and was pronounced dead the same day. An autopsy
concluded that he had accidentally died of asphyxia after aspirating
his own vomit while under the influence of fentanyl, oxycodone, and
alcohol. His team wore patches with No. 45, his uniform number, for the
rest of the season in his memory.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyler_Skaggs>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1863:
Four days of rioting began in New York City in response to laws
passed by the U.S. Congress to draft men to fight in the American Civil
War.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_draft_riots>
1942:
World War II: The 1st Filipino Infantry Regiment was converted
from a battalion to accommodate a larger number of volunteers spurred on
by the Japanese invasion of the Philippines.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1st_Filipino_Infantry_Regiment>
1962:
In an unprecedented reshuffle, British prime minister Harold
Macmillan dismissed seven members of his Cabinet.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Long_Knives_%281962%29>
2008:
War in Afghanistan: Taliban guerrillas attacked U.S. troops at
the Battle of Wanat in Nuristan Province.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Wanat>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
autobus:
1. (road transport, dated) A bus that is a motor vehicle, as opposed to
earlier horse-drawn buses.
2. (by extension, cycle racing) A large group of cyclists who have
fallen behind the peloton (“main group of riders”) in a race.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/autobus>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
At the very outset of our hearings, we described several elements
of President Trump's multipart plan to overturn the 2020 election. Our
hearings have now covered all but one of those elements, an organized
campaign to persuade millions of Americans of a falsehood that the 2020
election was stolen by widespread fraud; a corrupt effort to pressure
Vice President Pence to refuse to count electoral votes; an effort to
corrupt the US Department of Justice; efforts to pressure state election
officials and legislators to change state election results; a scheme to
create and submit fake electoral slates from multiple states. And today,
you saw how President Trump summoned a mob to Washington for January
6th, and then knowing that that mob was armed, directed that mob to the
United States Capitol. Every one of these elements of the planning for
January 6th is an independently serious matter. They were all ultimately
focused on overturning the election, and they all have one other thing
in common. Donald Trump participated in each, substantially and
personally. He oversaw or directed the activity of those involved.
--Liz Cheney
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Liz_Cheney>
Mount Melbourne is a 2,733-metre-high (8,967 ft) ice-covered
stratovolcano in Victoria Land, Antarctica. It is an elongated mountain
with a snow-filled summit caldera and numerous parasitic vents; a
volcanic field surrounds the edifice. Mount Melbourne has a volume of
about 180 cubic kilometres (43 cu mi) and last erupted between 1862
and 1922. Its volcanism is related both to the West Antarctic Rift and
to local tectonic structures such as faults and grabens. Mount Melbourne
has mainly erupted trachyandesite and trachyte, which formed within a
magma chamber; basaltic rocks are less common. Geothermal heat flow on
Mount Melbourne has created an unusual ecosystem formed by mosses and
liverworts that grow between fumaroles, ice towers, and ice hummocks.
This type of vegetation is found at other volcanoes of Antarctica and
develops when volcanic heat generates meltwater from snow and ice, thus
allowing plants to grow in the cold Antarctic environment.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Melbourne>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1488:
Choe Bu, an official of the Joseon dynasty, returned to Korea
after months of shipwrecked travel in China.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choe_Bu>
1943:
World War II: German and Soviet forces engaged each other at
the Battle of Prokhorovka (tanks pictured), one of the largest tank
battles in military history.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Prokhorovka>
1962:
The English rock band the Rolling Stones played their first
concert, at the Marquee Club in London.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rolling_Stones>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
unutterable:
1. Not utterable; incapable of being physically spoken or voiced;
unpronounceable.
2. Incapable of being articulated or expressed; indescribable,
inexpressible.
3. Not allowed to be spoken; taboo, unspeakable.
4. (figuratively) Extremely bad or objectionable; unspeakable.
5. Something which is unutterable (incapable of being physically spoken,
incapable of being articulated or expressed, etc.).
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/unutterable>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
There’s a built-in resistance to letting humanity be a success.
Each one claims that their system is the best one for coping with
inadequacy. We have to make them all obsolete. We need to find within
technology that there is something we can do which is capable of taking
care of everybody, and to demonstrate that this is so. That’s what
geodesic domes are about and that’s what my whole life has been about.
--Buckminster Fuller
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Buckminster_Fuller>
The Midland Railway War Memorial is a First World War memorial in Derby,
England, designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens. It commemorates employees of the
Midland Railway who died while serving in the First World War. The
Midland was the largest employer in Derby; around a third of the
company's workforce left to fight and 2,833 were killed. The memorial
consists of a cenotaph surrounded on three sides by a screen wall.
Affixed to the wall are bronze plaques which list the names of the dead.
The cenotaph is surmounted by a recumbent effigy of a soldier, covered
by a coat and resting on a catafalque. Lutyens anonymises the soldier by
lifting him high above eye level. The Midland published a book of
remembrance, and sent a copy to the family of each man listed on the
memorial. Unveiled on 15 December 1921, the memorial stands in a
conservation area and is a Grade II* listed building. Repairs were
undertaken in 2010 after several stolen bronze plaques were recovered.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midland_Railway_War_Memorial>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1833:
Yagan, a Noongar warrior wanted for leading attacks on British
colonists in Western Australia, was killed, becoming a symbol of the
unjust and sometimes brutal treatment of indigenous Australians by
colonial settlers.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yagan>
1936:
New York City's Triborough Bridge, the "biggest traffic machine
ever built", opened to traffic.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_F._Kennedy_Bridge>
1960:
To Kill a Mockingbird, a novel by Harper Lee featuring themes
of racial injustice and the loss of innocence in the Deep South of
America, was published.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Kill_a_Mockingbird>
2010:
The Islamist militia group Al-Shabaab carried out multiple
suicide bombings in Kampala, Uganda, killing 74 people and injuring 85
others.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Kampala_bombings>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
overpopulation:
(biology, demography) An excessive number of occupants (people, animals,
plants, etc.) in a particular area; specifically, when the number of
occupants exceeds the ability of that area to provide for them.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/overpopulation>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the
people are right more than half of the time. It is the feeling of
privacy in the voting booths, the feeling of communion in the libraries,
the feeling of vitality everywhere.
--E. B. White
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/E._B._White>
A globular cluster is a spherical collection of stars that orbits a
galaxy core as a satellite. They are tightly bound by gravity, which
gives them their spherical shape and relatively high stellar density
towards their core. There are more than 150 known globular clusters in
the Milky Way, with perhaps many more undiscovered. Large galaxies can
have more: Andromeda, for instance, may have as many as 500. Some giant
elliptical galaxies, such as M87, may have as many as 10,000 globular
clusters. These globular clusters orbit the galaxy out to large radii,
40,000 parsecs or more. Every galaxy of sufficient mass in the Local
Group and almost every large galaxy surveyed has an associated system of
globular clusters. The Sagittarius Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxy and Canis
Major Dwarf Galaxy both appear to be in the process of donating their
associated globular clusters to the Milky Way, such as Palomar 12.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Globular_cluster>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1645:
English Civil War: The Parliamentarians destroyed the last
Royalist field army at the Battle of Langport, ultimately giving
Parliament control of the west of England.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Langport>
1942:
An American naval aviator discovered a downed Mitsubishi
A6M Zero on Akutan Island, Alaska, which was later rebuilt and flown to
devise tactics against that type of aircraft.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akutan_Zero>
2011:
The last edition of the British tabloid News of the World was
published, closing due to allegations that it hacked the voicemails of
murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler, victims of the 7/7 attacks and
relatives of deceased British soldiers.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_International_phone_hacking_scandal>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
sortie:
1. (military, also attributively and figuratively)
2. An attack made by troops from a besieged position; a sally.
3. (aviation) An operational flight carried out by a single military
aircraft.
4. (by extension)
5. An act of venturing out to do a task, etc.
6. (figuratively)
7. An act of trying to enter a new field of activity.
8. (sports) An attacking move.
9. (astronautics) An operational flight carried out by a spacecraft
involving a return to Earth.
10. (military) Synonym of sally port (“an entry to or opening into a
fortification to enable a sally”)
11. (photography) A series of aerial photographs taken during the flight
of an aircraft; (by extension) a photography session.
12. (intransitive) To carry out a sortie; to sally.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sortie>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
The time which we have at our disposal every day is elastic; the
passions that we feel expand it, those that we inspire contract it; and
habit fills up what remains.
--Marcel Proust
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Marcel_Proust>
Suzanne Lenglen (1899–1938) was a French tennis player. One of the
sport's biggest stars and the dominant women's tennis player right after
World War I, Lenglen was the inaugural world No. 1 and a six-time
Wimbledon singles champion. After the war, she only had one singles loss
and was undefeated in doubles with Elizabeth Ryan. Her popularity
stemmed from her becoming a world champion at age 15, her unusual
balletic playing style, her brash personality, and prominent press
coverage that portrayed her as infallible at tennis. Lenglen had a wide
impact on the sport. She was the first leading amateur to turn
professional and her 1926 pro tour in the United States laid the
foundation for the next four decades of men's pro tennis. She
incorporated fashion into the game and popularised sportswear to
supplant the norm of women competing in corsets. Wimbledon moved to its
current venue to accommodate her popularity. Court Suzanne Lenglen at
the French Open is named in her honour.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzanne_Lenglen>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1877:
The inaugural Wimbledon Championship, the world's oldest tennis
tournament, began in London.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1877_Wimbledon_Championship>
1896:
Politician William Jennings Bryan made his Cross of Gold speech
advocating bimetallism, considered one of the greatest political
speeches in American history.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_of_Gold_speech>
1937:
Nitrate film being stored in a 20th Century Fox facility
spontaneously combusted, destroying more than 40,000 reels of negatives
and film prints.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1937_Fox_vault_fire>
1962:
In a seminal moment for pop art, Andy Warhol's Campbell's Soup
Cans exhibition opened at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campbell%27s_Soup_Cans>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
illumine:
1. Synonym of illuminate
2. (transitive)
3. (also figuratively) To shine light on (something).
4. (also figuratively) To cause (something) to glow or shine with light.
5. (figuratively)
6. To enlighten (someone) spiritually; to induce (someone) to adopt, or
believe in the truth of, a religion, religious tenet, etc.
7. To cause (the eyes) to see.
8. To cause (a person or their face) to show enlightenment, happiness,
etc.
9. (rare) To enlighten (someone) intellectually.
10. (art) To decorate (a page of a manuscript book) with ornamental
designs.
11. (intransitive)
12. To become bright; to light up.
13. (figuratively)
14. To enlighten intellectually.
15. Of a person or their face: to show enlightenment, happiness, etc.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/illumine>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
The kind of society that Japan should aim at is a society in
which the efforts of people are rewarded, a society in which there is no
stratification into winners and losers, and a society in which ways of
working, learning, and living are diverse and multi-tracked — in other
words, a society of opportunity where everyone has a chance to challenge
again. If there are people who sense they are facing inequality, it is
the role of politics to shed light on them.
--Shinzō Abe
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Shinz%C5%8D_Abe>
Christian Bale (born 1974) is an English actor. Known for his
versatility and recurring physical transformations to play his roles,
Bale has been a leading man in films of several genres. Born in Wales,
he had his breakthrough role at age 13 in the war film Empire of the Sun
(1987) and gained wider recognition for his work in the black comedy
American Psycho (2000) and the psychological thriller The Machinist
(2004). Bale played the superhero Batman in Batman Begins (2005) and
reprised the role in the sequels The Dark Knight (2008) and The Dark
Knight Rises (2012). He received acclaim for his performance in the
trilogy, which is one of the highest-grossing film franchises. The
recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award and a Golden
Globe Award for his portrayal of the boxer Dicky Eklund in the
biographical film The Fighter (2010), Bale was listed on Forbes
magazine's list of the highest-paid actors in 2014.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Bale>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1709:
Great Northern War: Swedish forces under Charles XII were
defeated by Russian troops led by Peter the Great at the Battle of
Poltava, effectively ending Sweden's role as a major European power.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Poltava>
1758:
French and Indian War: French forces defeated the British at
Fort Carillon on the shore of Lake Champlain in the British colony of
New York.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Carillon>
1947:
Following reports of the capture of a "flying disc" by U.S.
Army Air Force personnel near Roswell, New Mexico, the military stated
that the crashed object was a conventional weather balloon.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roswell_incident>
1962:
Following student protests at Rangoon University, Burmese
general Ne Win ordered the demolition of the historic students' union
building.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1962_Rangoon_University_protests>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
domestique:
(cycle racing) A cyclist on a cycle racing team whose role is to assist
the team's designated leaders (for example, by riding in front of them
to create a slipstream, or to set the pace), even if at the expense of
their own individual performance.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/domestique>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
It is clearly now the will of the parliamentary Conservative
Party that there should be a new leader of that party and therefore a
new prime minister. … I know that there will be many people who are
relieved and perhaps quite a few who will also be disappointed. And I
want you to know how sad I am to be giving up the best job in the world.
But them's the breaks. … I want to thank you, the British public, for
the immense privilege that you have given me. And I want you to know
that from now on until the new prime minister is in place, your
interests will be served and the government of the country will be
carried on.
--Boris Johnson
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Boris_Johnson>
For timekeeping, Finland follows Eastern European Time (EET) during its
winter as standard time and Eastern European Summer Time (EEST) in the
summer as daylight saving time. EET is two hours ahead of Coordinated
Universal Time and EEST is three hours ahead. Finland adopted EET in
1921, and daylight saving time in its current form from 1981. Up to the
19th century, each locality used its own solar time, which could vary in
Finland by up to 31 minutes. In 1862, a mean time was adopted as a
single time zone for railway scheduling. Daylight saving time was first
attempted in 1942, abandoned as not useful, and introduced again in 1981
to align with neighbouring countries. In 2017, the Finnish parliament
voted to call on the European Union to abolish daylight saving time.
Finland's time zone is maintained by the VTT Technical Research Centre
of Finland and the Centre for Metrology and Accreditation, using an
atomic clock and hydrogen monitors. The 24-hour clock notation is used
in Finland.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_Finland>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1798:
Outraged by the XYZ Affair, the United States rescinded its
treaties with France, resulting in the undeclared Quasi-War, fought
entirely at sea.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasi-War>
1954:
After the culmination of the 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état,
Carlos Castillo Armas was sworn in as president of Guatemala.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Castillo_Armas>
1963:
The secret police of Ngô Đình Nhu, brother and chief
political adviser of South Vietnamese president Ngô Đình Diệm,
attacked a group of American journalists who were covering a protest
during the Buddhist crisis.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Seven_Day_scuffle>
1983:
After writing a letter to Soviet premier Yuri Andropov,
American schoolgirl Samantha Smith visited the Soviet Union as
Andropov's personal guest, becoming known as "America's Youngest
Ambassador".
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samantha_Smith>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
extenuate:
1. Of a person: emaciated, wasted, weakened; of the body or part of it:
atrophied, shrunken, withered.
2. Of a quality or thing: lessened, weakened.
3. Reduced to poverty; impoverished.
4. To make (something) less dense, or thinner; also, to lower the
viscosity of (something).
5. (archaic)
6. To make (someone or something) slender or thin; to emaciate, to
waste.
7. To underestimate or understate the importance of (something); to
underrate.
8. (specifically) To diminish or seek to diminish the extent or severity
of (a crime, guilt, a mistake, or something else negative) by making
apologies or excuses; to palliate.
9. (obsolete)
10. To beat or draw (a metal object, etc.) out so as to lessen the
thickness.
11. To reduce the quality or quantity of (something); to lessen or
weaken the force of (something).
12. To degrade (someone); to detract from (someone's qualities,
reputation, etc.); to depreciate, to disparage.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/extenuate>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.
--Robert A. Heinlein
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_A._Heinlein>
The Jubilee coinage are British coins with an obverse depicting Queen
Victoria (pictured) by Joseph Edgar Boehm, and were struck between 1887
and 1893. In 1879, Boehm was selected to create a new depiction of
Victoria—some British coins still showed her as she had appeared forty
years previously. Boehm was slow to complete the project, and it took
years before it came to fruition. The new coins were released in June
1887, at the time of the queen's Golden Jubilee. The crown on Victoria's
head was seen as too small, was widely mocked, and helped bring about
the design's replacement. The series saw the entire issuance of the
double florin, from 1887 to 1890, and the last circulating British
fourpence piece, intended for use in British Guiana, in 1888. Bronze
coins (the penny and its fractions) were not part of the Jubilee
coinage, due to a surplus of them in commerce. The Jubilee coinage's
replacement, the Old Head coinage, with an obverse created by Thomas
Brock, began to be struck in 1893.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jubilee_coinage>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1483:
The last monarch of the House of York and the Plantagenet
dynasty, Richard III, was crowned King of England.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_III_of_England>
1801:
French Revolutionary Wars: A Royal Navy squadron failed to
eliminate a smaller French Navy squadron at Algeciras before they could
join their Spanish allies.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Battle_of_Algeciras>
1962:
The United States conducted the Sedan nuclear test as part of
Project Plowshare, a program to investigate the use of nuclear
explosions for civilian purposes.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedan_%28nuclear_test%29>
1997:
The Troubles: In response to the Drumcree conflict, five days
of unrest began in nationalist districts of Northern Ireland.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_Northern_Ireland_riots>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
bidon:
1. A bottle or flask for holding a beverage such as water or wine;
(specifically, sports) a water bottle which can be squeezed to squirt
the beverage out of the nozzle, especially (cycling) one designed for
mounting on a bicycle.
2. (archaic) A container for holding a liquid.
3. A cup made of wood.
4. An oil drum; a petrol can.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bidon>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
As to war, I am and always was a great enemy, at the same time a
warrior the greater part of my life, and were I young again, should
still be a warrior while ever this country should be invaded and I lived
— a Defensive war I think a righteous war to Defend my life & property
& that of my family, in my own opinion, is right & justifiable in the
sight of God. An offensive war, I believe to be wrong and would
therefore have nothing to do with it, having no right to meddle with
another man's property, his ox or his ass, his man servant or his maid
servant or anything that is his. Neither does he have a right to meddle
with anything that is mine, if he does I have a right to defend it by
force.
--Daniel Morgan
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Daniel_Morgan>
Hannah Montana is an American teen sitcom created by Michael Poryes,
Rich Correll, and Barry O'Brien that aired on Disney Channel for four
seasons between March 2006 and January 2011. The series centers on
Miley Stewart (Miley Cyrus), a teenage girl living a double life as the
famous pop singer Hannah Montana (pictured), an alter ego she adopted so
she could maintain her anonymity and live a normal life as a typical
teenager. The Walt Disney Company commissioned the series to continue
its successful line of music-based franchises. Hannah Montana is one of
Disney Channel's most commercially successful franchises; the program
influenced the development of merchandise, soundtrack albums, and
concert tours. It also helped launch Cyrus's musical career and
established her as a teen idol. Hannah Montana was nominated for four
Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Children's Program from 2007 to
2010. However, television critics disliked the writing and depiction of
gender roles and stereotypes.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Montana>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1852:
Frederick Douglass gave his speech known as "What to the Slave
Is the Fourth of July?", arguing that positive statements about liberty,
citizenship, and freedom, were an offense to the enslaved population of
the United States because of their lack of those things.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_to_the_Slave_Is_the_Fourth_of_July%3F>
1937:
The Hormel Foods Corporation introduced Spam, the canned
precooked meat product that would eventually enter into pop culture,
folklore, and urban legend.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spam_%28food%29>
1950:
Korean War: In the first encounter between North Korean and
American forces, an unprepared and undisciplined U.S. Army task force
was routed at the Battle of Osan.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Osan>
2012:
The Shard in London was inaugurated as the tallest building in
Europe, with a height of 310 m (1,020 ft), but was surpassed by
Moscow's Mercury City Tower four months later.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shard>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
insufferable:
Not sufferable; very difficult or impossible to endure; intolerable,
unbearable.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/insufferable>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
I am a showman by profession … and all the gilding shall make
nothing else of me.
--P. T. Barnum
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/P._T._Barnum>