title: German military brothels in World War II

text: Military brothels () were set up by Nazi Germany during World War II throughout much of occupied Europe for the use of Wehrmacht and SS soldiers. These brothels were generally new creations, but in the west, they were sometimes set up using existing brothels as well as many other buildings. Until 1942, there were around 500 military brothels of this kind in German-occupied Europe. Often operating in confiscated hotels and guarded by the Wehrmacht, these facilities served travelling soldiers and those withdrawn from the front. According to records, at least 34,140 European women were forced to serve as prostitutes during the German occupation of their own countries along with female prisoners of concentration camp brothels. In many cases in Eastern Europe, teenage girls and women were kidnapped on the streets of occupied cities during German military and police round ups called in Polish or in French.


text: The Foreign Ministry of the Polish Government in Exile issued a document on May 3, 1941, describing the mass kidnapping raids conducted in Polish cities with the aim of capturing young women for sexual slavery at brothels run by the German military. On top of that, Polish girls as young as 15 – classified as suitable for slave labor and shipped to Germany – were sexually exploited by German men. In Brandenburg, two Polish "Ostarbeiter" teens who returned home to Kraków in advanced stage of pregnancy, reported to have been raped by German soldiers with such frequency that they were unable to perform any of the worker's designated labour.


text: The Swiss Red Cross mission driver Franz Mawick wrote in 1942 from Warsaw about what he saw: "Uniformed Germans ... gaze fixedly at women and girls between the ages of 15 and 25. One of the soldiers pulls out a pocket flashlight and shines it on one of the women, straight into her eyes. The two women turn their pale faces to us, expressing weariness and resignation. The first one is about 30 years old. 'What is this old whore looking for around here?' – one of the three soldiers laughs. 'Bread, sir' – asks the woman. ... 'A kick in the ass you get, not bread' – answers the soldier. Owner of the flashlight directs the light again on the faces and bodies of girls. ... The youngest is maybe 15 years old ... They open her coat and start groping her with their lustfull paws. 'This one is ideal for bed' – he says."


text: In the Soviet Union, women were kidnapped by German forces for prostitution as well; one report by International Military Tribunal writes: "in the city of Smolensk the German Command opened a brothel for officers in one of the hotels into which hundreds of women and girls were driven; they were mercilessly dragged down the street by their arms and hair."


text: According to an exposé by the Polish "Wprost" magazine, the women forced into sexual slavery by the Nazi German authorities sometimes tried to escape. In one such instance, a group of Polish and Soviet women imprisoned at a German military brothel located in Norway escaped in 1941. They found refuge in the local Lutheran Church which offered them asylum. The women were raped by up to 32 men per day; the visiting soldiers were allocated 15 minutes each at a nominal cost of 3 Reichsmarks per "session" between the hours of 2 p.m. and 8.30 p.m. The women who were visibly pregnant were sometimes released, but would not go back to their families, so as not to shame them.


text: The Wehrmacht was able to establish a thoroughly bureaucratic system of around 100 new brothels already before 1942, based on an existing system of government-controlled ones – wrote Inse Meinen. The soldiers were given official visitation cards issued by Oberkommando des Heeres and were prohibited from engaging in sexual contact with other French women. In September 1941, Field Marshal von Brauchitsch suggested that weekly visits for all younger soldiers be considered mandatory to prevent "sexual excesses" among them. The prostitutes had a scheduled medical check-up to slow the spread of venereal diseases.


text: A 1977 German report by a neoconservative historian from Baden-Württemberg, Franz W. Seidler, contended that the foreign women who were made to register for the German military brothels had been prostitutes already before the war. Ruth Seifert, professor of sociology at the University of Applied Sciences in Regensburg, on the other hand, maintained that women were forced to work in these brothels by their German captors, as shown during the Trial of the Major War Criminals before the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg in 1946, further confirmed by the 1961 book published by Raul Hilberg.


text: There were some prostitutes primarily in Western Europe who volunteered to work in the brothels, rather than to be sent to a concentration camp.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: The Ford Mondeo Mk IV (third generation), codenamed "CD345" was officially unveiled in five-door production form by Ford in late 2006. Based on the EUCD platform developed with Volvo, the platform was the same as that used in the new large MPVs Galaxy and S-MAX, but not the North American Ford Fusion or the Mazda Atenza in Japan. It was also used for several Volvos starting with the Volvo S80 II.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: The Mk IV Ford Mondeo was released in May 2007 in the United Kingdom, where it was available in five different trim levels: Edge, Zetec, Ghia, Titanium and Titanium X. In February 2008, Ford announced that in some European markets the Mondeo will be made available with a new Titanium X Sport trim. This model aims to add an even more 'sporty character' than the current Titanium series. In March 2008, a new 2.2 TDCi common-rail diesel engine will be available on Mondeo providing acceleration to 0- in 8.4 seconds on the saloon and fuel consumption of returning 45.6 mpg combined (this engine was replaced with the 2.0l TDCi 163 returning a combined 53.3mpg imp gallons, with a marginal loss of performance). In March 2008, a new Mondeo ECOnetic based on the Zetec series was released. The Mondeo ECOnetic is powered with a 1.6 TDCI diesel that returns CO ratings of just 139 g/km on the 5-door.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: Although the fourth production model, after the Mk III Galaxy, S-Max and C-Max, to adopt Ford's current 'kinetic' design language, the Mondeo's design theme was first shown as the Ford Iosis concept at the 2005 Frankfurt Motor Show, which gave an indication to the look of the Mk IV Mondeo. The new car, in estate bodystyle, was pre-launched in 'concept' form at the Paris Motor Show on 30 September 2006.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: The new platform allowed for the use of Volvo's five-cylinder petrol engine, already featured in the Focus ST and S-Max. Also, Ford dropped the two V6 engines for this platform. The petrol engines include a 1.6-litre with two power outputs (110 PS & 125 PS), the 2.0-litre (145 PS), 2.3-litre (161 PS) for 6-speed automatic models only, and a 2.5-litre five-cylinder turbo with . It was initially believed performance models may have featured engines from Jaguar and Volvo, but following Tata's purchase of Jaguar/Land Rover, performance variants are more likely to feature other 'in-house' Ford engines such as an uprated 2.5l T5 petrol (as found in the Focus RS) or Volvo's D5 diesel and Mazda's 2.3l petrol.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: The new Mondeo uses the new electro-hydraulic steering system, first used on the C-Max, that sharpens the steering response, and helps to save fuel Inside, the Mk IV features Ford's Human-Machine Interface (HMI) first seen on the Galaxy and S-Max whilst an enhanced instrument cluster featuring a LCD for displaying trip computer and satellite navigation is available as an option on all models. Like the facelift Mk IV, base specification models have a manual heating/air-conditioning system in place of the climate control system. Also new on the Mk IV is the option of keyless starting of the engine via a "Ford Power" button on the dashboard.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: A product placement promotional initiative made the Mk IV Mondeo James Bond's car for one incidental scene in "Casino Royale", introducing the new model to global audiences in November 2006, on the launch day of the movie.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: As with the previous model, the Mk IV Mondeo was not marketed in the United States or Canada because Ford sold the same-class Fusion, which was launched in 2005. The new Mondeo was not sold in Venezuela, Brazil or Colombia because the Fusion is sold locally, nor is it offered in Mexico, although the Mk IV model was popular there. It was, however, sold in Argentina. In Middle East and Central America, it was sold along with the Ford Fusion until 2013, when the fifth Mondeo was introduced. It was not even sold in South Africa because Ford South Africa did not want to sell it after the MK II Mondeo went out of production, which meant that the Ford Fusion became sold in South Africa in 2015. thus replacing the Mondeo altogether.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: The 2007 Mondeo marked the return to the Australian market after a six-year absence, due to a resurgence in popularity of medium-sized cars in the last few years. This is in no small part the result of high fuel prices making people reconsider purchasing large cars like the Ford Falcon. Marketing for the Mondeo in Australia focused on the theme that the Mark IV Mondeo looks good but offers even more than style, with television commercials showing silly quotes from celebrities such as Britney Spears ("I've been to lots of overseas places... like Canada") interspersed with scenes of the vehicle and finally the slogan "more than just good looks".


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: Initial sales have been good in Australia, despite supply constraints from Europe limiting the car's success there. The Mondeo was initially sold as a sedan and liftback body styles in the Australian market, with diesel or petrol engines, and in four trim levels: LX, TDCi, Zetec and XR5 Turbo. In June 2009, Ford Australia announced that the 'Titanium' badge would also be used on Australian spec Mondeos, along with the release of the Mk IV Mondeo station wagon. Only the 2.3L petrol, 2.5L petrol and 2.0L diesel engines were offered there, the 2.5 being the only model available with a manual transmission. The ECOnetic Mondeo was also considered for the Australian market, but was never launched.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: In September 2010, a mid-cycle facelifted Mk IV Mondeo was introduced with some changes, such as the new ecoboost engines and LED daytime running lights. The final changes were shown at the 2010 Moscow International Motor Show. The front and rear of the car had minor changes, the biggest being the new Kinetic Design. The interior was improved, with a use of better materials.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: The Ghia trim line was removed in the United Kingdom, so the Titanium takes over as the top of the range models, along with the saloon. The new econetic has higher mpg and further reduced CO emissions thanks to Stop-Start technology. Also introduced is an improved version of the 2.2L PSA diesel engine, delivering a healthy 200PS. This facelift is prompted by similar revisions to the S-MAX, which was launched in August 2010.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: Despite positive reviews from the motoring media right up to the final year of production, this generation of Mondeo has not been a strong seller in the United Kingdom, falling out of "Top 10 Best Selling Cars In Britain" in 2010, when just over 30,000 were sold, and plummeting to just over 16,000 sales in 2013, and less than 7,000 during 2014. In 2009, it was outsold by its main rival, the Vauxhall Insignia.


title: Ford Mondeo (third generation)

text: This placed it well short of competitors, like the BMW 3 Series, Mercedes-Benz C-Class, and Vauxhall Insignia. This in stark contrast to the 1990s, when sales of the original Mondeo topped 100,000 per year, and even the second generation model peaked at more than 80,000 in 2001. It was still selling above 50,000 units per year in 2005. However, the popularity of more expensive versions of the Focus, the Kuga SUV and the related S-MAX have minimized the impact of the Mondeo's fall in popularity on overall Ford sales.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: Srinivasan Doraiswamy, known by his stage name Srinivas, is an Indian playback singer who has sung over 2000 songs in Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu, Kannada and Hindi. He has also worked independently as a music composer, working on films and private albums.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: Singer Srinivas was born On 7 November in Ambasamudram in Tamil Nadu. He was born to Duraiswamy Iyengar and Lakshmi. He learnt Carnatic music from his aunt Padma Narayanan. The great Carnatic stalwarts of the 60s influenced his early days. After which Hindi film music chiefly that of Kishore Kumar & R.D.Burman deeply influenced him in his childhood days.(Later on it was the ghazals of Mehdi Hassan which redefined his singing)


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: He completed his BTech in Dyestuffs And Intermediate Technology from University Department of Chemical Technology of University of Bombay; during which he represented his university in youth festivals. After pursuing his career as a chemical engineer and a marketing professional for ten years, he decided to follow his passion for music. He studied in Kerala and was coached in Carnatic music by his aunt.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: In 1988, Srinivas approached music director Ilaiyaraaja, who was at the helm of Tamil film music. He was offered the opportunity to work with Ilaiyaraaja, but things did not work out, as he was suffering from severe throat infection that day.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: In 1992, the soundtrack of Mani Ratnam's Tamil film "Roja" reignited his dreams of playback singing. Mani Ratnam introduced composer A. R. Rahman with this movie, who then went on to change the music scene in the whole Indian film industry. Encouraged by the use of fresh voices in "Roja", Srinivas approached Rahman. Rahman took a liking to his rendition of Mehdi Hassan's ghazals and offered him work at Chennai.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: In 1994, Srinivas shifted base to madras and started lending his voice to advertisement jingles and devotional albums.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: His first foray into playback singing began with the song "Sorgam Enbathu Namakku" with Swarnalatha from the movie "Nammavar", acted by Kamal Haasan. Music was composed by late Mahesh. It went on to become a runaway hit.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: Only in 1996 he did gain recognition with the song "Maana Madurai" from A. R. Rahman's "Minsaara Kanavu". Then came "En Uyire" in Mani Ratnam's "Uyire.." (the Tamil version of "Dil Se.."). This Rahman composition catapulted Srinivas into fame.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: Srinivas has sung for leading music directors like A. R. Rahman, Ilaiyaraaja, Deva, Vidyasagar, Bharadwaj, and in languages like Tamil, Malayalam, etc. He has made a foray into music direction through the Tamil movie Yai Nee Romba Azhaga Irukey, in which he was one among the five music directors. His composition "Ini Naanum naanillai" in that film is a major hit. His famous albums include "Ussele Ussele" and "Paarvai". Also he has worked as a co-composer to Praveen Mani for "Little John". He has composed music for Two Malayalam films titled "Seetha Kalyanam" & Train.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: The playback singer from the south cut his first private album in Hindi titled "Yeh Duniya Sab Ki". His other hits in Hindi include "Kaisi Hai Yeh" from "Dil Chahta Hai" and "Zindagi" from the film "Yuvvraaj".


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: Srinivas is a close associate to A. R. Rahman from the very first day they got introduced. On working with Rahman, he says,


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: "There can be only one Rahman. Two years ago, he called me out of the blue to supervise his recordings. I consider it an honour. Earlier, he would be there to monitor every single take. I sometimes wonder if I can match his perfection standards," and adds, "He's at lightning speed when it comes to creativity and innovations. There are times when he compliments me and nothing feels as good as that. For me, it's like an award."


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: In 2010, he released an album: "Timeless Classics by Srinivas". This was a tribute to Mehdi Hassan and included major ghazals of him sung by Srinivas. It was released on Saregama and was launched by A. R. Rahman.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: In May 2011, he composed music for Jayaraj's Mammootty-starrer thriller "The Train". In 2013, he composed music for the Tamil film 'Kangaroo'.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: He was also judging a famous music reality show named Josco Indian Voice, telecasted in Mazhavil Manorama alongside Sujatha and Sharreth.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: He worked on a private album named 'Siragadippen', which featured top musicians such as M.S Viswanathan, SPB, Shankar Mahadevan and himself.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: As of 2013 and 2014, his discography boasts of back to back hits from Superstar Rajinikanth's movies, Kochadaiiyaan and Lingaa. Kochadaiiyaan had him croon 'Idhayam', a pathos song and 'En Mannava', a romantic duet from Lingaa. His song 'Parakkiren Naan' for the Vijay Sethupathi starrer Mellisai was released in 2015, which had music by Sam CS.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: in 2016, Srinivas released his single, 'Adadadadadaa Kadhaippoma', a song saluting the spirit of Tamils across the world. With lyrics by esteemed composer Ramesh Vinayakam, it was extremely well received and garnered a lot of praise. He also composed a single for Doopadoo titled 'Kozhai', with his daughter Sharanya Srinivas on the vocals. It had thought provoking lyrics by Madhan Karky.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: His song ‘Minsara Poove’ in ‘Padayappa’ won him the Tamil Nadu Government's Award for the best Playback Singer . He won the Tamil Nadu state award again in 2008 for the song 'Margazhiyil' composed by Bharadwaj. He won the Cinema Express Award twice, the Dinakaran Award once, and the Film Fans Award twice for the best singer. He was also awarded the best playback singer at the International Tamil Film Awards held at Malaysia for the song ‘Apple Penne’ from Roja Kootam. He was conferred with the Kalaimamani Title by the Government of Tamil Nadu in 2006, and Kerala State Award for the song ‘Baansuri’ from the movie ‘Rathri mazha’ . In Hindi films, he won the A.V Max Award for the best playback singer for his splendid rendering of the song ‘Kaisi He Yeh Rut’ from ‘Dil Chahta Hai’.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: Be it "Vijay Television " Super singer or "Zee Tamil" Saregamapa, with his outspoken comments and the continuous support and encouragement for the contestants throughout the season makes him one of the most favourite judges in the reality shows of Tamil Nadu.


title: Srinivas (singer)

text: He marriedSujatha Narayanan on 20 April 1990 at Dharmaprakash Kalyana Mandapam in Purasaiwakkam. He has two daughters Sharanya Srinivas and Sunanda Srinivas.


title: Disco Pigs

text: Disco Pigs is a 2001 Irish film directed by Kirsten Sheridan and written by Enda Walsh, who adapted it from his 1996 play of the same name. Cillian Murphy and Elaine Cassidy star as two young people from Cork who have a lifelong, but unhealthy, friendship that is imploding as they approach active life.


title: Disco Pigs

text: The film revolves around the intense relationship of the two teenage protagonists, Darren (Cillian Murphy) and Sinéad (Elaine Cassidy), who call each other "Pig" and "Runt," respectively. Pig and Runt were born at the same hospital at nearly the same time and grow up next door to each other. This brings about an extremely close relationship between the two. They live in their own world and rarely interact with other people; when they do, it's mostly to express their hostility toward them. Their relationship, while very intense and unhealthy, remains platonic until just before their 17th birthday.


title: Disco Pigs

text: Around this time, Runt catches and reciprocates the attentions of another young man, Marky (Darren Healy), from their school just as Pig begins to develop romantic feelings for Runt. As their birthday draws closer, Pig becomes more volatile and violent and his new feelings become obvious to Runt when he kisses her after a rampage at a nightclub. Runt does not know how to reject him and they continue their friendship, though relations between them are markedly awkward. Their relationship finally raises concerns at their school. With the cooperation of her parents and Pig's single mother, Runt, considered the more adaptive of the two, is sent away to a boarding school. Pig is devastated by this and decides to run away and retrieve Runt.


title: Disco Pigs

text: Even though Runt is paralyzed with uncertainty and fear at the boarding school, unsure of how to live her daily life without Pig, she starts to adapt, even befriending another girl. On their 17th birthday, Pig arrives at Runt's school and asks her to leave with him, which she does. Elated at their reunion, the two eventually chance upon a nightclub called The Palace. There, Runt sees Marky again and dances with him. In a fit of jealous rage, Pig beats Marky until he dies. The two flee the club and take a taxi to the beach where they often spend time and make love. In the morning, Pig wordlessly allows Runt to smother him, knowing the punishment awaiting him. Runt stares out to the ocean, wondering what the rest of her life will be like.


title: Disco Pigs

text: Darren/"Pig" is portrayed by Cillian Murphy, who also originally played the part in the stage version. Runt is the only person Pig knows well. Pig also has an extreme hatred for public displays of affection. He cannot begin to comprehend a world where Runt does not exist. Together, they create a surreal world where there is little division between reality and dreams and Pig's and Runt's two personas. Pig is a strange, volatile dreamer. Charles Bark portrays Young Pig.


title: Disco Pigs

text: Sinéad/"Runt" is portrayed by Elaine Cassidy. She is the calmer of the two characters. When events involving Pig get too wild, Runt steps in quietly. Although the less voiced of the two, she is the more independent. Eileen Walsh played this role on stage. Sarah Gallagher portrays Young Runt.


title: Voiced palatal fricative

text: The voiced palatal fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) that represents this sound is (crossed-tail j), and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is codice_1. It is the non-sibilant equivalent of the voiced alveolo-palatal sibilant.


title: Voiced palatal fricative

text: In broad transcription, the symbol for the palatal approximant, , may be used for the sake of simplicity.


title: Voiced palatal fricative

text: The voiced palatal fricative is a very rare sound, occurring in only 7 of the 317 languages surveyed by the original UCLA Phonological Segment Inventory Database. In Kabyle, Margi, Modern Greek, and Scottish Gaelic, the sound occurs phonemically, along with its voiceless counterpart, and in several more, the sound occurs as a result of phonological processes.


title: Voiced palatal fricative

text: There is also the voiced post-palatal fricative in some languages, which is articulated slightly more back compared with the place of articulation of the prototypical voiced palatal fricative but not as back as the prototypical voiced velar fricative. The International Phonetic Alphabet does not have a separate symbol for that sound, but it can be transcribed as , (both symbols denote a retracted ), or (both symbols denote an advanced ). The equivalent X-SAMPA symbols are codice_2 and codice_3, respectively.


title: Voiced palatal fricative

text: Especially in broad transcription, the voiced post-palatal fricative may be transcribed as a palatalized voiced velar fricative ( in the IPA, codice_4 or codice_5 in X-SAMPA).


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The Reagan Doctrine was stated by United States President Ronald Reagan in his State of the Union address on February 6, 1985: "We must not break faith with those who are risking their lives—on every continent from Afghanistan to Nicaragua—to defy Soviet-supported aggression and secure rights which have been ours from birth." It was a strategy implemented by the Reagan Administration to overwhelm the global influence of the Soviet Union in the late Cold War. The doctrine was a centerpiece of United States foreign policy from the early 1980s until the end of the Cold War in 1991.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Under the Reagan Doctrine, the United States provided overt and covert aid to anti-communist guerrillas and resistance movements in an effort to "roll back" Soviet-backed pro-communist governments in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The doctrine was designed to diminish Soviet influence in these regions as part of the administration's overall strategy to win the Cold War.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The Reagan Doctrine followed in the tradition of U.S. presidents developing foreign policy "doctrines", which were designed to reflect challenges facing international relations, and to propose foreign policy solutions. The practice began with the Monroe Doctrine in 1823, and continued with the Roosevelt Corollary, sometimes called the Roosevelt Doctrine, introduced by Theodore Roosevelt in 1904.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The post–World War II tradition of Presidential doctrines started with the Truman Doctrine in 1947, under which the US provided support to the governments of Greece and Turkey as part of a Cold War strategy to keep both nations out of the Soviet sphere of influence. It was followed by the Eisenhower Doctrine, the Kennedy Doctrine, the Johnson Doctrine, the Nixon Doctrine, and the Carter Doctrine, all of which defined the foreign policy approaches of these respective U.S. presidents on some of the largest global challenges of their presidencies.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: At least one component of the Reagan Doctrine technically pre-dated the Reagan Presidency. In Afghanistan, the Carter administration began providing limited covert military assistance to Afghanistan's mujahideen in an effort to drive the Soviets out of the nation, or at least raise the military and political cost of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. The policy of aiding the mujahideen in their war against the Soviet occupation was originally proposed by Carter's national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski and was implemented by U.S. intelligence services. It enjoyed broad bipartisan political support.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Democratic congressman Charlie Wilson became obsessed with the Afghan cause, and was able to leverage his position on the House Appropriations committees to encourage other Democratic congressmen to vote for CIA Afghan war money, with the tacit approval of Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill, even as the Democratic party lambasted Reagan for the CIA's secret war in Central America. It was a complex web of relationships described in George Crile III's book "".


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Wilson teamed with CIA manager Gust Avrakotos and formed a team of a few dozen insiders who greatly enhanced the support for the Mujahideen, funneling it through Zia ul-Haq's ISI. Avrakotos and Wilson charmed leaders from various anti-Soviet countries including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and China to increase support for the rebels. Avrakotos hired Michael G. Vickers, a young Paramilitary Officer, to enhance the guerilla's odds by revamping the tactics, weapons, logistics, and training used by the Mujahideen. Michael Pillsbury, a Pentagon official, and Vincent Cannistraro pushed the CIA to supply the Stinger missile to the rebels. President Reagan's Covert Action program has been given credit for assisting in ending the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: With the arrival of the Reagan administration, The Heritage Foundation and other conservative foreign policy think tanks saw a political opportunity to significantly expand Carter's Afghanistan policy into a more global "doctrine", including U.S. support to anti-communist resistance movements in Soviet-allied nations in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. According to political analysts Thomas Bodenheimer and Robert Gould, "it was the Heritage Foundation that translated theory into concrete policy. Heritage targeted nine nations for rollback: Afghanistan, Angola, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Iran, Laos, Libya, Nicaragua, and Vietnam".


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Throughout the 1980s, the Heritage Foundation's foreign policy expert on the Third World, Michael Johns, the foundation's principal Reagan Doctrine advocate, visited with resistance movements in Angola, Cambodia, Nicaragua, and other Soviet-supported nations and urged the Reagan administration to initiate or expand military and political support to them. Heritage Foundation foreign policy experts also endorsed the Reagan Doctrine in two of their "Mandate for Leadership" books, which provided comprehensive policy advice to Reagan administration officials.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The result was that, unlike in Afghanistan, the Reagan Doctrine was rather quickly applied in Angola and Nicaragua, with the United States providing military support to the UNITA movement in Angola and the "contras" in Nicaragua, but without a declaration of war against either country. Addressing the Heritage Foundation in October 1989, UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi called the Heritage Foundation's efforts "a source of great support. No Angolan will forget your efforts. You have come to Jamba, and you have taken our message to Congress and the Administration". U.S. aid to UNITA began to flow overtly after Congress repealed the Clark Amendment, a long-standing legislative prohibition on military aid to UNITA.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Following these victories, Johns and the Heritage Foundation urged further expanding the Reagan Doctrine to Ethiopia, where they argued that the Ethiopian famine was a product of the military and agricultural policies of Ethiopia's Soviet-supported Mengistu Haile Mariam government. Johns and Heritage also argued that Mengistu's decision to permit a Soviet naval and air presence on the Red Sea ports of Eritrea represented a strategic challenge to U.S. security interests in the Middle East and North Africa.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The Heritage Foundation and the Reagan administration also sought to apply the Reagan Doctrine in Cambodia. The largest resistance movement fighting Cambodia's communist government was largely made up of members of the former Khmer Rouge regime, whose human rights record was among the worst of the 20th century. Therefore, Reagan authorized the provision of aid to a smaller Cambodian resistance movement, a coalition called the Khmer People's National Liberation Front, known as the KPNLF and then run by Son Sann; in an effort to force an end to the Vietnamese occupation.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: While the Reagan Doctrine enjoyed strong support from the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute, the libertarian-oriented Cato Institute opposed the Reagan Doctrine, arguing in 1986 that "most Third World struggles take place in arenas and involve issues far removed from legitimate American security needs. U.S. involvement in such conflicts expands the republic's already overextended commitments without achieving any significant prospective gains. Instead of draining Soviet military and financial resources, we end up dissipating our own."


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Even Cato, however, conceded that the Reagan Doctrine had "fired the enthusiasm of the conservative movement in the United States as no foreign policy issue has done in decades". While opposing the Reagan Doctrine as an official governmental policy, Cato instead urged Congress to remove the legal barriers prohibiting private organizations and citizens from supporting these resistance movements.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Within the Reagan administration, the doctrine was quickly embraced by nearly all of Reagan's top national security and foreign policy officials, including Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, UN Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick, and a series of Reagan National Security advisers including John Poindexter, Frank Carlucci, and Colin Powell.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Reagan himself was a vocal proponent of the policy. Seeking to expand Congressional support for the doctrine in the 1985 State of the Union Address in February 1985, Reagan said: "We must not break faith with those who are risking their lives ... on every continent, from Afghanistan to Nicaragua ... to defy Soviet aggression and secure rights which have been ours from birth. Support for freedom fighters is self-defense".


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: As part of his effort to gain Congressional support for the Nicaraguan contras, Reagan labeled the contras "the moral equivalent of our founding fathers", which was controversial because the contras had shown a disregard for human rights. There also were allegations that some members of the contra leadership were involved in cocaine trafficking.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Reagan and other conservative advocates of the Reagan Doctrine advocates also argued that the doctrine served U.S. foreign policy and strategic objectives and was a moral imperative against the former Soviet Union, which Reagan, his advisers, and supporters labeled an "evil empire".


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Other early conservative advocates for the Reagan Doctrine included influential activist Grover Norquist, who ultimately became a registered UNITA lobbyist and an economic adviser to Savimbi's UNITA movement in Angola, and former Reagan speechwriter and former U.S. Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, who made several secret visits with the "mujahideen" in Afghanistan and returned with glowing reports of their bravery against the Soviet occupation. Rohrabacher was led to Afghanistan by his contact with the "mujahideen", Jack Wheeler.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: In 1985, as U.S. support was flowing to the Mujahideen, Savimbi's UNITA, and the Nicaraguan Contras, columnist Charles Krauthammer, in an essay for "Time" magazine, labeled the policy the "Reagan Doctrine," and the name stuck.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The Reagan Doctrine was especially significant because it represented a substantial shift in the post–World War II foreign policy of the United States. Prior to the Reagan Doctrine, U.S. foreign policy in the Cold War was rooted in "containment", as originally defined by George F. Kennan, John Foster Dulles, and other post–World War II U.S. foreign policy experts. In January 1977, four years prior to becoming president, Reagan bluntly stated, in a conversation with Richard V. Allen, his basic expectation in relation to the Cold War. "My idea of American policy toward the Soviet Union is simple, and some would say simplistic," he said. "It is this: We win and they lose. What do you think of that?"


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Although a similar policy of "rollback" had been considered on a few occasions during the Cold War, the U.S. government, fearing an escalation of the Cold War and possible nuclear conflict, chose not to confront the Soviet Union directly. With the Reagan Doctrine, those fears were set aside and the United States began to openly confront Soviet-supported governments through support of rebel movements in the doctrine's targeted countries.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: One perceived benefit of the Reagan Doctrine was the relatively low cost of supporting guerrilla forces compared to the Soviet Union's expenses in propping up client states. Another benefit was the lack of direct involvement of American troops, which allowed the United States to confront Soviet allies without sustaining casualties. Especially since the September 11 attacks, some Reagan Doctrine critics have argued that, by facilitating the transfer of large amounts of weapons to various areas of the world and by training military leaders in these regions, the Reagan Doctrine actually contributed to "blowback" by strengthening some political and military movements that ultimately developed hostility toward the United States, such as al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. However, no direct U.S. aid to Osama bin Laden or any of his affiliates has ever been established.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Historian Greg Grandin described a disjuncture between official ideals preached by the United States and actual U.S. support for terrorism. "Nicaragua, where the United States backed not a counter insurgent state but anti-communist mercenaries, likewise represented a disjuncture between the idealism used to justify U.S. policy and its support for political terrorism. ... The corollary to the idealism embraced by the Republicans in the realm of diplomatic public policy debate was thus political terror. In the dirtiest of Latin America's dirty wars, their faith in America's mission justified atrocities in the name of liberty". Grandin examined the behaviour of the U.S.-backed contras and found evidence that it was particularly inhumane and vicious: "In Nicaragua, the U.S.-backed Contras decapitated, castrated, and otherwise mutilated civilians and foreign aid workers. Some earned a reputation for using spoons to gouge their victims' eyes out. In one raid, Contras cut the breasts of a civilian defender to pieces and ripped the flesh off the bones of another."


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Professor Frederick H. Gareau has written that the Contras "attacked bridges, electric generators, but also state-owned agricultural cooperatives, rural health clinics, villages, and non-combatants". U.S. agents were directly involved in the fighting. "CIA commandos launched a series of sabotage raids on Nicaraguan port facilities. They mined the country's major ports and set fire to its largest oil storage facilities." In 1984 the U.S. Congress ordered this intervention to be stopped; however, it was later shown that the Reagan administration illegally continued (See Iran–Contra affair). Gareau has characterized these acts as "wholesale terrorism" by the United States.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: A CIA manual for training the Nicaraguan Contras in psychological operations, leaked to the media in 1984, entitled "Psychological Operations in Guerrilla War". recommended "selective use of violence for propagandistic effects" and to "neutralize" government officials. Nicaraguan Contras were taught to lead:


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Similarly, former diplomat Clara Nieto, in her book "Masters of War", charged that "the CIA launched a series of terrorist actions from the "mothership" off Nicaragua's coast. In September 1983, she charged the agency attacked Puerto Sandino with rockets. The following month, frogmen blew up the underwater oil pipeline in the same port – the only one in the country. In October there was an attack on Puerto Corinto, Nicaragua's largest port, with mortars, rockets, and grenades blowing up five large oil and gasoline storage tanks. More than a hundred people were wounded, and the fierce fire, which could not be brought under control for two days, forced the evacuation of 23,000 people."


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The International Court of Justice, when judging the case of "Nicaragua v. United States" in 1984, found that the United States was obligated to pay reparations to Nicaragua, because it had violated international law by actively supporting the Contras in their rebellion and by mining the Naval waters of Nicaragua. The United States refused to participate in the proceedings after the Court rejected its argument that the ICJ lacked jurisdiction to hear the case. The U.S. later blocked the enforcement of the judgment by exercising its veto power in the United Nations Security Council and so prevented Nicaragua from obtaining any actual compensation.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: As the Reagan administration set about implementing The Heritage Foundation plan in Afghanistan, Angola, and Nicaragua, it first attempted to do so covertly, not as part of official policy. "The Reagan government's initial implementation of the Heritage plan was done covertly", according to the book "Rollback", "following the longstanding custom that containment can be overt but rollback should be covert". Ultimately, however, the administration supported the policy more openly.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: While the doctrine benefited from strong support from the Reagan administration, The Heritage Foundation and several influential Members of Congress, many votes on critical funding for resistance movements, especially the Nicaraguan contras, were extremely close, making the Reagan Doctrine one of the more contentious American political issues of the 1980s.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: As arms flowed to the contras, Savimbi's UNITA and the mujahideen, the Reagan Doctrine's advocates argued that the doctrine was yielding constructive results for U.S. interests and global democracy.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: In Nicaragua, pressure from the Contras led the Sandinstas to end the State of Emergency, and they subsequently lost the 1990 elections. In Afghanistan, the mujahideen bled the Soviet Union's military and paved the way for Soviet military defeat. In Angola, Savimbi's resistance ultimately led to a decision by the Soviet Union and Cuba to bring their troops and military advisors home from Angola as part of a negotiated settlement.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: All of these developments were Reagan Doctrine victories, the doctrine's advocates argue, laying the ground for the ultimate dissolution of the Soviet Union. Michael Johns later argued that "the Reagan-led effort to support freedom fighters resisting Soviet oppression led successfully to the first major military defeat of the Soviet Union ... Sending the Red Army packing from Afghanistan proved one of the single most important contributing factors in one of history's most profoundly positive and important developments".


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: Among others, Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990, credited the Reagan Doctrine with aiding the end of the Cold War. In December 1997, Thatcher said that the Reagan Doctrine "proclaimed that the truce with communism was over. The West would henceforth regard no area of the world as destined to forego its liberty simply because the Soviets claimed it to be within their sphere of influence. We would fight a battle of ideas against communism, and we would give material support to those who fought to recover their nations from tyranny".


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: U.S. funding for the Contras, who opposed the Sandinista government of Nicaragua, was obtained from covert sources. The U.S. Congress did not authorize sufficient funds for the Contras' efforts, and the Boland Amendment barred further funding. In 1986, in an episode that became known as The Iran–Contra affair, the Reagan administration illegally facilitated the sale of arms to Iran, the subject of an arms embargo, in the hope that the arms sales would secure the release of hostages and allow U.S. intelligence agencies to fund the Nicaraguan Contras.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: The Reagan Doctrine continued into the administration of Reagan's successor, George H. W. Bush, who won the U.S. presidency in November 1988. Bush's presidency featured the final years of the Cold War and the Gulf War, but the Reagan Doctrine soon faded from U.S. policy as the Cold War ended. Bush also noted a presumed peace dividend to the end of the Cold War with economic benefits of a decrease in defense spending. However, following the presidency of Bill Clinton, a change in United States foreign policy was introduced with the presidency of his son George W. Bush and the new Bush Doctrine, who increased military spending in response to the September 11th attacks.


title: Reagan Doctrine

text: In Nicaragua, the Contra War ended after the Sandinista government, facing military and political pressure, agreed to new elections, in which the contras' political wing participated, in 1990. In Angola, an agreement in 1989 met Savimbi's demand for the removal of Soviet, Cuban and other military troops and advisers from Angola. Also in 1989, in relation to Afghanistan, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev labeled the war against the U.S.-supported mujahideen a "bleeding wound" and ended the Soviet occupation of the country.


title: Fibroma

text: Fibromas are benign tumors that are composed of fibrous or connective tissue. They can grow in all organs, arising from mesenchyme tissue. The term "fibroblastic" or "fibromatous" is used to describe tumors of the fibrous connective tissue. When the term "fibroma" is used without modifier, it is usually considered benign, with the term fibrosarcoma reserved for malignant tumors.


title: Fibroma

text: The hard fibroma (fibroma durum) consists of many fibres and few cells, e.g. in skin it is called dermatofibroma (fibroma simplex or nodulus cutaneous). A special form is the keloid, which derives from hyperplastic growth of scars.


title: Fibroma

text: The soft fibroma (fibroma molle) or fibroma with a shaft (acrochordon, skin tag, fibroma pendulans) consist of many loosely connected cells and less fibroid tissue. It mostly appears at the neck, armpits or groin. The photo shows a soft fibroma of the eyelid.


title: Fibroma

text: The fibroma cavernosum or angiofibroma, consists of many often dilated vessels, it is a vasoactive tumor occurring almost exclusively in adolescent males.


title: Fibroma

text: The cemento-ossifying fibroma is hard and fibrous, most frequently seen in the jaw or mouth, sometimes in connection with a fracture or another type of injury.


title: Fibroma

text: Other fibromas: chondromyxoid fibroma, desmoplasmic fibroma, nonossifying fibroma, ossifying fibroma, nuchal fibroma, collagenous fibroma, fibroma of tendon sheath, perifollicular fibroma, pleomorphic fibroma, uterine fibroma, Gardner fibroma, etc.


title: Fibroma

text: It appears in the sex cord-stromal tumour group of ovarian neoplasms. Ovary fibromas are most frequent during middle age, and rare in children.


title: Fibroma

text: There may be thecomatous areas (fibrothecoma). The presence of an ovarian fibroma can cause ovarian torsion in some cases.


title: Fibroma

text: Benign fibromas may, but need not, be removed. Removal is usually a brief outpatient procedure or using cryotherapy in which the lesion is deep frozen (-196 degrees Celsius using liquid nitrogen) and thawed for two or more cycles, with full recovery within 3 to 4 weeks. The cryotherapy treatment needs no anesthetics and is painless. Another simple treatment is snip removal after injecting local anesthetic.


title: Virginia E. Johnson

text: Virginia E. Johnson (born Mary Virginia Eshelman; February 11, 1925 – July 24, 2013) was an American sexologist and a member of the Masters and Johnson sexuality research team. Along with her partner, William H. Masters, she pioneered research into the nature of human sexual response and the diagnosis and treatment of sexual dysfunctions and disorders from 1957 until the 1990s.


title: Virginia E. Johnson

text: Virginia Johnson was born Mary Virginia Eshelman in Springfield, Missouri, the daughter of Edna (née Evans) and Hershel "Harry" Eshelman, a farmer. Her paternal grandparents were members of the LDS Church, and her father had Hessian ancestry. When she was five, her family moved to Palo Alto, California, where her father worked as a groundskeeper for a hospital. The family later returned to Missouri and farming. Virginia enrolled at her hometown's Drury College at age 16, but dropped out and spent four years working in the Missouri state insurance office. She eventually returned to school, studying at the University of Missouri and the Kansas City Conservatory of Music, and during World War II began a music career as a band singer. She sang country music for radio station KWTO in Springfield, where she adopted the stage name Virginia Gibson.


title: Virginia E. Johnson

text: Johnson moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where she became a business writer for the "St. Louis Daily Record". Eschewing a singing career, Johnson enrolled at Washington University in St. Louis, intending to earn a degree in sociology but never attaining one.


title: Virginia E. Johnson

text: Johnson met William H. Masters in 1957 when he hired her as a research assistant at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Washington University in St. Louis. Masters trained her in medical terminology, therapy, and research during the years she worked as his assistant. Together they developed polygraph-like instruments that were designed to measure sexual arousal in humans. Using these tools, Masters and Johnson observed and measured about 700 men and women who agreed to engage in sexual activity with other participants or masturbate in Masters' laboratory. By observing these subjects, Johnson helped Masters identify the four stages of sexual response. This came to be known as the human sexual response cycle. The cycle consists of the excitement phase, plateau phase, orgasmic phase, and resolution phase. In 1964, Masters and Johnson established their own independent nonprofit research institution in St. Louis called the Reproductive Biology Research Foundation. The center was renamed the Masters and Johnson Institute in 1978.


title: Virginia E. Johnson

text: In April 2009, Thomas Maier reported in "Scientific American" that Johnson had serious reservations about the Masters and Johnson Institute's program to convert homosexuals into heterosexuals, a program which ran from 1968 to 1977.


title: Virginia E. Johnson

text: By her early 20s, Johnson had married a Missouri politician; the marriage lasted two days. She then married a much older attorney, whom she also divorced. In 1950, Johnson married bandleader George Johnson, with whom she had a boy and a girl, before divorcing in 1956. In 1971, Johnson married William Masters after he divorced his first wife. They were divorced in 1993, though they continued to collaborate professionally. Johnson died in July 2013 "of complications from several illnesses".


title: Virginia E. Johnson

text: The American cable network Showtime debuted "Masters of Sex", a dramatic television series loosely based on the 2009 biography of the same name, on September 29, 2013. The series stars Lizzy Caplan as Johnson.


title: Jake Cherry

text: Jacob Cherry (born September 15, 1996) is an American actor. He is best known for playing the role of Nick Daley in "Night at the Museum" (2006) and in its sequel "" (2009).


title: Jake Cherry

text: Cherry's film debut was in "Friends with Money". He appeared as Nick Daley in "Night at the Museum" and "", and as Travers McLain in "Desperate Housewives". Cherry did not reprise his role as Nick Daley in the third "Night at the Museum" film installment. He also appeared on Fox's short-lived series "Head Cases". He appeared in an episode of "Criminal Minds", as a patient's son in Fox's medical drama "House", and in an episode of Fox's crime drama "Bones". He appeared in "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" as 10-year-old David Stutler.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: Hendrik Erasmus "Rassie" van der Dussen (born 7 February 1989) is a South African professional cricketer who represents the South Africa national cricket team and plays for the Highveld Lions cricket team in domestic cricket. In the 2018 "South African Cricket Annual", he was named as one of the five Cricketers of the Year.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: In August 2019, van der Dussen was named the International Men's Newcomer of the Year at Cricket South Africa's annual award ceremony. Later the same month, Cricket South Africa awarded him with a central contract for the 2019–20 season.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: In August 2017, van der Dussen was named in Cape Town Knight Riders' squad for the first season of the T20 Global League. However, in October 2017, Cricket South Africa initially postponed the tournament until November 2018, with it being cancelled soon after.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: van der Dussen was the leading run-scorer during the 2017–18 Sunfoil Series, with 959 runs in ten matches. He was the joint-leading run-scorer in the 2018–19 CSA T20 Challenge tournament, with 348 runs in ten matches. In April 2021, he was named in Gauteng's squad, ahead of the 2021–22 cricket season in South Africa.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: On 3 June 2018, van der Dussen was selected to play for the Vancouver Knights in the players' draft for the inaugural edition of the Global T20 Canada tournament. He was the leading run-scorer in the tournament for the Vancouver Knights, with 255 runs in eight matches. In the same month, he was named in the squad for the Highveld Lions team for the 2018–19 season.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: In October 2018, van der Dussen was named in Jozi Stars' squad for the first edition of the Mzansi Super League T20 tournament. In June 2019, he was selected to play for the Vancouver Knights franchise team in the 2019 Global T20 Canada tournament. In September 2019, he was named in the squad for the Jozi Stars team for the 2019 Mzansi Super League tournament. In December 2019, he was picked by Islamabad United in the supplementary round of the 2020 Pakistan Super League players draft as their last pick.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: In July 2020, van der Dussen was named in the St Kitts & Nevis Patriots squad for the 2020 Caribbean Premier League. However, van der Dussen was one of five South African cricketers to miss the tournament, after failing to confirm travel arrangements in due time. In February 2022, he was bought by the Rajasthan Royals in the auction for the 2022 Indian Premier League tournament.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: In September 2018, van der Dussen was named in South Africa's Twenty20 International (T20I) series against Zimbabwe. He made his T20I debut for South Africa against Zimbabwe on 9 October 2018. In January 2019, he was named in South Africa's One Day International (ODI) squad for their series against Pakistan. He made his ODI debut for South Africa against Pakistan on 19 January 2019. During his debut, van der Dussen came within just seven runs of scoring a maiden ODI century on debut before he fell for 93. He followed this with an unbeaten 80 at Kingsmead Stadium three days later. He finished the series with 241 runs, averaging 120.5, across the five ODIs.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: van der Dussen was then retained for the ODI series against Sri Lanka in March 2019. He scored 112 runs across four ODIs including one fifty and finished the series with an average of 56. In April 2019, he was named in South Africa's squad for the 2019 Cricket World Cup. In December 2019, he was named in South Africa's Test squad for their series against England. He made his Test debut for South Africa, against England, on 26 December 2019. In March 2020, he was awarded with a national contract by Cricket South Africa ahead of the 2020–21 season.


title: Rassie van der Dussen

text: In April 2021, in the first match against Pakistan, van der Dussen scored his first century in an ODI, with 123 not out. At the age of 32 years and 54 days, he also became the oldest cricketer for South Africa to score his first century in an ODI match. In September 2021, van der Dussen was named in South Africa's squad for the 2021 ICC Men's T20 World Cup.


title: Tilia cordata

text: Tilia cordata, the small-leaved lime or small-leaved linden, is a species of tree in the family Malvaceae, native to much of Europe. Other common names include little-leaf or littleleaf linden, or traditionally in South East England, pry or pry tree. Its range extends from Britain through mainland Europe to the Caucasus and western Asia. In the south of its range it is restricted to high elevations.


title: Tilia cordata

text: "Tilia cordata" is a deciduous tree growing to tall, diameter 1/3 to 1/2 the height, with a trunk up to 1 m diameter. The largest known trunk circumference was a specimen in Närke, Sweden, that measured 8.35 meters diameter at chest height. Lindar in Germany is said to be over 1000 years old. The bark is smooth and grayish when young, firm with vertical ridges and horizontal fissures when older. The crown is rounded in a formal oval shape to pyramidal. Branching is upright and increases in density with age. The leaves are alternately arranged, rounded to triangular-ovate, 3–8 cm long and broad, mostly hairless (unlike the related "Tilia platyphyllos") except for small tufts of brown hair in the leaf vein axils – the leaves are distinctively heart-shaped. The buds are alternate, pointed egg shaped and have red scales. It has no terminal bud. The small yellow-green hermaphrodite flowers are produced in clusters of five to eleven in early summer with a leafy yellow-green subtending bract, have a rich, heavy scent; the trees are much visited by bees to the erect flowers which are held above the bract; this flower arrangement is distinctly different from that of the Common Lime "Tilia × europaea" where the flowers are held beneath the bract. The fruit is a dry nut-like drupe 6–7 mm long by 4 mm broad containing one, or sometimes two, brown seeds (infertile fruits are globose), downy at first becoming smooth at maturity, and (unlike "T. platyphyllos" and also "T." × "europaea") not ribbed but very thin and easily cracked open.


title: Tilia cordata

text: The trees favour good, loamy sites, but can also be found on sandy, infertile soils, and are not thought to be drought resistant. Dormant shoots of "Tilia cordata" can resist winter frost temperatures as low as −34 °C.


title: Tilia cordata

text: In Britain "Tilia cordata," traditionally called pry, is considered an indicator of ancient woodland, and is becoming increasingly rare. Owing to its rarity, a number of woods have been given SSSI status. Cocklode Wood, part of the Bardney Limewoods, is the best surviving spread of medieval small leaved limes in England. Another site is Shrawley Wood in Worcestershire. Small-leaved lime was once regarded as holy and good for carving.


title: Tilia cordata

text: Trees in northern England were found to have established when the climate was warmer and have adapted to the cooling climate. Paleobotanical analysis of tree pollen preserved in peat deposits demonstrates that "Tilia cordata" was present as a woodland tree in the southern Lake District c 3100 B.C. In spite of the late migration of "T. cordata" into the Lake District, pollen diagrams from many sites show rapid expansion so that, within a few centuries, it had become plentiful and even locally dominant in the southern valleys. Maximum values for "Tilia" from all pollen diagrams available for the north of England show a conspicuous concentration of high values in the southern Lake District. At several sites among the limestone hills on both sides of the estuary of the River Kent, the curves for "Tilia", although beginning about 4800 to 4000 B.C. then achieve values of at least 10% within a few centuries. At Witherslack values of this magnitude persist for a depth of 3 m which represents about 4000 years. For much of this period "Ulmus" is approximately 10%, "Quercus" 20% and the remaining arboreal pollen is largely that of "Alnus". For a shorter period "Tilia" exceeds "Quercus" and reaches a maximum of 30%. The (Witherslack) basin is about 200 m in width, so that with distance correction factors applied this indicates that the surrounding woodlands on well-drained soils contained "Tilia", "Quercus" and "Ulmus" in the proportions 4 : 1 : 1. Modern mature woodland trees were estimated to have germinated between 1150 and 1300 AD, making them around 800 years old. Precise age determination is impossible as heartwood at the centre disintegrates and therefore rings cannot be counted, and other methods are used.


title: Tilia cordata

text: The tree is fairly disease-resistant, though a common problem is leaf scorch where planted on dry soils, however leaf scorch is not a long-term problem as the leaves are lost in the autumn. Pests include Japanese beetles, aphids, lace bugs and various species of moths, such as "Lymantria dispar dispar" (Gypsy moth). This moth is one of the top 100 invasive species in North America, introduced by Étienne Léopold Trouvelot, and citizens are encouraged to remove Gypsy moth egg masses and cocoons from tree bark in order to help prevent the spread of this species.


title: Tilia cordata

text: "Tilia cordata" is widely grown as an ornamental tree. It was much planted to form avenues in 17th and early 18th century landscape planning. A famous example is Unter den Linden in Berlin. It is also widely cultivated in North America as a substitute for the native "Tilia americana" (American linden or basswood) which has a larger leaf, coarser in texture; there it has been renamed "Little-leaf Linden". It is popular as both a shade tree with its dense canopy, an ornamental tree with its architectural shape and a street tree. In the US, "Tilia cordata" has been planted in Wellesley, MA; Modesto, CA; Chicago, IL; Indianapolis, IN; and Atlanta, GA as street trees. In Europe, there are espaliered trees owing to the ability to survive heavy pruning. "Tilia cordata" is an easy tree to train for bonsai when the training is not done all at once. Letting the tree recoup in between sessions over a period of several months creates a healthy, good-looking miniature tree. Prior to the advent of firearms, it was also commonly used for making shields (as referenced in "Beowulf").


title: Tilia cordata

text: "Tilia cordata" survives best in a soil pH range of 5.0 to 8.0. and in USDA Hardiness Zones 3–7. The tree prefers moist, well drained soil, but can survive flooding; it is not highly drought tolerant. It does not do well in soils with high salinity.


title: Tilia cordata

text: The Najevnik linden tree (), about 700 years old "Tilia cordata", is the thickest tree in Slovenia. It is a place of cultural events, and every June a national meeting of Slovene politicians takes place under it.


title: Tilia cordata

text: In the countries of Central, Southern and Western Europe, linden flowers are a traditional herbal remedy made into an herbal tea called lime tea or linden tea in Britain, tilleul in France.


title: Tilia cordata

text: A monofloral honey is produced by bees using the trees and is widely used all over Europe. "Linden honey" is said to be nutritious and to have medicinal qualities.


title: Tilia cordata

text: The white, finely-grained wood is not a structurally strong material but a classic choice for refined woodcarvings such as those by Grinling Gibbons for medieval altarpieces, such as the Altar of Veit Stoss. Linden wood was the prime choice for the carvings in St. Paul's Cathedral, Windsor Castle, and Chatsworth. It is also commonly used for lightweight projects such as carved spoons, light furniture, bee hives and honeycomb frames.


title: Tilia cordata

text: "Tilia cordata" is the national tree of the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic, and one of two national trees in Latvia.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: The system of ancient Egyptian numerals was used in Ancient Egypt from around 3000 BCE until the early first millennium CE. It was a system of numeration based on multiples of ten, often rounded off to the higher power, written in hieroglyphs. The Egyptians had no concept of a place-valued system such as the decimal system. The hieratic form of numerals stressed an exact finite series notation, ciphered one-to-one onto the Egyptian alphabet.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: Multiples of these values were expressed by repeating the symbol as many times as needed. For instance, a stone carving from Karnak shows the number 4,622 as:


title: Egyptian numerals

text: Egyptian hieroglyphs could be written in both directions (and even vertically). In this example the symbols decrease in value from top to bottom and from left to right. On the original stone carving, it is right-to-left, and the signs are thus reversed.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: By 1740 BCE, the Egyptians had a symbol for zero in accounting texts. The symbol nfr (𓄤), meaning beautiful, was also used to indicate the base level in drawings of tombs and pyramids and distances were measured relative to the base line as being above or below this line.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: Rational numbers could also be expressed, but only as sums of unit fractions, "i.e.", sums of reciprocals of positive integers, except for and . The hieroglyph indicating a fraction looked like a mouth, which meant "part":


title: Egyptian numerals

text: Fractions were written with this fractional solidus, "i.e.", the numerator 1, and the positive denominator below. Thus, was written as:


title: Egyptian numerals

text: If the denominator became too large, the "mouth" was just placed over the beginning of the "denominator":


title: Egyptian numerals

text: For plus and minus signs, the hieroglyphs D54-and-D55 (D54, D55) were used: if the feet pointed into the direction of writing, it signified addition, otherwise subtraction.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: As with most modern day languages, the ancient Egyptian language could also write out numerals as words phonetically, just like one can write "thirty" instead of "30" in English. The word ("thirty"), for instance, was written as


title: Egyptian numerals

text: This was, however, uncommon for most numbers other than one and two and the signs were used most of the time.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: As administrative and accounting texts were written on papyrus or ostraca, rather than being carved into hard stone (as were hieroglyphic texts), the vast majority of texts employing the Egyptian numeral system utilize the hieratic script. Instances of numerals written in hieratic can be found as far back as the Early Dynastic Period. The Old Kingdom Abusir Papyri are a particularly important corpus of texts that utilize hieratic numerals.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: Boyer proved 50 years ago that hieratic script used a different numeral system, using individual signs for the numbers 1 to 9, multiples of 10 from 10 to 90, the hundreds from 100 to 900, and the thousands from 1000 to 9000. A large number like 9999 could thus be written with only four signs—combining the signs for 9000, 900, 90, and 9—as opposed to 36 hieroglyphs. Boyer saw the new hieratic numerals as ciphered, mapping one number onto one Egyptian letter for the first time in human history. Greeks adopted the new system, mapping their counting numbers onto two of their alphabets, the Doric and Ionian.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: In the oldest hieratic texts the individual numerals were clearly written in a ciphered relationship to the Egyptian alphabet. But during the Old Kingdom a series of standardized writings had developed for sign-groups containing more than one numeral, repeated as Roman numerals practiced. However, repetition of the same numeral for each place-value was not allowed in the hieratic script. As the hieratic writing system developed over time, these sign-groups were further simplified for quick writing; this process continued into Demotic, as well.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: Two famous mathematical papyri using hieratic script are the Moscow Mathematical Papyrus and the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus.


title: Egyptian numerals

text: The following table shows the reconstructed Middle Egyptian forms of the numerals (which are indicated by a preceding asterisk), the transliteration of the hieroglyphs used to write them, and finally the Coptic numerals which descended from them and which give Egyptologists clues as to the vocalism of the original Egyptian numbers. A breve (˘) in some reconstructed forms indicates a short vowel whose quality remains uncertain; the letter 'e' represents a vowel that was originally u or i (exact quality uncertain) but became e by Late Egyptian.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: The 12 Hours of Sebring is an annual motorsport endurance race for sports cars held at Sebring International Raceway, on the site of the former Hendricks Army Airfield World War II air base in Sebring, Florida, US. The event is the second round of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and in the past has been a round of the now defunct World Sportscar Championship, IMSA GT Championship and American Le Mans Series. In 2012, the race was the opening event of the FIA World Endurance Championship.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: The track opened in 1950 on an airfield and is a road racing course styled after those used in European Grand Prix motor racing. The first race was a six-hour race on New Year's Eve 1950. The winning car is currently on display at the Edge Motor Museum in Memphis, Tennessee. The next race held 14 months later as the first 12 Hours of Sebring. The race is famous for its "once around the clock" action, starting during the day and finishing at night. From 1953 to 1972 the 12 Hour was a round of the FIA's premier sports car series which was contested under various names including the World Sportscar Championship and the International Championship for Makes. In the 1950's, in addition to Le Mans, Sebring was on the calendar at the same time now-legendary races such as the Mille Miglia, Targa Florio, Carrera Panamericana and the RAC Tourist Trophy were on the World Sportscar Championship calendar, such was the prestige of the Sebring race. It was also the most important American race for the European teams and drivers and was the center of European racing activity in the United States, as it was the only time during the 1950's that the big European manufacturer teams and drivers came to the United States in force, and with that brought a lot of international media attention- the United States Formula One Grand Prix was not run until 1959. Top drivers who competed on the European circuit in the 1950's such as Juan Manuel Fangio, Alberto Ascari, Nino Farina, Stirling Moss and Mike Hawthorn all raced at Sebring, and the 1957 Sebring 12 Hours was the only American race the 5-time world champion Fangio ever won.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: In its early years, the Sebring circuit combined former airport runways with narrow two-lane service roads. The 1966 event was a turning point in Sebring history, as the facilities and the safety of the circuit were heavily criticized. Five people were killed during the race, which was more people killed than in the race's prior 15-year history combined. Bob McLean crashed while approaching the hairpin; his car rolled several times, struck a utility pole and then exploded, landing in a ditch and killing McLean. In another incident Mario Andretti in his Ferrari 365 P2 tangled with Don Wester's Porsche 906 on the Warehouse Straight near the Webster Turns, killing four spectators and then crashing into a warehouse next to the track. Subsequent to these events, the facilities were upgraded and the circuit layout was changed, including eliminating the Webster Turns and creating the Green Park Chicane further down the track to move the straight further away from the airport warehouses. The circuit was made safer, and since then there have only been 4 fatalities since then- a remarkable record for a circuit of Sebring's age.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: It is known as preparation for the 24 Hours of Le Mans, as the track's extremely bumpy surface, combined with south-central Florida's perennial hot weather, is a test of a car's reliability. In recent years, six overall victories have been achieved by the Audi R8, one fewer than the record seven wins of the Porsche 935.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: Tom Kristensen has won the race more times than anyone else, with six victories—in 1999–2000, 2005–2006, 2009 and in 2012.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: 2020 saw the race be rescheduled to mid-November due to delays caused by the pandemic. It was also the first occurrence of the race behind closed doors.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: Races up until 1969 began with the traditional Le Mans start procedure, which was abolished at the end of the 1969 season following Jacky Ickx protesting at Le Mans 1969; 1970 was the first 12 Hours of Sebring started with a rolling start.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: The 1966 race had Dan Gurney leading at the last lap, when his engine of his Shelby American Ford GT40 Mk II seized near the end. Gurney pushed his car over the finish line, beaten only by Ken Miles and Lloyd Ruby. However, his actions were ultimately determined to be against the rules and he did not receive credit for his finish.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: In 2005, the Chevrolet Corvette C6.R and Aston Martin DBR9 made their race debut in the hotly contested GT1 class, with Aston Martin winning its class for the first time in 49 years at Sebring ahead of the two Corvettes. Corvette had dominated the class the past three years with its previous generation C5R.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: The all-new Audi R10 TDI won the 2006 edition of the race, the car's first ever run in competition. The much-hyped Porsche RS Spyder campaigned by Penske Racing dropped to take 2nd place in its LMP2 class, behind the Intersport Lola car. The GT1 Corvette C6R team got their revenge against the Aston Martin, although the second Corvette came within 1/3 of a second of the podium in the closing laps of the race.


title: 12 Hours of Sebring

text: 2007 saw Audi again winning in the R10 TDI despite requiring more frequent refueling due to changes in American Le Mans series rules intended to even the field between gasoline and diesel-powered engines.


title: Poplin

text: Poplin, also called tabinet (or tabbinet), is a fine (but thick) wool, cotton or silk fabric that has a vertical warp and a horizontal weft. Nowadays, the name refers to a strong material in a plain weave of any fiber or blend, with crosswise ribs that typically give a corded surface.


title: Poplin

text: Poplin traditionally consisted of a silk warp with a weft of worsted yarn. In this case, as the weft is in the form of a stout cord, the fabric has a ridged structure, like rep, which gives depth and softness to the lustre of the silky surface. The ribs run across the fabric from selvedge to selvedge.


title: Poplin

text: Poplin is now made with wool, cotton, silk, rayon, polyester or a mixture of these. Since it has a plain under/over weave, the fabric displays a plain woven surface with no ribbing if the weft and warp threads are of the same material and size. Shirts made from this material are easy to iron and do not wrinkle easily.


title: Poplin

text: Poplins are used for dress purposes, and for rich upholstery work which are formed by using coarse filling-yarns in a plain/hard weave.


title: Poplin

text: The term "poplin" allegedly originates from "papelino", a fabric made at Avignon, France, in the 15th century, and named for the papal (pope's) residence there, and from the French "papeline" (a fabric, normally made with silk, of the same period). An alternative derivation associates "poplin" with products of the cloth industry of Poperinge in Flanders in present-day Belgium.


title: Poplin

text: The most common usage of poplin until about the 20th century was to make silk, cotton or heavy-weight wool dresses, suitable for winter wear.


title: Poplin

text: In the early 1920s, British-made cotton poplin was introduced to the United States, but the American market thought that the name had connotations of heaviness and arbitrarily renamed it "broadcloth", a name that persists for a cotton or polyester-cotton blend fabric used for shirting. In Europe, "broadcloth" typically describes a densely-woven woolen fabric with a smooth finish.


title: Mark Schlereth

text: Mark Fremont Schlereth (; born January 25, 1966) is a former professional American football player and current television and radio sportscaster. Schlereth played guard in the NFL for 12 seasons (1989–2000) with the Washington Redskins and Denver Broncos. He is currently a football analyst for Fox Sports, appearing on FS1, and other programs. He also co-hosted "Sedano & Stink" with Jorge Sedano from 7–10 p.m. ET on ESPN Radio until late March 2015 when he left the program to pursue other broadcast opportunities.


title: Mark Schlereth

text: Schlereth was born and grew up in Anchorage, Alaska, and struggled with dyslexia as a youth — he did not learn to read until he was seven. He graduated from Robert Service High School in 1984. Growing up in Alaska, Schlereth did not receive much attention as a college football prospect; the only current FBS schools that offered him a scholarship were Idaho (I-AA at the time) and Hawaii. He accepted the scholarship offer from the University of Idaho from head coach Dennis Erickson. Erickson departed following the 1985 season, and Schlereth started at left guard on the Vandals' offensive line for new head coach Keith Gilbertson, blocking for quarterbacks Scott Linehan and John Friesz. In his senior season in 1988, the Vandals advanced to the national semifinals, and he was second-team


title: Mark Schlereth

text: Schlereth was selected in the tenth round (#263 overall) of the 1989 NFL Draft by the Washington Redskins. He played 12 NFL seasons—six with the Denver Broncos (1995–2000). He was a member of three Super Bowl championship teams (one with the Redskins and two with the Broncos) and was selected to the Pro Bowl for his performances in the 1991 and 1998 seasons. On January 25, 1998 Schlereth celebrated his 32nd birthday on the same day he helped the Broncos win Super Bowl XXXII, a 31–24 victory over the Green Bay Packers.


title: Mark Schlereth

text: Before ending his playing career, Schlereth endured 29 surgeries. Twenty of those surgeries were performed on his knees (15 left, five right). After the 13th procedure on his left knee on July 24, 2000, Denver Broncos head coach Mike Shanahan stated, "He has a great pain threshold. I think the doctors said that it was the worst knee that they've ever seen." Schlereth would have two more procedures on his left knee during the 2000 season, his last in the NFL. His injuries are documented on "Athlete 360", the sports medicine television show hosted by Schlereth's former Redskins teammate, Dr. Mark Adickes.


title: Mark Schlereth

text: On April 18, 2001, Schlereth announced his retirement. "The reason I came out here today was to announce that I have just signed a six-year, $42 million contract to extend my career with the Denver Broncos. The truth of the matter is, after going through my 15th operation on my left knee last November, it became painfully obvious that I couldn't sign a six-year contract for $42 worth of Tupperware. I started to realize in the last three months of free agency that there is not a lot of market for a , guard that is 35 years old and beat to a pulp." He landed a job with ESPN soon after.


title: Mark Schlereth

text: After retirement, Schlereth hosted an afternoon sports talk radio show on Denver AM radio 760 The Zone with fellow former Broncos lineman David "Doc" Diaz-Infante. The show was frequently referred to as the "Stink and Doc" show. Schlereth was a part-time analyst with ESPN for a time, commuting from Denver to Connecticut, before leaving 760 to go full-time with ESPN in 2004. He was an analyst on "NFL Live" (2004–2017) and "SportsCenter".


title: Mark Schlereth

text: Since 2017, Schlereth has been a color commentator for NFL games broadcast on "Fox NFL", initially being paired with Dick Stockton on the #6 team for 4 seasons, until being paired with former ESPN colleagues Adam Amin and Lindsay Czarniak on the #3 team. He also co-hosts a radio show in Denver on 104.3 The Fan, and appears as an analyst on FS1 television programming. He was a frequent guest and fill-in host for Mike Golic on "Mike and Mike in the Morning". He has also filled in for Jim Rome on "Jim Rome is Burning".


title: Mark Schlereth

text: Schlereth revealed on the "Mike and Mike in the Morning" show that he was considering a career in acting, mainly on soap operas, under the name Roc Hoover. Schlereth originally chose the name Rock Hoover, however after cybersquatters took several domain names pertaining to that name he dropped the k from Rock and became Roc Hoover. He announced on May 4, 2007, that he was cast as Detective Roc Hoover, a recurring role, on the soap opera, "Guiding Light".


title: Mark Schlereth

text: After the , Schlereth was critical of Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler, tweeting "As a guy who had 20 knee surgeries you'd have to drag me out on a stretcher to leave a championship game!"


title: Mark Schlereth

text: In 2012 Schlereth appeared on the Discovery Channel show "American Guns". He worked with the staff at Gunsmoke gun shop to find a suitable firearm he could use on a hunting trip with his son.


title: Mark Schlereth

text: Schlereth is a Christian. Schlereth is married to Lisa Schlereth. They have three children: Alexandria, Avi, and Daniel. Alexandria was an actress featured on the MyNetworkTV series "Desire" in 2006. Avi was a contestant on Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce's reality dating show "Catching Kelce", but was not chosen. She is still trying to pursue a modeling career in California. In 2021, Avi caused quite a stir by posting multiple pictures of herself partially nude on the internet. Daniel was a pitcher in Major League Baseball, having appeared in 94 games in a relief capacity. Schlereth got the nickname "Stink" due to his habit of intentionally urinating on himself, much to his wife's displeasure.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: Twisted Pair is a 2018 American science fiction psychological thriller film directed, produced, scored, edited, and written by Neil Breen. The film stars Neil Breen, Sara Meritt, Siohbun Ebrahimi, Denise Bellini, Marty Dasis, Brad Stein, John Smith Burns, Art MacHenster, Greg Smith Burns, Ada Masters, and Jason Moriglio. The film centers around identical twin brothers, Cade and Cale Altair, who become hybrid Artificial Intelligence entities, who are torn in different directions to achieve justice for humanity.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: "Twisted Pair" was theatrically released in the United States on October 3, 2018, by Neil Breen Films, LLC.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: During their youth, Cade and his identical twin brother Cale were abducted by an unknown power and modified to become Humanoids, secret agents who are out to stop evil. Cale didn't fit in with the program and was fired. Cade, as an adult, is introduced on a mission where he is protecting troops. He returns to headquarters and meets with his boss, who suggests that he take a vacation. Cade laments not having seen his brother since before he became a Humanoid.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: Cale meets with a lawyer, an executive and the President of The Bank and interrogates them for a while before he shoots one of them in the leg and leaves to do pills with his girlfriend Donna. Cade's boss tells him about programmable virtual reality and how a man named Cuzzx is going to use it to conduct the biggest cyber and terror attack ever. Cade decides to investigate, but while investigating around town he bumps into Alana. He offers to buy her a drink to apologize, but she says she's very busy and leaves. Cade attempts to make a date with the woman, before she departs. She doesn't come back but later he sees her and decides to follow her home. Cade breaks into her house and they fight, before they abruptly stop fighting, revealing that they'd been in a relationship the whole time.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: Cade breaks into a Cuzzx lab to find clues for his mission. Cade finds four guys wearing VR goggles who are in some kind of trance, and in the next room, a very old person dressed like Cuzzx meeting with people. The men disappear, due to the programmable virtual reality and Cade reports back to his boss. Cade takes Alana, his girlfriend, out to dinner, and a mysterious man stabs Cade's homeless friend, taking his cell phone. Meanwhile, Cale tracks down and murders a rich executive, but the police find no evidence because Cale picked up the shell casings. He did, however, drop a syringe. Cade pretends to be a rich investor who wants to give money to the Cuzzx Empire, which gets him a tour of Cuzzx' house. Donna, Cale's pillhead girlfriend, breaks up with him and then runs into Cade, demanding to know where she can get more drugs and why he shaved his beard. Cade responds by going "I never had a beard" repeatedly. He gives the girl some money to find a place to stay and they hug. Alana sees and gets jealous.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: Cade then decides to take down the Cuzzx Empire and goes into the boiler room to enact his plan. After his empire is destroyed, Cuzzx flees the country. Cade goes home and Alana pulls a gun on him, as she was working for Cuzzx the whole time. They shoot each other, and Alana dies in his arms. In the virtual reality forest, Cade and Alana reunite, they embrace and Alana tells him she loves him, and then disappears. The film ends with Cade addressing the audience, accepting the loss of Alana, and stating that humanity will eventually live in a virtual universe. Before the credits, the message "Cade Altair will return" appears onscreen.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: Principal photography began on September 2, 2017, at Nevada State College, with John Mastrogiacomo serving as cinematographer. In April 2018, during post-production on "Twisted Pair", Breen released a trailer for the film.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: "Twisted Pair" was theatrically released in the United States on October 3, 2018 and in the United Kingdom on February 9, 2019, by Neil Breen Films, LLC.


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: "/Film" gave a review of the trailer with "Breen shows up playing a pair of identical twins standing in front of what looks like a screensaver. Things just get better/weirder from there, and we're treated to one of the worst (best?) fake beards in history. Watching this trailer, you start to think that maybe this is a very elaborate joke, and Breen is just messing with us. But I assure you, Breen is serious, and that makes it even better."


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: "Twisted Pair" has received negative reviews by several critics. Leor Galil of the "Chicago Reader" gave a negative review by stating ""Twisted Pair" doesn't make much sense, it drags in parts, and it sometimes resembles the ramblings of a tinfoil-hatted conspiracy theorist. But, somehow, Breen unexpectedly emerges with flecks of gold, little moments that have stubbornly attached themselves to my memory". Gena Radcliffe of "The Spool" also gave a negative review by stating "The deeply strange Neil Breen returns with an even more deeply strange entry in his filmography of homespun, barely-coherent psychological thrillers." She elaborated by stating "What little plot exists is incoherent... Breen himself doesn't understand what's happening in his own movie, or, at least, what kind of movie he wants it to be. He drops phrases like "artificial intelligence" and "programmable virtual reality," and they don't have any meaning or bearing on the plot. Though he describes "Twisted Pair" in publicity material as a "psychological thriller," it is most definitely not that. What it does have are some elements of science fiction, a murder mystery, espionage, romance, and even a touch of domestic drama, but none of it is cohesive, and none of it goes anywhere. They're all their own little mini-plots, like Short Cuts if it was made by an alien who only had a rudimentary grasp of English." She mentions a positive element of the film with "There's a seed of something interesting planted here – the villain looks like a dollar store Elvis Costello, carries a bowl of diamonds around, and talks like his voice is being disguised on an episode of "Dateline NBC". Unfortunately, time that could have been spent developing this character, or at least explaining who he is and what motivates him (and why his scarf keeps changing colors), is wasted on long scenes of Breen indifferently creeping around in an empty laboratory."


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: Grady Bolding of "Cultured Vultures" gave a negative review by stating "It has its moments of hilarity which kill any boredom that might ensue, but otherwise, it's a raging fire that cannot be put out." Bolding describes the positive elements of the film with "The only strength with Neil Breen's film is quite similar to what the great Tommy Wiseau did with "The Room". While "The Room" can be seen as an unintentional takedown of the superficiality of Hollywood drama films, Breen's film(s) provide an antithesis to the overly-hyped mercenary-for-hire/vigilante agent films seen today in American theaters. American culture has always championed the idea of a lone warrior setting out to right the wrongs of society, if not the world. "Twisted Pair" efficiently reflects this part of American culture, but provides unintentional satire. The All-American hero is a noticeably aged Neil Breen who either makes his enemies think about their actions or makes them pay for it. He is not a stocky, barrel-chested figure like Matt Damon or Chuck Norris. He's so aged and withered that it makes him 100% average." Bolding summarizes Breen's work by stating that "any audience can – and will – laugh at Neil Breen's mediocrity, but they will easily be able to project themselves into what he's trying to accomplish. Breen fails across the board, but he gives us something worth laughing at and enjoying. In this respect, Breen accomplishes his mission when it comes to the most basic tenant [sic] of producing a film: providing entertainment."


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: Diego Olguín of "The Charlatan" also gave a negative review by stating "The surreal editing makes the film almost incomprehensible; the soundtrack is pretty much stock trailer music; the special effects look straight out of some mid 1990s straight-to-VHS movie; and the script is full of nonsensical dialogue, amplified by the cast's wooden deliveries. However, no film must reach perfection in order to be enjoyable, and this is a clear example of this." Olguín continues by discussing some of the positives of the film, "While "Twisted Pair" fails in every level in being an action film with social commentary, it does succeed as an unintentional comedy. While the CGI looks cheap and fake, that only adds to the fun during scenes where explosions awkwardly fill a classroom. Breen's acting capabilities rival Tommy Wiseau's in how weird and inhuman they are. Watching him trying his best to emote sadness as he tries to persuade his brother (which is Breen with a cheap beard and a hoodie) to turn himself in to the cops is something to be witnessed—preferably with a few friends and some drinks. There is also a sense of honest effort on the film, crappiness aside. You can feel that Breen tried his best to deliver a legitimately good movie, like a modern-day Ed Wood—famous only for people roasting his past films, but still not giving up."


title: Twisted Pair (film)

text: On March 11, 2019, Breen confirmed that a sequel was in development. On December 16, 2022, Breen announced that the film, titled "Cade - the tortured crossing," would be released in 2023.


title: Cash Converters

text: Cash Converters International Limited (Cash Converters or Cashies) is an Australian ASX-listed personal finance and secondhand retail company headquartered in Perth, Western Australia.


title: Cash Converters

text: Cash Converters was founded in Perth, Western Australia, in 1984 by Brian Cumins and a group of partners. Within four years, the network had opened a further six outlets across Perth.


title: Cash Converters

text: The Company commenced its international expansion in the mid-1990s establishing operations in New Zealand, the United Kingdom (UK), France, Belgium, South Africa, Italy and other markets. As of 30 June 2021, the Company operated 693 stores across 15 countries, with all non-Australian stores managed through franchising agreements.


title: Cash Converters

text: The group listed on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) in 1995 and was then granted a dual listing on the ASX in February 1997 under the code CCV. In 2001, Cash Converters migrated its primary listing location to the ASX and subsequently delisted from the LSE on 19 February 2013 based on the composition of its share register and low trading volumes in the UK.


title: Cash Converters

text: Cash Converters made two acquisitions in 2006. The first, Safrock Finance Corporation (Safrock), was completed on 29 September for a total consideration of $17.5 million (including earn out) and the second was financial software platform MON-E for $15 million. Both acquisitions were funded through a combination of cash and shares (scrip).


title: Cash Converters

text: Cash Converters acquired 80% of vehicle financing company Green Light Auto Group Ltd (GLA) in September 2013 through the conversion of a $4 million loan previously provided to the business. In November 2014, Cash Converters acquired the remaining 20% of GLA, becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary.


title: Cash Converters

text: In November 2009, EZCorp (NASDAQ:EZPW) purchased a 30% stake in Cash Converters, appointing two representatives to the Board of Directors. Between dividend reinvestments and a rights issue in 2018, EZCorp increased its ownership to 35.65% on 30 June 2021.


title: Cash Converters

text: The primary service provided by Cash Converters is personal finance in the form of small amount credit contracts (SACC) up to $2,000 and medium amount credit contracts (MACC) up to $5,000. Both these products are regulated by the National Consumer Credit Act 2009 (NCCP Act) and are available throughout the store network and online to Australian customers. The personal finance business is the largest contributor to Cash Converters total earnings, representing 53% of the Company’s EBITDA for the financial year 2021.


title: Cash Converters

text: The second highest earnings contributor for Cash Converters is its corporate-owned store network, which generates income through the sale of second-hand goods, unsecured loans and secured pawnbroking loans. Cash Converters’ franchise network represents 618 stores throughout the globe, including 80 in Australia, and income is generated through royalties paid to the Group by the franchisees.


title: Cash Converters

text: Secured vehicle financing is provided through GLA – a wholly owned subsidiary – via a network of Australian finance brokers and car dealers. This business unit contributed 16% of Cash Converters EBITDA in financial year 2021.


title: Cash Converters

text: Two class actions have been launched in the Federal Court of Australia on allegations that Cash Converters charged excessive fees on short term loans in NSW between July 2010 and June 2013. Over 50,000 customers have joined to seek about $40 million in compensation. A $23 million in-principle settlement was reached with more than 37,000 Cash Converters customers in June 2015.


title: Cash Converters

text: In 2016, an Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) investigation found that Cash Converters had failed to make reasonable inquiries into the income and expenses of customers availing their small amount loan product. They were ordered to pay back $10.8 million to consumers and fined a further $1.35 million in addition to entering an Enforceable Undertaking (EU) to uplift its risk, compliance and loan application assessment processes. Cash Converters completed all commitments made to ASIC as part of the EU in February 2018 which included the engagement of Deloitte as an independent expert to review the Company’s updated practices.


title: Cash Converters

text: The investigation was part of a wider focus by ASIC on pay day lending in 2016, with lenders Nimble and Fair Go Finance also refunding customers as a result of investigations.


title: Cash Converters

text: In May 2018, Cash Converters reached a settlement with ASIC relating to debt collections practices between 2013 and March 2016 resulting in a payment of $650,000 to the National Debt Helpline and the outsourcing of debt collection activity to a third-party, Collections House Limited (ASX:CLH) which was completed by 30 June 2018. In 2021, Cash Converters recommenced its own debt collection activity after receiving ASIC approval.


title: Cash Converters

text: Cash Converters made the final class action settlement payment relating to historic lending practices in September 2020.


title: Bryan Guinness, 2nd Baron Moyne

text: Bryan Walter Guinness, 2nd Baron Moyne, (27 October 1905 – 6 July 1992) was an heir to part of the Guinness family brewing fortune, and a lawyer, poet and novelist. He was briefly married to Diana Mitford.


title: Bryan Guinness, 2nd Baron Moyne

text: He was born to Walter Guinness (created 1st Baron Moyne in 1932), son of Edward Guinness, 1st Earl of Iveagh, and Lady Evelyn Stuart Erskine, daughter of the 14th Earl of Buchan. He attended Heatherdown School, near Ascot in Berkshire, followed by Eton College (also in Berkshire), and Christ Church, Oxford, and was called to the bar in 1931.


title: Bryan Guinness, 2nd Baron Moyne

text: At Oxford, Guinness was part of the Railway Club, which included: Henry Yorke, Roy Harrod, Henry Thynne, 6th Marquess of Bath, David Plunket Greene, Edward Henry Charles James Fox-Strangways, 7th Earl of Ilchester, Brian Howard, Michael Parsons, 6th Earl of Rosse, John Sutro, Hugh Lygon, Harold Acton, Patrick Balfour, 3rd Baron Kinross, Mark Ogilvie-Grant, John Drury-Lowe.


title: Bryan Guinness, 2nd Baron Moyne

text: As an heir to the Guinness brewing fortune and a handsome, charming young man, Bryan was an eligible bachelor. One of London's "bright young things", he was an organiser of the 1929 "Bruno Hat" hoax art exhibition, held at his home in London.


title: Bryan Guinness, 2nd Baron Moyne

text: The couple became leaders of the London artistic and social scene and were dedicatees of Evelyn Waugh's second novel "Vile Bodies". However, they divorced in 1933, after Diana deserted Guinness for British fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley.