Russian Laundromat

The Russian Laundromat was a scheme to move $20–80 billion out of Russia from 2010 to 2014 through a network of global banks, many of them in Moldova and Latvia. The "Guardian" reported that around 500 people were suspected of being involved, many of whom were wealthy Russians. The money laundering scheme was uncovered by Global Laundromat, an investigation. "The New Yorker" says that that operation was known as "The Russian Laundromat," "The Global Laundromat," or "The Moldovan Scheme." "The Herald" wrote that the scheme is "thought to be the world's biggest and most elaborate money-laundering scheme."
Investigation and the reveal to the media.
Internal bank documents detailing around 70,000 transactions between 2011 and 2014 were obtained by the Russian newspaper "Novaya Gazeta" and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), which then shared data from the documents with various media companies in March 2017. The term "Russian Laundromat" was coined by the OCCRP. The analyzed documents contained the details of approximately 70,000 banking transactions, according to "Bloomberg," with 1,920 firms in the UK and 373 in the US involved. The alleged architect of the scheme is Veaceslav Platon, a Moldovan businessman and former MP. Igor Putin (Vladimir Putin's cousin) has also been named in connection with this scheme. The scheme allowed Russia's elite to funnel out at least $20 billion from Russia.
Laundered Money by Region.
Global banks and other.
The $20.8 billion was laundered in 96 countries, according to the investigation. According to money laundering experts, the money was moved initially to a network of 21 shell companies in the UK, Cyprus, and New Zealand, after which further payments went to wider group of companies, many of which were fictitious.
Eleven companies registered in the UAE were named in the investigation as possible shell companies filtering the laundered money, and the data said that the UAE registered companies total received $434,076,385.
Global banks that touched the laundered money included Deutsche Bank, Standard Chartered, and Barclays.
British territories.
Afterwards, it was reported that $740 million had been processed by British banks as part of the scheme. On 20 March 2017 the British paper "The Guardian" reported that hundreds of banks had helped launder KGB-related funds out of Russia, as uncovered by the investigation named Global Laundromat. Among the banks facing scrutiny under the investigation were HSBC, the Royal Bank of Scotland, NatWest, Lloyds, Barclays and Coutts. HSBC was listed among the 17 banks in the UK that were "facing questions over what they knew about the international scheme and why they did not turn away suspicious money transfers", as HSBC "processed $545.3m in Laundromat cash, mostly routed through its Hong Kong branch". The Royal Bank of Scotland "handled $113.1 million" in Laundromat cash. Coutts, owned by RBS, had "accepted $32.8m worth of payments via its office in Zurich, Switzerland.” NatWest, also owned by RBS, was named for allowing through $1.1 million in related funds. The "Guardian" reported that around 500 people were suspected of being involved, many of whom were wealthy Russians.
On 27 March 2017, "The Herald" in Scotland reported that Scottish shell companies were used as part of the scheme, estimated at $5 billion. The newspaper said that one means to circumvent capital export controls was for a Western company to make a fake loan to a Russian company. The Russian company would intentionally default on the loan, and a corrupt court in Moldova would order the company to pay the "debt".
The "Guardian" wrote that most of the companies involved in laundering the money had UK registration and over half of the money went to shell companies in Scotland, Birmingham, and London. Of those core companies, the data read that Seabon Lt. handled $9 billion through a network of companies. Involved parties included Chadborg Trade LLP, a British shell company, and Tronlux Ventures LLP, also a British shell company.
By June 2017 the UK watchdog, the Financial Conduct Authority, had demanded information from HSBC and the Royal Bank of Scotland concerning the Russian Laundromat.
United States.
Citibank was listed among the American banks who were named as having handled the laundered funds, with banks in the US processing around $63.7 million between 2010 and 2014. Citibank was listed as having processed $37 million of that amount, with others including the Bank of America, which processed $14 million. Others included JP Morgan and Wells Fargo in the United States.
Central Asia.
More than $6 billion was fraudulently moved, laundered or embezzled from Kazakhstan's BTA Bank by its former Chairman and CEO Mukhtar Ablyazov.
Responses from banks and Russia.
In response to the reports, HSBC stated that it was against financial crime and that the case "highlights the need for greater information sharing between the public and private sectors". Citibank and Standard Chartered responded with statements against the activities, while Wells Fargo, Deutsche Bank, Bank of America, and JP Morgan initially declined to comment to the press.
Several Latvian banks were named as participants in this scheme. Among those Trasta Komercbanka with more than $3.2 billion deposited from the scheme. In 2016 its license was revoked by European Central Bank. Another Latvian bank Baltikums was fined 1.2 million euros by the Latvian Financial and Capital Market Commission (FKTK).
Under the direction of CEO Dmitrijs Latiševs, it was renamed as BlueOrange and reoriented towards domestic customers and the European market.
It substituted current accounts from "high-risk countries" with deposits from individuals from Western Europe.
In total 9 Latvian banks have received deposits associated with this case.
Moldova filed an official complaint to Russia about the laundering on 9 March 2017, and by 23 March, had not received a formal response. On 24 March 2017, Moldova said that Russia was stonewalling and sabotaging its probe into the Russian Laundromat, by seeking to "humiliate and abuse officials visiting or passing through Russia" who were Moldovan. In turn, Russia said its own officials had been harassed, and that they were ready for "constructive cooperation" on the issue.
Legal cases.
Platon was arrested in July 2016 in Kyiv and subsequently extradited to the Republic of Moldova. On 20 April 2017, he was sentenced to 18 years in jail.


William Boyland Jr.

William Frank Boyland Jr. is an American convicted felon and former politician from the state of New York. A Democrat, Boyland represented District 55 (Brooklyn) in the New York State Assembly and was first elected in a 2003 special election. He forfeited his Assembly seat on March 6, 2014 due to his conviction on federal felony charges related to extortion, bribery, and official corruption, and he was sentenced to 14 years in prison.
Life and career.
Prior to his election to the Assembly, Boyland served as an intern in the offices of several United States Congressmen, including those of fellow Brooklynites Edolphus Towns and Major Owens.
Boyland comes from a family of Brooklyn politicians. His sister, Tracy L. Boyland, was the Chairwoman of the Women's Issues Committee on the New York City Council. His uncle, Thomas S. Boyland, was a member of the Assembly from 1977 to 1982, and his father, William F. Boyland Sr., occupied a seat in the New York State Assembly for two decades. Boyland's father stepped down from the Assembly in the middle of a term, and Boyland sought election to the seat his father vacated. Boyland was first elected to the Assembly in a 2003 special election. He represented Assembly District 55 in Brooklyn.
Prosecution, conviction, and imprisonment.
On March 10, 2011, Boyland was among eight individuals (including State Senator Carl Kruger) who surrendered to face charges in a federal corruption case accusing the lawmakers of taking bribes over the course of a decade. On November 10, 2011, Boyland was acquitted of those charges. Before the end of the month, he was arrested again on separate federal bribery charges, with prosecutors claiming to have secretly recorded him soliciting $250,000 in bribes even while the first set of charges was still unresolved. Boyland's chief of staff, Ry-Ann Hermon, was also arrested on related charges, and eventually pleaded guilty. On March 8, 2013, Boyland was charged with three additional counts of mail fraud for falsely securing tens of thousands of dollars in travel reimbursements. Several weeks later, another fraud charge was added for steering taxpayer money to a nonprofit agency and directing that agency to reimburse him for other expenses. On May 14, 2013, Boyland pleaded not guilty.
On March 6, 2014, Boyland was convicted of all 21 felony counts he faced, including extortion, bribery, and mail fraud (Eastern District of New York, docket no. 11-CR-850). Upon conviction, Boyland immediately lost his seat in the Assembly. In September 2015, he was sentenced to 14 years in federal prison; the sentence "fell short of the minimum of 19 years sought by prosecutors but exceeded many of the prison terms imposed on other state lawmakers in a string of Albany corruption cases.". As of August 2016, he was serving his sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution, Loretto, a low-security federal prison in Western Pennsylvania.


Global Forest Resources Assessment (FRA)

The Global Forest Resources Assessment (FRA) reports on the status and trends of the world's forest resources. It is led by the Forestry Department of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
The FRA reports the extent of the world’s forest area as well as other variables, including land tenure and access rights, sustainable forest management (SFM), legal and institutional frameworks for forest conservation, and sustainable use.
Background.
History.
FAO’s mandate to assess the world’s forest resources stems from its constitution:
The first FAO Global Forest Resources Assessment was published in 1948 with the main focus on assessing the availability of timber. Since then, FAO has been monitoring the world's forests at five- to ten-year intervals, and has produced various other regional and global surveys.
Data collection and partners.
The assessment is based on two primary sources of data: country reports prepared by national correspondents and remote sensing that is combined with national focal points and international partners, such as the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (JRC).
Definition of a forest.
The FAO definition of a forest is:
The definition excludes tree stands in agricultural production systems, such as fruit tree plantations, oil palm plantations, olive orchards, and agroforestry systems when crops are grown under tree cover.
Global Forest Resources Assessment 2015.
The most recent assessment, FRA 2015, builds on data from years 1990–2015 covering 234 countries and territories and shows a tendency towards reduction in the rates of forest net loss and carbon emissions from forests. However, globally, the extent of the world's forest continues to decline. Key findings include:
The next comprehensive FRA report is due in 2020.
FRA and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
FAO was the United Nations agency responsible for reporting the proportion of land area covered by forest to the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs were replaced by the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2016. Information provided by FRA will directly contribute to measuring progress on the SDGs on forest-related indicators under Goal 15: Sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, halt and reverse land degradation, halt biodiversity loss (Resolution A/RES/70/1 25 September 2015).


Sidney Buchman

Sidney Robert Buchman (March 27, 1902 – August 23, 1975) was an American screenwriter and producer who worked on about 40 films from the late 1920s to the early 1970s. He received four Oscar nominations and won once for Best Screenplay for fantasy romantic comedy film "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" (1941) along with Seton I. Miller.
Biography.
Born to a Jewish family, in Duluth, Minnesota, and educated at Columbia University, where he was a member of the Philolexian Society, he served as President of the Screen Writers Guild of America in 1941–1942. Buchman was one of the most successful Hollywood screenwriters of the 1930s and 1940s.
His scripts from this period include "The Right to Romance" (1933), "She Married Her Boss" (1935), "The King Steps Out" (1936), "Theodora Goes Wild" (1936) and "Holiday" (1938). He would go on to receive Academy Award nominations for his writing on "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" (1939), "The Talk of the Town" (1942), and "Jolson Sings Again" (1949), winning an Oscar for "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" (1941). He also did uncredited work on various films during this period, notably "The Awful Truth". He was the 1965 recipient of the Laurel Award of the Writers Guild of America, West.
Buchman's refusal to provide the names of American Communist Party members to the House Un-American Activities Committee led to a charge of contempt of Congress. Buchman was fined, given a year's suspended sentence, and was then blacklisted by the Hollywood movie studio bosses.
He would return to screenwriting in the 1960s, working on "Cleopatra" (1963) and "The Group" (1966).
Personal life.
Buchman married twice and has one daughter, Susanna Silver, with his first wife. His granddaughter and grandson are Amanda Silver and Michael B. Silver, respectively. He died in his adopted home in Cannes on August 23, 1975 at the age of 73.
Awards and nominations.
Sidney Buchman received a Laurel Award for Screenwriting Achievement at the 17th Writers Guild of America Awards on March 17, 1965.


Jerry Dennis

Jerry Dennis (born 1954) is an American writer of nonfiction and short fiction. He is known for writing about the effect of human culture on the natural environment.
Early life and education.
Dennis was born in Flint, Michigan and grew up in rural northern Michigan. Dennis received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of Louisville in 1981, after attending Northern Michigan University and Northwestern Michigan College.
Career.
After graduating Dennis worked as a carpenter for five years while establishing himself as a book author and magazine writer.
He has written articles for more than 100 publications, including "The New York Times", "Smithsonian", "Audubon", "Sports Afield", "Field and Stream", "American Way," and the literary magazines "Epoch", "Witness", "Mid-American Review", "Pank," and "Michigan Quarterly Review". Throughout the 1990s he wrote regular columns for "Wildlife Conservation Magazine", the publication of Wildlife Conservation International and the Bronx Zoo, and "Canoe and Kayak Magazine". Journalistic assignments sent him to Iceland, Chile, and extensively throughout the U.S. and Canada.
Since 2000 he has been on the faculty of the University of Michigan's Bear River Writers Conference, where he teaches creative non-fiction and nature writing.
As of 2014, he is the author of ten books. In 2015 his best known book is "The Living Great Lakes", about his trip around the great lakes in a rickety ship. This book appeared on the Michigan Bestseller Book List for October, 2014.
In 2014, in response to a pricing dispute between his publisher, MacMillan Press, and Amazon, Dennis set up his own publishing house, Big Maple Press, to produce books which will be sold only through independent booksellers.


Chris Lavers

Chris Lavers (born 1965) is an author, natural historian, and Associate Professor of Ecology and Biogeography at the University of Nottingham.
His most popular book to date is "The Natural History of Unicorns." In a review of this book, "The Washington Post" has written "Don't confuse this book with cryptozoology [...] Lavers is a scientist and a scholar. He isn't trying to prove the existence of an elusive beast. He understands that myths, like hardy plants, grow from their native environment, then get carried abroad and cross-fertilize with indigenous stories elsewhere, producing hybrids whose lineage requires careful untangling."


Virendranath Chattopadhyaya

Virendranath Chattopadhyaya (), alias Chatto, (1880 – 2 September 1937, Moscow), was a prominent Indian revolutionary who worked to overthrow the British Raj in India using armed force. He created alliances with the Germans during World War I, was part of the Berlin Committee organising Indian students in Europe against the British, and explored actions by the Japanese at the time.
He went to Moscow in 1920 to develop support by the Communists for the Indian movement, including among Asians in Moscow who were working on revolutionary movements. He joined the German Communist Party (KPD). He lived in Moscow for several years in the 1930s. Arrested in July 1937 in Joseph Stalin's Great Purge, Chatto was executed on 2 September 1937. He was the brother of prominent political activist and poet Sarojini Naidu.
Early life.
His childhood nickname was Binnie or Biren. Virendranath was the eldest son (the second of eight children) of Dr. Aghorenath Chattopadhyaya (Chatterjee), a scientist-philosopher and educationist who was an ex-principal and professor of science at the Nizam College, and his wife Barada Sundari Devi, a poet and singer in a Bengali family settled in Hyderabad. Their children Sarojini Naidu and Harindranath Chattopadhyay became well-known poets and parliamentarians. Their daughter Mrinalini (Gannu) became a Nationalist activist and introduced Virendranath to many of her circle in Kolkata (Calcutta). A younger son Marin became involved with Virendranath in political activism.
Chattopadhyaya received a secular and liberal education. He was a polyglot and was fluent in the Indian languages Telugu, Tamil, Bengali, Urdu, Persian, Hindi, as well as English; later he was to learn French, Italian, German, Dutch, Russian and the Scandinavian languages as well. He matriculated in the University of Madras and received an undergraduate degree in Arts from the University of Calcutta. In Kolkata, through his sister Gannu (Mrinalini), already known as an advanced Nationalist, Virendranath was introduced to Bejoy Chandra Chatterjee, a barrister and extremist. Chatto met Sri Aurobindo's family, especially his cousins, Kumudini and Sukumar Mitra; the former was editor of the seditious magazine "Suprabhat". For years afterwards, Chattopadhyaya maintained contact with all of them.
In England.
In 1902, Chattopadhyaya joined the University of Oxford, while preparing for the Indian Civil Service. Later, he became a law student of the Middle Temple. While frequenting Shyamji Krishna Varma's India House at 65 Cromwell Avenue in London, Chattopadhyaya became closely acquainted with V. D. Savarkar (since 1906). In 1907, Chattopadhyaya was on the editorial board of Shyamji's "Indian Sociologist." In August, along with Madame Cama and S. R. Rana, he attended the Stuttgart Conference of the Second International where they met delegates including Henry Hyndman, Karl Liebknecht, Jean Jaurès, Rosa Luxemburg and Ramsay MacDonald, among others. Vladimir Lenin attended, but it is not certain if Chattopadhyaya met him on this occasion.
In 1908, at "India House" he came in contact with a number of important "agitators" from India: G. S. Khaparde, Lajpat Rai, Har Dayal, Rambhuj Dutt and Bipin Chandra Pal. In June 1909, at an India House meeting, V. D. Savarkar strongly advocated assassinations of the Englishmen in India. On 1 July, at the Imperial Institute in London, Sir William Curzon-Wyllie, political aide-de-camp at the India Office, was assassinated by Madan Lal Dhingra, who was deeply influenced by Savarkar. Chattopadhyaya published a letter in "The Times" on 6 July in support of Savarkar, and was promptly expelled from the Middle Temple by the Benchers. In November 1909, he edited the short-lived but virulent nationalist periodical "Talvar" (The Sword).
In May 1910, seizing the opportunity of tension between the United Kingdom and Japan over the Korean peninsula, Chattopadhyaya discussed the possibility of Japanese help to Indian revolutionary efforts. On 9 June 1910, along with D. S. Madhavrao, he followed V. V. S. Aiyar to Paris, to avoid a warrant issued for his arrest. Upon reaching France, he joined the French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO).
In Paris.
Aiyar returned to India and settled in Pondicherry where he published the "Dharma" newspaper and a number of political pamphlets in Tamil, while maintaining a regular contact with Madame Bhikaiji Cama in Paris. Chatto and some other revolutionaries stayed with her at 25 rue de Ponthieu and helped her to edit the "Bande Mataram": its April 1911 issue "was one of the most violent that ever appeared," praising outrages in Nasik and Kolkata. It said: "With gentlemen we can be gentlemen, but not with rogues and scoundrels. (...) Our friends the Bengalis have also begun to understand. Blessed be their efforts. Long be their arms."
In connection with the Tirunelveli Conspiracy Case in February 1912, Madame Bhikaiji Cama published an article showing that these political assassinations were in accord with the teachings of the "Bhagavad Gita".
Marriage and family.
In 1912 Chattopadhyaya married Miss Reynolds, an Irish Catholic girl. Because he was pagan who rejected all effort to convert him, she brought a special dispensation from the pope to marry him. After the ceremony she informed him that a condition of the marriage was that any issue (child) was to be brought up Catholic. They quarreled and parted, she becoming a nun in some hidden English convent and he trying for years to have the marriage annulled. Chattopadhyaya went to Berlin in April 1914 to further revolutionary activities. There he entered a union with Agnes Smedley. Although it was not a legal marriage, she bore his name and was known as his wife. The relationship lasted eight years. Agnes wrote her famous novel Daughter of Earth in 1928, the year they got separated.
In Germany.
In Germany to avoid suspicion, he enrolled in a university as a student. As a student in comparative linguistics at the University of Saxe-Anhalt in April 1914, Chattopadhyaya met Dr. Abhinash Bhattacharya (alias Bhatta) and some other nationalist Indian students. The former was well known to the influential members as belonging to the Kaiser's immediate circle. Early in September 1914, they formed a "German Friends of India" association, and were received by the brother of Wilhelm II. The Indians and Germans signed a treaty in favour of German help to oust the British from India. With the help of Baron Max von Oppenheim, who was an expert in Middle Eastern affairs in the German Foreign Office, Chattopadhyaya informed Indian students in thirty-one German universities about the association's future plans. He also helped in finding new members for the Berlin Committee.
Among its first members were Chattopadhyaya, Bhatta, Dr. Moreshwar Govindrao Prabhakar (Cologne), Dr Abdul Hafiz (Leipzig), C. Padmanabhan Pillai (Zürich), Dr. Jnanendra Dasgupta (Zürich), Dhiren Sarkar, Narain S. Marathé, Vishnu Suktankar, Gopal Paranjapé, Karandikar, Shrish Chandra Sen, Satish Chandra Ray, Sambhashiva Rao, Dadachanji Kersasp, Mansur Ahmad, Siddiq. Other prominent revolutionaries who soon found their way to Berlin were Har Dayal, Tarak Nath Das, Mohammad Barakatullah, Bhupendranath Datta, A. Raman Pilla (A. R. Pillai), Chandrakanta Chakravarti, M. P. Tirumal Acharya, Herambalal Gupta, Jodh Singh Mahajan, Jiten Lahiri, Satyen Sen, and Vishnu Ganesh Pingley
On 22 September 1914, Sarkar and Marathé left for Washington, D.C. with a message for the German ambassador, Von Bernstorf. He ordered Von Papen, his Military Attaché, to arrange for steamers, and purchase arms and ammunition, to be delivered on the eastern coast of India. On 20 November 1914, Chattopadhyaya sent Satyen Sen, V. G. Pingley and Kartâr Singh to Kolkata with a report for Jatindranath Mukherjee or Bagha Jatin. Bagha Jatin sent a note through Pingley and Kartar Singh to Rash Behari Bose, asking him to expedite preparations for the proposed armed uprising. In 1915, Chattopadhyaya went to meet Mahendra Pratap in Switzerland and tell him of the Kaiser's personal invitation to meet. He was dogged by the British agent, Donald Gullick, and an attempt was made to kill Chattopadhyaya.
Revolutionary vagabond.
With the failure of the Indo-German Zimmermann Plan, in 1917 Chattopadhyaya opened a new Bureau of the Indipendence Committee in Stockholm, which acted under the name "Indiska Nationalkommittéen". From this point on the Stockholm venture faught with the remaining parts of the Berlin Committee over the role of legitimate representative of Indian nationalism in Europe. In 1918, he contacted the Russian leaders Troinovski and Angelica Balabanova, the First General Secretary of the Communist International. In December, he dissolved the Berlin Committee. In May 1919, he arranged for a secret meeting of Indian revolutionaries in Berlin. In November 1920, in his search of financial and political support exclusively for the revolutionary nationalist movement in India, Chattopadhyaya was encouraged by M. N. Roy (with Mikhail Borodin's approval).
He went to Moscow with Agnes Smedley and they became companions, sharing their lives until 1928. Under her influence, Chattopadhyaya coveted the influential position M. N. Roy enjoyed in Moscow. The next year, he was received by Lenin, along with Bhupendra Nath Datta and Pandurang Khankoje. From May to September, he attended the Indian Committee of the Third Congress of Communist International in Moscow. In December 1921 in Berlin, Chattopadhyaya founded an Indian News and Information Bureau with his correspondent Rash Behari Bose in Japan.
According to Sibnarayan Ray, Roy and Chattopadhyaya were rivals for Agnes: "Roy would have liked to work with him since he admired the latter's intelligence and energy. (...) By early 1926 Chatto had got into good terms with Roy."
At Roy's instance, Willi Münzenberg "took Chatto under his wings" in organising an international conference in Europe to inaugurate the League against Imperialism. On the eve of Roy's mission to China, in January 1927, Chatto wrote to Roy asking "if there is anything further you wish me to do..." On 26 August 1927, he wrote to Roy, after the latter's return to Moscow from China, asking to help him "directly" to gain admission to the Communist parties of India and Germany. After being advised by Roy, Chatto joined the Communist Party of Germany (KPD).
In 1927, while working as the head of the Indian Languages Section of the KPD, Chatto accompanied Jawaharlal Nehru to the Brussels Conference of the League against Imperialism. Chattopadhyaya served as its general secretary. His younger brother Harin went to Berlin that year to meet him and Agnes. On learning of Jawaharlal Nehru's becoming president of the Indian National Congress, Chattopadhyaya asked him – in vain – to split the party for a more revolutionary programme of full independence from British imperialism.
From 1930 to 1932, Chattopadhyaya published 28 articles in "Inprecor", the Comintern organ, about an ultra-leftist sectarian turn of the Communist Party of India. Between 1931 and 1933, while living in Moscow, Chattopadhyaya continued to advocate anti-Hitler activities, Asian emancipation from Western powers, the independence of India, and Japanese intervention into the Chinese revolution. Among his Korean, Japanese and Chinese friends was Zhou Enlai, the future Prime Minister of the People's Republic of China after its successful Revolution.
Agnes saw him for the last time in 1933 and remembered later:
"He embodied the tragedy of a whole race. Had he been born in England or America, I thought, his ability would have placed him among the great leaders of his age... He was at last growing old, his body thin and frail, his hair rapidly turning white. The desire to return to India obsessed him, but the British would trust him only if he were dust on a funeral pyre."
Last years.
In January–February 1934, Chatto exchanged letters with Krupskaya (Lenin's widow). On 18 March 1934 he gave a talk about his reminiscences of Vladimir Lenin. He wrote to Georgi Dimitrov, Comintern's Secretary-General, on 9 September 1935: "For three years I have been kept away from active work in the Comintern." Clemens Palme Dutt (the brother of Rajani Palme Dutt), mentioned having seen Chatto for the last time in 1936/37 at the department of ethnography of the Academy of Science in Leningrad.
Chattopadhyaya was arrested on 15 July 1937 during the Great Purge of Stalin. His name appeared on a death list among 184 other persons, which was signed on 31 August 1937 by Stalin, Molotov, Voroshilov, Zhdanov and Kaganovich. The death sentence was pronounced by Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR on 2 September 1937 and Chatto was executed the same day.
On 10 July 1938, A. C. N. Nambiar, Chattopadhyaya's brother-in-law, wrote to Nehru about the arrest. He replied on 21 July, agreeing to try to find out about Chattopadhyaya's fate.
Evaluation.
James Campbell Ker's "Political Trouble in India: 1907–1917" discusses Chattopadhyaya. He described some of the less appealing aspects of his character and actions.
He was deeply admired by colleagues such as M. N. Roy and Dr. Abhinash Bhattacharya for his able leadership, sharp intelligence and sincere emotion.
In his autobiography decades later, Jawaharlal Nehru wrote of Chatto:
An entirely different type of person was Virendranath Chattopadhyay, member of a famous family in India. Popularly known as Chatto he was a very able and a very delightful person. He was always hard up, his clothes were very much the worse for wear and often he found it difficult to raise the wherewithal for a meal. But his humour and light heartedness never left him. He had been some years senior to me during my educational days in England. He was at Oxford when I was at Harrow. Since those days he had not returned to India and sometimes a fit of homesickness came to him when he longed to be back. All his home-ties had long been severed and it is quite certain that if he came to India he would feel unhappy and out of joint. But in spite of the passage of time the home pull remains. No exile can escape the malady of his tribe, that consumption of the soul, as Mazzini called it ... Of the few I met, the only persons who impressed me intellectually were Virendranath Chattopadhyay and M.N. Roy. Chatto was not, I believe, a regular communist, but he was communistically inclined.
Chattopadhyaya's family line survives today in Kolkata.
Representation in other media.
Chatto was well known in Great Britain and India as a revolutionary. He is believed to have inspired Somerset Maugham's character of "Chandralal" in his short story, "Giulia Lazzari;" (its character of was based upon Maugham).. The American writer Agnes Smedley, who was involved with Chatto for eight years, used him as a model for the character "Ananda" in her novel "Daughter of Earth.". The Indian revolutionary in Berlin, A C N Nambiar, had married Chatto's sister Suhasini.


Phil Brown (actor)

Philip Mortimer Brown (April 30, 1916 – February 9, 2006) was an American actor.
Early life.
Brown was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1916. He majored in dramatics at Stanford University, where he was a member of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity.
Career.
Brown played some of his first roles on stage when he joined the Group Theatre in New York City. The Group Theatre eventually closed, and many of its members relocated to Hollywood, where Brown helped found the Actors' Laboratory Theatre. He found his first cinema roles here, making his motion picture debut in Mitchell Leisen's 1941 war movie, "I Wanted Wings".
In 1946, he played Ernest Hemingway's protagonist Nick Adams in Robert Siodmak's version of "The Killers", alongside William Conrad and Charles McGraw as the titular "killers".
In 1948, he played Tom in Tennessee Williams's "The Glass Menagerie", at the Haymarket Theatre London, in a production directed by John Gielgud.
His association with the Lab came back to haunt him later in the decade, when its members fell under the scrutiny of the House Un-American Activities Committee. Although he was not a communist, Brown was blacklisted in 1952, and was eventually compelled to relocate with his family to the United Kingdom between 1953 and 1993.
Overseas he was able to resume acting on stage, TV and films; he also directed for the stage and TV. He was best known for his role as Luke Skywalker's uncle, Owen Lars, in "Star Wars" (1977).
He returned to the United States in the 1990s and in later years made the rounds of autograph shows.
Death.
Phil Brown died in his sleep of pneumonia on February 9, 2006 at the age of 89, two months before his 90th birthday.
Legacy.
His wife Ginny survives him with their son, two grandchildren and a great grandchild.


Alistair Beaton

Alistair Beaton (born 1947) is a Scottish left-wing political satirist, journalist, radio presenter, novelist and television writer. At one point in his career he was also a speechwriter for Gordon Brown.
Born in Glasgow, Scotland, Beaton was educated at the universities of Edinburgh, Moscow and Bochum and graduated from the University of Edinburgh with First-Class Honours in Russian and German. He lives in Holloway, London.


Maria del Carmen Montoya

Maria del Carmen Montoya is an American artist working in participatory art, sculpture and new media. Her work is inherently collaborative and collective. In 2009, Montoya became a core member of Ghana Think Tank along with Christopher Robbins and John Ewing. Ghana Think Tank is an international artist collective that "develops the first world" by flipping traditional power dynamics, asking people living in the "third world" to intervene into the lives of the people living in the so-called "developed" world. Montoya is an assistant professor in sculpture and spatial practices at the Corcoran School of Art and Design at George Washington University.
Early life and education.
Maria del Carmen Montoya grew up on the outskirts of Houston, Texas, in a Northside working-class neighborhood.
Her mother, for whom she was named, was born on the Palo Alto ranch in the Sonoran Desert in Mexico. Her mother worked on the U.S.–Mexican border in Ciudad Juárez and El Paso. Soon after marrying Montoya's father, she opened a small import shop. Due to customer demand, she began stocking paraphernalia, and her store soon became a popular head shop. Carmen and her family lived in the back room of the store and she learned all about American rock music and how to talk to strangers helping her mother tend shop. Her mother now runs a small import stand in a Fiesta Mart. Montoya's personal family history of immigration and experience with fringe cultures deeply influences her artistic practice.
Education.
Montoya earned a BA from Loyola University Chicago in 1995, where she studied philosophy and women's studies. Her second degree was in nursing in 1999. She received an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2007.
Career.
She is a member of the Ghana ThinkTank.


The Man Who Planted Trees (film)

The Man Who Planted Trees () is a 1987 Canadian short animated film directed by Frédéric Back. It is based on Jean Giono's short story "The Man Who Planted Trees". This 30-minute film was distributed in two versions, French and English, narrated respectively by actors Philippe Noiret and Christopher Plummer, and produced by Radio-Canada.
Awards.
The film won the Academy Award (1988) for Best Animated Short Film. It also competed for the Short Film Palme d'Or at the 1987 Cannes Film Festival. The film won the Golden Sheaf Award for Best Animation at the 1988 Yorkton Film Festival.
In 1994, it was voted number 44 of the "50 Greatest Cartoons" of all time by members of the animation field.


Ricardo Salinas Pliego

Ricardo Benjamín Salinas Pliego (born 19 October 1955) is a Mexican billionaire businessman, founder and chairman of Grupo Salinas, a group of companies with interests in telecommunications, media, financial services, and retail stores.
He is the third richest person in Mexico and the 172th richest person in the world with an estimated net worth of US$13.6 billion in February 2021.
Entrepreneurialism.
Ricardo Salinas Pliego is a CPA graduate of the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM). After earning an MBA at Tulane University, he joined Elektra in 1981 as import manager. He learned the business moves when the company was in dire financial straits at the continuing devaluation of the eighties. Between 1981 and 1986, Salinas experimented with other businesses such as a restaurant in Monterrey, satellite dishes and the sale of systems multi communication.
In 1987 Ricardo succeeded his father Hugo Salinas Price as CEO of Grupo Elektra. The company began as a family-owned furniture manufacturing company called Salinas & Rocha founded in 1906 by Salinas' great-grandfather, Benjamin Salinas. In 1950, Hugo Salinas Rocha created Grupo Elektra and when Ricardo Salinas became CEO of the company in 1987 he refocused Elektra on basic products: appliances, electronics, and furniture. Significantly, he developed at Elektra a vast new consumer market among Mexico's lower middle income consumers by providing credit sales and diverse financial products and services.
Grupo Elektra expanded further and became Mexico's biggest consumer-finance company when, in 2002, it won the first banking license granted to any Mexican institution in nearly a decade. The strategy was to build new markets by creating new buying power among classes of people largely ignored by most other major Mexican businesses. Thus was born Banco Azteca, which currently has operations in Mexico, Panama, Guatemala and Honduras. Subsequently, Grupo Elektra obtained two financial licenses from the federal government to create Seguros Azteca and Afore Azteca.
Salinas is also chairman of TV Azteca, one of the world's two largest producers of Spanish-language television programming. Under his leadership, TV Azteca broke Mexico's long-standing television monopoly through the successful privatization of a media package offered by the government.
In 2001, TV Azteca launched Azteca America, a wholly owned Spanish-language broadcasting network aimed at the 50 million-strong Hispanic population of the United States. Azteca America had affiliates in 70 markets, including Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, Miami and Houston, reaching 89 percent of the Hispanic population in the U.S. Azteca America was sold to HC2 Holdings in 2017.
In 2003, Salinas bought Iusacell (the first cell phone company in Mexico) and four years later, merged it with Unefon, another cell phone company, founded by him in 1999. However, in early 2015, Grupo Salinas announced the sale of Iusacell to AT&T Today, with Totalplay, offers the most innovative internet and television services and telephony via fiber optics to home. Also, Totalplay Empresarial provides broadband internet access video surveillance, broadband interfaces, videoconferencing, among other services to institutions and companies throughout Mexico.
In 2012, Grupo Elektra acquired Advance America, —currently Purpose Financial—, a company that provides short-term non- bank loans in the United States. Also put into operation Punto Casa de Bolsa. The Group operates more than six thousand points of contact in Mexico, United States, Guatemala, Honduras, Peru and Panama.
Salinas has participated and addressed The World Economic Forum, The Economist Roundtable on Mexico, the Young Presidents' Organization, UCLA, the Institute of the Americas, Harvard Business School and TED, where he discussed issues related to globalization, education, entrepreneurship, freedom and opportunity in the BOP. He also has a blog where he publishes his business, political, economic and cultural ideas. His articles have been published in "The New York Times", "The Boston Globe", "The Hill", "Newsweek" in Spanish, "La Opinión", and regularly writes in the Mexican press. Mr. Salinas was the first Mexican to elect the Board of Trustees of the Aspen Institute.
It was announced in 2020 that Salinas had 10% of his liquid portfolio invested in Bitcoin.
Philanthropy.
Salinas formed the nonprofit Fundación Azteca in 1997 to address a broad range of social problems with ongoing campaigns in healthcare and nutrition, education, and the protection of the environment. It is a foundation that finances and supports other foundations. Fundación Azteca has raised millions of dollars, benefiting hundreds of thousands of lives.
He also created Caminos de la Libertad, Kybernus, Arte & Cultura Grupo Salinas in addition to sponsoring Ciudad de las Ideas.
Controversies.
Salinas has been involved in a series of political and financial scandals (which include investigations by the American Securities and Exchange Commission and the Mexican Comisión Nacional Bancaria y de Valores).
Salinas was charged by the American Securities and Exchange Commission in January 2005 with being engaged in an elaborate scheme to conceal Salinas's role in a series of transactions through which he personally profited by $109 million. The SEC complaint also alleged that Salinas and Padilla sold millions of dollars of TV Azteca stock while Salinas's self-dealing remained undisclosed to the market place. This was settled in September 2006 with Salinas required to pay $7.5M while not admitting guilt. As part of the settlement, Salinas was forbidden for five years to serve as officer or director of any United States publicly listed company.
Soccer game and presidential debate.
Salinas decided to air the 2011–12 quarter final game between Tigres and Monarcas Morelia, two soccer teams from the Liga MX, during the same time as the presidential debate of the 2012 Mexican general elections. The day of these two events were set for 6 May 2012.
He posted on Twitter the following message on 30 April 2012:
The Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) and its president, Leonardo Valdés Zurita, asked for TV Azteca to not air the game at the same time as the presidential debate. According to Zurita, the IFE has already set up the permissions and invitations to carry out the debate, but also recognized that other media companies can air programs they consider relevant.
On 3 May 2012, the IFE acknowledged that TV Azteca decided to air the presidential debate on XHTVM-TV, commonly referred to as Proyecto 40 (ADN 40). On his defense, Salinas said on 4 May 2012 that only 15% of the population was interested in the debate, while 54% of them claim they were not interested at all. If the statistics were different, he said, then he would have adjusted his strategy. Salinas then said that his business "understands well" the preferences of the population and takes decisions accordingly.


Wu Chien-pao

Wu Chien-pao (; born 29 November 1950) is a Taiwanese politician. He was a member of the Tainan County Council from 1998 to 2010, and served as its speaker from 2002 to 2010. Wu served on the succeeding Tainan City Council from December 2010 to May 2011, when he was removed from office as part of a legal verdict against him.
Career.
Wu's 1998 campaign for the Tainan County Council was supported by the Kuomintang. Throughout his tenure on the council, Wu maintained an interest in environmental causes affecting Southern Taiwan. In 2001, he backed Tainan County magistrate Mark Chen's decision to support Kueijen Township residents' protest of an Environmental Protection Administration plan to construct an industrial waste complex there. Wu was elected speaker of the county council in 2002. In 2003, Wu organized a demonstration at the Nanhua Reservoir, calling for the government to lift restrictions on development at the site while providing compensation for county residents. Shortly after Typhoon Morakot struck Taiwan in August 2009, Wu criticized the decision to build a water diversion tunnel through Mount Siandu. Completion of the tunnel was suspected to have contributed to a landslide that destroyed the village of Siaolin, Kaohsiung.
Wu drew continuous attention for alleged ties to gangs. In March 2004, police alleged that Wu bet on the Taiwan Capitalization Weighted Stock Index, and won NT$50 million. He reportedly promised NT$18 million of the total to Chang Chao-lin of the Four Seas Gang if Chang helped Wu collect his winnings. Wu only received NT$6 million, and supposedly asked other gang members to pursue Chang. In March 2005, the Tainan District Prosecutors' Office sought Wu and Lee Chuan-fu for questioning. The pair were suspected of earning NT$1 billion in profit via Wu's Fu-hsin Company, which had begun dredging sand from the Tsengwen River in 2004. In the midst of the Tsengwen River case, Wu ran for reelection as Tainan County Council speaker and won in March 2006. The Tainan District Court heard charges against Wu, ruling in August 2008 that he was not guilty. Upon appeal, the Taiwan High Court ruled in May 2011 that Wu was guilty, extending his sentence to 42 months.
In 2007, the Tainan District Prosecutors' Office began investigating Wu for gambling on Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) games. He contested the legislative elections held in January 2008, losing to Lee Chun-yee. In April of that year, the prison sentence in another gambling case against Wu relating to gambling houses in operation between 2004 and 2005 was commuted to a fine. Wu's CPBL gambling case continued with his indictment in August 2008 by prosecutors in Tainan. Further questioning of Wu undertaken in 2010 by Banqiao-based prosecutors established a link to the CPBL's . Wu was indicted by the Banqiao District Prosecutor's Office in February 2010. "The New York Times" reported in October 2016 that Wu would order players to be beaten if they refused to participate in match fixing. Following the Banqiao indictment, the Kuomintang expelled Wu. The party ordered affiliated Tainan city councillors to vote for themselves during the 2010 speakership election to keep Wu out of the office. He lost the office to Democratic Progressive Party candidate by nine votes, 30–21. Ten Tainan City Council members were later expelled from the Kuomintang for not following the party's directive. Wu was removed from office in May 2011 after the Taiwan High Court found him guilty in the Tsengwen River case. In December 2011, Wu's appeal of the match fixing charges related to the 2007 probe led by the Tainan prosecutors was heard by the Taiwan High Court. He was sentenced to two years imprisonment, which he began serving in January 2012. The same court ruled on the 2009 charges in August 2014, sentencing Wu to 38 months in prison. Wu could not be located by law enforcement to serve this sentence, which was extended to 65 months on appeal due to Wu's attitude during the proceedings. In August 2017, Weng Ping-yao stated that Ma Ying-jeou offered payment for him to kill Alex Tsai in 2007. According to Weng, the deal fell through when Wu Chien-pao was named an additional target. In 2018, Wu was tracked to the Philippines. He was arrested by the Philippine Bureau of Immigration's Fugitive Search Unit on 16 January 2019. On 6 February 2019, Criminal Investigation Bureau officers from Taiwan's National Police Agency flew to Manila to extradite Wu. In April 2020, the Supreme Court upheld the High Court decision to convict Wu on the 2009 game fixing-related charges.


Karen DeWolf

Karen DeWolf (1904–1989), sometimes known as Gypsy Wells, was an American screenwriter and novelist credited on over 50 films during her 20+ years in Hollywood. She's best known for her work on Columbia's "Blondie" films, in addition to movies like "Nine Girls" and "Johnny Allegro". She also wrote a book, "Take the Laughter", in 1940.
Biography.
Early life.
DeWolf was born Muriel Valentine Quack, the only child of Hugh Quack and Florence Morrow in Manhattan. After her family moved west, she graduated from high school in Alameda, California.
She had dreams of becoming an actress, and caused quite a stir at 17 by posing in a swimsuit for a photo that ended up on the cover of "National Police Gazette." (After being suspended, DeWolf would tell her principal she had never agreed for those photos—which were taken with the intent of furthering her ambition to be an actress—to be used in that manner.)
She briefly gave up her Hollywood dreams, however, when she married her first husband, real estate developer John Warfield Wells, at age 19. At this time, she assumed the stage name Gypsy Wells and performed in the San Francisco Bay Area as a dancer. The marriage would soon end in divorce.
Hollywood career.
After moving to Hollywood, DeWolf married cinematographer Abraham Fried, aka Conrad Wells, in 1926, but the pair separated in the late 1920s, shortly before Wells died in a freak plane accident in 1930 on the set of "Such Men Are Dangerous". Soon after, she married Eric DeWolf, president of the California Etchers' Association.
When DeWolf first arrived in Hollywood, she hoped to be an actress, but she eventually discovered a love for screenwriting. She slipped a script to director Lowell Sherman on set one day, and he brought her on as an editor and dialogue director. From there, she worked her way into writing rooms, gaining work on a number of franchises, including the Charlie Chan films, the Jones Family films, and the "Blondie" films.
Blacklisting.
Her career came to a halt in the 1950s when she was blacklisted during the McCarthy era for alleged Communist ties.
Personal life.
DeWolf was married four times: first to John Warfield Wells, then to Conrad Wells, then to Eric DeWolf, and then to Dennis Grady.


Jimothy

Timothy Gonzales, previously known as Jimothy Lacoste and subsequently by his stage name, Jimothy, is a British rapper and musician from Camden, North London, associated with the bedroom pop and DIY genres.
Career.
Lacoste started posting music online in 2016, but his breakthrough track was "Getting Busy", released on YouTube on 28 July 2017. Since then, he has had a series of viral hits, and received considerable media attention in London and from music websites. Lacoste started performing live in 2018, including festivals such as Field Day, where he received positive reviews from "The Guardian", which described him as "North London's viral wonderkid".
In early 2019 Jimothy completed his second UK tour, where he performed alongside fellow London rapper VBackin20017. In 2019, he played at festivals including Cambridge's Strawberries and Creem and Glastonbury, where The Telegraph referred to him as a "viral Internet enigma". He has recently worked with brands such as Adidas and Vogue.
Music.
Lacoste's music consists of deadpan vocals laid over lo-fi midi beats. His lyrics reflect an optimistic worldview and usually relate to inane everyday scenarios. A review in "The Guardian" characterised his music as "absurd iPad pop". The success of his tracks online has been credited to the low-budget humorous videos that accompany them, which invariably feature Lacoste dancing alone or in idiosyncratic situations, and frequent visual references to public transport. His catchphrase, first mentioned in "Getting Busy", is "Life is getting quite exciting".
Personal life.
Lacoste has stated in interviews that he has dyscalculia and said that he attended a school for children with special educational needs, which he has credited with giving him confidence and allowing him to follow his interest in music.


Save the forest! Stop coal!


Watchclock

A watchclock is a mechanical clock used by security guards as part of their guard tour patrol system which require regular patrols. The most commonly used form was the mechanical clock systems that required a key for manual punching of a number to a strip of paper inside with the time pre-printed on it. Recently, electronic systems have increased in popularity due to their light weight, ease of use, and downloadable logging capabilities.
This increase in the electronic systems led the largest U.S. manufacturer of watchclocks, Detex, to discontinue all of their mechanical watchclocks on December 31, 2011, including the Detex Newman which had been manufactured for 130 years.
Watchclocks often had a paper or light cardboard disk or paper tape placed inside for a set period of time usually 24 hours for disk models, and 96 hours for tape models. The user would carry the clock to each checkpoint where a numbered key was mounted (typically chained in place, ensuring that the user was present). That key was then inserted into the clock, turned, and imprint the disk with the key number. The paper disk or tape had the times pre printed and the key impressed the key number on the corresponding time. After the shift (or a specified time period, up to 96 hours in the case of the Detex Guardsman clocks), an authorized person (usually a supervisor), would unlock the watchclock and retrieve the disk or tape and insert a new one. In the case of Detex brand clocks, each time the cover is opened or closed, a mechanical device would puncture the disk or tape at the current time, if a disk had more than two perforations on it, it proved that the clock had been opened and possibly tampered with, or records forged.
The approximately five pound circular watchclock was enclosed in a black leather pouch attached to a leather strap and carried over the shoulder. Inside buildings mounted near doors, were watchclock stations consisting of a small metal box with a hinged lid, which contained a numbered key affixed by a twelve-inch chain. The watchman would insert the key into the clock, rotate it and a numeric stamp would be pressed onto a roll or disk of paper locked inside the clock.


Stay home


Ion Shop


Julie Freeman

Julie Freeman (born 1972 in Halton, UK) is an artist whose work spans visual, audio and digital art forms and explores the relationship between science, nature and how humans interact with it.
Biography.
Freeman's work has focused on using electronic technologies to ‘translate nature’ – whether it is through the sound of torrential rain dripping on a giant rhubarb leaf, a pair of mobile concrete speakers who lurk in galleries haranguing passersby with fractured sonic samples, or by providing an interactive platform from which to view the flap, twitch and prick of dogs' ears.
In 2005 she launched her most known digital artwork, 'The Lake', which used hydrophones, custom software and advanced technology to track electronically tagged fish and translate their movement into an audio-visual experience. The work was developed over three years and was supported by Tingrith Coarse Fishery (which was run by the artist's mother) and a two-year fellowship from the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA). It was exhibited at the Tingrith Fishery in Bedfordshire.
She was artist-in-residence at the Microsystems and Nanotechnology Centre at Cranfield University (2007-9) where, with Professor Jeremy J. Ramsden, she created works that aimed to increase public understanding of self-assembly and organising processes at the nanoscale, and their potential social impacts and consequences.
Freeman is a graduate of the MA in Digital Arts at the Centre for Electronic Arts, Middlesex University, London and Board Member of nonprofit collective MzTEK (which encourages women artists to pick up technical skills). She has been featured on the BBC World Service programme "The Science Hour" and "The Guardian"s online "Tech Weekly" podcast.
She is currently a PhD student and research technician in the Media and Arts Technology lab at Queen Mary University of London.


List of accolades received by V for Vendetta (film)

"V for Vendetta" is a 2006 dystopian thriller film directed by first-time filmmaker James McTeigue with a screenplay written by the Wachowski sisters. The film was produced by the latter and Joel Silver. It is based on the comic book series of the same name by Alan Moore and David Lloyd. It starred Natalie Portman, Hugo Weaving, Stephen Rea, and John Hurt. The film had its world premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival on February 12, 2006. It was released March 17, 2006 in the United States, United Kingdom, and six other countries; it topped that week's US box office. Its worldwide gross was $132,511,035.
"V for Vendetta" garnered various awards and nominations following its release, with most nominations recognizing the film overall. In addition, "V for Vendetta" was included in a number of best film lists for 2006, including a list authored by director Kevin Smith. Fandomania named the character V the 96th greatest fictional character of all time.


Werner Otto von Hentig

Werner Otto von Hentig (22 May 1886, Berlin, Germany – 8 August 1984, Lindesnes, Norway) was a German Army Officer, adventurer and diplomat from Berlin. When still only a 25 year old lieutenant he was commissioned by the Kaiser to lead an expedition into the unknown and uncharted territories of Central Asia. The region associated with the political "Great Game" had its roots in Victorian rivalries between the local Great Powers: Russia and British India. The small expedition party, travelling in extreme climatic conditions, suffered extraordinary privations with courage and equanimity. Surviving diary accounts of participants on both sides of the Great War bear witness to the unusual camaraderie and esprit de corps summoned by Hentig's outstanding qualities of leadership.
Hentig was the elder brother of the criminal psychologist Hans von Hentig and the father of . Though critical of the Nazi regime, he served in the Third Reich and intervened at personal risk to save Jews who were in danger, and was instrumental in arranging for thousands of Jews to be transferred from Germany to Palestine during the 1930s.
Hentig joined the Imperial German diplomatic service in 1909 and was posted as an attaché to the German mission at Beijing. He was later posted to Istanbul and Tehran. During the First World War he was wounded in the Battle of the Masurian Lakes, then later in 1915, with Oskar Niedermayer, led the Niedermayer–Hentig Expedition, a German mission to Kabul that sought to enlist the Afghan Amir's support for the Central Powers and an attack on British India.
At the end of the war, Hentig was attached to the embassy at Istanbul, before becoming active in repatriation of German prisoners of war from Siberia. In 1924, he was appointed the ambassador to Poznań. In the 1920s, Hentig became involved in the German Youth Movement. In the 1930s, he was appointed the German Consul General to San Francisco and later Bogotá when in 1935, attempts were made to assassinate him.
Nora Levin writes in 'The Holocaust' about Hentig's actions during 1937 and 1938, when the rate of Jewish emigration from Germany to Palestine was being restricted by a combination of British obstructions (in response to Arab uprisings in Mandatory Palestine that opposed giving asylum to European Jews) and a change in German policy concerning the German Jewish contribution to the potential establishment of a Jewish State:
The Palestine Desk in the Wilhelmstrasse at this time (1937-38) was held by Werner Otto von Hentig, a critic of the Nazi regime, but a man whose foreign service expertise could not be ignored or wasted. Hentig had already dealt with the Palestine problem in Constantinople [now Istanbul]... In Berlin, he had often seen and heard Chaim Weizmann and had been deeply impressed by him. He was also attracted to the daring of the Zionist experiment. Hentig advised Ernst Marcus, who was employed by the Paltreu Company ["Palästina Treuhandstelle", Palestine Trustee Office], a subsidiary of the Haavara Company, to prepare material proving that the contribution of the German Jews to the upbuilding of Palestine was small as compared with the share of Polish Jews and the financial contribution of American Jews. Marcus prepared such a memorandum, which served as the basis for a brief, arguing that there were certain advantages to Germany in the establishment of a Jewish State. Other divisions within the Foreign Ministry, however, submitted negative recommendations. Several months passed ... A short time before the Mossad emissary, Auerbach, arrived in Vienna, Hentig phoned Marcus to tell him that Hitler at last had made a favorable decision and that all obstacles in the way of emigration to Palestine were now removed
Although Hentig was overly optimistic about the removal of all obstacles, especially the British opposition to unlimited Jewish immigration into Palestine, the actions he initiated enabled Auerbach to negotiate with Eichmann for (at first) a thousand Jewish boys and girls to be trained in preparation for emigration to Palestine. Although Eichmann had wanted the training and emigration to be handled by the Gestapo, Auerbach found confederates who used the opportunity to obtain 20,000 transit visas that could theoretically enable Jewish migration to Yugoslavia. Although the actual numbers saved from later being sent to concentration camps were fewer than 20,000, various efforts enabled many small groups in bunches of hundreds to find passage on several different vessels departing Yugoslav and Grecian ports. Although there were a variety of putative destinations, after a series of adventures and mishaps, many of these Jewish refugees eventually arrived safely in Palestine. These arrangements were continued until the British took strong action to stop such rescue operations.
After the Nazi Kristallnacht in Germany, November 1938:
 Hentig ... expressed his shame, and willingly used his influence, at great personal risk, to protest a fresh action from starting... Hentig interceded with Under-Secretary of State Ernst von Weizsäcker, pointing out the detrimental effects of the riots on German foreign policy... Hentig ... did secure the release of ... arrested ... Jewish functionaries from concentration camps.
As the Middle East historian Wolfgang G. Schwanitz of New Jersey proved in his research, Hentig did cultivate a bitter rivalry with another leading German envoy to the Middle East, Dr Fritz Grobba, because they did not share the same ideological opinions. This shaped the German Middle Eastern policy: Hentig obstructed the expansion of the Second World War to the Middle East. Whereas Grobba, an ardent Nazi, belonged in both world wars to the Foreign Office faction that favoured the massive incitement of Muslims to jihad in the colonial hinterland of Britain, France, and Russia, Hentig and Niedermayer rejected it. During the First World War they both underwent a professional transformation in the German officer corps, and nationalist ideas spreading across the region played a part in the conduct of Hentig's secret mission to Kabul, Afghanistan; the Turkish declaration of war escalated racial tensions among the Ottoman-German conspiracy, seeking to launch a Holy War to counter the so-called Allied powers.
Some years after the Second World War, Hentig served as the West German ambassador to Indonesia. In retirement he was a personal advisor to the Saudi Royal Family for nearly two years.
In 1961, Hentig, along with Bogislaw von Bonin, Herman Schwann, Wolf Schenke, and Theodor Kogler, was one of the founders of the Association of German National Assembly.
He died on 8 August 1984 in Lindesnes, Norway, aged 98.


Digital Advertising Alliance of Canada

The Digital Advertising Alliance of Canada (DAAC) is a Canadian non-profit trade association.
Founded in 2013 by eight Canadian marketing and communications trade associations, the DAAC is responsible for the operations of the AdChoices self-regulatory program, and the Political Ads Program, in Canada.
The AdChoices program in Canada.
The DAAC's website serves as a central element of the program by offering consumers the ability to opt out of interest-based advertising from a wide range of participating companies through a single page.
The associations that have developed this program are:
Advertising Standards Canada (ASC) implements the accountability program, which involves monitoring participants and providing guidance to bring companies into compliance with the principles. ASC also compiles reports about the AdChoices program in Canada.
The Executive Director of the DAAC is Julie Ford.
Political Ads Program.
In June 2019, the DAAC announced the Political Ads Program in Canada, an ad transparency platform for political advertisers.
OPC Research Study on OBA.
In June 2015, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada released a research study of the Canadian digital ad industry, to see how their guidelines for online behavioural advertising were being adhered to. The OPC study found that notice of OBA and opt-out was given to web users 96% of the time – primarily by way of the AdChoices icon, but they did recommend some improvements, such as ensuring all targeted ads have notice on them and the ability to opt-out, companies avoid targeting based on sensitive topics, and closely monitor their use of retargeting.


Hugh Grosvenor, 7th Duke of Westminster

Hugh Richard Louis Grosvenor, 7th Duke of Westminster (born 29 January 1991), styled as Earl Grosvenor until August 2016, is a British aristocrat, billionaire, businessman, and owner of Grosvenor Group. He became Duke of Westminster on 9 August 2016, on the death of his father Gerald Grosvenor.
The Duke and his family are estimated to be worth £10.1 billion (US$13 billion), according to the "Sunday Times Rich List" in May 2019. He was the world's richest person aged under 30.
Early life.
Hugh Richard Louis Grosvenor is the third child and only son of Gerald Grosvenor, 6th Duke of Westminster, and his wife Natalia ("née" Phillips). Through his mother, he is descended from the Romanov imperial family of Russia, the Russian writer Alexander Pushkin and his wife Natalia Nikolayevna Goncharova, as well as from the latter's great-grandfather—African freed slave turned Russian nobleman Abram Petrovich Hannibal.
Hugh Richard Louis Grosvenor is a descendant of the Hetman of Zaporizhian Host Petro Doroshenko through Natalia Nikolayevna Goncharova. She is the great-great-granddaughter of the famous Ukrainian Hetman.
He was baptised into the Church of England on 23 June 1991. His sisters include Lady Edwina Grosvenor, a prison reformer and philanthropist.
Grosvenor and his sisters were educated at a local state primary school, followed by a small private day school, Mostyn House School, near the family home of Eaton Hall, Cheshire. He then attended Ellesmere College, Shropshire, from 2000 to 2009. At Ellesmere, Grosvenor served as a School Prefect, Captain of Meynell House and Captain of the First XI Football Team in his final year. He was awarded Full Colours in Football, and, as a member of the School's Combined Cadet Force, he obtained a BTEC First Diploma in Public Services with Distinction.
From 2010 to 2013, he studied countryside management at Newcastle University, graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree with upper second-class honours.
Career.
After university, Grosvenor (at the time Earl Grosvenor) worked in estate management at Wheatsheaf Investment from 2013 to 2014, and the Grosvenor Group from 2014 to 2015, before becoming Accounts Manager at Bio-bean, a green energy company, in January 2016.
Upon his father's death, in August 2016, as well as the peerages, he inherited a wealth then estimated at £9 billion, with considerable trust funds for his sisters. This wealth is held in a trust, of which Grosvenor is a beneficial owner but not the legal owner—an arrangement that received considerable press attention, owing to the inheritance tax exemption it confers.
Personal life.
Little is publicly known about Grosvenor's personal life. However, in October 2013, he was named a godfather to Prince George of Cambridge.
In April 2020, Grosvenor donated several million pounds in support of the British government response to the COVID-19 pandemic and National Health Service.


Ian McLellan Hunter

Ian McLellan Hunter (8 August 1915 – 5 March 1991) was an English screenwriter, best remembered for fronting for the blacklisted Dalton Trumbo as the credited writer of "Roman Holiday" in 1953. Hunter was himself later blacklisted.
"Roman Holiday".
Hunter agreed to front for Trumbo's screenplay for "Roman Holiday", which both William Wyler and Paramount were very keen to make. When it was released to great acclaim and financial success, it was Hunter's name on the credits and it was he who picked up the Academy Award for Best Story. Academy members did not know they were honouring a blacklistee. Hunter paid Trumbo most of the salary he had earned for the film.
In the 1990s, the Academy sought to rectify some of the mistakes they had made during the Cold War and the Second Red Scare, reinstating Dalton Trumbo being one of them. Trumbo had died in 1976 but his widow was presented with an Oscar in 1993 for "Roman Holiday". This was actually the second Oscar made for this category win as Hunter's son, Tim Hunter, a director in his own right, refused to hand over his father's Oscar.
Other work.
Hunter also fronted for Ring Lardner Jr., collaborating with him under the pseudonym Philip Rush. With Lardner, he co-wrote the book for the short-lived 1964 Broadway musical "Foxy".
Hunter's work was not confined to fronting for others. He wrote the screenplays for over twenty films, including "Footlight Fever" (1941), "The Amazing Mr. X" (1948) and "Mastermind" (1976), as well as episodes of the television series "The Defenders" and the teleplay for the miniseries "The Blue and the Gray" (1982).
Legacy.
A dramatization of Trumbo's life, also called "Trumbo", was released in November 2015. In it, Ian McLellan Hunter was portrayed by Alan Tudyk.


Will Geer

Will Geer (born William Aughe Ghere, March 9, 1902 – April 22, 1978) was an American actor, musician, and social activist, who was active in labor organizing and other movements in New York and Southern California in the 1930s and 1940s. In California he befriended rising singer Woody Guthrie. They both lived in New York for a time in the 1940s. He was blacklisted in the 1950s, by Hollywood, after refusing, in testimony before Congress, to name persons who had joined the Communist Party.
Geer acted on stage in New York and eastern theatres, and in California for film. He is best-known as an actor for his later portrayal of Grandpa Zebulon Tyler Walton in the 1970s TV series "The Waltons".
Personal life.
Geer was born in Frankfort, Indiana, the son of Katherine (née Aughe), a teacher, and Roy Aaron Ghere, a postal worker. His father left the family when he was 11 years old. He was deeply influenced by his grandfather, who taught him the botanical names of the plants in his native state. Geer started out to become a botanist, studying the subject and obtaining a master's degree at the University of Chicago. While at Chicago, he was a member of Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity.
Anglicizing his name, Geer began his acting career touring in tent shows and on riverboats. He worked on several left-oriented documentaries, including narrating Sheldon Dick's "Men and Dust", about silicosis among miners.
Geer became involved with the young Harry Hay, who later became a homosexual activist. In 1934, Hay met Geer at the Tony Pastor Theatre, where Geer worked as an actor. They became lovers, and Hay credited Geer as his political mentor. Hay and Geer participated in a milk strike in Los Angeles. There Hay was first exposed to radical gay activism in the person of "Clarabelle", a drag queen who held court in the Bunker Hill neighborhood and who hid Hay from police. Later that year, Hay and Geer performed in support of the San Francisco General Strike, where they witnessed police firing on strikers, killing two.
Early career.
Geer created the role of Mr. Mister in Marc Blitzstein's 1937 "The Cradle Will Rock", played Candy in John Steinbeck's theatrical adaptation of his novella "Of Mice and Men", and appeared in numerous plays and revues throughout the 1940s. From 1948 to 1951, he appeared in more than a dozen movies, including "Winchester '73" (as Wyatt Earp), "Broken Arrow", "Comanche Territory" (all 1950) and "Bright Victory" (1951).
Geer became a member of the Communist Party of the United States in 1934. Geer was also influential in introducing Harry Hay to organizing in the Communist Party. In 1934, Geer and Hay gave support to a labor strike of the port of San Francisco; the 1934 West Coast waterfront strike which lasted 83 days. Though marred by violence, it was an organizing triumph, one that became a model for future union strikes. Geer became a reader of the West Coast Communist newspaper "People's World".
Geer became a dedicated activist, touring government work camps of the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s with folk singers such as Burl Ives and Woody Guthrie (whom he introduced to the "People's World" and the "Daily Worker". Guthrie later wrote a column for the latter paper). In 1956, the duo released an album together on Folkways Records, titled "Bound for Glory: Songs and Stories of Woody Guthrie." In his biography, Harry Hay described Geer's activism and their activities while organizing for the strike. Geer is credited with introducing Guthrie to Pete Seeger at the 'Grapes of Wrath' benefit which Geer organized in 1940 for migrant farm workers.
Geer acted with the Group Theatre (New York) studying under Harold Clurman, Cheryl Crawford and Lee Strasberg. Geer also acted in radio, appearing as Mephistopheles (the Devil) in the 1938 and 1944 productions of Norman Corwin's "The Plot to Overthrow Christmas". He also acted in the radio soap opera "Bright Horizon".
Blacklist.
Geer was blacklisted in the early 1950s for refusing to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. As a result, Geer appeared in very few films over the next decade. Among them was "Salt of the Earth" (1954) which starred and was produced, directed and written by blacklisted Hollywood personnel. It told the story of a miners' strike in New Mexico from a pro-union standpoint. The film was denounced as "subversive," and faced difficulties in its production and distribution as a consequence.
Later years.
In 1951 Geer founded the Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum in Topanga, California, with his wife, actress Herta Ware. He combined his acting and botanical careers at the Theatricum, cultivating every plant mentioned in Shakespeare's plays.
During the late 1950s and early 1960s, Geer played several seasons at the American Shakespeare Festival in Stratford, Connecticut. In addition, he created a second "Shakespeare Garden" on the theater's grounds.
By this time he was also working sporadically again on Broadway. In 1964 he was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical for "110 in the Shade". In 1972, he played the part of "Bear Claw" in "Jeremiah Johnson" along with Robert Redford. In 1972, he was cast as Zebulon Walton, the family patriarch on "The Waltons," a role he took over from Edgar Bergen, who played the character in the pilot. He won an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for "The Waltons" in 1975.
Geer maintained a garden at his vacation house, called Geer-Gore Gardens, in Nichols, Connecticut. He visited often and attended the local Fourth of July fireworks celebrations, sometimes wearing a black top hat or straw hat and always his trademark denim overalls with only one suspender hooked. Geer also had a small vacation house in Solana Beach, California, where his front and back yards were cultivated as vegetable gardens rather than lawns.
When Geer died, shortly after completing the sixth season of "The Waltons", the death of his character was written into the show's script. His final episode, the last episode of the 1977–78 season, depicted his being reunited with his onscreen wife Esther (played by Ellen Corby; she had been absent for the entire season, due to a stroke). Geer's character was mourned onscreen during the first episode of the 1978–79 season.
His former wife, actress Herta Ware, was best known for her performance as the wife of Jack Gilford in the film "Cocoon" (1985). Geer and Ware had three children, Kate Geer, Thad Geer, and actress Ellen Geer. Ware also had a daughter, actress Melora Marshall, from another marriage. Although Geer and Ware eventually divorced, they remained close for the rest of their lives.
As Will Geer was dying on April 22, 1978, of respiratory failure at the age of 76, his family sang Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land" and recited poems by Robert Frost at his deathbed. Geer's remains were cremated; his ashes are buried at the Theatricum Botanicum in the "Shakespeare Garden" in Topanga Canyon, near Santa Monica, California.


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Christy Kinahan

Christy 'the Dapper Don' Kinahan (born 1958) is an Irish drug dealer with convictions for ecstasy and heroin smuggling.
Biography.
His father was a dairy farm manager. Christy Kinahan was born in St Thersa's Gardens, Dublin, in the south inner city.
He was arrested for crimes related to the seizure of heroin in Marino in the 1980s and served a six-year jail sentence. He studied for two degrees whilst in prison. While inside, he refused early release to complete a degree. As well, while in prison he learned to speak both Spanish and Russian.
He is suspected of setting up drug routes into Western Europe for Mexican and Colombian cartels, and the Russian mafia.
His home was raided by Spanish police in 2010, though no charges were brought.
His ex-wife lived in Dublin and died in 2015. His son Daniel is a boxing promoter, lives in a villa in Guadalmina and allegedly runs the day-to-day aspects of his father's gang. He was probably the main target of the Regency Hotel shooting. His son Christopher Jr is also involved in boxing.
Other associates.
John Cunningham served 17 years for kidnapping Jennifer Guinness.
Hutch-Kinahan feud.
Gary Hutch was blamed for an attempt on Daniel Kinahan's life, so the Kinahans ordered him shot. He was murdered in Málaga in late 2015.
Gary Hutch was the nephew of 'Monk' Hutch, the most successful armed robber in Ireland, and the Monk is said to have taken the murder very personally, refusing any attempt at a 'sit down' made by the Kinahans.
In January 2016, in an event that received international media attention, hitmen working for the Monk dressed up as Gardaí before attacking a boxing weigh-in at the Regency Hotel in North Dublin. It is believed they were aiming for Christy Kinahan's son Daniel, who was in attendance at the weigh-in.
On New Year's Eve 2015, gunmen associated with Kinahan are believed to have targeted Gerry 'The Monk' Hutch at a pub in Lanzarote. Hutch had, however, already left the bar.
Other events.
By February 2010 Kinahan was awaiting sentence in Belgium on money laundering charges.
He is believed, by UK detectives, to have laundered drug dealing profits by funding 27 fixed horse races between December 2002 and August 2004. As a result of the alleged conspiracy, jockeys Kieren Fallon, Darren Williams and Fergal Lynch, faced criminal horse race-fixing charges at the Old Bailey.
In March 2016 Julio Martinez, the chief prosecutor for the Marbella area, told El País that charges against Kinahan for money laundering were imminent. Christy Kinahan already has convictions for money laundering in Ireland, the Netherlands and Belgium.
He is a suspect in six murders, including the father and uncle of Jamie Kavanagh in 2014 and 2015.
In September 2020 Spanish authorities charged Kinahan with passport fraud.


Robert Bryce (writer)

Robert Bryce (born 1960) is an American author and journalist in Austin, Texas. His articles on energy, politics, and other topics have appeared in numerous publications, including the "New York Times," "Washington Post," "Wall Street Journal," "Forbes, Real Clear Energy," "Counterpunch," and "National Review."
Career.
Bryce has been writing about the energy business for three decades. He spent twelve years writing for "The Austin Chronicle". From 2006 to 2010, he was the managing editor of the online magazine, "Energy Tribune." From October 2007 to February 2008 he was a fellow at the Institute for Energy Research. From 2010 to 2019 he was a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute.
Other works.
"Writing on the Energy Industry and Species Protection".
Bryce has written frequently about the in-feasibility of the United States becoming energy independent.
In March 2009, he testified before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources to discuss the limits inherent in renewable energy, saying "no matter how you do the calculations, renewable energy by itself, can not, will not, be able to replace hydrocarbons over the next two to three decades, and that's a conservative estimate".
In an opinion piece in the "Wall Street Journal" in March 2009 he denounced the energy policies of former United States President George W. Bush and the current president Barack Obama, claiming their rush for renewable energy will not be sufficient to cover the country's future energy needs.
Bryce has criticized special exceptions to wildlife protection laws given to renewable energy facilities in the United States. Oil producers and electric utilities have repeatedly been charged and fined under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act for killing birds; meanwhile, wind-power companies are not prosecuted despite routine violations of the MBTA. In the "Wall Street Journal", he wrote,
Yet there is one group of energy producers that are not being prosecuted for killing birds: wind-power companies. And wind-powered turbines are killing a vast number of birds every year. A July 2008 study of the wind farm at Altamont Pass California, estimated that its turbines kill an average of 80 golden eagles per year. The study, funded by the Alameda County Community Development Agency, also estimated that about 10,000 birds—nearly all protected by the migratory bird act—are being whacked every year at Altamont.
He also wrote about the health problems caused by low-frequency noise emitted from wind turbines.
In June 2010, in an article for "Slate" he expressed dismay at the corn ethanol industry's attempts to use the blowout of the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico as an basis to pursue more subsidies.
Bryce is an advocate for increased shale gas consumption in the US. In a June 13, 2011 piece published in the "Wall Street Journal" he posited that the "shale revolution now underway is the best news for North American energy since the discovery of the East Texas Field in 1930."
Bryce opposes federal corn subsidies for ethanol, citing high costs. He has argued that American farmland should be used to grow food rather than fuel. In addition he has opposed the EPA's considerations to raise the volume of ethanol mixed in gasoline, arguing that vehicles could be damaged by higher ethanol blends, and warranties would be voided.
He has criticized the Obama administration for "attempting to pick winners in the car business" with electric vehicles subsidies. He has also argued that electric vehicles have failed to date due to the lack of energy density in batteries, safety concerns, and relatively few sales.
N2N.
Bryce recently argued that renewable energy remains unready to meet real-world energy needs at a scale that can save the climate.
Accordingly, he has long favored "N2N" (natural gas to nuclear), as the logical way forward for energy policy and insurance against the potential risk of climate change.
Carbon Capture and Sequestration.
In May 2010, he published an op-ed in "The New York Times" that underscored the difficulties associated with large-scale carbon capture and sequestration. He has recently extended this line of argument in "National Review Online"
"Writings on Politics and Current Events".
George W. Bush.
In 1993, Bryce wrote a piece for the "Christian Science Monitor" about George W. Bush's jump into the Texas gubernatorial race arguing that Bush would "pose a formidable challenge" to then Democratic Governor Ann Richards. Bryce also referred to Karl Rove a "savvy political consultant."
Bryce predicted that Bush would win the White House in a 1999 piece for "The Austin Chronicle", and was the first journalist to report on how Bush's ownership of the Texas Rangers would become a financial asset.
Bryce also analyzed how Bush and his partners used the power of eminent domain to profit off of land they did not own.
"I am Sullied-No More".
In 2007, Bryce featured 44-year-old Colonel Theodore S. Westhusing's suicide note in an article for the Texas Observer titled, "I am Sullied-No More." In it he argues that Westhusing chose death over dishonor while faced with the Iraq war's corruption.
Funeral industry.
In 1999, Bryce wrote about corruption in the funeral industry, reporting on how Robert Waltrip, C.E.O of the world's largest death-care company, Service Corporation International "used the [Texas] governor's office and a state senator in an effort to crush an investigation into S.C.I.'s operations."
V-22 Tiltrotor.
Bryce has been an outspoken critic of the troubled V-22 tiltrotor, or Osprey, for its safety and cost record.
Controversy.
In October 2011 a petition was addressed to "The New York Times" complaining about Bryce. It asked the paper's public editor, Arthur Brisbane, to address the issue of how op-ed writers are identified and asked that the paper be more transparent with regard to any financial support the op-ed writers may get from various industries.
On October 29, 2011, Brisbane responding to the petition, writing "I don't think Mr. Bryce is masquerading as anything: experts generally have a point of view". Regarding the issue of funding from energy-related interests, Brisbane wrote that "the Manhattan Institute's dependence on this category of funding is slight – about 2.5 percent of its budget over the past 10 years."
In June 2013, TheAutoChannel.com published a 60-page rebuttal of Robert Bryce's "Gusher of Lies" written by Marc J. Rauch, co-founder of The Auto Channel. The rebuttal challenges Mr. Bryce's negative claims about ethanol. Mr. Bryce has not responded to Rauch's criticisms.
External links.
[[Category:American male journalists]]
[[Category:American non-fiction environmental writers]]
[[Category:Writers from Austin, Texas]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:Manhattan Institute for Policy Research]]
[[Category:1960 births]]