title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole attended Orange Lutheran High School. In his sophomore year, Cole pitched for the school's junior varsity baseball team, allowing no runs in 45 innings pitched. He gained national attention while pitching for the varsity team in his junior year, as his fastball reached . He reached in a showcase for the best prep school talents, and close to 50 scouts attended the first game of his senior season. In his senior year, Cole pitched to an 8–2 win–loss record and a 0.47 earned run average (ERA), while also recording 121 strikeouts in 75 innings.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: In 2008, "USA Today" named Cole to their All-USA high school baseball team. "Baseball America" rated him the 17th-best prospect available in the 2008 Major League Baseball draft. He was named the starting pitcher of the 2008 Orange County North–South All-Star Game.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: After his senior year, the New York Yankees selected Cole in the first round, with the 28th overall selection, of the 2008 Major League Baseball draft, becoming the first player ever drafted out of Orange Lutheran High School. The Yankees were reportedly planning on offering Cole a $4 million signing bonus, which was above the recommended amount for the slot. As the Yankees planned to give Cole a large bonus to sign, they waited until the deadline to attempt to sign him. By the time the deadline approached, Cole and his family had considered many variables, comparing players who sign out of high school to those who go to college, and decided to follow through with his commitment to attend the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) on a college baseball scholarship. Despite being represented by Scott Boras, and though the Yankees were believed to be ready to offer upwards of $4 million, Cole never negotiated with the Yankees, as he was determined to attend college.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: John Savage, coach of the UCLA Bruins, made Cole the team's Friday night starting pitcher in his freshman year. That season, Cole recorded a 4–8 win–loss record with a 3.49 ERA, collecting 104 strikeouts in 85 innings. Cole was a member of the 2009 United States collegiate national baseball team and was named to the 2010 Collegiate National Team roster. He competed in the 2010 World University Baseball Championship.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: During UCLA's 2010 season, Cole and Trevor Bauer contributed in making the Bruins the best baseball team (51–17 record) in school history and the second-best team in the country. Cole had an 11–4 win–loss record, a 3.37 ERA, and 153 strikeouts in 123 innings. His 153 strikeouts placed Cole third among collegiate pitchers. The Bruins went on to play in the 2010 College World Series, but were defeated by South Carolina in the NCAA Championship Series.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole's statistics declined in 2011, his junior year. He finished the season with a 6–8 win–loss record and a 3.31 ERA, with 119 strikeouts in innings.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Heading into the 2011 MLB draft, Cole, Bauer, and Danny Hultzen, also a college pitcher, were seen as among the best available talents in the draft. The Pittsburgh Pirates selected Cole with the first overall selection. He signed a minor league contract with an $8 million signing bonus, the highest signing bonus ever offered to a rookie, 15 minutes before the signing deadline on August 15, 2011. Though he signed too late to pitch in the 2011 minor league season, he pitched for the Mesa Solar Sox of the Arizona Fall League (AFL). He recorded 16 strikeouts in 15 innings pitched for the Solar Sox and had a 3.00 earned run average (ERA) and a 0.93 walks plus hits per inning pitched ratio (WHIP). He was selected to start the AFL Rising Stars game in November 2011.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: The Pirates invited Cole to spring training in 2012 as a non-roster invitee, but they optioned him to the minor leagues. Cole started the 2012 season with the Bradenton Marauders of the Class A-Advanced Florida State League, along with fellow starting pitcher Jameson Taillon, the Pirates' first selection in the 2010 MLB draft. Cole was named a FSL Mid-Season All-Star. He was promoted to the Altoona Curve of the Class AA Eastern League on June 15, 2012. He was named to appear in the 2012 All-Star Futures Game. In twelve starts with the Curve, Cole pitched to a 2.90 ERA, before the Pirates promoted him to the Indianapolis Indians of the Class AAA International League on August 29, 2012.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Prior to the 2013 season, Cole was ranked as the ninth best prospect in baseball by MLB.com. Cole played for the Indianapolis Indians to start the 2013 season. Cole pitched to a 5–3 record and a 2.91 ERA in 12 starts for Indianapolis.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Due to injuries to James McDonald and Wandy Rodríguez, the Pirates promoted Cole to the major leagues, to make his MLB debut on June 11, 2013. During his debut, he struck out the first batter he faced, Gregor Blanco, on three pitches; the last one at . He also recorded his first career hit, a 2-run single with the bases loaded in his first career plate appearance. Cole pitched innings being charged with two earned runs but got the win as the Pirates won over the San Francisco Giants, 8–2. Cole became the fourth pitcher since 1920 to drive in 2+ runs and earn the win in his Major League debut. Cole is the first Pirate to start his career with wins in his first four starts since Nick Maddox in 1907. He was the fifth pitcher for any team to accomplish the feat in the past 40 years, joining Rich Gale of the 1978 Royals, Kaz Ishii of the 2002 Dodgers, Jered Weaver of the 2006 Angels and Scott Lewis of the 2008 Indians.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole was voted the National League (NL) Rookie of the Month for September 2013. On the month, Cole had a 4–0 record and led all rookies with a 1.69 ERA and 39 strikeouts. Cole had a 10–7 record and a 3.22 ERA in 19 starts for Pittsburgh in 2013. Cole started Game Two of the 2013 National League Division Series, going six innings allowing two hits, one earned run, and five strikeouts, and ultimately defeating the St. Louis Cardinals. The Pirates chose Cole to start the deciding Game 5 over A. J. Burnett. The Cardinals won the game, and the series.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: After focusing on his fastball during his rookie season, Cole entered 2014 spring training working on improving his curveball and slider. Cole had been a durable pitcher in 2014 pitching innings, but manager Clint Hurdle acknowledged on June 7 that Cole would miss at least one start with shoulder fatigue. Cole was placed on the 15-day disabled list the next day, and activated on June 28.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On September 7, 2014, Cole hit his first career home run at Wrigley Field off of Chicago Cubs pitcher Blake Parker. On September 23, Cole helped the Pirates clinch a second consecutive playoff berth by beating Alex Wood and the Atlanta Braves.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole won the NL Pitcher of the Month Award for April 2015, after going 4–0 with a 1.76 ERA and 35 strikeouts in innings pitched for the month. He was the Pirates' choice to start the 2015 National League Wild Card Game against the Chicago Cubs but took the loss after giving up four earned runs on six hits and a walk in five innings pitched.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On June 14, 2016, Cole was placed on the 15-day disabled list due to a right triceps strain. On July 27, Cole pitched his first complete game against the Seattle Mariners. In 2017, Cole was 12–12 with a 4.26 ERA, as he led the National League with 33 starts.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On January 13, 2018, the Pirates traded Cole to the Houston Astros for Joe Musgrove, Michael Feliz, Colin Moran and Jason Martin.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On April 29, 2018, Cole struck out 12 hitters in a game against the Oakland Athletics that resulted in a no-decision but an Astros win. In doing so, Cole broke the Astros strikeout record for April with 61 strikeouts in the first month. He finished his first month in an Astros uniform going 2–1 with 61 strikeouts and a 1.73 ERA in 41.2 innings pitched. On May 4, against the Arizona Diamondbacks Cole struck out 16, allowed only one hit, and pitched his first career shutout as the Astros won 8–0.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole was elected to his first American League All-Star appearance (2nd overall). Cole did not appear in the game but finished the first half of the season with a 10–2 record with a 2.52 ERA and 177 strikeouts. He finished the season with 278 strikeouts, a new career high and good for second-most in the American League behind teammate Justin Verlander, a 15–5 record, and a 2.88 ERA, his best since the 2015 season. He led the majors in strikeouts per 9 innings (12.40). In Game 2 of the 2018 American League Division Series against the Cleveland Indians, Cole struck out 12 and walked none in seven innings in a 3–1 victory. Cole became the second pitcher to strikeout at least 12 hitters with no walks in the postseason, after Tom Seaver in the 1973 National League Championship Series.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On September 8, 2019, his 29th birthday, Cole became the second pitcher ever to strike out 14 or more hitters in three consecutive games. On September 18, 2019, Cole struck out his 300th batter of the season, becoming the third Astros pitcher to strike out 300 batters in a single season, after J. R. Richard and Mike Scott. Cole became the second-fastest pitcher to register 300 strikeouts in terms of innings pitched. His innings trailed only Randy Johnson, who achieved the feat in innings in 2001. The following start, September 24, 2019, Cole struck out 14 batters to break the single-season strikeout record for any Astros pitcher, bringing his total to 316 on the year, and allowing only two singles in his appearance of seven scoreless innings. In his next start on September 29, 2019, Cole set an MLB record with his ninth consecutive outings with at least 10 strikeouts.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole's performance since February 2018 and through the 2019 season was markedly different from his earlier seasons, due to intervention by the Astros management and coaching staff. Cole vastly reduced the number of two-seam fastballs he threw, threw more into the top of the strike zone, and increased the spin rate of his fastball.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole finished the 2019 season with a 20–5 record and a 0.895 WHIP. He led the American League with a 2.50 ERA, and led the major leagues in strikeouts (326), strikeout percentage (39.9%), and strikeouts per nine innings (13.818). He became the first full-time starting pitcher in MLB history to average more than one and a half strikeouts per inning in a season. He finished second in voting for the 2019 Cy Young Award, behind Verlander with 159 points to Verlander's 171.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On December 18, 2019, the Yankees signed Cole to a franchise record nine-year, $324 million contract. Cole's contract is the largest signed by a pitcher, topping the $245 million, seven-year contract signed by Stephen Strasburg. Cole's contract has an average annual value of $36 million, which also represents the highest average annual value of any player contract in Major League Baseball, eclipsing the previous average annual value record set by Mike Trout, at an average annual value of $35.5 million. The contract also allows Cole to opt out and become a free agent again after the fifth year; however, if he attempts to do so, the Yankees can choose to prevent him from doing so by adding an additional year and $36 million to his contract, which would bring the total length and value of the contract to 10 years and $360 million.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On July 23, 2020, Cole made his Yankees debut as an Opening Day starting pitcher throwing 5 innings against the Washington Nationals and allowing just one hit, a home run by Adam Eaton. Cole's regular-season winning streak reached 20, the third-longest in MLB history, but his streak ended on August 26, 2020, when he took a loss against the Atlanta Braves. Through August 4, 2020, his 242 strikeouts are a Major League record since his last loss. He would lose three decisions in a row, but on September 11, 2020, Cole ended his 3-game losing streak by throwing a 2-hitter complete game shutout against the Baltimore Orioles. As it was a doubleheader, the game only went 7 innings. He ended his first season as a Yankee with a 7–3 record, throwing to a 2.84 ERA in 73 innings and striking out 94.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On September 29, 2020, in his Yankees playoff debut, during Game 1 of the wild card series against the Cleveland Indians, Cole struck out 13 batters without a walk, tying Tom Seaver (1973 NLCS Game 1) and second most in Yankees franchise history. He also became the first Major Leaguer in history to win three postseason games with 12 or more strikeouts. Only Roger Clemens (15 K's) has fanned more in a postseason start with the Yankees. In the 2020 ALDS against the Tampa Bay Rays, he was the winning pitcher in Game 1, and received a no-decision in the decisive game 5, which the Yankees would go on to lose.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On April 12, after recording 8 strikeouts and retiring 15 batters in a row in a game against the Toronto Blue Jays, Cole became the Yankees pitcher with the most strikeouts in the first three starts of the season of all-time, matching David Cone (1997) with 29. On May 12, 2021, Cole notched his 1,500th career strikeout, becoming the second-fastest pitcher in history to reach the milestone behind Randy Johnson.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole finished the 2021 season with a 3.23 ERA and 243 strikeouts in innings over 30 starts. He led the American League with 16 wins and a 5.93 strikeout-to-walk ratio. He finished second in American League Cy Young Award voting behind Robbie Ray.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: In the 2021 American League Wild Card Game at Fenway Park, Cole pitched two innings and gave up three earned runs and two home runs in a loss to the Boston Red Sox.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On November 23, Cole was named a First Team selection for the All-MLB Team, which was determined by a fan vote and a panel consisting of media members, former players, and baseball officials. It was his third consecutive All-MLB selection, as he was on the First Team in 2019 with the Houston Astros, and appeared on the Second Team with the Yankees in 2020.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Against the Minnesota Twins on June 9, Cole allowed three consecutive home runs the first three batters he faced. He allowed 5 total home runs in only 2.1 innings, but the Yankees came back and won 10-7. While playing against the Seattle Mariners on August 3, Cole allowed 6 runs in the first inning on 3 home runs. It was the most runs allowed in the first inning at home since Phil Hughes back in 2013.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: On September 28, 2022, facing the Toronto Blue Jays, Cole recorded his 248th strikeout for the 2022 regular season, tying the New York Yankees single season strike out record set by Ron Guidry in 1978. On October 4, 2022, Cole recorded his 249th strikeout of the season against the Texas Rangers, surpassing Guidry for the franchise record, and then became the first Yankees pitcher in history to strikeout 250+ batters in a single season. He made 33 starts in 2022 with an MLB-leading 257 strikeouts, a 13-8 record, a 3.50 ERA, and an AL-leading 33 home runs allowed. He also became the first right-handed pitcher in New York Yankees history to solely lead all of MLB in strikeouts in a season that year.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole is a power pitcher who features a four-seam and two-seam fastball that he regularly throws between 98 and 100 MPH, but has been clocked as high as in college. He also throws a slider, knuckle curve, changeup, and as of 2022 has reintroduced his cutter, a pitch he has not thrown since college. Between 2017 and 2018, due to his increased spin rate and a more complete arm deceleration and follow-through, his fastball got a lower WHIP, and has used his sinker less often, no longer "pitching to contact". Like Pedro Martinez, he throws from a low three-quarters position. In the first round of 2019 ALDS, his strikeout pitches were high fastballs, sliders and knuckle curve that are down and away from right-handed batters.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole is the elder son of Mark and Sharon. He has one younger sister, Erin. Erin attended UCLA, where she played for the Bruins' soccer team. Cole grew up as a fan of the New York Yankees, as his father – raised in Syracuse, New York – passed down his affinity for the Yankees to his son.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole attended the 2001 World Series, in which the Yankees took part. He held a sign that said "YANKEE FAN TODAY TOMORROW FOREVER", and a photograph shared by "Newsday" went viral in 2019 when news of his signing with the Yankees was reported. He brought the sign to his introductory press conference with the Yankees.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: In the same introductory press conference with the Yankees, Cole thanked the late Marvin Miller, the former executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association and National Baseball Hall of Fame inductee, along with late Curt Flood, for their pivotal roles in establishing free agency for Major League Baseball players.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole is married to Amy Crawford, a former UCLA softball player and the sister of San Francisco Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford. They met when they attended UCLA. On January 1, 2020, Amy announced their first pregnancy. Their son was born on June 30, 2020. They reside in Greenwich, Connecticut.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole has a passion for cooking, and he and his wife have a blog where they discuss their favorite recipes.


title: Gerrit Cole

text: Cole is musically inclined, and plays piano and guitar. In addition, Cole can read sheet music fluently.


title: Dandadan

text: Momo Ayase is a high school girl who believes in ghosts but not aliens, while her classmate Okarun believes in aliens but not ghosts. In a bet to determine who's correct, the two decide to separately visit locations associated with both the occult and the supernatural—Ayase visiting the former and the boy visiting the latter. When the two reach their respective places it turns out that they were half-right, both aliens and ghosts do exist.


title: Dandadan

text: Before the serialization of "Dandadan", Yukinobu Tatsu had worked as an assistant for Tatsuki Fujimoto's "Chainsaw Man" and Yuji Kaku's "". The serialization was confirmed in the serialization meeting of Shōnen Jump+ in Spring (Q2) 2020. Tatsu however started "Dandadan" after the above two works had finished because he wanted to complete his role as an assistant till the end of those works.


title: Dandadan

text: "Dandadan" is written and illustrated by Yukinobu Tatsu. The series began serialization in Shueisha's "Shōnen Jump+" service on April 6, 2021. Shueisha has compiled its chapters into individual "tankōbon" volumes. The first volume was released on August 4, 2021. As of October 4, 2022, seven volumes have been released.


title: Dandadan

text: The series is simultaneously published in English and Spanish on Shueisha's "Manga Plus" service and in English on Viz Media's "Shonen Jump" website. In February 2022, Viz Media announced that they had licensed the series in print format; the first volume was released on October 11 of the same year.


title: Dandadan

text: In June 2021, "Dandadan" was nominated for the seventh Next Manga Award in the Best Web Manga category and placed 2nd out of 50 nominees. It ranked 4th on Takarajimasha's "Kono Manga ga Sugoi!" 2022 list of best manga for male readers. It was nominated for the 15th Manga Taishō in 2022 and placed seventh with 53 points. The series ranked 1st on both the Nationwide Bookstore Employees and Publisher Comics' Recommended Comics of 2022. The series has ranked at the 4th place in the Tsutaya Comic Award 2022.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Georges Albert Maurice Victor Bataille (; ; 10 September 1897 – 9 July 1962) was a French philosopher and intellectual working in philosophy, literature, sociology, anthropology, and history of art. His writing, which included essays, novels, and poetry, explored such subjects as eroticism, mysticism, surrealism, and transgression. His work would prove influential on subsequent schools of philosophy and social theory, including poststructuralism.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Georges Bataille was the son of Joseph-Aristide Bataille (b. 1851), a tax collector (later to go blind and be paralysed by neurosyphilis), and Antoinette-Aglaë Tournarde (b. 1865). Born on 10 September 1897 in Billom in the region of Auvergne, his family moved to Reims in 1898, where he was baptized. He went to school in Reims and then Épernay. Although brought up without religious observance, he converted to Catholicism in 1914, and became a devout Catholic for about nine years. He considered entering the priesthood and attended a Catholic seminary briefly. However, he quit, apparently in part in order to pursue an occupation where he could eventually support his mother. He eventually renounced Christianity in the early 1920s.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Bataille attended the École Nationale des Chartes in Paris, graduating in February 1922. He graduated with a bachelor's thesis titled "L'ordre de la chevalerie, conte en vers du xiiie siècle, avec introduction et notes". Though he is often referred to as an archivist and a librarian because of his employment at the Bibliothèque Nationale, his work there was with the medallion collections (he also published scholarly articles on numismatics). His thesis at the École des Chartes was a critical edition of the medieval poem "L'Ordre de chevalerie" which he produced directly by classifying the eight manuscripts from which he reconstructed the poem. After graduating he moved to the School of Advanced Spanish Studies in Madrid. As a young man, he befriended, and was much influenced by, the Russian existentialist Lev Shestov, who schooled him in the writing of Nietzsche, Dostoyevsky, and Plato as well as Shestov's own critique of reason and philosophical systematization


title: Georges Bataille

text: Founder of several journals and literary groups, Bataille is the author of a large and diverse body of work: readings, poems, essays on innumerable subjects (on the mysticism of economy, poetry, philosophy, the arts and eroticism). He sometimes published under pseudonyms, and some of his publications were banned. He was relatively ignored during his lifetime and scorned by contemporaries such as Jean-Paul Sartre as an advocate of mysticism, but after his death had considerable influence on authors such as Michel Foucault, Philippe Sollers, and Jacques Derrida, all of whom were affiliated with the journal "Tel Quel". His influence is felt most explicitly in the phenomenological work of Jean-Luc Nancy, but is also significant for the work of Jean Baudrillard, the psychoanalytic theories of Jacques Lacan, Julia Kristeva, and recent anthropological work from the likes of Michael Taussig.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Initially attracted to Surrealism, Bataille quickly fell out with its founder André Breton, although Bataille and the Surrealists resumed cautiously cordial relations after World War II. Bataille was a member of the extremely influential College of Sociology which included several other renegade surrealists. He was heavily influenced by Hegel, Freud, Marx, Marcel Mauss, the Marquis de Sade, Alexandre Kojève, and Friedrich Nietzsche, the last of whom he defended in a notable essay against appropriation by the Nazis.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Fascinated by human sacrifice, he founded a secret society, "Acéphale", the symbol of which was a headless man. According to legend, Bataille and the other members of Acéphale each agreed to be the sacrificial victim as an inauguration; none of them would agree to be the executioner. An indemnity was offered for an executioner, but none was found before the dissolution of Acéphale shortly before the war. The group also published an eponymous review of Nietzsche's philosophy which attempted to postulate what Derrida has called an "anti-sovereignty". Collaborators in these projects included André Masson, Pierre Klossowski, Roger Caillois, , Jean Rollin and Jean Wahl.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Bataille drew from diverse influences and used various modes of discourse to create his work. His novel "Story of the Eye" ("Histoire de l'oeil"), published under the pseudonym Lord Auch (literally, Lord "to the shithouse" — "auch" being short for "aux chiottes," slang for telling somebody off by sending him to the toilet), was initially read as pure pornography, while interpretation of the work has gradually matured to reveal the same considerable philosophical and emotional depth that is characteristic of other writers who have been categorized within "literature of transgression". The imagery of the novel is built upon a series of metaphors which in turn refer to philosophical constructs developed in his work: the eye, the egg, the sun, the earth, the testicle.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Other famous novels include the posthumously published "My Mother" (which would become the basis of Christophe Honoré's film "Ma Mère"), "The Impossible" and "Blue of Noon", which, with its incest, necrophilia, politics, and autobiographical undertones, is a much darker treatment of contemporary historical reality.


title: Georges Bataille

text: During World War II Bataille produced "Summa Atheologica" (the title parallels Thomas Aquinas' "Summa Theologica") which comprises his works "Inner Experience", "Guilty", and "On Nietzsche". After the war he composed "The Accursed Share", which he said represented thirty years' work. The singular conception of "sovereignty" expounded there would become an important topic of discussion for Derrida, Giorgio Agamben, Jean-Luc Nancy and others. Bataille also founded the influential journal "Critique".


title: Georges Bataille

text: Bataille's first marriage was to actress Silvia Maklès, in 1928; they divorced in 1934, and she later married the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. Bataille also had an affair with Colette Peignot, who died in 1938. In 1946 Bataille married Diane de Beauharnais, with whom he had a daughter.


title: Georges Bataille

text: In 1955 Bataille was diagnosed with cerebral arteriosclerosis, although he was not informed at the time of the terminal nature of his illness. He died seven years later, on 9 July 1962.


title: Georges Bataille

text: At the crossroads of knowledge and the great ideological, philosophical and anthropological debates of his time, his work is both literary and philosophical, multiple, heterogeneous, marginal and escapes labelling: "the traditional categories, the delimitations they establish, prove inappropriate or cumbersome when one wants to account for the whole of his writings".  All the more so since he went out of his way to blur the lines, as he himself declared in his last interview with Madeleine Chapsal in March 1961: "I would willingly say that what I am most proud of is having blurred the lines [...], that is to say, having associated the most turbulent and shocking way of laughing, the most scandalous, with the deepest religious spirit ". This "scrambling" is all the more evident because of the multiple versions, manuscripts and typescripts of his texts, and also because he often used pseudonyms to sign certain writings (such as erotic stories): Troppmann, Lord Auch, Pierre Angélique, Louis Trente and Dianus.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Bataille developed base materialism during the late 1920s and early 1930s as an attempt to break with mainstream materialism, which he viewed as a subtle form of idealism. He argues for the concept of an active base matter that disrupts the opposition of high and low and destabilises all foundations. Inspired by Gnostic ideas, this notion of materialism defies strict definition and rationalisation. Base materialism was a major influence on Derrida's deconstruction, and both thinkers attempt to destabilise philosophical oppositions by means of an unstable "third term." Bataille's notion of materialism may also be seen as anticipating Louis Althusser's conception of aleatory materialism or "materialism of the encounter," which draws on similar atomist metaphors to sketch a world in which causality and actuality are abandoned in favor of limitless possibilities of action.


title: Georges Bataille

text: "La Part maudite" is a book written by Bataille between 1946 and 1949, when it was published by Les Éditions de Minuit. It was translated into English and published in 1991, with the title "The Accursed Share". It presents a new economic theory, which Bataille calls "general economy," as distinct from the "restricted" economic perspective of most economic theory. Thus, in the theoretical introduction, Bataille writes the following:


title: Georges Bataille

text: I will simply state, without waiting further, that the extension of economic growth itself requires the overturning of economic principles—the overturning of the ethics that grounds them. Changing from the perspectives of restrictive economy to those of general economy actually accomplishes a Copernican transformation: a reversal of thinking—and of ethics. If a part of wealth (subject to a rough estimate) is doomed to destruction or at least to unproductive use without any possible profit, it is logical, even inescapable, to surrender commodities without return. Henceforth, leaving aside pure and simple dissipation, analogous to the construction of the Pyramids, the possibility of pursuing growth is itself subordinated to giving: The industrial development of the entire world demands of Americans that they lucidly grasp the necessity, for an economy such as theirs, of having a margin of profitless operations. An immense industrial network cannot be managed in the same way that one changes a tire… It expresses a circuit of cosmic energy on which it depends, which it cannot limit, and whose laws it cannot ignore without consequences. Woe to those who, to the very end, insist on regulating the movement that exceeds them with the narrow mind of the mechanic who changes a tire.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Thus, according to Bataille's theory of consumption, the accursed share is that excessive and non-recuperable part of any economy which is destined to one of two modes of economic and social expenditure. This must either be spent luxuriously and knowingly without gain in the arts, in non-procreative sexuality, in spectacles and sumptuous monuments, or it is obliviously destined to an outrageous and catastrophic outpouring in war. Though the distinction is less apparent in Hurley's English translation, Bataille introduces the neologism "consummation" (akin to a fire's burning) to signal this excess expenditure as distinct from "consommation" (the non-excess expenditure more familiarly treated in theories of "restricted" economy).


title: Georges Bataille

text: The notion of "excess" energy is central to Bataille's thinking. Bataille's inquiry takes the superabundance of energy, beginning from the infinite outpouring of solar energy or the surpluses produced by life's basic chemical reactions, as the norm for organisms. In other words, an organism in Bataille's general economy, unlike the rational actors of classical economy who are motivated by scarcity, normally has an "excess" of energy available to it. This extra energy can be used productively for the organism's growth or it can be lavishly expended. Bataille insists that an organism's growth or expansion always runs up against limits and becomes impossible. The wasting of this energy is "luxury." The form and role luxury assumes in a society, are characteristic of that society. "The accursed share" refers to this excess, destined for waste.


title: Georges Bataille

text: Crucial to the formulation of the theory was Bataille's reflection upon the phenomenon of potlatch. It is influenced by Marcel Mauss's "The Gift", as well as by Friedrich Nietzsche's "On the Genealogy of Morals".


title: Georges Bataille

text: A work-in-progress listing of Bataille's work and English translations can be found at Progressive Geographies.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a federally funded research and development center and NASA field center in the City of La Cañada Flintridge, California, United States.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: Founded in the 1930s by Caltech researchers, JPL is owned by NASA and managed by the nearby California Institute of Technology (Caltech). The laboratory's primary function is the construction and operation of planetary robotic spacecraft, though it also conducts Earth-orbit and astronomy missions. It is also responsible for operating the NASA Deep Space Network.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: Among the laboratory's major active projects are the Mars 2020 mission, which includes the "Perseverance" rover and the "Ingenuity" Mars helicopter; the Mars Science Laboratory mission, including the "Curiosity" rover; the InSight lander ("Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport"); the "Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter"; the "Juno" spacecraft orbiting Jupiter; the "SMAP" satellite for earth surface soil moisture monitoring; the NuSTAR X-ray telescope; and the forthcoming "Psyche" asteroid orbiter. It is also responsible for managing the JPL Small-Body Database, and provides physical data and lists of publications for all known small Solar System bodies.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL's Space Flight Operations Facility and Twenty-Five-Foot Space Simulator are designated National Historic Landmarks.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL traces its beginnings to 1936 in the Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology (GALCIT) when the first set of rocket experiments were carried out in the Arroyo Seco. Caltech graduate students Frank Malina, Qian Xuesen, Weld Arnold and Apollo M. O. Smith, along with Jack Parsons and Edward S. Forman, tested a small, alcohol-fueled motor to gather data for Malina's graduate thesis. Malina's thesis advisor was engineer/aerodynamicist Theodore von Kármán, who eventually arranged for U.S. Army financial support for this "GALCIT Rocket Project" in 1939. In 1941, Malina, Parsons, Forman, Martin Summerfield, and pilot Homer Bushey demonstrated the first jet-assisted takeoff (JATO) rockets to the Army. In 1943, von Kármán, Malina, Parsons, and Forman established the Aerojet Corporation to manufacture JATO rockets. The project took on the name Jet Propulsion Laboratory in November 1943, formally becoming an Army facility operated under contract by the university. In 1944, Parsons was expelled due to his "unorthodox and unsafe working methods" following one of several FBI investigations into his involvement with the occult, drugs and sexual promiscuity.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: During JPL's Army years, the laboratory developed two deployed weapon systems, the MGM-5 Corporal and MGM-29 Sergeant intermediate-range ballistic missiles. These missiles were the first US ballistic missiles developed at JPL. It also developed a number of other weapons system prototypes, such as the Loki anti-aircraft missile system, and the forerunner of the Aerobee sounding rocket. At various times, it carried out rocket testing at the White Sands Proving Ground, Edwards Air Force Base, and Goldstone, California.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: In 1954, JPL teamed up with Wernher von Braun's engineers at the Army Ballistic Missile Agency's Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, to propose orbiting a satellite during the International Geophysical Year. The team lost that proposal to Project Vanguard, and instead embarked on a classified project to demonstrate ablative re-entry technology using a Jupiter-C rocket. They carried out three successful sub-orbital flights in 1956 and 1957. Using a spare Juno I (a modified Jupiter-C with a fourth stage), the two organizations then launched the United States' first satellite, Explorer 1, on January 31, 1958.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL was transferred to NASA in December 1958, becoming the agency's primary planetary spacecraft center. JPL engineers designed and operated Ranger and Surveyor missions to the Moon that prepared the way for Apollo. JPL also led the way in interplanetary exploration with the Mariner missions to Venus, Mars, and Mercury. In 1998, JPL opened the Near-Earth Object Program Office for NASA. As of 2013, it has found 95% of asteroids that are a kilometer or more in diameter that cross Earth's orbit.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL was early to employ female mathematicians. In the 1940s and 1950s, using mechanical calculators, women in an all-female computations group performed trajectory calculations. In 1961, JPL hired Dana Ulery as the first female engineer to work alongside male engineers as part of the Ranger and Mariner mission tracking teams.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL has been recognized four times by the Space Foundation: with the Douglas S. Morrow Public Outreach Award, which is given annually to an individual or organization that has made significant contributions to public awareness of space programs, in 1998; and with the John L. "Jack" Swigert, Jr., Award for Space Exploration on three occasions – in 2009 (as part of NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander Team), 2006 and 2005.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: When it was founded, JPL's site was immediately west of a rocky flood-plain – the Arroyo Seco riverbed – above the Devil's Gate dam in the northwestern panhandle of the city of Pasadena in Southern California, near Los Angeles. While the first few buildings were constructed in land bought from the city of Pasadena, subsequent buildings were constructed in neighboring unincorporated land that later became part of La Cañada Flintridge. Nowadays, most of the of the U.S. federal government-owned NASA property that makes up the JPL campus is located in La Cañada Flintridge. Despite this, JPL still uses a Pasadena address (4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109) as its official mailing address. There has been occasional rivalry between the two cities over the issue of which one should be mentioned in the media as the home of the laboratory.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: There are approximately 6,000 full-time Caltech employees, and typically a few thousand additional contractors working on any given day. NASA also has a resident office at the facility staffed by federal managers who oversee JPL's activities and work for NASA. There are also some Caltech graduate students, college student interns and co-op students.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: The JPL Education Office serves educators and students by providing them with activities, resources, materials and opportunities tied to NASA missions and science. The mission of its programs is to introduce and further students' interest in pursuing STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) careers.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL offers research, internship and fellowship opportunities in the summer and throughout the year to high school through postdoctoral and faculty students. (In most cases, students must be U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents to apply, although foreign nationals studying at U.S. universities are eligible for limited programs.) Interns are sponsored through NASA programs, university partnerships and JPL mentors for research opportunities at the laboratory in areas including technology, robotics, planetary science, aerospace engineering, and astrophysics.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: In August 2013, JPL was named one of "The 10 Most Awesome College Labs of 2013" by Popular Science, which noted that about 100 students who intern at the laboratory are considered for permanent jobs at JPL after they graduate.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: The JPL Education Office also hosts the Planetary Science Summer School (PSSS), an annual week-long workshop for graduate and postdoctoral students. The program involves a one-week team design exercise developing an early mission concept study, working with JPL's Advanced Projects Design Team ("Team X") and other concurrent engineering teams.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL created the NASA Museum Alliance in 2003 out of a desire to provide museums, planetariums, visitor centers and other kinds of informal educators with exhibit materials, professional development and information related to the then-upcoming landings of the Mars rovers "Spirit" and "Opportunity". The Alliance now has more than 500 members, who get access to NASA displays, models, educational workshops and networking opportunities through the program. Staff at educational organizations that meet the Museum Alliance requirements can register to participate online.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: The Museum Alliance is a subset of the JPL Education Office's Informal Education group, which also serves after-school and summer programs, parents and other kinds of informal educators.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: The NASA/JPL Educator Resource Center, which is moving from its location at the Indian Hill Mall in Pomona, Calif. at the end of 2013, offers resources, materials and free workshops for formal and informal educators covering science, technology, engineering and science topics related to NASA missions and science.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: The lab had an open house once a year on a Saturday and Sunday in May or June, when the public was invited to tour the facilities and see live demonstrations of JPL science and technology. More limited private tours are also available throughout the year if scheduled well in advance. Thousands of schoolchildren from Southern California and elsewhere visit the lab every year. Due to federal spending cuts mandated by budget sequestration, the open house has been previously cancelled. JPL open house for 2014 was October 11 and 12 and 2015 was October 10 and 11. Starting from 2016, JPL replaced the annual Open House with "Ticket to Explore JPL", which features the same exhibits but requires tickets and advance reservation. Roboticist and Mars rover driver Vandi Verma frequently acts as science communicator at open house type events to encourage children (and particularly girls) into STEM careers.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: In addition to its government work, JPL has also assisted the nearby motion picture and television industries, by advising them about scientific accuracy in their productions. Science fiction shows advised by JPL include "Babylon 5" and its sequel series, "Crusade".


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL also works with the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate (DHS-S&T). JPL and DHS-S&T developed a search and rescue tool for first responders called FINDER. First responders can use FINDER to locate people still alive who are buried in rubble after a disaster or terrorist attack. FINDER uses microwave radar to detect breathing and pulses.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: Additionally, JPL is home to the JPL-RPIF (Jet Propulsion Laboratory – Regional Planetary Image Facility) which is chartered as a repository for all robotic spacecraft hard-copy data and thus provides a valuable resource to NASA funded science investigators, and an important conduit for the distribution of NASA generated materials to local educators in the Los Angeles/southern California area.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: JPL is a federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) managed and operated by Caltech under a contract from NASA. In fiscal year 2012, the laboratory's budget was slightly under $1.5 billion, with the largest share going to Earth Science and Technology development.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: There is a tradition at JPL to eat "good luck peanuts" before critical mission events, such as orbital insertions or landings. As the story goes, after the Ranger program had experienced failure after failure during the 1960s, the first successful Ranger mission to impact the Moon occurred after a JPL staff member had decided to pass out peanuts to relieve tension. The staff jokingly decided that the peanuts must have been a good luck charm, and the tradition persisted.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: The JPL Advanced Projects Design Team, also known as Team X, is an interdisciplinary team of engineers that utilizes "concurrent engineering methodologies to complete rapid design, analysis and evaluation of mission concept designs".


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: On February 25, 2005, Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 was approved by the Secretary of Commerce. This was followed by Federal Information Processing Standards 201 (FIPS 201), which specified how the federal government should implement personal identity verification. These specifications led to a need for rebadging to meet the updated requirements.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: On August 30, 2007, a group of JPL employees filed suit in federal court against NASA, Caltech, and the Department of Commerce, claiming their constitutional rights were being violated by the new, overly invasive background investigations. 97% of JPL employees were classified at the low-risk level and would be subjected to the same clearance procedures as those obtaining moderate/high risk clearance. Under HSPD 12 and FIPS 201, investigators have the right to obtain any information on employees, which includes questioning acquaintances on the status of the employee's mental, emotional, and financial stability. Additionally, if employees depart JPL before the end of the two-year validity of the background check, no investigation ability is terminated; former employees can still be legally monitored.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: Employees were told that if they did not sign an unlimited waiver of privacy, they would be deemed to have "voluntarily resigned". The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit found the process violated the employees' privacy rights and issued a preliminary injunction. NASA appealed and the US Supreme Court granted certiorari on March 8, 2010. On January 19, 2011, the Supreme Court overturned the Ninth Circuit decision, ruling that the background checks did not violate any constitutional privacy right that the employees may have had.


title: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

text: On March 12, 2012, the Los Angeles Superior Court took opening statements on the case in which former JPL employee David Coppedge brought suit against the lab due to workplace discrimination and wrongful termination. In the suit, Coppedge alleges that he first lost his "team lead" status on JPL's "Cassini-Huygens" mission in 2009 and then was fired in 2011 because of his evangelical Christian beliefs and specifically his belief in intelligent design. Conversely, JPL, through the Caltech lawyers representing the laboratory, allege that Coppedge's termination was simply due to budget cuts and his demotion from team lead was because of harassment complaints and from on-going conflicts with his co-workers. Superior Court Judge Ernest Hiroshige issued a final ruling in favor of JPL on January 16, 2013.


title: Least common multiple

text: In arithmetic and number theory, the least common multiple, lowest common multiple, or smallest common multiple of two integers "a" and "b", usually denoted by lcm("a", "b"), is the smallest positive integer that is divisible by both "a" and "b". Since division of integers by zero is undefined, this definition has meaning only if "a" and "b" are both different from zero. However, some authors define lcm("a",0) as 0 for all "a", since 0 is the only common multiple of "a" and 0.


title: Least common multiple

text: The lcm is the "lowest common denominator" (lcd) that can be used before fractions can be added, subtracted or compared.


title: Least common multiple

text: The least common multiple of more than two integers "a", "b", "c", . . . , usually denoted by lcm("a", "b", "c", . . .), is also well defined: It is the smallest positive integer that is divisible by each of "a", "b", "c", . . .


title: Least common multiple

text: A multiple of a number is the product of that number and an integer. For example, 10 is a multiple of 5 because 5 × 2 = 10, so 10 is divisible by 5 and 2. Because 10 is the smallest positive integer that is divisible by both 5 and 2, it is the least common multiple of 5 and 2. By the same principle, 10 is the least common multiple of −5 and −2 as well.


title: Least common multiple

text: The least common multiple of two integers "a" and "b" is denoted as lcm("a", "b"). Some older textbooks use ["a", "b"].


title: Least common multiple

text: When adding, subtracting, or comparing simple fractions, the least common multiple of the denominators (often called the lowest common denominator) is used, because each of the fractions can be expressed as a fraction with this denominator. For example,


title: Least common multiple

text: Suppose there are two meshing gears in a machine, having "m" and "n" teeth, respectively, and the gears are marked by a line segment drawn from the center of the first gear to the center of the second gear. When the gears begin rotating, the number of rotations the first gear must complete to realign the line segment can be calculated by using formula_6. The first gear must complete formula_7 rotations for the realignment. By that time, the second gear will have made formula_8 rotations.


title: Least common multiple

text: Suppose there are three planets revolving around a star which take "l", "m" and "n" units of time, respectively, to complete their orbits. Assume that "l", "m" and "n" are integers. Assuming the planets started moving around the star after an initial linear alignment, all the planets attain a linear alignment again after formula_9 units of time. At this time, the first, second and third planet will have completed formula_10, formula_11 and formula_12 orbits, respectively, around the star.


title: Least common multiple

text: To avoid introducing integers that are larger than the result, it is convenient to use the equivalent formulas


title: Least common multiple

text: These formulas are also valid when exactly one of and is , since . However, if both and are , these formulas would cause division by zero; so, must be considered as a special case.


title: Least common multiple

text: There are fast algorithms, such as the Euclidean algorithm for computing the gcd that do not require the numbers to be factored. For very large integers, there are even faster algorithms for the three involved operations (multiplication, gcd, and division); see Fast multiplication. As these algorithms are more efficient with factors of similar size, it is more efficient to divide the largest argument of the lcm by the gcd of the arguments, as in the example above.


title: Least common multiple

text: The unique factorization theorem indicates that every positive integer greater than 1 can be written in only one way as a product of prime numbers. The prime numbers can be considered as the atomic elements which, when combined, make up a composite number.


title: Least common multiple

text: Here, the composite number 90 is made up of one atom of the prime number 2, two atoms of the prime number 3, and one atom of the prime number 5.


title: Least common multiple

text: The lcm will be the product of multiplying the highest power of each prime number together. The highest power of the three prime numbers 2, 3, and 7 is 2, 3, and 7, respectively. Thus,


title: Least common multiple

text: This method is not as efficient as reducing to the greatest common divisor, since there is no known general efficient algorithm for integer factorization.


title: Least common multiple

text: The same method can also be illustrated with a Venn diagram as follows, with the prime factorization of each of the two numbers demonstrated in each circle and "all" factors they share in common in the intersection. The lcm then can be found by multiplying all of the prime numbers in the diagram.


title: Least common multiple

text: This also works for the greatest common divisor (gcd), except that instead of multiplying all of the numbers in the Venn diagram, one multiplies only the prime factors that are in the intersection. Thus the gcd of 48 and 180 is 2 × 2 × 3 = 12.


title: Least common multiple

text: Let there be a finite sequence of positive integers "X" = ("x", "x", ..., "x"), "n" > 1. The algorithm proceeds in steps as follows: on each step "m" it examines and updates the sequence "X" = ("x", "x", ..., "x"), "X" = "X", where "X" is the "m"th iteration of "X", that is, "X" at step "m" of the algorithm, etc. The purpose of the examination is to pick the least (perhaps, one of many) element of the sequence "X". Assuming "x" is the selected element, the sequence "X" is defined as


title: Least common multiple

text: In other words, the least element is increased by the corresponding "x" whereas the rest of the elements pass from "X" to "X" unchanged.


title: Least common multiple

text: The algorithm stops when all elements in sequence "X" are equal. Their common value "L" is exactly lcm("X").


title: Least common multiple

text: This method works for any number of numbers. One begins by listing all of the numbers vertically in a table (in this example 4, 7, 12, 21, and 42):


title: Least common multiple

text: The process begins by dividing all of the numbers by 2. If 2 divides any of them evenly, write 2 in a new column at the top of the table, and the result of division by 2 of each number in the space to the right in this new column. If a number is not evenly divisible, just rewrite the number again. If 2 does not divide evenly into any of the numbers, repeat this procedure with the next smallest prime number, 3 (see below).


title: Least common multiple

text: Once 2 no longer divides any number in the current column, repeat the procedure by dividing by the next larger prime, 3. Once 3 no longer divides, try the next larger primes, 5 then 7, etc. The process ends when all of the numbers have been reduced to 1 (the column under the last prime divisor consists only of 1's).


title: Least common multiple

text: As a general computational algorithm, the above is quite inefficient. One would never want to implement it in software: it takes too many steps and requires too much storage space. A far more efficient numerical algorithm can be obtained by using Euclid's algorithm to compute the gcd first, and then obtaining the lcm by division.


title: Least common multiple

text: According to the fundamental theorem of arithmetic, every integer greater than 1 can be represented uniquely as a product of prime numbers, up to the order of the factors:


title: Least common multiple

text: Given two positive integers formula_20 and formula_21, their least common multiple and greatest common divisor are given by the formulas


title: Least common multiple

text: In fact, every rational number can be written uniquely as the product of primes, if negative exponents are allowed. When this is done, the above formulas remain valid. For example:


title: Least common multiple

text: The positive integers may be partially ordered by divisibility: if "a" divides "b" (that is, if "b" is an integer multiple of "a") write "a" ≤ "b" (or equivalently, "b" ≥ "a"). (Note that the usual magnitude-based definition of ≤ is not used here.)


title: Least common multiple

text: Under this ordering, the positive integers become a lattice, with meet given by the gcd and join given by the lcm. The proof is straightforward, if a bit tedious; it amounts to checking that lcm and gcd satisfy the axioms for meet and join. Putting the lcm and gcd into this more general context establishes a duality between them:


title: Least common multiple

text: It can also be shown that this lattice is distributive; that is, lcm distributes over gcd and gcd distributes over lcm:


title: Least common multiple

text: The least common multiple can be defined generally over commutative rings as follows: Let "a" and "b" be elements of a commutative ring "R". A common multiple of "a" and "b" is an element "m" of "R" such that both "a" and "b" divide "m" (that is, there exist elements "x" and "y" of "R" such that "ax" = "m" and "by" = "m"). A least common multiple of "a" and "b" is a common multiple that is minimal, in the sense that for any other common multiple "n" of "a" and "b", "m" divides "n".


title: Least common multiple

text: In general, two elements in a commutative ring can have no least common multiple or more than one. However, any two least common multiples of the same pair of elements are associates. In a unique factorization domain, any two elements have a least common multiple. In a principal ideal domain, the least common multiple of "a" and "b" can be characterised as a generator of the intersection of the ideals generated by "a" and "b" (the intersection of a collection of ideals is always an ideal).


title: The Muffin Man

text: "The Muffin Man" is a traditional nursery rhyme, children's song, or children's game of English origin. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 7922.


title: The Muffin Man

text: The man in question, who lived on Drury Lane in London, may have been a man whose profession was delivering baked goods such as English muffins, or he may have been an impoverished beggar man (like a "ragamuffin").


title: The Muffin Man

text: The rhyme was first recorded in a British manuscript circa 1820, that is preserved in the Bodleian Library with lyrics very similar to those used today:


title: The Muffin Man

text: Victorian households had many of their fresh foods delivered, such as muffins, which were delivered door-to-door by a vendor known as a muffin man. The "muffin" in question was the bread item known as an English muffin, not the typically sweeter U.S. variety of muffin. Drury Lane is a thoroughfare bordering Covent Garden in London.


title: The Muffin Man

text: The rhyme and game appear to have spread to other countries in the mid-nineteenth century, particularly the US and the Netherlands. As with many traditional songs, there are regional variations in wording; for example, another popular English version substitutes "Dorset Lane" for Drury Lane, while in the Dutch version (entitled ""), mussels are substituted for muffins, and Scheveningen, the fishermans harbour near the Hague, for Drury Lane.


title: The Muffin Man

text: In Volume 5 of his contemporary account of the London Prize Ring, "Boxiana", published in 1829, Pierce Egan writes of an attempted fix (or "cross") of a match scheduled for October 18, 1825, between Reuben Marten and Jonathan Bissel ("Young Gas"). Young Gas refused to take the bribe and one week later identified the person who offered him £200 to throw the fight as a "Mr. Smith, a muffin-baker in Gray's Inn Lane". Young Gas also identified the "gentlemen" who employed the muffin-baker to act as go between, but those gentlemen denied involvement claiming they did not have "the slightest knowledge of the muffin-man".


title: The Muffin Man

text: Iona and Peter Opie observed that, although the rhyme had remained fairly consistent, the game associated with it has changed at least three times including: as a forfeit game, a guessing game, and a dancing ring.


title: The Muffin Man

text: No. 2 then turns to No. 3, repeating the same words, who replies in the same way, only saying, "Three of us know the muffin man,". No. 3 then turns to No. 4, and so on round the room, the same question and answer being repeated, the chorus only varied by the addition of one more number each time.


title: The Muffin Man

text: Verses beyond those described in the book have been sung. For example, the song may be concluded, "We all know the Muffin Man ..."


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Triumph of the Will () is a 1935 German Nazi propaganda film directed, produced, edited and co-written by Leni Riefenstahl. Adolf Hitler commissioned the film and served as an unofficial executive producer; his name appears in the opening titles. It chronicles the 1934 Nazi Party Congress in Nuremberg, which was attended by more than 700,000 Nazi supporters. The film contains excerpts of speeches given by Nazi leaders at the Congress, including Hitler, Rudolf Hess and Julius Streicher, interspersed with footage of massed Sturmabteilung (SA) and Schutzstaffel (SS) troops and public reaction. Its overriding theme is the return of Germany as a great power with Hitler as its leader. The film was produced after the Night of the Long Knives and many formerly prominent SA members are absent.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Following its release in March 1935, it became a major example of film used as propaganda and was well-received at home. Riefenstahl's techniques—such as moving cameras, aerial photography, the use of long-focus lenses to create a distorted perspective, and the revolutionary approach to the use of music and cinematography—have earned "Triumph of the Will" recognition as one of the greatest propaganda films in history. She won several awards in Germany, France and Italy.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: During World War II, Frank Capra's seven-film series "Why We Fight" was directly inspired by "Triumph of the Will" and the United States' response to it. In present-day Germany, the film is not censored but the courts commonly classify it as Nazi propaganda, which requires an educational context for public screenings. The film continues to influence films, documentaries and commercials to this day.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: The film begins with a prologue establishing the present-day as 5 September 1934 and the elapsed time since World War I, the Treaty of Versailles, Hitler's appointment as chancellor, climaxing in his visit to Nuremberg on that day. It is the only commentary in the entire film.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Day 1: The film opens with shots of the clouds above the city, and then moves through the clouds to float above the assembling masses below, with the intention of portraying beauty and majesty of the scene. The cruciform shadow of Hitler's plane is visible as it passes over the tiny figures marching below, accompanied by an orchestral arrangement of the "Horst-Wessel-Lied". Upon arriving at the Nuremberg airport, Hitler and other Nazi leaders emerge from his plane to thunderous applause and a cheering crowd. He is then driven into Nuremberg, through equally enthusiastic people, to his hotel where a night rally is later held.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Day 2: The second day begins with images of Nuremberg at dawn, accompanied by an extract from the Act III Prelude ("Wach Auf!") of Richard Wagner's "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg". Following this is a montage of the attendees preparing for the opening of the Reich Party Congress, and footage of the top Nazi officials arriving at the Luitpold Arena. The film then cuts to the opening ceremony, where Rudolf Hess announces the start of the Congress. The camera then introduces much of the Nazi hierarchy and covers their opening speeches, including Joseph Goebbels, Alfred Rosenberg, Hans Frank, Fritz Todt, Robert Ley and Julius Streicher. Then the film cuts to an outdoor rally for the "Reichsarbeitsdienst" (Labor Service), which is primarily a series of quasi-military drills by men carrying spades. This is also where Hitler gives his first speech on the merits of the Labour Service and praising them for their work in rebuilding Germany. The day then ends with a torchlight SA parade and fireworks display in which Viktor Lutze speaks to the crowds.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Day 3: The third day starts with a Hitler Youth rally on the parade ground. Again the camera covers the Nazi dignitaries arriving and the introduction of Hitler by Baldur von Schirach. Hitler then addresses the Youth, describing in militaristic terms how they must harden themselves and prepare for sacrifice. Everyone present, including General Werner von Blomberg, then assemble for a military pass and review, featuring Wehrmacht cavalry and various armored vehicles. That night Hitler delivers another speech to low-ranking party officials by torchlight, commemorating the first year since the Nazis took power and declaring that the party and state are one entity.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Day 4: The fourth day is the climax of the film, where the most memorable of the imagery is presented. Hitler, flanked by Heinrich Himmler and Viktor Lutze, walks through a long wide expanse with over 150,000 SA and SS troops standing at attention, to lay a wreath at a First World War memorial. Hitler then reviews the parading SA and SS men, following which Hitler and Lutze deliver a speech where they discuss the Night of the Long Knives purge of the SA several months prior. Lutze reaffirms the SA's loyalty to the regime, and Hitler absolves the SA of any crimes committed by Ernst Röhm. New party flags are consecrated by letting them touch the "Blutfahne" (the same cloth flag said to have been carried by the fallen Nazis during the Beer Hall Putsch) and, following a final parade in front of the Nuremberg Frauenkirche, Hitler delivers his closing speech. In it he reaffirms the primacy of the Nazi Party in Germany, declaring, "All loyal Germans will become National Socialists. Only the best National Socialists are party comrades!" Hess then leads the assembled crowd in a final "Sieg Heil" salute for Hitler, marking the close of the party congress. The entire crowd sings the "Horst-Wessel-Lied" as the camera focuses on the giant Swastika banner, which fades into a line of silhouetted men in Nazi party uniforms, marching in formation as the lyrics "Comrades shot by the Red Front and the Reactionaries march in spirit together in our columns" are sung.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Riefenstahl, a popular German actress, had directed her first film called "Das blaue Licht" ("The Blue Light") in 1932. Hitler was impressed with "Das blaue Licht", and in 1933 asked her to direct a film about the Nazis' annual Nuremberg Rally, which became "Der Sieg des Glaubens" ("The Victory of Faith"). Hitler chose Riefenstahl as he wanted the film as "artistically satisfying" as possible to appeal to a non-political audience, but he also believed that propaganda must admit no element of doubt.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: "The Victory of Faith" faced numerous technical problems, including a lack of preparation (Riefenstahl reported having just a few days) and Hitler's apparent unease at being filmed. Though the film apparently did well at the box office, it later became a serious embarrassment to the Nazis after SA Leader Ernst Röhm, who had a prominent role in the film, was executed during the Night of the Long Knives. All references to Röhm were ordered to be erased from German history, which included the destruction of all copies of "The Victory of Faith". It was considered a lost film until a copy turned up in the 1980s in the German Democratic Republic's film archives.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: In April 1934, Riefenstahl was commissioned by Hitler to create a successor film to "The Victory of Faith". Riefenstahl however, remain focused on production of her own film "Tiefland" (which was released only in 1954), while fellow director Walter Ruttmann worked on the party film. Ruttmann's ideals departed significantly from "The Victory of Faith" and sought to reorient the focus of the film onto the history of the Nazi movement rather than Hitler himself. Hitler visited the studio on 6 December 1934 and permanently removed Ruttmann from the project, leaving Riefenstahl in sole control of what would become "Triumph des Willens" ("Triumph of the Will").


title: Triumph of the Will

text: The film follows a script similar to "The Victory of Faith" which is evident when one sees both films side by side. For example, the city of Nuremberg scenes—even to the shot of a cat included in the city driving sequence in both films. Furthermore, Herbert Windt reused much of his musical score for that film in , which he also scored. Riefenstahl shot "Triumph of the Will" on a budget of roughly 280,000 RM (approximately US$110,000 in 1934, $1.54 m in 2015). With that said, there were extensive preparations facilitated by the cooperation of party members, the military, and vital help from high-ranking Nazis like Goebbels. As Susan Sontag observed, "The Rally was planned not only as a spectacular mass meeting, but as a spectacular propaganda film."


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Albert Speer, Hitler's personal architect, designed the set in Nuremberg and did most of the coordination for the event. Pits were dug in front of the speakers' platform so Riefenstahl could get the camera angles she wanted, and tracks were laid so that her cameramen could get traveling shots of the crowd. When rough cuts were not up to par, major party leaders and high-ranking public officials reenacted their speeches in a studio for her.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: "Triumph of the Will" premiered on 28 March 1935 at the Berlin Ufa Palace Theater and was an instant success. Within two months the film had earned 815,000 Reichsmark (equivalent to million euros), and Ufa considered it one of the three most profitable films of that year. Hitler praised the film as being an "incomparable glorification of the power and beauty of our Movement." For her efforts, Riefenstahl was rewarded with the German Film Prize ("Deutscher Filmpreis"), a gold medal at the 1935 Venice Biennale, and the Grand Prix at the 1937 World Exhibition in Paris. However, there were few claims that the film would result in a mass influx of "converts" to fascism and the Nazis apparently did not make a serious effort to promote the film outside of Germany. Film historian Richard Taylor also said that "Triumph of the Will" was not generally used for propaganda purposes inside Nazi Germany. "The Independent" wrote in 2003: ""Triumph of the Will" seduced many wise men and women, persuaded them to admire rather than to despise, and undoubtedly won the Nazis friends and allies all over the world."


title: Triumph of the Will

text: The reception in other countries was not always as enthusiastic. British documentarian Paul Rotha called it tedious, while others were repelled by its pro-Nazi sentiments. During World War II, Frank Capra helped to create a direct response, through the film series called "Why We Fight", a series of newsreels commissioned by the United States government that spliced in footage from "Triumph of the Will", but recontextualized it so that it promoted the cause of the Allies instead. Capra later remarked that "Triumph of the Will" "fired no gun, dropped no bombs. But as a psychological weapon aimed at destroying the will to resist, it was just as lethal." Clips from "Triumph of the Will" were also used in an Allied propaganda short called "General Adolph Takes Over", set to the British dance tune "The Lambeth Walk". The legions of marching soldiers, as well as Hitler giving his Nazi salute, were made to look like wind-up dolls, dancing to the music. The Danish resistance used to take over cinemas and force the projectionist to show "Swinging the Lambeth Walk" (as it was also known); Erik Barrow has said: "The extraordinary risks were apparently felt justified by a moment of savage anti-Hitler ridicule." Also during World War II, the poet Dylan Thomas wrote a screenplay for and narrated "These Are The Men", a propaganda piece using "Triumph of the Will" footage to discredit Nazi leadership.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: One of the best ways to gauge the response to "Triumph of the Will" was the instant and lasting international fame it gave Riefenstahl. "The Economist" said it "sealed her reputation as the greatest female filmmaker of the 20th century." For a director who made eight films, only two of which received significant coverage outside of Germany, Riefenstahl had unusually high name recognition for the remainder of her life, most of it stemming from "Triumph of the Will". However, her career was also permanently damaged by this association. After the war, Riefenstahl was imprisoned by the Allies for four years for allegedly being a Nazi sympathizer and was permanently blacklisted by the film industry. When she died in 2003—sixty-eight years after the film's premiere—her obituary received significant coverage in many major publications, including the Associated Press, "The Wall Street Journal", "The New York Times", and "The Guardian", most of which reaffirmed the importance of "Triumph of the Will".


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Like American filmmaker D. W. Griffith's "The Birth of a Nation", "Triumph of the Will" has been criticized as a use of spectacular filmmaking to promote a profoundly unethical system. In her defense, Riefenstahl claimed that she was naïve about the Nazis when she made it and had no knowledge of Hitler's genocidal or anti-semitic policies. She also pointed out that "Triumph of the Will" contains "not one single anti-semitic word", although it does contain a veiled comment by Julius Streicher that "a people that does not protect its racial purity will perish".


title: Triumph of the Will

text: However, Roger Ebert has observed that for some, "the very absence of anti-semitism in "Triumph of the Will" looks like a calculation; excluding the central motif of almost all of Hitler's public speeches must have been a deliberate decision to make the film more efficient as propaganda."


title: Triumph of the Will

text: However, Riefenstahl was an active participant in the rally, though in later years she downplayed her influence significantly, claiming, "I just observed and tried to film it well. The idea that I helped to plan it is downright absurd." Ebert states that "Triumph of the Will" is "by general consent [one] of the best documentaries ever made", but added that because it reflects the ideology of a movement regarded by many as evil, it poses "a classic question of the contest between art and morality: Is there such a thing as pure art, or does all art make a political statement?" When reviewing the film for his "Great Movies" collection, Ebert reversed his opinion, characterizing his earlier conclusion as "the received opinion that the film is great but evil" and calling it "a terrible film, paralyzingly dull, simpleminded, overlong and not even 'manipulative', because it is too clumsy to manipulate anyone but a true believer".


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Writing in 1975, Susan Sontag considers "Triumph of the Will" the "most successful, most purely propagandistic film ever made, whose very conception negates the possibility of the filmmaker's having an aesthetic or visual conception independent of propaganda." Sontag points to Riefenstahl's involvement in the planning and design of the Nuremberg ceremonies as evidence that Riefenstahl was working as a propagandist, rather than as an artist in any sense of the word. With some 30 cameras and a crew of 150, the marches, parades, speeches, and processions were orchestrated like a movie set for Riefenstahl's film. Further, this was not the first political film made by Riefenstahl for the Nazis (there was "Victory of Faith", 1933), nor was it the last ("Day of Freedom", 1935, and "Olympia", 1938). "Anyone who defends Riefenstahl's films as documentary", Sontag states, "if documentary is to be distinguished from propaganda, is being disingenuous. In "Triumph of Will", the document (the image) is no longer simply the record of reality; 'reality' has been constructed to serve the image." This is considerably different from the position she takes ten years earlier in a 1965 essay entitled "On Style," where she opposes the idea that Riefenstahl's propaganda films are purely propaganda, and writes: "To call Leni Riefenstahl's "The Triumph of the Will" and "The Olympiad" masterpieces is not to gloss over Nazi propaganda with aesthetic lenience. The Nazi propaganda is there. But something else is there, too, which we reject at our loss. Because they project the complex movements of intelligence and grace and sensuousness, these two films of Riefenstahl (unique among works of Nazi artists) transcend the categories of propaganda or even reportage. And we find ourselves—to be sure, rather uncomfortably—seeing 'Hitler' and not Hitler, the '1936 Olympics' and not the 1936 Olympics. Through Riefenstahl's genius as a film-maker, the 'content' has—let us even assume, against her intentions—come to play a purely formal role."


title: Triumph of the Will

text: "Triumph of the Will" remains well known for its striking visuals. As one historian notes, "many of the most enduring images of the [Nazi] regime and its leader derive from Riefenstahl's film."


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Extensive excerpts of the film were used in Erwin Leiser's documentary "Mein Kampf", produced in Sweden in 1960. Riefenstahl unsuccessfully sued the Swedish production company Minerva-Film for copyright violation, although she did receive forty thousand marks in compensation from German and Austrian distributors of the film.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: In 1942, Charles A. Ridley of the British Ministry of Information made a short propaganda film called among other names "Schichlegruber - Doing the Lambeth Walk" and "Lambeth Walk – Nazi Style", which edited footage of Hitler and German soldiers from the film to make it appear they were marching and dancing to the song "The Lambeth Walk". The targeted-at-Nazis parody of "The Lambeth Walk" (a British dance that had been popular in swing clubs in Germany which the Nazis denounced as "Jewish mischief and animalistic hopping") so enraged Joseph Goebbels that reportedly he ran out of the screening room kicking chairs and screaming profanities. The propaganda film was distributed uncredited to newsreel companies, who would supply their own narration.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Charlie Chaplin's satire "The Great Dictator" (1940) was inspired in large part by "Triumph of the Will". Frank Capra used significant footage, with a mocking narration in the first installment of the propagandistic film produced by the United States Army "Why We Fight" as an exposure of Nazi militarism and totalitarianism to American soldiers and sailors.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: Riefenstahl filed lawsuits against two postwar documentaries which had incorporated footage of "Triumph of the Will". The first lawsuit occurred in 1954 against Wolfgang Hartwig, producer of "Bis fünf nach zwölf". Hartwig argued that the rights belonged to the state, but reportedly eventually paid compensation to Riefenstahl, who donated it to a charity dedicated to returning prisoners of war. Her second lawsuit against Swedish producer Erwin Leiser's "Mein Kampf" in 1960 was enveloped in greater public debate about the copyright and morality of works produced during the Nazi regime. The case was settled against her in 1969.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: In a judgement by the Federal Court of Justice on 29 December 1966, the copyright to the film was transferred to the Federal Republic of Germany as the legal successor of Nazi Germany. These rights are administered by the federally owned Transit-Film GmbH based in Munich, although it was contractually regulated in 1974 that any public screening until 2004 had to be approved by Riefenstahl and that she received 70% of all revenues.


title: Triumph of the Will

text: In 1996, the copyrights of the film were restored to Riefenstahl under the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, although some aspect of the US copyrights are uncertain.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Klaus Werner Iohannis (; ; also spelled Johannis; born 13 December 1959) is a Romanian politician, physicist and former teacher who has been serving as the president of Romania since 2014. Ideologically a conservative, he became leader of the National Liberal Party (PNL) in 2014, after serving as leader of the Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania (FDGR/DFDR) between 2002 and 2013. Prior entering politics, Iohannis was a physics teacher.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Iohannis was elected the mayor of the city of Sibiu () in 2000, representing the Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania. Although the German population of the once predominantly German-speaking town of Sibiu had declined to a tiny minority, Iohannis won a surprise victory and was re-elected by landslides in 2004, 2008, and 2012. Iohannis is credited with turning his city into one of Romania's most popular tourist destinations, and the city was chosen to be the European Capital of Culture in 2007. In February 2013, Iohannis became a member of the National Liberal Party (PNL), accepting an invitation from then liberal leader Crin Antonescu, and was immediately elected the party's First Vice President, eventually becoming the PNL President during the following year.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: In October 2009, four of the five political groups in the Parliament, excluding the Democratic Liberal Party (PDL) of then-President Traian Băsescu, proposed him as a candidate for the office of Prime Minister of Romania; however, Băsescu refused to nominate him despite the Parliament's adoption of a declaration supporting his candidacy. He was again the candidate for Prime Minister of the PNL and the Social Democratic Party (PSD) in the elections in the same year.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Iohannis is the first Romanian president to come from an ethnic minority, as he is a Transylvanian Saxon, part of Romania's German minority, which settled in Transylvania beginning in the 12th century. He was initially elected in 2014 and then subsequently re-elected in 2019.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Born in the historic centre of Sibiu () to a Transylvanian Saxon family, Klaus Iohannis is the eldest child of Gustav Heinz and Susanne Johannis. He has a younger sister, Krista Johannis (born 1963). His father worked as a technician at an enterprise, while his mother was a nurse. Both his parents as well as his sister emigrated from their native Sibiu () to Würzburg, Bavaria in Germany in 1992, acquiring citizenship there under the right of return granted by German nationality law, as most other Transylvanian Saxons after the fall of the Iron Curtain. However, he chose to live and work in Romania. As of 2014, his parents, sister and a niece live in Würzburg.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: After graduating from the Faculty of Physics of the Babeș-Bolyai University (UBB) in Cluj-Napoca in 1983, Iohannis worked as a high school physics teacher at various schools and colleges in Sibiu, including, from 1989 to 1997, the Samuel von Brukenthal National College in Sibiu, the oldest German-speaking school in Romania. From 1997 to 1999, he was Deputy General School Inspector of Sibiu County, and from 1999 until his election as mayor in 2000, he was the General School Inspector, head of public schools in the county.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Alongside his native German and Romanian, Iohannis also speaks English fluently and has some knowledge of French. The original German spelling of his name is Johannis, but the name was registered by a Romanian official as Iohannis on his birth certificate and he has used both spellings interchangeably. In 1989, he married ethnic Romanian Carmen Lăzurcă, an English teacher at the Gheorghe Lazăr National College in Sibiu. They have no children. Iohannis is also a member of the Evangelical Church of Augustan Confession in Romania, the German-speaking Lutheran church in Transylvania.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: He joined the Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania (FDGR/DFDR) in 1990, and served as a member of its board of education in Transylvania from 1997, and a member of the local party board in Sibiu from 1998. In 2001, he was elected President of the Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania (FDGR/DFDR), succeeding former president Eberhard Wolfgang Wittstock.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: In 2000, the Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania in Sibiu/Hermannstadt (FDGS), the local chapter of the Democratic Forum of Germans (FDGR/DFDR), decided to back him as a candidate for mayor. While initially not wanting anything else than to represent the forum through a local candidate and to obtain a certain degree of local political visibility at that time, the leadership of FDGR/DFDR was surprised for his subsequent victory.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Despite the fact that Sibiu's German minority (represented, more specifically, by Transylvanian Saxons) had shrunken to a mere 1.6%, Iohannis was elected with 69.18% of the votes and has won three re-elections in a row, getting some of the largest electoral scores in the country: 88.69% of the vote in 2004, and 83.26% in 2008. Consequently, he became the third ethnic German mayor of a Romanian city since Albert Dörr and (who briefly served in 1941 in Timișoara), the former who had also served in Sibiu from 1906/07 to 1918 (the first was , who served as elected mayor of the town of Roman in Neamț County, between 1992 and 1996).


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Throughout his tenure as mayor, he has worked to restore the town's infrastructure and to tighten the local administration. Iohannis is also widely credited with turning his hometown into one of Romania's most popular tourist destinations thanks to the extensive renovation of the old downtown. During his first term, Iohannis worked with a town council which was formed by PDSR/PSD, FDGR/DFDR, PD, CDR, and PRM. Since 2004, during his second and third terms, his own party, FDGR/DFDR, had the majority. Between 2008 and 2012, FDGR/DFDR had 14 out of 23 councillors, PDL 4, PSD 3, and PNL only 2.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Iohannis established contacts with foreign officials and investors. Sibiu was declared the European Capital of Culture of 2007, along with Luxembourg (the bearer of the distinction in 1995). Luxembourg chose to share this honourable status with Sibiu due to the fact that many of the Transylvanian Saxons emigrated in the 12th century to Transylvania from the area where Luxembourg is today. Sibiu, or "Hermannstadt" in German, which was mainly built by the Transylvanian Saxons as early as the Middle Ages, was for many centuries the cultural centre of the German ethnic group in Transylvania, and was a predominantly German-speaking town until the mid 20th century. Subsequently, many Germans left the town after World War II, and especially in 1990, within months of the fall of the Iron Curtain.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: On 7 November 2005, Iohannis was nominated as the "Personality of the Year for a European Romania" () by the "Eurolink – House of Europe" organization.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: On 14 October 2009, the leaders of the opposition parliamentary groups (the National Liberal Party, the Social Democratic Party, the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania, the Conservative Party led by Dan Voiculescu, and the group of smaller ethnic minorities), proposed Iohannis as a candidate for the Prime Minister of Romania, after the government of Prime Minister Emil Boc fell a day before as a result of a motion of no confidence in the Parliament. Coming from outside the national-level politics of Romania, Iohannis had an image of an independent politician, although his party (i.e. FDGR/DFDR) consistently allied itself with, and Iohannis campaigned in the prior European Parliament elections for, the National Liberal Party (PNL).


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Subsequently, the National Liberal Party (PNL), the Social Democratic Party (PSD), the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR), and the group of small ethnic minorities in the Parliament subsumed Iohannis as their common candidate for Prime Minister of an interim government. On 14 October, Iohannis confirmed acceptance of his candidacy. However, on 15 October President Traian Băsescu nominated Lucian Croitoru, a top Romanian economist, as Prime Minister, and charged the latter with forming the country's next government.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: After the second round of negotiations, a day before Croitoru's nomination, Băsescu noted: "Some parties have proposed Klaus Iohannis. I would like you to know that I have not rejected the possibility for him to become Prime Minister in the condition that my options would be directed towards other [national unity government] solutions. But I have rejected such a proposal because it comes from PSD or another party [PNL]", referring to his alleged constraint to consider a proposal of the largest party (PDL), constraint disputed by the other parties. The opposition criticized the President for not designating Iohannis. Social Democrat leader Mircea Geoană accused Băsescu of trying to influence the upcoming presidential elections by having them organised by a sympathetic government. Crin Antonescu, the leader of the National Liberals, vowed his party would derail other nominations but Iohannis'. After the nomination of Croitoru, Antonescu, a candidate in the presidential election, stated that he would nominate Iohannis as prime minister if elected president. Three days later, on 18 October, Geoană suggested Antonescu was trying to use Iohannis as an "electoral agent" for Antonescu's bid for president. In response, Antonescu told the press that Iohannis "is not the type of person that would let himself be used". Geoană and PSD leadership has held a second meeting with Iohannis in Bucharest in the evening of 18 October. UDMR, which the previous day announced it would also attend, declared in the morning that all their leaders were not in the city. PNL was present at the meeting with lower level representatives, after Antonescu announced in the morning that he was campaigning in Cluj-Napoca. On 21 October the Parliament adopted with 252 votes in favor (PSD, PNL, UDMR, and minorities groups) and 2 against a declaration requesting the President to nominate Iohannis as Prime Minister.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: On 20 February 2013, Klaus Iohannis joined the PNL, announcing this during a press conference with Crin Antonescu. At a PNL extraordinary congress, he was elected First Vice President of the Party. In the meeting of 28 June 2014, he was elected President of the PNL with 95% of the votes.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: In 2009, Iohannis had stated that he might possibly run for the office of President of Romania, although not in that year. In addition, former Prime Minister Călin Popescu-Tăriceanu also stated on 27 October 2009 and again on 23 April 2010 that he would like to see Iohannis become either Prime Minister or President of Romania sometime in the future.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: PNL and PDL started in the summer of 2014 procedures to strengthen the political right. The two parties will eventually merge under the name PNL, but went for elections in an alliance: the Christian Liberal Alliance (). On 11 August the alliance chose Iohannis as its candidate for the presidential election in November and so he was registered as an official presidential candidate. In a late August 2014 interview, Iohannis described himself as a politruk who candidates for the presidency of Romania. He subsequently received 30.37% of the votes in the first round, finishing second and consequently qualifying for the second round. In the second round on 16 November he was elected President of Romania with 54.43% of the cast ballots.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Iohannis took office on 21 December, when Traian Băsescu's term ended. His presidential campaign focused on fighting corruption and on improving the justice system. Iohannis is also a supporter of a strongly pro-Western foreign policy. Regarding the unification of the Republic of Moldova with Romania, much discussed in the electoral campaign, Iohannis stated that "is something that only Bucharest can offer and only Chișinău can accept", and this "special relationship must be cultivated and enhanced especially by us [the Romanian state]". Upon taking office, Iohannis suspended his membership in the National Liberal Party; the Romanian constitution does not allow the president to be a formal member of a political party during his tenure.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: A heavily disputed draft law proposed by Nicolae Păun, leader of the Party of the Roma, regarding the amnesty of some misdemeanors and the pardoning of certain penalties was rejected by the Chamber of Deputies at the initiative of Klaus Iohannis and the party he led, after PNL asked the Judiciary Committee 17 times to reject the draft law.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: The collaboration with socialist Prime Minister Victor Ponta was praised by both sides at the start of the mandate, but deteriorated thereafter once with foreign visits of the Head of the Executive, without informing the President, but especially with the criminal prosecution of Victor Ponta for 22 alleged corruption charges, prompting Iohannis to demand his resignation from the head of the Government. Relations with Parliament went similarly. Iohannis criticized the Parliament for defending MPs by rejecting the requests of the National Anticorruption Directorate for lifting their immunity, as in the case of PSD senator Dan Șova or Prime Minister Victor Ponta. Regarding the judicial system, Klaus Iohannis pleads for a sustained fight against corruption. Likewise, Iohannis expressed dissatisfaction with attempted amendments to the Penal Code. In the context of foreign policy, Iohannis and Andrzej Duda, the President of Poland, created Bucharest Nine during a meeting between both in Bucharest on 4 November 2015. The Russian annexation of Ukrainian Crimea and the country's intervention in the east of Ukraine are the main reason for the creation of the organization. It has nine members, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Since coming into office, President Klaus Iohannis has made a habit to hold consultations with parliamentary parties. The first round of consultations took place on 12 January, the purpose of these discussions being a political agreement that would ensure, by 2017, a minimum threshold of 2% of GDP for the Ministry of Defence, agreement signed by all parties. The second round of consultations focused on the legislative priorities of the parliamentary session: voting in diaspora, financing electoral campaigns and parties and lifting parliamentary immunity. Because the Parliament has not implemented the commitments made on 28 January, Iohannis has organised another series of consultations on the state of electoral laws, but also on rejection of Justice requests for approval of arrest or prosecution of MPs. The topics of other meetings between the president and parties focused on the Big Brother law package and the national defense strategy.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: Regarding the unification of Romania and Moldova, Klaus Iohannis declared during the 2014 presidential campaign that the unification is something that only Bucharest can provide and only Chișinău can accept. "If Moldovan citizens want the unification with Romania, then nobody can stop them", stated Klaus Iohannis. After election, his position mitigated, stressing that, at the moment, Romania should support Moldova to consolidate its pro-European path. President Klaus Iohannis said that a possible unification of Romania and Moldova could be discussed at the moment things are going well and stable in the two countries.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: In March 2017, a sub-group of the ethnically Hungarian Székely community in southeastern Transylvania launched a petition demanding autonomy for their region, arguing for political and administrative self-rule, their own elected president and flag, as well as the recognition of Hungarian as an official language next to Romanian. Iohannis, on a visit to the region in July, cautioned against decentralization and the creation of regions based on the ethnic origin of residents. He argued for more and improved cooperation between Romanians and Hungarians "as the only solution for us" instead, stressing local administrative reforms and developing the region.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: On 28 April 2020, a draft legislation favouring the autonomy of Székely Land, submitted by two deputies of the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) in December 2019, was tacitly adopted by the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of the Parliament of Romania, in which the Social Democratic Party (PSD) held a plurality of seats and all whilst the National Liberal Party led a minority government. The draft bill was automatically adopted after it exceeded the 45-day deadline for debate. On 29 April, Klaus Iohannis criticised the draft's adoption in a television speech, stating "as we ... fight the coronavirus pandemic, ... the PSD ... fights in the secret offices of the parliament to give Transylvania to the Hungarians". In his speech, he used Hungarian language in a mocking manner: "" ['good day' in Romanian], dear Romanians; ['good day' in Hungarian], PSD." On the same day, the draft was rejected in the Senate, with both PNL's and PSD's senators voting in favour of the rejection.


title: Klaus Iohannis

text: The president's speech was met with widespread criticism. Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó described the statements of Iohannis as "particularly uncivilized and suitable for inciting hatred" and asked the Romanian president to show "more respect to Hungarians". In turn, Romanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Bogdan Aurescu called Szijjártó's statements "provocative and inadequate". In a radio interview, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán also reacted to the speech, saying "we have never heard such remarks from Romania, not even in the worst, most antidemocratic, tumultuous times". The president's comments were also criticised by members of the Romanian opposition parties PSD and ALDE, but also by the confidence and supply USR (which has been supporting the PNL minority government since 2019). Iohannis was fined by the National Council for Combating Discrimination (CNCD) for discrimination and ethnicity/nationality-based violation of the right to dignity.