Sidney Verba (May 26, 1932 – March 4, 2019) was an American political scientist, librarian and library administrator. His academic interests were mainly American and comparative politics. He was the Carl H. Pforzheimer University Professor at Harvard University and also served Harvard as the director of the Harvard University Library from 1984 to 2007.

Verba was educated at Harvard College and Princeton University, and served on the faculty of Princeton, Stanford University, and the University of Chicago, before returning to Harvard, where he would spend the rest of his career. As he gave notice of his intention to retire in 2006, Verba observed: "Academics are the only people I can think of for whom this sentence makes sense: 'I'm hoping to get some time off so that I can get some work done.'"

Early life and education
Verba grew up in Brooklyn, New York, where his family ran a "small mom-and-pop dry goods store and always worried about money." After high school he attended Harvard College, where he earned a degree in History and Literature. He began graduate school in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University, intending to join the foreign service, but transferred to Princeton's politics department and earned a PhD.

Early career
After graduate school Verba stayed at Princeton as a research assistant and then assistant and associate professor. In 1964, Verba moved to Stanford University, where he was a full professor for four years, and the University of Chicago for another four years.

Harvard faculty
As a member of the Harvard faculty, Verba's contributions to the life of the scholarly community extended beyond the realm of his academic discipline or his administrative title.  For example, even though he "retired" in 2007, he continued to chair a University Committee on Calendar Reform which had begun its work in 2003. This committee was composed of students (undergraduate and graduate) and faculty members drawn from across the University's Schools and Faculties.  In 2008, the Committee's efforts reached fruition as Harvard President Drew Faust announced the adoption of a coordinated academic calendar that synchronizes the academic schedules of Harvard's 13 Schools.  Verba's committee managed to preserve the traditional eight-day reading periods for undergraduates, one of the best features of the former calendar, while eliminating impediments to student cross-registration.  No less important, the Verba committee's work helped to align Harvard's calendar with those of most colleges and universities in the U.S., making it easier for Harvard students to compete for internships, study-abroad experiences, and work opportunities during breaks and summer vacation.

Librarian
Harvard President Derek Bok named Verba to be director of Harvard University Library in 1984; and  when news of Verba's retirement was received in Massachusetts Hall, Bok observed:
"Professor Verba has led the Harvard libraries during one of their most transformative periods in University's history. ... When I appointed him more than 20 years ago, we were only beginning to realize what the revolution in information technology would mean. Sid's foresight has helped to preserve our valuable collections and opened Harvard's vast resources to scholars, researchers, and students throughout the world. I believe that generations of students will benefit from the doors that Sid has opened." -- Derek Bok.

When Verba retired from the post, he had served longer than anyone else who had held the title of director of the University Library; and not since Thaddeus Harris, whose tenure (1831–1856) straddled the card catalog revolution of the 19th century, had anyone spent so long at the top of Harvard's libraries.

Four specific areas in which Verba's contributions at Harvard have become the model for other academic and research libraries:
 HUL's "Harvard Depository" (HD) -- a "sophisticated way" of addressing the problem of needing to send books off campus.
With a fully digitized collection, "Harvard users gain online access to the full text of out-of-copyright books stored at HD. For books still in copyright, Harvard users could gain the ability to search for small snippets of text and, possibly, to view tables of contents. In short, the Harvard student or faculty member would gain some of the advantages of browsing that remote storage of books at HD cannot currently provide.
 HUL's Digital Initiative—influencing the ways libraries see themselves as responsible for creating and managing digital content.
 "Plans call for the development of a unique union catalog linking the Google search engine with the online HOLLIS (Harvard Online Library Information System) catalog  (http://holliscatalog.harvard.edu), thus furthering retrieval of information on the location and availability at Harvard of works identified through a Google search. This would merge the search capacity of the Internet with the deep research collections at Harvard into one seamless resource-a development especially important for undergraduates who often see the library and the Internet as alternative and perhaps rival sources of information.
 HUL's Open Collections Program -- something of a counterpart to the Google project, though less well known, it aims to digitize and make available university resources on a given topic.
 Women Working, 1800–1930.
 Immigration to the United States, 1789–1930.
 Contagion: Historical Views of Diseases and Epidemic.
 HUL's preservation staff, facilities, and program.
"The possibility of a large-scale digitization of Harvard's library books does not in any way diminish the University's commitment to the collection and preservation of books as physical objects. The digital copy will not be a substitute for the books themselves. We will continue actively to acquire materials in all formats and we will continue to conserve them. In fact, as part of the pilot we are developing criteria for identifying books that are too fragile for digitizing and for selecting them out of the project."—Sidney Verba.

Harvard-Google digitization partnership
Verba was ultimately responsible for Harvard's participation in the Google Books Library Project, which involves a series of agreements between Google and major international libraries through which a  collection of its public domain books will be scanned in their entirety and made available for free to the public online. Verba's role encompassed developing digitization protocols, addressing logistical and operations issues, and administering the project. The more difficult part of his job required moderating the institutional debate about anticipated consequences inherent in conventional content-vs.-collection strategies; and sometimes he took on the role of public spokesman.

Sidney Verba Endowment Fund
Friends and colleagues of Sidney Verba established a $2.5 million endowment fund in his honor. The Fund benefits the Harvard University Library, which provides University-wide services, including digital acquisitions and collections, information technology, high-density storage, and preservation. Under the terms creating the fund, Verba himself was given the freedom to designate the purpose of the new endowment.

Political scientist
The central focus of Verba's work as a political scientist can be summed up in one word -- "participation."  Expanding the subject somewhat, that topic might be elaborated to "the issues of political participation by different groups." The great framing question of his work has been, "Whose voice is heard by the government?"  Verba himself argued that issues having to do political participation have become central in America's political discourse today; but he attributes his initial interest in the subject to the prescient encouragement of his mentor, Professor Gabriel Almond at Princeton University. Verba earned his Ph.D. at Princeton in 1959; and in 1963, he was named as a co-author with Almond in The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations. It popularized the idea of a political culture – a concept that includes national character and how people choose to govern themselves – as a fundamental aspect of society.  Sidney Verba built on the theory of civic culture that was developed in this book with many of his students and collaborators, including Kay Lehman Schlozman and Henry E. Brady, over the following half century.

In retirement, he continued to explore his longtime interest in "the citizen voice" with a new study of interest groups in the United States, asking whom they represent—ethnic groups, women, trade associations, professions.  His research goal was to produce "a kind of statistical model of what the interest groups in the U.S. look like."

Honors
 American Philosophical Society (2003), member.
Johan Skytte Prize (2002) for distinguished contribution to political science.
 American Political Science Association (APSA), president (1994).
 APSA's Kammerer Prize (1972) for Participation in America.
 APSA's Woodrow Wilson Prize (1976) for The Changing American Voter.
 APSA's James Madison Prize (1993) for career contribution to the discipline.
 National Academy of Sciences (NAS), member.
 NAS Committee on International Conflict and Cooperation, Chair.
 American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS), fellow.
 Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS), fellow.
 Guggenheim Fellowship (1980).
 Social Science Research Council (SSRC).
 SSRC Policy Committee, Chair.

Selected works
Verba's published writings encompass 83 works in 201 publications in 8 languages and 16,633 library holdings.

 2012 -- The Unheavenly Chorus: Unequal Political Voice and the Broken Promise of American Democracy by Kay Lehman Schlozman, Sidney Verba, and Henry E. Brady
 2011 -- A Life in Political Science Annual Review of Political Science. DOI 10.1146/annurev-polisci-082409-094200
 2005 -- Contest of Symbols: The Sociology of Election Campaigns through Israeli Ephemera by Hanna Herzog (Foreword by Sidney Verba). Cambridge: Harvard University Press.  (paper)
 2001 -- The Private Roots of Public Action: Gender, Equality, and Political Participation. Cambridge: Harvard University Press—with Nancy Burns and Kay Lehman Schlozman.   cloth)
 1995 -- Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics. Cambridge: Harvard University Press—with Kay Lehman Schlozman and Henry E. Brady.   (cloth)    (paper)
 1994 -- Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research Princeton: Princeton University Press—with Gary King and Robert Keohane.   (cloth)   (paper)
 1987 --  Elites and the Idea of Equality: A Comparison of Japan, Sweden, and the United States. Cambridge: Harvard University Press—with Steven Kelman, Gary R. Orren, Ichiro Miyake, Joji Watanuki, Ikuo Kabashima, and G. Donald Ferree.  (cloth)  ;  (paper)
 1985 -- Equality in America: A View from the Top Cambridge: Harvard University Press—with Gary R. Orren.   (cloth)   (paper)
 1972 -- Participation in America: Political Democracy and Social Equality. New York: Harper & Row—with Norman H. Nie. ;  (cloth). [reprinted by The University of Chicago Press, Chicago.  (paper)]
 1963 -- The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations. Princeton: Princeton University Press—with Gabriel Almond. [reprinted by Little, Brown, Boston, 1980.  (cloth)], [reprinted by SAGE Publications, London   (paper)]
 1961 -- Small Groups and Political Behavior: A Study of Leadership. Princeton: Princeton University Press.  (cloth)

References

 Barringer, Felicity. "Washington Talk; Librarian of Congress: New Skills, More Roles," New York Times. May 26, 1989.
 Campbell, Colin. "Tenure Denial of Noted Sociologist Stirs Troubling Queries at Harvard," New York Times. April 21, 1985.
 Cowan, Alison. "For Dealer, Stolen Maps Point Way to Jail," New York Times. June 23, 2006.
 Guernsey, Lisa. "The Library As the Latest Web Venture," New York Times. June 15, 2000.
 Hafner, Katie. "At Harvard, a Man, a Plan and a Scanner," New York Times. November 21, 2005.
 Hafner, Katie. "Libraries Shun Deals to Place Books on Web," New York Times. October 22, 2007.
 "Harvard Cleared In Bias Case." New York Times. April 5, 2005.
 Hays, Constance L. "Tempers Rise Over Fate of Rare Book Collection at Harvard," New York Times. December 29, 1989.
 Herzokovits, Zara. "New type of research journal gaining ground," Boston Globe. July 11, 2005.
 "In Harvard Papers, a Dark Corner of the College's Past," New York Times. November 30, 2002.
  "New Musical Archives For Harvard University," New York Times. December 27, 1984.
 Kelly, Kevin. "Scan This Book!" New York Times. May 14, 2006.
 Keohane, Robert O., Stanley Hoffman, Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Robert D. Putnam, Sidney Verba. "Letter of the Editor: Was This Objectivity?" New York Times. May 17, 1987.
 Oreskes, Michael. "In a Surprise, Voters Say They're Watching a Lot," New York Times. May 15, 1988.
 Page, Tim. "Music Notes: Festival Honors Musical Theater." New York Times. April 14, 1985.
 Pogrebin, Robin. "Renovations to a Study Room by Aalto Splits Harvard Faculty," New York Times. July 10, 2006.
 Riding, Alan. "France Detects a Cultural Threat in Google," New York Times. April 11, 2005.
 Romero, Simon. "Arts in America: Harvard Finds 2 Poems, and a Latin Romance Reignites." New York Times. September 19, 2000.
 Schmidt, Eric. "Half the Electorate, Perhaps Satisfied or Bored, Sat Out Voting." New York Times. November 7, 1996.
 Specter, Michael.  "Computer Speak;World, Wide, Web: 3 English Words." New York Times. April 14, 1996.
 Steinfels, Peter. "Beliefs," New York Times. May 4, 1996.
 Verba faculty bio, Harvard web site
 Walker, Ruth. "Sidney Verba to retire; Appointed in 1984, Verba changed the face of the University Library," Harvard Gazette. September 21, 2006.
 Wyatt, Edward. "Google Adds Library Texts to Search Database," New York Times. November 3, 2005.
 Wyatt, Edward. "Google Library Database Is Delayed," New York Times. August 13, 2005.
 Zexima, Katie. "A Samuel Johnson Trove Goes to Harvard's Library." New York Times. March 18, 2004.

See also
 Google Book Search
 Google Books Library Project

External links
 Installation of President Faust: "Harvard Faculty Greeting,"—video excerpt, Sidney Verba speaking on behalf of the faculty (5 mins).
 Harvard@Home video: "Teaching American Politics"—Professors Waters, Verba, Skocpol
An Annual Reviews Conversations Interview with Sidney Verba (video)

1932 births
2019 deaths
Writers from Brooklyn
American political scientists
Harvard University faculty
Harvard University librarians
Princeton University alumni
Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences
Harvard College alumni

Sidney Verba


The Delaney Park Strip is an 11-block park in the Municipality of Anchorage, Alaska.  Originally a firebreak, the Park Strip would become Anchorage's first airfield.

History
Known to the Anchorage community as the Park Strip, Delaney Park is the oldest park in the city. It was established as part of the original Anchorage township plat in 1917 and named for James Delaney, one of the first mayors of Anchorage.

The park was originally used simply as a firebreak, but in 1923 it became "The Golf Course." The community used the space both for a golf course and an airstrip.

Anchorage residents, working for free, had prepared a 300 by 2000 foot landing field for Noel Wien to fly Jimmy Rodebaugh's newly arrived Standard J-1.  Wien's first flight took place on 4 June 1924, and by the end of the month had flown 170 passengers, two at a time in the front cockpit, on a 15 minute ride.  These were the first passenger flights from Anchorage.  Wien also started the first flight between Anchorage and Fairbanks from the strip on 6 July.

In 1932, however, Merrill Field opened, so the Delaney Park airstrip was no longer necessary.

In 1954 the Parks & Recreation Department began to develop recreation facilities for a variety of activities and events, including ice skating, softball, horseshoes, and, later, tennis. In 1958 the Park Strip hosted the Alaska Statehood Celebration.

On the 75th anniversary of Noel Wien's historic flight to Fairbanks, his two sons Noel Merrill and Richard, reenacted the flight using a Boeing Stearman, after receiving FAA permission to take off from the park.

Presently, the park is used for a variety of community events, sports, and festivals year-round.

Facilities

 Two soccer fields
 Six softball fields
 Eight tennis courts
 Two sand volleyball courts
 Five horseshoe pits
 Ice hockey rink and ice skating area
 Winter running route around the park
 Fitness center at Pete's Gym
 Memorial to Pope John Paul II, who visited the Park Strip in 1981
 Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial
 Victims for Justice Tree
 Purple Heart Memorial
 Aviation Memorial
 E.G. Fenn Memorial
 POW/MIA Tree
 Organ and Tissue Donor Memorial
 C.A. Berg Tree
 R.O. Robertson Tree
 Veterans' Memorial
 Bandstand
 Centennial Rose Garden
 Parking spaces available along 10th Avenue on the park side

References

External links

Protected areas of Anchorage, Alaska
Parks in Alaska
Ice hockey venues in Alaska
Soccer venues in Alaska
Softball venues in the United States
Tennis venues in the United States
Volleyball venues in Alaska

Delaney Park Strip


The California Smog Check Program requires vehicles that were manufactured in 1976 or later to participate in the biennial (every two years) smog check program in participating counties. The program's stated aim is to reduce air pollution from vehicles by ensuring that cars with excessive emissions are repaired in accordance with federal and state guidelines. With some exceptions, gasoline-powered vehicles, hybrid vehicles, and alternative-fuel vehicles that are eight model-years old or newer are not required to participate; instead, these vehicles pay a smog abatement fee for the first 8 years in place of being required to pass a smog check. The eight-year exception does not apply to nonresident (previously registered out-of-state) vehicles being registered in California for the first time, diesel vehicles 1998 model or newer and weighing 14,000 lbs or less, or specially constructed vehicles 1976 and newer. The program is a joint effort between the California Air Resources Board, the California Bureau of Automotive Repair, and the California Department of Motor Vehicles.

A Smog Check is not required for electric, diesel powered manufactured before 1998 or weighing over 14,000 lbs, trailers, motorcycles, or gasoline powered vehicles 1975 or older. In April 2015, hybrid vehicles became subject to smog check requirements.

Although vehicles 1975 and older are not required to get a smog check, owners of these vehicles must still ensure that their emissions systems are intact.

Anyone wishing to sell a vehicle that is over four years old must first have a smog check performed. It is the seller's responsibility to get the smog certificate prior to the sale. If the vehicle is registered in California and was acquired from a spouse, domestic partner, sibling, child, parent, grandparent, or grandchild it is exempt.

California's history with smog
According to the California EPA, "Californians set the pace nationwide in their love affair with cars". The state's 34 million residents own approximately 25 million cars—one for every adult aged 18 years or older.

Smog is created when nitrogen oxides () and hydrocarbon gases (HC) are exposed to sunlight. The five gasses monitored during a smog check are hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen oxides (NOx), carbon dioxide (CO2), and oxygen (O2).

Impact on human health
In 1998 the Air Resource Board identified diesel particulate matter as carcinogenic. Further research revealed that it can cause life-shortening health problems such as respiratory illness, heart problems, asthma, and cancer. Diesel particulate matter is the most common airborne toxin that Californians breathe.

Between 2005 and 2007 air pollution led to almost 30,000 hospital and emergency room visits in California for asthma, pneumonia, and other respiratory and cardiovascular ailments. A study by RAND Corporation showed the cost to the state, federal and private health insurers was over $193 million in hospital-based medical care. John Romley lead author of the study. said "California's failure to meet air pollution standards causes a large amount of expensive hospital care." According to the American Lung Association, California's dirty air causes 19,000 premature deaths, 9,400 hospitalizations and more than 300,000 respiratory illnesses including asthma and acute bronchitis.

A study of children living in Southern California found that smog can cause asthma. The study of over 3,000 children showed those living in high-smog areas were more likely to develop asthma if they were avid athletes, when compared to children who did not participate in sports.

More people in California live in areas that do not meet federal clean air standards than in any other state. A report by the American Lung Association states that some areas in California are the most polluted in the United States, with air quality that is likely damaging the health of millions of people. The report finds that Los Angeles, Bakersfield (CA), and Visalia-Porterville (CA) rank among the five U.S. cities most polluted with particulates and ozone.

Impact on global warming
Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a greenhouse gas that is associated with global warming. Vehicles are a significant source of CO2 emissions and thus contribute to global warming. According to an advocacy group Environmental Defense, in 2004, automobiles from the three largest automakers in the US – Ford, GM, and DaimlerChrysler – contributed CO2 emissions that were comparable to those from the top 11 electric companies.

Historically, California was hottest in July and August, but as climate change takes place, the temperature may be extended from July through September, according to a report from the team established by the Air Resource Board. Some climate change simulations indicate the global warming impact on California will be an increase in the frequency of hot daytime and nighttime temperatures. The climate change simulations also indicate that drying in the Sacramento area may be evident by the mid 21st century. The California sea level has risen at about 7 inches per century, but this trend could change with global warming. According to the report by the Climate Action Team, "[t]he sea-level rise projections in the 2008 Impacts Assessment indicate that the rate and total sea-level rise in future decades may increase substantially above the recent historical rates". While all sectors are vulnerable to rising sea-levels, 70 percent of those at risk are residential areas. Hospitals, schools, water treatment plants, and other buildings may be at risk of flooding.

Climate change may also affect California's diverse agricultural sector, since it is likely to change precipitation, temperature averages, pest and weed ranges, and the length of the growing season (this affecting crop productivity). In one study, researchers looked at the possible effects on the agricultural sector in the US and identified some possible effects. Results suggested that climate change will decrease annual crop yields in the long-term, especially for cotton.

Climate change in California could also impact energy consumption. Demand patterns for electricity might be affected as the mean temperatures and the frequency of hot days increases, increasing demand for cooling in summertime.

Causes of smog
Air pollution has two primary sources, biogenic and anthropogenic. Biogenic sources are natural sources, such as volcanoes that spew particulate matter, lightning strikes that cause forest fires, and trees and other vegetation that release pollen and spores into the atmosphere.

Californian greenhouse gas emissions come mostly from transportation, utilities, and industries including refineries, cement, manufacturing, forestry, and agriculture.
In 2004, transportation accounted for approximately 40 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions in California. About 80 percent of that came from road transportation.

Population growth increases air pollution, as more vehicles are on the road. California's large population significantly contributes to the high amount of smog and air pollution in the state. In 1930, California's population was less than six million people and the total registered vehicles were two million.

Topography
California has a unique topography which contributes to some of the problems; the warm, sunny climate is ideal for trapping and forming air pollutants. On hot, sunny days, pollutants from vehicles, industry, and many products may chemically react with each other. In the winter, temperature inversions can trap tiny particles of smoke and exhaust from vehicles and anything else that burns fuel. This keeps pollution closer to the ground.

History of the Smog Check Program
In 1974 American automobiles manufactured on or after 1966 required a smog inspection upon change of ownership in California by a licensed MVPC Class A Installer/Adjuster technician (Smog Check I). An aftermarket " kit" would be installed on all 1966 to 1973 American automobiles to lower Nitrous Oxide emissions. After the 1973 model year, automobile manufacturers were required to factory install  devices (usually in the form of EGR valves) on all cars sold in California. HC and CO (hydrocarbon and carbon monoxide) limits at idle were also checked by an infrared exhaust analyzer and manually recorded by the technician. A $50 repair cost limit was imposed on vehicles that did not pass emission standards. The first truly comprehensive "Smog Check" program was implemented in March 1984. It came about as a result of "SB 33" which was passed in 1982. The program included a biennial and change of ownership testing, "BAR 84" emissions test plus a visual and functional inspection of various emission control components, a $50 repair cost limit (unless emission device tampering was noted), licensing shops to perform smog checks and mechanic certification for emissions repair competence. The program is generally known as "BAR 84" program. During the BAR 84 program, the first acceleration simulation mode (ASM) test was implemented which tests for two gases, HC and CO (hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide) while the vehicle was run at 2500 RPM for 30 seconds (static test). EGR device functions were also tested for  emissions.

Automobiles with a motor swap performed prior to the March 19, 1984 mandate which was older than the model year of the vehicle e.g. a 1970 LT-1 350 swapped into a 1975 Chevrolet with the 1970 smog gear intact (with documentation e.g. receipts) are considered noncompliant illegal engine swaps including nonstock exhaust swaps e.g. dual catalytic converters with a true dual exhaust not original to the vehicle - this means that the engine swap performed after the date of enactment must be the same model year or newer. Engine swaps which are the same year or newer where the vehicle class did not have it as a manufacturer option (from a Chevrolet S-10 with a late model LSx powertrain transplant with the associated smog gear intact salvaged from the donor vehicle which includes the OBDII diagnostic connections and associated exhaust system with the catalytic converter attached including the secondary downstream oxygen sensor (catalytic converter must be California legal which has a serial number and build date mandated under California state law) must be approved by a 'referee' smog test station where the engine/transmission package is certified where a silver tag is stickered to the door jamb. Although the engine may be newer than the vehicle model year even with an OBDII upgrade the automobile must be tested based on the model year using the test criteria based on the VIN and registration. This means that even with an OBDII powertrain upgrade regardless of the engine swap being 1996 and newer, the vehicle being smogged must be tested using BAR97 criteria, not the OBDII standard procedure.

In 1997 important laws were passed that made significant changes to Smog Check II.
AB 57 created a financial assistance program.
AB 208 provided funding for low-income assistance and vehicle retirement
AB 1492 exempted vehicles less than four years old from the biennial smog check
AB 42 exempted vehicles manufactured before 1978 from smog check testing. Also required that vehicles 20 years old or older be exempt from the Smog Check program starting in 2004. AB 42 established a brief rolling chassis exemption until it was repealed in 2006 where 1976 and newer vehicles were subjected to emission testing.

In 1999, "AB 1105" made additional changes to the program. It authorized but did not require the Bureau of Automotive Repairs (BAR) to exempt vehicles up to six years old from the biennial smog check and gave the agency authorization to except additional vehicles by low-emitter profiling (Schwartz). It also created additional changes to the repair assistance program and provided BAR with increased flexibility for how much to pay drivers whose vehicle failed the smog check so that the vehicle may be scrapped.

In 2010 the Air Resource Board and the Bureau of Automotive Repair jointly sponsored legislation, "AB 2289", that is designed to improve the program to reduce air pollution through "the use of new technologies that provide considerable time and cost savings to consumers while at the same time improving consumer protections by adopting more stringent fine structures to respond to stations and technicians that perform improper and incomplete inspections". The bill, which passed and took effect in 2013, will allow for a major upgrade in technologies used to test vehicle emissions. According to ARB Chairman, Mary D. Nichols, "[t]his new and improved program will have the same result as taking 800,000 vehicles away from California residents, also resulting in a more cost effective program for California motorists".  One way the program would reduce costs is by taking advantage of on-board diagnostic (OBDII) technology that has been installed on new vehicles since 1996. The program will eliminate tailpipe testing of post-1999 vehicles and instead use the vehicle's own emissions monitoring systems. This system has saved consumers in 22 states time and money. Vehicles manufactured in the model years between 1976 and 1999 are now required to pass a more stringent dynamometer-based tail-pipe test than was previously required. A high number of vehicles in this range have begun to fail the emissions test with the arrival of their first test-year under the new rule; some question the influence of the automotive industry on the new rule and the inherent push and perceived unfair requirement to purchase a new or near-new vehicle to replace an otherwise functional and OBDII compliant vehicle.

Smog check process
The Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) sends a registration renewal notice which indicates if a smog check is required. If the DMV requires a smog check for a vehicle, the owner must comply with the notice within 90 days and provide a completed smog check certificate.

A smog check inspection is performed by a station that has been licensed by the California Bureau of Automotive Repair (BAR). Depending on the situation, the owner may be required to take the vehicle to one of the following types of smog check stations:
 Test-only station, one that can perform the smog check test, but cannot make repairs.
 Test-and-repair station, one that can both perform the smog check and repair the vehicle.
 Repair-only station, one that can only repair the vehicle, but cannot perform the test itself.
 STAR station, one that meets the BAR's higher performance standards. Some STAR stations are test-only stations, while other STAR stations are test-and-repair.

Until a smog certificate can be provided registration will not be renewed. If the vehicle fails the smog check, the owner will be required to complete all necessary repairs and pass a smog check retest in order to complete the registration. If the costs of repairing the vehicle outweigh its value, the state may buy it and have it scrapped. The buyback program is part of California's Consumer Assistance Program (CAP) that also offers consumer assistance for repairs related to smog check. The program is administered by the Bureau of Automotive Repair.

Participating counties
Residents in certain counties, primarily rural ones, are normally exempt from the smog inspection requirements.

Policy tools
Air is susceptible to the Tragedy of the Commons, but that can be overcome with policy tools. In their book Environmental Law and Policy, Salzman and Thompson describe these policy tools as the "5 P's" - Prescriptive Regulation, Property Rights, Penalties, Payments, and Persuasion.

Throughout the years there have been some tensions between the US EPA and the California EPA with disagreements centered on California's Smog Check Policy (The Press-Enterprise, 1997). One disagreement has been over where smog checks are performed. The EPA believes that smog checks and smog repairs must be done separately, to avoid conflicts of interest.

For years, California has been asking the US EPA to approve a waiver allowing it to enforce its own greenhouse gas emission standards for new motor vehicles. A request was made in December 2005, but denied in March 2008 under the Bush administration, when interpretations of the Clean Air Act found California did not have the need for special emission standards. However, shortly after taking office, president Obama asked the EPA to assess if it was appropriate to deny the waiver and subsequently allowed the waiver. US EPA's interpretation of the Clean Air Act allows California to have its own vehicle emissions program and set greenhouse gas standards due to the state's unique need.

Car manufacturers have been strongly opposed to the emission standards set by California, arguing that regulation imposes further costs on consumers. In 2004, California approved the world's most stringent standards to reduce auto emissions, and the auto industry threatened to challenge the regulations in court. The new regulations required car makers to cut exhaust from cars and light trucks by 25% and from larger trucks and SUVs by 18%, standards that must be met by 2016. The auto industry argued that California's Air Resource Board did not have the authority to adopt such regulation and that the new standards could not be met with the current technology. They further argued that it would raise vehicle costs by as much as $3,000. The agency, however, countered that argument by saying that the additional costs would only be about $1,000 by 2016.

The Obama administration has proposed setting a national standard for greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles, which could potentially increase fuel efficiency by an average of 5% per year from 2012 to 2016.

Evaluation
According to the California Air Resources Board, the California Smog Check program removes about 400 tons of smog-forming pollutants from California's air every day.

On March 12, 2009, the Bureau of Automotive Repair and the Air Resource Board hired Sierra Research, Inc. to analyze the data collected in the BAR's Roadside Inspection Program to evaluate the effectiveness of the Smog Check Program from data collected in 2003–2006. Under the Roadside Inspection Program vehicles are randomly inspected at checkpoints set up by the California Highway Patrol (CHP). One objective of the evaluation was to compare the post smog check performance of pre-1996 (1974–1995) vehicles to the post smog check performance determined from a previous evaluation collected in 2000–2002.
The report made several recommendations to reduce the number of vehicles failing the Roadside test. One was to develop a method for evaluating station performance. The other was to perform inspections immediately following certifications at smog check stations. Finally, the report recommended continued use of the Roadside test to evaluate the effectiveness of the Smog Check program.

References

External links
 Official California Smog Check Program website
 California DMV Smog Requirements

California law
Air pollution in California
Smog
Road transportation in California
Vehicle emission controls
1984 in the environment
1984 in American law
1984 establishments in California
California Environmental Protection Agency

California Smog Check Program


Christian radio is a kind of radio station that has mostly Christian programs. Some Christian radio stations play Christian music. Some Christian radio stations have talk or news programs.

History

Since the early days of broadcasting, some stations have included Church services, sermons, and Christian Music.  The first AM experimental broadcast was on Christmas Eve, and included a violin playing religious music. Christian programs were common by the time radio became popular in the 1920s.

Christian Radio Formats

Christian Radio can follow many different formats.  In fact, for most every secular radio format there is a corresponding Christian format.  The only exception may be the "shock jock" format.
Some of the popular Christian formats would be "Oldies" (traditional music), Black Gospel, Southern Gospel, "Rock", Talk, Worship, sermons, etc. In addition many Christian stations use languages other than the majority language of their country.  Because of these language and format possibilities, a large city may have a dozen or more Christian stations without much overlap in their programming.

Christian Radio Viewpoints

While Evangelical groups have by far the most stations, there are also Roman Catholic radio stations.  Liberal Christian groups make some programs, but few own their own stations, preferring to buy time on other, usually secular stations.

Target Audience

Some Christian stations seek to target a particular group such as youth, elderly, women or other groups.  Many Christian stations produce programs that are mainly of interest to those who are already committed Christians.  Others seek to do evangelism, and have music and programs that might attract those who are not already Christians.

Funding

Many Christian Stations operate as non-commercial stations.  They get most of their financial support from listeners or those who donate in order to influence the listeners.  Other stations operate as commercial stations, that is, they carry advertisements to cover the cost of the operation.

Growth in numbers

The number of radio stations in the U.S. with a Christian format has grown greatly in the 21st Century.  This is partly because some AM stations could not compete as commercial stations and were bought by Christian groups to operate as non-commercial or semi-commercial Christian stations.  Also more opportunities for FM stations came about with changes in FCC rules. Many countries which used to have only government stations began to allow other groups to have radio stations. This increased the number of Christian stations outside the U.S.

International Stations

There are many Christian stations that operate with a Missionary purpose.  They broadcast the Christian message to countries and groups where there are large numbers of persons who are not Christians, or who are Christians with limited access to churches or Christian teaching. These stations consider themselves "Missionary Radio"  stations, as opposed to Stations that mainly serve the needs of persons in majority Christian countries. Another distinction between Christian radio and Missionary Radio is that with Missionary Radio, the funding almost never comes from the people being served, whereas in Christian radio is often is from them.

In the past when many countries, for example the Communist block, limited Christian activities, the Missionary stations were very active in broadcasting in many languages and to many places.Some of these countries now allow more local Christian activity.  However other countries still limit the work of missionaries and so radio is still used. In some countries only government stations can operate. Stations outside the country are the only way to provide service into those countries. To provide the longer range coverage, shortwave is often used by Missionary stations, although super power AM is also sometimes used.

References

Radio
Christian media

Christian radio


Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American broadcast news analyst, conservative political commentator, talk show host, and writer. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.

Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR. In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.

Hannity has promoted conspiracy theories such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health, and false claims of election fraud in the 2020 presidential election. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election, and  often acted as an unofficial spokesman for him. When Trump was president, White House advisors characterized Hannity as the "shadow" chief of staff, and he reportedly phoned the White House and spoke to Trump most weeknights. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump. He privately urged Trump administration officials before and during the January 6 United States Capitol attack to cease some of their efforts to retain the presidency and to urge Trump's supporters to leave the Capitol.

Hannity has an honorary degree from Liberty University. He won awards from the National Association of Broadcasters in 2003 and 2007. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.

Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.

In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.

Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.

Career

In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."

Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.

After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an advertisement in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.

Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.

In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.

Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.

In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.

Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.

At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.

Television

Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.

While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.

In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.

In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.

Books

Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.

Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.

In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.

Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .

Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)(3) charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.

Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.

Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.

As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.

Views

According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism".  Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones.  The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".

During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."

Donald Trump

Candidacy of Donald Trump

Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.

Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Trump and granting him more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".

Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity also appeared in a 2016 Trump campaign ad. Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.

Relationships with Donald Trump, Michael Cohen and other officials
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and became even closer during his presidency. The two men spoke on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.

According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.

Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.

On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.

Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.

The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.

In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.

In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.

Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.

After Trump lost the 2020 election, Hannity sent a number of text messages offering advice to Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows, including a message apparently suggesting a joint "NC Real estate" venture with him.

In October 2023, a staffer on his show emailed Republican lawmakers asking why they weren't supporting Representative Jim Jordan, Donald Trump's choice for House Speaker to replace Representative Kevin McCarthy.

Conspiracy theories

2016 election and Seth Rich
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fake news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".

Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.

In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from news sources across the political spectrum and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.

In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On October 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.

Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, FactCheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.

2020 election
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. The House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack investigated what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December 2020, Hannity called for Trump's claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite no credible evidence of such. The Washington Post reported in May 2022 that Hannity participated in a conference call days after the 2020 presidential election that focused on strategies for challenging the legitimacy of the vote. Other participants on the call included senator Lindsey Graham, Trump personal attorney Jay Sekulow, Oracle Corporation founder Larry Ellison and James Bopp, an attorney for True the Vote.

Fox News was sued for defamation in 2021 by Dominion Voting Systems, after Hannity and other network hosts and their guests promoted claims the company's voting machines had been rigged against Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election. Shortly after the election, Hannity hosted Trump attorney Sidney Powell, who made such assertions, but Hannity said in a sworn deposition for the Dominion case, "I did not believe it for one second."

QAnon and "deep state"
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.

WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that WikiLeaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after WikiLeaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.

In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.

Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the WikiLeaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.

Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop". In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.

On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.

Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.

In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.

In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.

Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your  in the next life".

In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.

In another lawsuit, he was accused of belittling a female guest on his TV show, allegedly offering cash to anyone on set who would take her on a date.

In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".

Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.

LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.

In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".

Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.

Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.

Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site. Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network. In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"

Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.

Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.

Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.

A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".

Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.

Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.

Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."

In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."

From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."

A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.

COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.

Personal life
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.

Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colts Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she hosted her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.

Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.

In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.

In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.

Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free Or Die: America (and the World) on the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .

See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism

References

External links

1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
Writers from New York City

Sean Hannity


Karl Immanuel Nitzsch (21 September 1787, Borna – 21 August 1868, Berlin) was a German Lutheran church leader. He was the father of theologian Friedrich August Nitzsch.

Biography
He was born in the small Saxon town of Borna near Leipzig.  His father, Karl Ludwig Nitzsch, at that time pastor and superintendent in Borna, later (1790) became professor at Wittenberg and director (1817) of the seminary for preachers. He was sent to study at Schulpforta in 1803, going on to the University of Wittenberg in 1806. In 1809 he graduated, and in 1810 he became a privatdozent at the university. Having become a deacon at the Schlosskirche in 1811, he showed remarkable energy and zeal during the bombardment and siege of the city in 1813. In 1815 he was appointed a preceptor in the preachers' seminary which had been established at Wittenberg after the suppression of the university.

From 1820 to 1822 he was superintendent in Kemberg, and in the latter year he was appointed professor ordinarius of systematic and practical theology at Bonn. Here he remained until called to succeed Philip Marheineke at Berlin in 1847; subsequently he became university preacher, rector of the university, provost of St Nicolai (in 1854) and member of the supreme council of the church, in which last capacity he was one of the ablest and most active promoters of the Evangelical Union. He represented the Vermittelungstheologie of the school of Friedrich Schleiermacher.

Published works
Nitzsch's principal works are: System der christlichen Lehre (1829; 6th edition, 1851; English translation: System of Christian doctrine 1849), Praktische Theologie (1847-1860; 2nd edition, 1863-1868), Akademische Vorträge über christliche Glaubenslehre (1858), and several series of sermons. According to Otto Pfleiderer, (Development of Theology, p. 123): "He took as his starting-point the fundamental thought of Schleiermacher, that religion is not doctrine but life, direct consciousness, feeling. At the same time he sought to bring religious feeling into closer connection with knowledge and volition than Schleiermacher had done; he laid special stress – and justly – on the recognition of a necessary and radical union of religion with morality, treating both dogmatics and ethics together accordingly in his System der christlichen Lehre". His Protestantische Beantwortung, a reply to the Symbolik of Johann Adam Möhler (1796-1838), which originally appeared in the Studien und Kritiken, of which he was one of the founders, may also be mentioned.

References

1787 births
1868 deaths
People from Borna
People from the Electorate of Saxony
19th-century German Protestant theologians
University of Wittenberg alumni
Academic staff of the University of Wittenberg
Academic staff of the University of Bonn
Academic staff of the Humboldt University of Berlin
19th-century German male writers
19th-century German writers
German male non-fiction writers

Karl Immanuel Nitzsch


Apollon was a Formula One racing car constructor from Switzerland. The team participated in one Formula One World Championship Grand Prix but failed to qualify. The team was formed by racing driver Loris Kessel.

Formula One
After Loris Kessel had left John Macdonald's RAM team, he approached Frank Williams for a drive at his team. Williams had no place left for Kessel, but could sell him an old car, the FW03. Kessel agreed and approached the Swiss Jolly Club of Switzerland, that was successful in touring cars and rallying. Kessel also hired ex-Ferrari designer Giacomo Caliri. In his FLY-studio the FW03 was heavily updated. The result was a car with a striking long nose and radiators placed directly in front of the front wheel suspension. Painted in fresh yellow and white colours the former FW03 was a nice looking car. The car was renamed the Apollon Fly, named after the sponsor of the project, a pharmacist. However, it took a long time before the Apollon actually appeared on the track. Jolly Club tried to race in Belgium, France, Austria and the Netherlands. However, in Belgium and France, Kessel had transport problems. At Monza the Apollon finally appeared. Because not enough pit boxes were available, the Swiss had to settle for a place in the open air, a clumsy scene. In the untested car Kessel was way too slow and when he went off track in the final qualifying session, the adventure was finally over.

Complete Formula One World Championship results
(key)

References

External links
 Apollon F1 biography
 Apollon F1 biography at histomobile.com

Formula One constructors
Formula One entrants
Auto racing teams in Switzerland
Swiss racecar constructors
1977 establishments in Switzerland
1977 disestablishments in Switzerland
Auto racing teams established in 1977
Auto racing teams disestablished in 1977

Apollon (Formula One)


Peter Easton ( – 1620 or after) was a Scottish privateer and later pirate in the early 17th century. Conflicting accounts exist regarding his early life. By 1602, Easton had become a highly successful privateer, commissioned to protect English interests in Newfoundland. The 'most famous English pirate of the day', his piracies ranged from Ireland and Guinea to Newfoundland. He is best known today for his involvement in the early English settlement of Newfoundland, including the settlements at Harbour Grace and Ferryland from 1611 to 1614. One of the most successful of all pirates, he controlled such seapower that no sovereign or state could afford to ignore him, and he was never overtaken or captured by any fleet commissioned to hunt him down. However, he is not as well known as some of the pirates from the late 17th and early 18th centuries.

Loyal service
Peter Easton, who was also known by Eston, had been a loyal servant of the English Crown. His ancestors had served in the Crusades. The Eastons also distinguished themselves against the Spanish Armada.

The Historic Rose Manor based in Harbour Grace, Newfoundland and Labrador, is in close proximity to the fort that once housed Peter and his crew .

In 1602, Easton was in command of a convoy as a privateer with a commission from Elizabeth I of England to protect the Newfoundland fishing fleet.  During these times, fishing vessels would carry arms and small cannons to protect the valuable cargo of fish from pirates and foreign vessels. Under his commission, he could legally press-gang local fishermen into service for him.  He could also attack the ships and wharves of the enemy as much as he wished, especially the much hated Spanish. Easton's flagship was Happy Adventure from which he flew the Saint George's Cross at the masthead.

Becoming a pirate
On 23 June 1604, after Elizabeth I was succeeded by James I, the king sued for peace with Spain and canceled all letters of commission to privateers. On hearing the news, Easton continued his attack on vessels as though nothing had changed. In so doing, he had crossed the line into piracy.

In his flagship, Happy Adventure, Easton flew the St. George's Cross and attacked Spanish ships for gold in the West Indies and the Mediterranean Sea, while in the meantime demanding and receiving protection money from English ships. In 1610, he blockaded the Bristol Channel, effectively controlling the shipping entering and leaving the western English ports. For the most part, he was acting on behalf of the powerful family of the Killigrews from Falmouth, Cornwall.  They financed his expeditions and also took shares in his profits.

Easton arrived in the colony of Newfoundland in 1612 with ten pirate ships and had his headquarters at Harbour Grace. He raided and plundered both English and foreign vessels and the harbours of Newfoundland, press-ganging fishermen into his service along the way.

On one expedition, he plundered thirty ships in St. John's and held Sir Richard Whitbourne prisoner, releasing him on the condition that Whitbourne would go to England and obtain a pardon for Easton. The pardon was granted, but by this time, Easton had moved on to the Barbary Coast to harass the Spanish.

While in Newfoundland, Easton is estimated to have taken as many as 1,500 fishermen for his ships, most voluntarily. Easton continued to protect John Guy's colony at Cuper's Cove but did not allow him to establish another colony at Renews.

On one of his raids, Easton headed for the Azores. Stationing his fleet south and west of the islands, he planned to intercept the Spanish silver fleet. No details of the battle are known except that a few days later, Easton arrived in Tunis loaded with treasure and four Spanish ships in tow.

Retirement to Savoy

Early in 1613 the Duke of Savoy issued a proclamation making Nice and Villefranche free ports and offering asylum and safe conducts to all pirates. On 20 February 1613 Easton sailed into Villefranche at the head of four ships and 900 soldiers, leaving eight more vessels outside the Strait of Gibraltar. Easton met with the duke and agreed to invest 100,000 crowns in Savoy, offering to the duke a percentage of the proceeds in return for an annual income. William Parkhurst, an English agent in Savoy, wrote of him:

"This Easton hath since beene with me: hee seemeth to have the age of 40 yeares: his countenance is rude and savadge (which the Duke tooke notice off), his speech and carriage is slow, subtile, and guilty..."

Easton ingratiated himself with the Duke of Savoy by taking part in a raid on the Duchy of Mantua. Easton was granted a pension of £4000 a year and was sworn to faithful service, becoming a Catholic, marrying an heiress and being created a Marquis of the Duchy of Savoy. Despite this, he remained known at court as 'Il cosaro Inglese' (the English corsair).

Within a month of Easton's arrival in Savoy he had dismissed most of his company. Although he took part in a Savoyard naval attack on Venice later in 1613, he commanded French crews and ships. The expedition was not successful and after this Easton took little part in maritime affairs. Nevertheless, he remained in the Duke's employ till at least 1620.

References

1570s births
17th-century deaths
1610 crimes
16th-century English people
17th-century English people
17th-century Canadian people
17th-century pirates
English pirates
English privateers
People of British North America
Newfoundland Colony people
People from Harbour Grace
Canadian folklore
Persons of National Historic Significance (Canada)
Recipients of English royal pardons
People from Alpes-Maritimes
17th-century people from Savoy
Margraves in Italy
English expatriates in Italy
Pardoned pirates

Peter Easton


Fiesta de la Tirana is an annual festival held in the locality of La Tirana in the Tarapacá Region of northern Chile. The celebration takes place on July 16 in honor of the Virgen del Carmen. La Tirana is the biggest geographically localized religious festivity in Chile and attracts between 200,000 and 250,000 visitors during the week of celebrations, while the village's permanent population normally numbers 1,200 inhabitants.

Background
Dancing is a big part of the celebrations of Fiesta de La Tirana, and dance groups and pilgrims dance before the virgin. "The doors of the "temple," or sanctuary, at La Tirana are formally opened on July 10, and bailes make their entrada from July 11-14. Each baile is assigned a specific time for entry, and the same order applies for departure at the end of the week. The baile dances first at a plaza at the entrance to the town, in front of the statue of the Cruz del Calvario, or Calvary Cross. Normally there is a priest there to formally welcome and bless the group at the Cruz Calvario."

See also
Marian Days
Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel

References

La Tirana
Tourist attractions in Tarapacá Region
July observances
Marian feast days
Winter events in Chile

Fiesta de La Tirana


The Apostolic Overcoming Holy Church of God was founded in 1916 as the Ethiopian Overcoming Holy Church of God by the late Bishop W.T. Phillips in Mobile, Alabama. The Church was locally incorporated on July 14, 1920.

Believing that God's message was to all people on April 1, 1941, the church changed its name and was incorporated in the State of Alabama as the Apostolic Overcoming Holy Church of God. The church spread to many parts of the United States and into foreign territories.

Bishop Phillips led the church successfully for 57 years. He died on November 24, 1973, and Senior Bishop Jasper Roby served as the National Presider until May 2000. In June 2000, Bishop George W. Ayers, Ph.D. was voted by the Executive board as the National/International Presiding Prelate. His position was reaffirmed in June 2002 and he served faithfully until his death in 2015. His position was succeeded by Bishop John H. Matthews, who currently serves.

The church presently has missionaries serving Western, Southwest and Southeast Africa.

The local churches are united under districts, which are governed by overseers and district or diocesan bishops. The Annual Meeting called "Pentecost" convenes each year on June 1–10.

Birmingham, Alabama, is the home of the church headquarters. Since 2011 it has been located at the Cathedral of the Cross A.O.H. Church of God at 1480 CenterPoint Parkway Birmingham, AL 35215.

The Apostolic Overcoming Holy Church of God proclaims it is set upon the foundation laid by Jesus Christ and the Apostles following (non-Trinitarian) Oneness-Pentecostal doctrine. It believes that the work that Christ began must be continued to bring humanity to complete reconciliation with God.

References

External links
 Apostolic Overcoming Holy Church of God (Official Website)

Churches in Mobile, Alabama
Christian organizations established in 1916
Nontrinitarian denominations

Apostolic Overcoming Holy Church of God