title: Iván Duque

text: Duque attended Colegio Rochester but obtained his high-school diploma from Colegio Winston-Salem. He then graduated from Sergio Arboleda University in Bogotá in 2000 with a degree in law. He holds a LLM in International economic law from American University and a Masters in Public Policy Management from Georgetown University, Washington D.C..


title: Iván Duque

text: He began his professional career in 1999 as a consultant in the Andean Development Corporation (CAF) and later served as an advisor at the Colombian Ministry of Finance and Public Credit during the government of Andrés Pastrana (1998–2002).


title: Iván Duque

text: Subsequently, he was appointed by Juan Manuel Santos, future president and then Minister of Finance, as one of Colombia's representatives at the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), a post he held between 2001 and 2013. There he served as chief of the Division of Culture, Solidarity, and Creativity.


title: Iván Duque

text: Duque also served as international advisor of former President Álvaro Uribe Vélez. Between 2010 and 2011, he was a consultant at the United Nations (UN) in the Panel of Inquiry appointed by the Secretary-General for the Incident of the Gaza Flotilla that occurred on 31 May 2010, between Israel and Turkey, known as Mavi Marmara.


title: Iván Duque

text: Duque returned to Colombia to become a candidate for the Senate in the legislative elections of 2014, for the Partido Centro Democrático (Democratic Center Party) which split away from the ruling governing party after Juan Manuel Santos opened peace negotiations with the FARC. This new party campaigned against the new peace agreement and the Santos Government, and was led by right wing former president Uribe.


title: Iván Duque

text: Uribe created his own political party and presented himself and a list of hand picked political allies as candidates for the office of Congressman in a closed list, which meant that people could not vote for an individual congressman but had to vote for the party as a whole in both the upper and lower chamber elections. Duque was included in the number seven spot of the closed off list for the Senate and thus was elected senator.


title: Iván Duque

text: On 10 December 2017, Duque was nominated by his party as its candidate for President of Colombia. He won the nomination through a system of surveys conducted by the party, with a 29.47% favorability compared to the other two candidates: Carlos Holmes Trujillo who obtained 20.15%, and Rafael Nieto with 20.06%. In January 2018, it was announced that the center-right coalition would participate in the Grand Primary for Colombia – an interparty consultation – with Duque as its candidate confronting Marta Lucía Ramírez (civil-center right movement) and Alejandro Ordóñez (right wing civil movement). On 11 March 2018, Duque won the primary with more than 4 million votes. Ramírez was second, with just over 1.5 million votes, and Ordóñez came third with 385,000 votes. During his speech, Duque thanked the support of Colombians at the polls and announced Marta Lucía Ramírez as his running mate in the elections.


title: Iván Duque

text: On 27 May 2018, Duque earned the most votes in the first round of the presidential election with over 39% of the vote. Duque was elected President of Colombia on 17 June 2018 after defeating Gustavo Petro 54% to 42% in the second round.


title: Iván Duque

text: Duque was sworn in on 7 August 2018 at Bogotá's Bolívar Square. Duque's government main priorities are legality and entrepreunership, among other areas.


title: Iván Duque

text: In 2020, after the drug lord "Ñeñe" Hernandez was murdered in Brazil, some audios of him conspiring to give money to Duque's party in order to buy votes for his election were published in what is known as the "Ñeñepolítica".


title: Iván Duque

text: The Presidency of Ivan Duque has continued the policies of his predecessor Juan Manuel Santos in regards to immigration, and the Venezuelan refugee crisis. Ivan Duque's government has been a vocal supporter for the Venezuelan Refugees at the United Nations and has provided aid, schooling and health care for many, and has been a vocal critic of other South American countries closing of doors to Venezuelan Refugees. In 2018, Duque dedicated 0.5% of government spending to supporting refugees accounting for about 20% of Colombia's budget short fall, despite opposition. In response to this criticism on a televised address Duque stated: "For those who want to make from xenophobia a political path, we adopt the path of brotherhood, for those who want to outcast or discriminate against migrants, we stand up today ... to say that we are going to take them in and we are going to support them during difficult times." Duque's policies regarding this issue have received repeated praise from international humanitarian organizations for its efforts to legalize, formalize and offer assistance to refugees, and the Atlantic has noted that it has set the bar welcoming refugees. A representative from the International Rescue Committee has noted that: "[she's] never seen a government trying this hard to register people and leave the borders open. Unfortunately," she added "the scale of this crisis, and the speed at which it changes, is more than Colombia can handle." His decision to provide temporary protected legal status to nearly 1.7 million Venezuelan migrants drew praise from leaders around the world.


title: Iván Duque

text: Very close to the Trump administration in the United States, he supports its projects in Colombia and Latin America and in return receives unwavering political support and billions of dollars in economic and military aid.


title: Iván Duque

text: He pursues the war on drugs as defined by the US government and supports the Trump administration's efforts for regime change in Venezuela by supporting coup attempts in that country and allowing Venezuelan armed groups to train in Colombia. He describes the Venezuelan government of Nicolás Maduro as "dictatorial" and says he does not rule out armed intervention against Venezuela.


title: Iván Duque

text: His government welcomes the removal of Bolivian President Evo Morales during the Bolivian crisis of 2019 and was accused of interference in the Ecuadorian elections of 2021 by accusing the left-wing candidate Andrés Arauz of being financed by the Colombian guerrilla group ELN.


title: Iván Duque

text: He retains very good relations with the United States after the election of Joe Biden as US President in 2020, although his party, the Democratic Center, had supported Donald Trump in the presidential election. The Biden administration has shown signs of favouring right-wing candidates in the Colombian presidential election of 2022. Senior US diplomats spoke to the press about alleged Russian, Cuban and Venezuelan interference in the election in favour of leftist candidate Gustavo Petro, while US officials avoided meeting Petro before the election while meeting other candidates.


title: Iván Duque

text: During the 2020 United States elections, Duque's party Democratic Centre promoted Republican Party candidates in the United States, especially in Florida, sharing support for President of the United States Donald Trump. The involvement of a Colombian party promoting political candidates in a foreign election drew controversy among some observers. After Duque's party supported President Trump in the 2020 United States presidential election, relations between the government of President Joe Biden and Colombia became strained.


title: Iván Duque

text: In the months leading up to the end of his term, he used his proximity to the U.S. government to obtain a position that would project him onto the international stage after his political retirement. The presidency of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees or the Inter-American Development Bank are in his sights, according to the Colombian press.


title: Iván Duque

text: Opposed to the peace agreement signed in 2016 with the FARC guerrilla group, he nevertheless stated at the time of his election that he had no intention of "smashing it to bits". In power, he is trying to eliminate certain points of the agreement. His government is seeking to weaken the Special Jurisdiction for Peace and is cutting the budget of the Truth Commission and the Unit for the Search for Disappeared Persons by 30%. The government also promotes generals involved in extrajudicial executions (see : "False positives" scandal), appoints controversial figures to key positions and halts negotiations with the other guerrilla group, the National Liberation Army (ELN).


title: Iván Duque

text: Through its National Development Plan 2018-2022, the Colombian government plans to revive the country's gold and copper markets. In addition, 161 new oil drilling sites are planned for 2022, four times more than the 46 existing in 2018. Hydraulic fracturing (fracking) is legalised in 2019. This plan is widely criticised by environmentalists, who consider it dangerous for the environment and the climate (in favour of fossil fuels, which emit a lot of greenhouse gases), and offering the country's non-renewable resources to foreign multinationals (the share of extraction profits paid to the state has dropped to 0.4% for gold and silver, and 3.27% for open-cast coal mines). This plan also threatens indigenous communities, whose territories and resources are once again under threat (in mid-2019 the Pan-American Highway was blocked for several weeks by the mobilisation of thousands of indigenous people in the department of Cauca).


title: Iván Duque

text: The 2019–2020 Colombian protests were a collection of protests that have occurred since 21 November 2019. Hundreds of thousands of Colombians demonstrated to support the Colombian peace process and against the Duque government. Demonstrators criticise also the government's desire to make the labour market more flexible, to reduce the public pension fund in favour of private entities and to raise the retirement age . The unions are also protesting against the tax reform aimed at reducing the taxes paid by companies and against the planned privatisation of public companies such as the oil company Ecopetrol and the electricity company Cenit. The army was deployed in the main cities of the country and a curfew was introduced. The unpopularity rate of Iván Duque reached almost 70%.


title: Iván Duque

text: The 2021 Colombian protests began on 28 April 2021 against increased taxes proposed by the Duque government amid the pandemic.


title: Iván Duque

text: Insecurity in Colombia has increased during Iván Duque's presidency. Cocaine production is at a record high of 1,200 tonnes. This makes Colombia the world's leading producer of the drug, according to the UN.


title: Iván Duque

text: On the other hand, violence against social leaders in the territories has increased substantially. As of 4 June 2022, 930 social leaders had been assassinated. In addition, 245 former FARC combatants who took advantage of the Peace Accords have been assassinated during the Duque government.


title: Iván Duque

text: Following the publication of alleged evidence in March 2018 that Duque's political party conspired with the drug trafficking organization of Marquitos Figueroa to commit fraud in the presidential election, Congress's Accusations Committee and the National Electoral Council opened an investigation into his alleged role in the fraud. The Supreme Court opened a criminal investigation into his political sponsor, right-wing former President Álvaro Uribe, who is already being investigated for alleged witness fraud and bribery.


title: Iván Duque

text: Two days after the end of his presidency, he was named a "distinguished fellow" at the influential Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C., a U.S. government-funded "think tank" with a monthly salary of $10,000.


title: Iván Duque

text: Iván Duque is the author of the books "Monetary Sins" (2007), "Machiavelli in Colombia" (2010), "Orange Effect" (2015), "IndignAcción" (IndignAction) (2017) and is co-author of the book "The Orange Economy: An Infinite Opportunity" (2013).


title: Iván Duque

text: Duque has also been an Op-Ed contributor to several newspapers: "El Colombiano", from Medellín; "Portafolio" and "El Tiempo" from Casa Editorial El Tiempo in Bogotá; and "El País" in Spain.


title: Iván Duque

text: Duque is Roman Catholic. He is married to María Juliana Ruiz Sandoval, with whom he has three children: Luciana, Matías and Eloísa.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham was born and raised in New York City. His mother, Laurie Simmons, is an artist and photographer, and his father, Carroll Dunham, is a painter. Dunham's older sister, Lena, is a writer, actress, and producer.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham attended St. Ann's School in New York City. He wrote for the school newspaper and yearbook and spoke at the graduation. As a high school student in 2009, Dunham received the Poetry Society of America's Louise Louis/Emily F. Bourne Student Poetry Award for the poem "Twin Oaks", which was judged for the competition by American poet Matthew Rohrer.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham graduated from Brown University with a degree in urban studies in May 2014. He was a contributing writer for the student weekly "The College Hill Independent".


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham has written for "The New Yorker", "Artforum" and "Granta"; as well as "Transgender Herstory in 99 Objects: Legends and Mythologies" at the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives, "UNCOUNTED: Call & Response" at Vienna Secession and the "AL-UGH-ORIES" monograph"," as part of Nicole Eisenman's exhibition at the New Museum.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: In 2016, Dunham published his first collection of poetry and short essays, "The Fool". The publication is a free, online-only web-book published by Curse of Cherifa.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham's memoir, "A Year Without a Name", was published in October 2019 by Little, Brown and Company. The book was met with positive reviews from "The Atlantic", "Kirkus Reviews" and "them". A short section of the book was published online in "The New Yorker".


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham has collaborated frequently with transgender activist Tourmaline; their work together includes public speaking, writing, and performance.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham's first film appearance was in the 2006 short, "Dealing," as June, a 13-year-old art dealer. "Dealing" was written and directed by Dunham's older sister.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: In 2010, Dunham starred in a second film written and directed by his sister called "Tiny Furniture" in which Dunham's sister and mother played characters in the film that were loosely based on their own family.


title: Cyrus Grace Dunham

text: Dunham stars as Junior in the film "Happy Birthday, Marsha!" about the gay activist Marsha P. Johnson and transgender activist Sylvia Rivera in the hours before the Stonewall riots. Dunham also appeared in artist A.K. Burns' multi-channel video installation "A Smeary Spot".


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Thief is a stealth video game developed by Eidos-Montréal and published by Square Enix in February 2014 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One video gaming platforms. Feral Interactive brought the game to macOS in November 2015. It is a revival of the cult classic "Thief" video game series of which it is the fourth installment. Initially announced in 2009 as "Thief 4", it was later announced in 2013 that the game is a reboot for the series.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: The game is set in 'The City', a dark fantasy world inspired by Victorian, Gothic, gaslight fantasy and steampunk aesthetics. Players control Garrett, a master thief who embarks on several missions focusing on stealing from the rich. Players may approach levels in a variety of different ways; players can choose the action-oriented and lethal approach, where players will disable or kill enemies on their way to their destination, using knives and takedowns, or opt for the non-lethal stealthy approach, where players minimize interaction with non-player characters and the environment in order to avoid detection. Players may choose which path to take to their destination, as each location contains several branching paths.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Upon release, the game received a mixed critical reception, with critics praising its replay value and stealth gameplay, but criticizing the map layout and story.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: The player controls Garrett, a master thief, as he goes about a series of missions, most of which are focused around stealing from the rich. As with the previous games in the series, players must use stealth in order to overcome challenges, while violence is left as a minimally effective last resort.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: There are a variety of routes through each level and the player is able to utilize a variety of playing styles to traverse them. The game contains a variety of ways to distract or kill guards, such as barrels of oil which can be set alight. Levels contain coins and valuable objects which Garrett can steal; these are converted into money which can be spent on equipment and upgrades. Garrett is able to pickpocket guards and other characters. The player may evade guards by hiding in shadows or around corners and is able to peek around edges and through keyholes in order to track the movements of enemies. Once Garrett has been spotted, guards and other non-player characters will attempt to hunt him down. The developers have stated that the game's artificial intelligence is aware of the level design, and as such guards will know in advance of potential hiding spots that the player may be utilizing.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: The player may enter a "Focus" mode, which provides several advantages. It enhances Garrett's vision, highlighting pipes that can be climbed, or candles that can be put out to make the area darker. Focus can slow down time, so that Garrett is able to steal more effectively while pickpocketing. Garrett can use Focus to push enemies or perform debilitating attacks. It can be further upgraded over the course of the game.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Garrett carries a blackjack, used to knock guards unconscious; a collapsible, composite bow, which can be used for both combat and non-lethal purposes such as distracting guards; and a claw, which can be used to grapple onto higher ledges.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: An experience point system for the in-game growth of the character was meant to be used in the final game, but was later scrapped after negative feedback from fans, and to reflect the fact that the character was already a master thief.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: "Thief" is set in a dark fantasy world inspired by Victorian, Gothic, and steampunk aesthetics. Garrett, a master thief who has been away from his hometown for a long time, returns to it, a place known only as The city, and finds it ruled with an iron grip by a tyrant called the Baron. While The City is ravaged by a plague, the rich continue to live in isolation and good fortune while the poor are forming numerous mobs against the authorities. Garrett intends to use the volatile situation to his favor.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: A reboot of the series, the story is set several hundreds of years after the original events in the same universe, with clues to the backstory being hidden among documents, letters and plaques. The original master thief Garrett's (known as the legendary Sneak Thief) iconic mechanical eye is one of the hidden unique loots in the game that can be found inside of a prison complex. Other references to the original series include the Keepers, Hammerites and the Old Gods, with ruins relating to them being visitable locations throughout the City and beneath.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: During a night of revelry in the city, Garrett is hired by his contact Basso to steal from the manor of Baron Northcrest, the tyrannous ruler of the city; Garrett is partnered with Erin to assist him. Erin is naïve and reckless, and needlessly kills a guard using her grappling Claw, leading Garrett to rebuke her. Atop the manor's roof, the pair witness Northcrest inside leading a group of men into conducting a magical ritual. A wary Garrett calls off the job, but Erin objects; in the ensuing struggle, Erin falls through a skylight and absorbs the energy being channelled through the ritual. Garrett inadvertently falls into the hall and is knocked out.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Garrett awakens from a coma one year later to find that the city is being plagued by a disease of unknown origin called "the Gloom", and that various districts of the city are in lockdown. Returning to his hideout, Garret receives a message from Basso, who hires Garrett to steal a ring from a noble's corpse at a foundry used to dispose of victims of the Gloom. Garrett evades Northcrest's right-hand man, the Thief-Taker General, and retrieves the ring. There, he meets a man called Orion, the leader of a resistance movement working to bring down Northcrest. Agreeing to help Orion, Garrett ventures to a hidden brothel to find a unique book, visiting Erin's hideout in the process and experiencing a vision of her mentioning a place called Moira Asylum. Basso is arrested by the Thief-Taker General, prompting Garrett to rescue him. Garrett breaks into Northcrest's vault and recovers a piece of a mysterious stone called the Primal, which had been used in the ritual at Northcrest's manor; another vision reveals to Garrett that Erin is alive and under the influence of the power from the stone.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Exploring Moira Asylum, Garrett uncovers a second piece of the stone, but is unable to find Erin there. Garrett returns to Northcrest's manor to confront him, while Orion sparks a revolution on the city's streets. Northcrest reveals to Garrett that his ritual intended to harness the power of the stone to use as a new energy source; the disruption of the ritual and fragmentation of the stone resulted in the Gloom being unleashed into the city. Orion transpires to be Northcrest's illegitimate brother, Aldous, who seeks the Primal for his own purposes. Seeking information on the stone, Garrett visits an informant, the Queen of Beggars, who tells him that the Primal must be reassembled and its power contained to save the city from the Gloom.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Garrett enters an old cathedral and finds Aldous using Erin in an attempt to heal citizens, assisted by the items stolen by Garrett. The Thief-Taker General arrives as Aldous flees with Erin; Garrett kills the General and pursues Aldous to his hideout aboard a ship. Erin unleashes the power of the Primal, killing Aldous, before attacking Garrett. He manages to reassemble the stone, returning Erin to normal, but the force knocks her over the edge of the ship. Garrett throws down her Claw to save her and falls unconscious. He awakens to find the Claw embedded in a post next to wet footprints, implying Erin survived, as dawn arrives.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: "Thief" was initially announced in 2009 under the working title "Thief 4" (stylized as "Thi4f"), after rumours of its development. Developed at Eidos-Montréal, the game was handled by a team other than the one that made "". The development team was initially kept small, and the game remained in concept phase for a long time. During this, numerous experimental design changes were proposed, such as having a third-person perspective, having a new protagonist, or environmental clambering similar to the "Assassin's Creed" series of games. The general manager of the studio, Stephane D'Astous, was quoted as stating "Thief 4" was currently in early development: "We're in the early development stages for "Thief 4", but this is an incredibly ambitious project and a very exciting one. It's too early for us to offer any specific game details. Right now, we are focused on recruiting the very best talent to join the core team at the studio and help us make what we believe will be one of the most exciting games on the market." After some gossip that several major members of Eidos Montréal left their jobs, D'Astous countered these claims by saying, "We will be able to be a little more communicative later on, hopefully before the year's end. Right now, "Thief" is our priority and we're putting everything behind it to make sure it's as successful as our first game". In January 2013, NeoGAF found LinkedIn files that indicated network programmers were working on the project. Eidos-Montréal was expanded in 2010 with a separate team for multiplayer development, and when MP producer Joe Khoury was asked if they would also work on their next project, "Thief 4", he did not deny or confirm. Steam users that pre-ordered the game received "Team Fortress 2" items for the sniper class (cosmetics based on what Garrett wears and a modified version of the huntsman weapon styled after the bow used in-game) and/or "Dota 2" items based on the game.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Although the game was initially expected for seventh-generation consoles, it was switched to eighth-generation consoles during development. This was confirmed when in March 2013, the game was unveiled through that month's issue of "Game Informer" and announced to be released on the PC, PlayStation 4 and "other next-gen consoles". The game is a reboot of the "Thief" series. Based upon initial press release photos Phil Savage of "PC Gamer" made some comparisons to "Dishonored", stating "It all looks a bit "Dishonored", which is apt, given that "Dishonored" looked a bit "Thief"."


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Eidos announced that the veteran voice actor Stephen Russell has been replaced by actor Romano Orzari for the role of the main protagonist in the series, Garrett. In a statement, Eidos explained their decision. "We made the decision to record our actor's voices and their movement at the same time using a full performance capture technique. The actor playing Garrett needed to be able to perform his own stunts. Garrett's a really athletic guy. We could have pasted Stephen's voice on top of the actions and stunts of someone else, but this wouldn't appear natural." However, this decision has upset some fans of the series who initiated an online petition requesting Eidos-Montréal to bring back Stephen Russell as lead voice actor.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: "Thief" received "mixed" reviews, according to video game review aggregator Metacritic. Most reviewers praised its stealth gameplay, level design, graphics, and replay value, but criticized its map layout, technical issues, and story.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: GameZone's Mike Splechta gave the PlayStation 4 version a 6.5/10, stating "Some might be able to look past Thief's shortcomings and instead only focus on the moments of brilliance. However, I imagine long-time Thief fans hoping for Garrett's grand return might be somewhat disappointed." Giving the reboot a score of 6.8, IGN's Dan Stapleton criticized the decision to replace the voice actor for Garrett, saying that the new actor, Romano Orzari, made the protagonist seem "flat" and "poorly lip-synced"; Stapleton also took issue with the sub-par AI, lack of variety or creativity in Garrett's choice of weapons, the poorly designed and cumbersome layout of The city, and the story, calling it "bland" and "supernatural-driven". However, he praised the ability to change the difficulty of the game so as to make it more challenging and was also positive about Garrett's new sprinting mechanics. "The Telegraph"s Tim Martin was much more scathing in his review, giving the game 2 stars out of 5 and lambasting the rote manner in which each level plays out, forcing the player to conform to one set path through the maps and very rarely allowing him a sense of freedom and challenge. The review also pointed out that increasing the game's difficulty will do little to heighten any sense of danger or unpredictability; overall, Martin thought to be a half-hearted disaster.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Eurogamer Italy gave it a score of 9/10, saying: "one of the best action-stealth titles in years and the first serious contender for the '2014 Game of the Year' contest". Digital Spy gave it a glowing review, stating: "While the game does have its faults - particularly falling apart when Garrett is spotted - "Thief" excels in the shadows as a pure stealth title, becoming increasingly enjoyable as your skills improve."


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw was very negative on the game in his "Zero Punctuation" review, criticizing the linear structure of the game when compared to previous "Thief" titles, reducing the protagonist to "a boring, easily digestible archetype", the lack of incentive to play it stealthily, and the sound design. He concluded by saying that "The kindest thing one can say about "Thief" is that it's just another soulless AAA game to add to the pile." In his annual game awards video, he listed "Thief" as the single worst video game of 2014.


title: Thief (2014 video game)

text: At an OXM press event a week before the game's release, Eidos-Montréal's Nick Cantin hinted a "Thief" sequel could be possible, depending upon its reception: "Nothing's announced yet but we're very keen to see how people respond to the game [...] We've built a really big universe around the first game, and there's a lot of layers to it – the world is really deep [...] so there's a lot of possibilities to jump on." As of 2022, this potential sequel has yet to materialize.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Death to Smoochy is a 2002 satirical black comedy crime film directed by Danny DeVito and written by Adam Resnick. Starring Robin Williams, Edward Norton, DeVito, Catherine Keener and Jon Stewart, the film centers on "Rainbow" Randolph Smiley (Williams), a disgraced former children's television host who attempts to sabotage his replacement, Sheldon Mopes (Norton), and his character, Smoochy the Rhino.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Produced by Film4 Productions and Andrew Lazar's Mad Chance Productions, "Death to Smoochy" was released in the United States on March 29, 2002, by Warner Bros. Pictures. The film met with mixed-to-negative reviews from critics and was a huge box office bomb, grossing only $8.3 million against a budget of $50 million. Despite this, in recent years it has garnered a cult following.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: "Rainbow" Randolph Smiley is the host of a popular children's television show on Kidnet. Despite appearing friendly and playful on-screen in the studio, he is actually an alcoholic and criminal in reality. The FBI arrest him for accepting bribes and he is fired, his show is canceled, and he is thrown out of his penthouse and left homeless. Kidnet orders executive Marion Stokes to hire a new host who is "squeaky clean", Stokes selects the naive Sheldon Mopes and his character Smoochy the Rhino. Mopes is uniquely sincere and dedicated to providing quality children's entertainment, which puts him at odds with his new producer Nora Wells. The Smoochy Show quickly becomes tremendously popular, causing Rainbow Randolph to fixate his anger on Mopes. Randolph turns to Stokes and pleads for help to get his job back, but Stokes refuses. The deranged Randolph then hatches several poorly planned attempts to get Mopes fired, all of which fail. Finally hitting rock bottom, Randolph turns to his former partner Angelo Pike for help. Angelo feeds Randolph and allows him to stay at his apartment.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Mopes finds himself losing creative control over his show and hires corrupt talent agent Burke Bennett to renegotiate his contract. Bennett introduces Mopes to the dark side of the entertainment business by giving him a gun and trying to convince him to work with a corrupt charity. While having dinner with Burke, Mopes is introduced to mobster Tommy Cotter. Tommy pressures Mopes into giving her cousin Spinner a role on his show, and Mopes casts him as Smoochy's cousin Moochy. Tommy tells Mopes that in return for casting Spinner, she will make sure he is protected.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Burke becomes impatient with Mopes and books him to star in a Smoochy ice show, run by Merv Green and his corrupt charity Parade of Hope. Mopes refuses to do the show despite Burke's warnings, in response Green personally threatens Mopes to do the show. In the meantime, Randolph manages to trick Mopes into performing his Smoochy act at a Neo-Nazi rally. Mopes is branded a racist and loses his job and show, and Nora refuses to help him. Randolph visits Nora to ask for his job back but accidentally reveals that he set Mopes up. Nora tells Tommy, who tracks down Randolph with her crew and force him to confess that he tricked Mopes. Sheldon's reputation and show are restored and the media dubs Randolph the most hated man in America. Angelo kicks Randolph out of his apartment after Randolph angrily destroys the TV. Nora and Mopes reconnect and begin a romantic relationship.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Mopes decides to host his own ice show, without the corrupt charities involved. Burke and Stokes, under pressure from Green, plot to kill Mopes and hire a new host who will accommodate their corruption. Their plan backfires when Green's men mistake Spinner in his Moochy costume for Mopes and murder him. An enraged Tommy retaliates by killing Green and his men. Randolph confronts Mopes and Nora in their apartment at gunpoint and reveals that Nora had affairs with several kid show hosts, including Randolph himself. Mopes manages to calm Randolph down and disarm him, allowing Randolph to remain in the apartment until Mopes could explain everything to the police.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Burke and Stokes decide to hire former Kidnet host Buggy Ding Dong to kill Sheldon during the ice show. Randolph intervenes and saves Mopes by killing Buggy. Mopes realizes that Burke and Stokes set him up and threatens Burke with a gun. Tommy and her crew arrive in time to stop Mopes and Tommy decides to handle the matter herself (murdering them offscreen, in a deleted scene). Mopes and Nora kiss in Times Square, and Smoochy and Randolph launch a new show together alongside Nora, who becomes an ice skater.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: In November or December 2000, screenwriter Adam Resnick wrote the screenplay for the film, while art designers sketched designs for the characters for the film. In the original screenplay, the Smoochy costume was orange. The final film used a pink costume instead.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Principal photography began in January 2001. Sequences were filmed in several locations in New York City such as Times Square, Coney Island, Upper West Side and Duane Street in Lower Manhattan. A brief shot of the North Tower of the World Trade Center can be seen where Rainbow Randolph is dancing on the small bench in Duane Park. In the DVD commentary, Danny DeVito says it was the only shot in the movie that the towers were in. No changes were made after the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks. Filming production moved to Canada on spring 2001. The KidNet studios scenes were shot in several areas in Toronto. In the ice show scene with Smoochy and Rainbow, Robin's stuntdouble Elvis Stojko choreographed some of the skating moves for Rainbow Randolph. Robin was off stage. Filming ended in May 2001.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, "Death to Smoochy" holds an approval rating of 42% based on 119 reviews with an average rating of 5.3/10. The site's critical consensus states, "The talent involved can't save a script that has nowhere to go with its promising premise." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 38 out of 100, based on 30 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "C" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Roger Ebert of "The Chicago Sun-Times" gave the film an extremely negative review (giving it half a star out of four), saying that "Only enormously talented people could have made "Death to Smoochy". Those with lesser gifts would have lacked the nerve to make a film so bad, so miscalculated, so lacking any connection with any possible audience. To make a film this awful, you have to have enormous ambition and confidence, and dream big dreams." He named the film the Worst of the Year. Todd McCarthy of "Variety" also gave the film a negative review, saying that the film "pushes its dark, smart, clever, cynical, satirical, nasty, provocative and sarcastic instincts to the point of heavily diminished returns—to the point where the very amusing premise just isn't funny anymore." Peter Travers of "Rolling Stone" wrote: "This black-comic assault on family entertainment is going to set a lot of teeth on edge—If only his (DeVito's) material were better this time."


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Conversely, J. Hoberman of "The Village Voice" praised the film, saying that ""Death to Smoochy" is often very funny, but what's even more remarkable is the integrity of DeVito's misanthropic vision." David Sterritt of "The Christian Science Monitor" called the film a "razor-sharp satire" and "the most refreshingly outrageous movie of the season."


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Though it received a wide release by playing in 2,164 theaters its opening weekend in the United States, the film was a box-office bomb after grossing only $4,266,463 its opening weekend and a mere $8,382,691 overall, with negligible box-office receipts outside the American/Canadian market.


title: Death to Smoochy

text: Robin Williams received a Razzie Award nomination for Worst Supporting Actor for his performance as Randolph in this film, but lost to Hayden Christensen for his performance in "".


title: Near and far field

text: The near field and far field are regions of the electromagnetic (EM) field around an object, such as a transmitting antenna, or the result of radiation scattering off an object. Non-radiative "near-field" behaviors dominate close to the antenna or scattering object, while electromagnetic radiation "far-field" behaviors dominate at greater distances.


title: Near and far field

text: Far-field E (electric) and B (magnetic) field strength decreases as the distance from the source increases, resulting in an inverse-square law for the radiated "power" intensity of electromagnetic radiation. By contrast, near-field E and B strength decrease more rapidly with distance: the radiative field decreases by the inverse-distance squared, the reactive field by an inverse-cube law, resulting in a diminished power in the parts of the electric field by an inverse fourth-power and sixth-power, respectively. The rapid drop in power contained in the near-field ensures that effects due to the near-field essentially vanish a few wavelengths away from the radiating part of the antenna.


title: Near and far field

text: The far field is the region in which the field acts as "normal" electromagnetic radiation. In this region, it is dominated by electric or magnetic fields with electric dipole characteristics. The near field is governed by multipole type fields, which can be considered as collections of dipoles with a fixed phase relationship. The boundary between the two regions is only vaguely defined, and it depends on the dominant wavelength () emitted by the source and the size of the radiating element.


title: Near and far field

text: In the far-field region of an antenna, radiated power decreases as the square of distance, and absorption of the radiation does not feed back to the transmitter. However, in the near-field region, absorption of radiation does affect the load on the transmitter. Magnetic induction as seen in a transformer can be seen as a very simple example of this type of near-field electromagnetic interaction.


title: Near and far field

text: In the far-field region, each part of the EM field (electric and magnetic) is "produced by" (or associated with) a change in the other part, and the ratio of electric and magnetic field intensities is simply the wave impedance in the medium. However, in the near-field region, the electric and magnetic fields can exist independently of each other, and one type of field can dominate the other in different subregions.


title: Near and far field

text: In a normally-operating antenna, positive and negative charges have no way of leaving and are separated from each other by the excitation "signal" (a transmitter or other EM exciting potential). This generates an oscillating (or reversing) electrical dipole, which affects both the near field and the far field. In general, the purpose of antennas is to communicate wirelessly for long distances using far fields, and this is their main region of operation (however, certain antennas specialized for near-field communication do exist).


title: Near and far field

text: Also known as the radiation-zone field, the far field carries a relatively uniform wave pattern. The radiation zone is important because far fields in general fall off in amplitude by formula_1. This means that the total energy per unit area at a distance is proportional to formula_2. The area of the sphere is proportional to formula_3, so the total energy passing through the sphere is constant. This means that the far-field energy actually escapes to infinite distance (it "radiates").


title: Near and far field

text: In contrast, the near field refers to regions such as near conductors and inside polarizable media where the propagation of electromagnetic waves is interfered with. One easy-to-observe example is the change of noise levels picked up by a set of rabbit ear antennas when one places a body part in close range. The near-field has been of increasing interest, particularly in the development of capacitive sensing technologies such as those used in the touchscreens of smart phones and tablet computers.


title: Near and far field

text: The interaction with the medium (e.g. body capacitance) can cause energy to deflect back to the source, as occurs in the "reactive" near field. Or the interaction with the medium can fail to return energy back to the source, but cause a distortion in the electromagnetic wave that deviates significantly from that found in free space, and this indicates the "radiative" near-field region, which is somewhat further away. Another intermediate region, called the "transition zone", is defined on a somewhat different basis, namely antenna geometry and excitation wavelength.


title: Near and far field

text: The separation of the electric and magnetic fields into components is mathematical, rather than clearly physical, and is based on the relative rates at which the amplitude of different terms of the electric and magnetic field equations diminish as distance from the radiating element increases. The amplitudes of the far-field components fall off as formula_1, the "radiative" near-field amplitudes fall off as formula_2, and the "reactive" near-field amplitudes fall off as formula_6. Definitions of the "regions" attempt to characterize locations where the activity of the associated field "components" are the strongest. Mathematically, the distinction between "field components" is very clear, but the demarcation of the spatial "field regions" is subjective. All of the field components overlap everywhere, so for example, there are always substantial far-field and radiative near-field components in the closest-in near-field reactive region.


title: Near and far field

text: The regions defined below categorize field behaviors that are variable, even within the region of interest. Thus, the boundaries for these regions are approximate rules of thumb, as there are no precise cutoffs between them: All behavioral changes with distance are smooth changes. Even when precise boundaries can be defined in some cases, based primarily on antenna type and antenna size, experts may differ in their use of nomenclature to describe the regions. Because of these nuances, special care must be taken when interpreting technical literature that discusses far-field and near-field regions.


title: Near and far field

text: The term "near-field region" (also known as the "near field" or "near zone") has the following meanings with respect to different telecommunications technologies:


title: Near and far field

text: The most convenient practice is to define the size of the regions or zones in terms of fixed numbers (fractions) of wavelengths distant from the center of the radiating part of the antenna, with the clear understanding that the values chosen are only approximate and will be somewhat inappropriate for different antennas in different surroundings. The choice of the cut-off numbers is based on the relative strengths of the field component amplitudes typically seen in ordinary practice.


title: Near and far field

text: For antennas shorter than half of the wavelength of the radiation they emit (i.e., electromagnetically "short" antennas), the far and near regional boundaries are measured in terms of a simple ratio of the distance from the radiating source to the wavelength of the radiation. For such an antenna, the near field is the region within a radius , while the far-field is the region for which . The transition zone is the region between and .


title: Near and far field

text: The length of the antenna, , is not important, and the approximation is the same for all shorter antennas (sometimes idealized as so-called "point antennas"). In all such antennas, the short length means that charges and currents in each sub-section of the antenna are the same at any given time, since the antenna is too short for the RF transmitter voltage to reverse before its effects on charges and currents are felt over the entire antenna length.


title: Near and far field

text: For antennas physically larger than a half-wavelength of the radiation they emit, the near and far fields are defined in terms of the Fraunhofer distance. Named after Joseph von Fraunhofer, the following formula gives the Fraunhofer distance:


title: Near and far field

text: where is the largest dimension of the radiator (or the diameter of the antenna) and is the wavelength of the radio wave. Either of the following two relations are equivalent, emphasizing the size of the region in terms of wavelengths or diameters :


title: Near and far field

text: This distance provides the limit between the near and far field. The parameter corresponds to the physical length of an antenna, or the diameter of a reflector ("dish") antenna.


title: Near and far field

text: Having an antenna electromagnetically longer than one-half the dominated wavelength emitted considerably extends the near-field effects, especially that of focused antennas. Conversely, when a given antenna emits high frequency radiation, it will have a near-field region larger than what would be implied by a lower frequency (i.e. longer wavelength).


title: Near and far field

text: where is the largest physical linear dimension of the antenna and is the far-field distance. The far-field distance is the distance from the transmitting antenna to the beginning of the Fraunhofer region, or far field.


title: Near and far field

text: The "transition zone" between these near and far field regions, extending over the distance from one to two wavelengths from the antenna, is the intermediate region in which both near-field and far-field effects are important. In this region, near-field behavior dies out and ceases to be important, leaving far-field effects as dominant interactions. (See the "Far Field" image above.)


title: Near and far field

text: As far as acoustic wave sources are concerned, if the source has a maximum overall dimension or aperture width () that is large compared to the wavelength , the far-field region is commonly taken to exist at distances, when the Fresnel parameter formula_12 is larger than 1:


title: Near and far field

text: For a beam focused at infinity, the far-field region is sometimes referred to as the "Fraunhofer region". Other synonyms are "far field", "far zone", and "radiation field". Any electromagnetic radiation consists of an electric field component and a magnetic field component . In the far field, the relationship between the electric field component and the magnetic component is that characteristic of any freely propagating wave, where and have equal magnitudes at any point in space (where measured in units where [[speed of light|).


title: Near and far field

text: In contrast to the far field, the [[diffraction]] pattern in the near field typically differs significantly from that observed at infinity and varies with distance from the source. In the near field, the relationship between and becomes very complex. Also, unlike the far field where [[electromagnetic wave]]s are usually characterized by a single [[polarization (waves)|polarization]] type (horizontal, vertical, circular, or elliptical), all four polarization types can be present in the near field.


title: Near and far field

text: The near field is a region in which there are strong inductive and capacitive effects from the currents and charges in the antenna that cause electromagnetic components that do not behave like far-field radiation. These effects decrease in power far more quickly with distance than do the far-field radiation effects. Non-propagating (or evanescent) fields extinguish very rapidly with distance, which makes their effects almost exclusively felt in the near-field region.


title: Near and far field

text: Also, in the part of the near field closest to the antenna (called the "reactive near field", [[#Reactive near field, or the nearest part of the near field|see below]]), absorption of electromagnetic power in the region by a second device has effects that feed back to the transmitter, increasing the load on the transmitter that feeds the antenna by decreasing the antenna impedance that the transmitter "sees". Thus, the transmitter can sense when power is being absorbed in the closest near-field zone (by a second antenna or some other object) and is forced to supply extra power to its antenna, and to draw extra power from its own power supply, whereas if no power is being absorbed there, the transmitter does not have to supply extra power.


title: Near and far field

text: The near field itself is further divided into the "reactive" near field and the "radiative" near field. The "reactive" and "radiative" near-field designations are also a function of wavelength (or distance). However, these boundary regions are a fraction of one wavelength within the near field. The outer boundary of the reactive near-field region is commonly considered to be a distance of formula_14 times the wavelength (i.e., formula_15 or approximately ) from the antenna surface. The reactive near-field is also called the "inductive" near-field. The radiative near field (also called the "Fresnel region") covers the remainder of the near-field region, from formula_15 out to the Fraunhofer distance.


title: Near and far field

text: In the reactive near field (very close to the antenna), the relationship between the strengths of the and fields is often too complicated to easily predict, and difficult to measure. Either field component ( or ) may dominate at one point, and the opposite relationship dominate at a point only a short distance away. This makes finding the true [[power density]] in this region problematic. This is because to calculate power, not only and both have to be measured but the [[phase (waves)|phase relationship]] between and as well as the angle between the two vectors must also be known in every point of space.


title: Near and far field

text: In this reactive region, not only is an electromagnetic wave being radiated outward into far space but there is a reactive component to the electromagnetic field, meaning that the strength, direction, and phase of the electric and magnetic fields around the antenna are sensitive to EM absorption and re-emission in this region, and respond to it. In contrast, absorption far from the antenna has negligible effect on the fields near the antenna, and causes no back-reaction in the transmitter.


title: Near and far field

text: Very close to the antenna, in the reactive region, [[energy]] of a certain amount, if not absorbed by a receiver, is held back and is stored very near the antenna surface. This energy is carried back and forth from the antenna to the reactive near field by electromagnetic radiation of the type that slowly changes [[electrostatic]] and magnetostatic effects. For example, current flowing in the antenna creates a purely magnetic component in the near field, which then collapses as the antenna current begins to reverse, causing transfer of the field's magnetic energy back to electrons in the antenna as the changing magnetic field causes a self-inductive effect on the antenna that generated it. This returns energy to the antenna in a regenerative way, so that it is not lost. A similar process happens as electric charge builds up in one section of the antenna under the pressure of the signal voltage, and causes a local electric field around that section of antenna, due to the antenna's [[self-capacitance]]. When the signal reverses so that charge is allowed to flow away from this region again, the built-up electric field assists in pushing electrons back in the new direction of their flow, as with the discharge of any unipolar capacitor. This again transfers energy back to the antenna current.


title: Near and far field

text: Because of this energy storage and return effect, if either of the inductive or electrostatic effects in the reactive near field transfer any field energy to electrons in a different (nearby) conductor, then this energy is lost to the primary antenna. When this happens, an extra drain is seen on the transmitter, resulting from the reactive near-field energy that is not returned. This effect shows up as a different impedance in the antenna, as seen by the transmitter.


title: Near and far field

text: The reactive component of the near field can give ambiguous or undetermined results when attempting measurements in this region. In other regions, the power density is inversely proportional to the square of the distance from the antenna. In the vicinity very close to the antenna, however, the energy level can rise dramatically with only a small decrease in distance toward the antenna. This energy can adversely affect both humans and measurement equipment because of the high powers involved.


title: Near and far field

text: The radiative near field (sometimes called the "Fresnel region") does not contain reactive field components from the source antenna, since it is far enough from the antenna that back-coupling of the fields becomes out of phase with the antenna signal, and thus cannot efficiently return inductive or capacitive energy from antenna currents or charges. The energy in the radiative near field is thus all [[radiant energy]], although its mixture of magnetic and electric components are still different from the far field. Further out into the radiative near field (one half wavelength to 1 wavelength from the source), the and field relationship is more predictable, but the to relationship is still complex. However, since the radiative near field is still part of the near field, there is potential for unanticipated (or adverse) conditions.


title: Near and far field

text: For example, metal objects such as steel beams can act as antennas by inductively receiving and then "re-radiating" some of the energy in the radiative near field, forming a new radiating surface to consider. Depending on antenna characteristics and frequencies, such coupling may be far more efficient than simple antenna reception in the yet-more-distant far field, so far more power may be transferred to the secondary "antenna" in this region than would be the case with a more distant antenna. When a secondary radiating antenna surface is thus activated, it then creates its own near-field regions, but the same conditions apply to them.


title: Near and far field

text: The near field is remarkable for reproducing classical [[electromagnetic induction]] and electric charge effects on the EM field, which effects "die-out" with increasing distance from the antenna: The magnetic field component that’s in phase quadrature to electric fields is proportional to the inverse-cube of the distance (formula_6) and electric field strength proportional to inverse-square of distance (formula_2). This fall-off is far more rapid than the classical radiated far-field ( and fields, which are proportional to the simple inverse-distance (formula_1). Typically near-field effects are not important farther away than a few wavelengths of the antenna.


title: Near and far field

text: More-distant near-field effects also involve energy transfer effects that couple directly to receivers near the antenna, affecting the power output of the transmitter if they do couple, but not otherwise. In a sense, the near field offers energy that is available to a receiver if the energy is tapped, and this is sensed by the transmitter by means of responding to electromagnetic near fields emanating from the receiver. Again, this is the same principle that applies in [[electromagnetic induction|induction coupled]] devices, such as a [[transformer]], which draws more power at the primary circuit, if power is drawn from the secondary circuit. This is different with the far field, which constantly draws the same energy from the transmitter, whether it is immediately received, or not.


title: Near and far field

text: The amplitude of other components (non-radiative/non-dipole) of the electromagnetic field close to the antenna may be quite powerful, but, because of more rapid fall-off with distance than formula_1 behavior, they do not radiate energy to infinite distances. Instead, their energies remain trapped in the region near the antenna, not drawing power from the transmitter unless they excite a receiver in the area close to the antenna. Thus, the near fields only transfer energy to very nearby receivers, and, when they do, the result is felt as an extra power draw in the transmitter. As an example of such an effect, power is transferred across space in a common [[transformer]] or [[metal detector]] by means of near-field phenomena (in this case [[inductive coupling]]), in a strictly short-range effect (i.e., the range within one wavelength of the signal).


title: Near and far field

text: Solving [[Maxwell's equations]] for the [[electric field|electric]] and [[magnetic field]]s for a localized oscillating source, such as an antenna, surrounded by a homogeneous material (typically [[vacuum]] or [[air]]), yields fields that, far away, decay in proportion to formula_1 where is the distance from the source. These are the radiating fields, and the region where is large enough for these fields to dominate is the far field.


title: Near and far field

text: In general, the fields of a source in a [[homogeneity (physics)|homogeneous]] [[isotropic]] [[transmission medium|medium]] can be written as a [[multipole expansion]]. The terms in this expansion are [[spherical harmonic]]s (which give the angular dependence) multiplied by [[spherical Bessel function]]s (which give the radial dependence). For large , the spherical Bessel functions decay as formula_1, giving the radiated field above. As one gets closer and closer to the source (smaller ), approaching the near field, other powers of become significant.


title: Near and far field

text: The next term that becomes significant is proportional to formula_2 and is sometimes called the "induction term". It can be thought of as the primarily magnetic energy stored in the field, and returned to the antenna in every half-cycle, through self-induction. For even smaller , terms proportional to formula_6 become significant; this is sometimes called the "electrostatic field term" and can be thought of as stemming from the electrical charge in the antenna element.


title: Near and far field

text: Very close to the source, the multipole expansion is less useful (too many terms are required for an accurate description of the fields). Rather, in the near field, it is sometimes useful to express the contributions as a sum of radiating fields combined with [[evanescent field]]s, where the latter are exponentially decaying with . And in the source itself, or as soon as one enters a region of inhomogeneous materials, the multipole expansion is no longer valid and the full solution of Maxwell's equations is generally required.


title: Near and far field

text: If an oscillating electrical current is applied to a conductive structure of some type, electric and magnetic fields will appear in space about that structure. If those fields are lost to a propagating space wave the structure is often termed an antenna. Such an antenna can be an assemblage of [[electrical conductor|conductor]]s in space typical of [[radio]] devices or it can be an [[aperture]] with a given current distribution radiating into space as is typical of [[microwave]] or [[optical device]]s. The actual values of the fields in space about the antenna are usually quite complex and can vary with distance from the antenna in various ways.


title: Near and far field

text: However, in many practical applications, one is interested only in effects where the distance from the antenna to the observer is very much greater than the largest dimension of the transmitting antenna. The equations describing the fields created about the antenna can be simplified by assuming a large separation and dropping all terms that provide only minor contributions to the final field. These simplified distributions have been termed the "far field" and usually have the property that the angular distribution of energy does not change with distance, although the energy levels still vary with distance and time. Such an angular energy distribution is usually termed an [[antenna pattern]].


title: Near and far field

text: Note that, by the principle of [[reciprocity (electromagnetism)|reciprocity]], the pattern observed when a particular antenna is transmitting is identical to the pattern measured when the same antenna is used for reception. Typically one finds simple relations describing the antenna far-field patterns, often involving trigonometric functions or at worst [[Fourier transform|Fourier]] or [[Hankel transform]] relationships between the antenna current distributions and the observed far-field patterns. While far-field simplifications are very useful in engineering calculations, this does not mean the near-field functions cannot be calculated, especially using modern computer techniques. An examination of how the near fields form about an antenna structure can give great insight into the operations of such devices.


title: Near and far field

text: The electromagnetic field in the far-field region of an antenna is independent of the details of the near field and the nature of the antenna. The wave impedance is the ratio of the strength of the electric and magnetic fields, which in the far field are in phase with each other. Thus, the far field "[[impedance of free space]]" is resistive and is given by:


title: Near and far field

text: With the usual approximation for the [[speed of light]] in free space m"/"s, this gives the frequently used expression:


title: Near and far field

text: The electromagnetic field in the near-field region of an electrically small coil antenna is predominantly magnetic. For small values of the impedance of a magnetic loop is low and inductive, at short range being asymptotic to:


title: Near and far field

text: The electromagnetic field in the near-field region of an electrically short rod antenna is predominantly electric. For small values of the impedance is high and capacitive, at short range being asymptotic to:


title: Near and far field

text: In both cases, the wave impedance converges on that of [[free space]] as the range approaches the far field.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Norman Beresford Tebbit, Baron Tebbit (born 29 March 1931) is a British politician. A member of the Conservative Party, he served in the Cabinet from 1981 to 1987 as Secretary of State for Employment (1981–1983), Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (1983–1985), and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Chairman of the Conservative Party (1985–1987). He was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1970 to 1992, representing the constituencies of Epping (1970–1974) and Chingford (1974–1992).


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In 1984, Tebbit was injured in the Provisional Irish Republican Army's bombing of the Grand Hotel in Brighton, where he was staying during the Conservative Party Conference. His wife Margaret was left permanently disabled after the explosion. He left the cabinet after the 1987 general election to care for his wife.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit considered standing for the Conservative leadership following Margaret Thatcher's resignation in 1990, but came to the decision not to stand as he had earlier made a commitment to his wife to retire from front-line politics. He did not stand for re-election as MP for Chingford in 1992, and was given a life peerage to sit in the House of Lords as Baron Tebbit, of Chingford. He retired from the House on 31 March 2022.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Born in Ponders End, Middlesex, to working-class parents Leonard and Edith Tebbit, he went to Edmonton County Grammar School, which was then an academically selective state school in north London.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: At the age of 16, Tebbit got a job with the "Financial Times" and had to join NATSOPA. Disliking rules that caused members who criticized union officials to be fined or expelled (and thus lose their jobs), he recalled vowing to "break the power of the closed shop".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In November 1950, Tebbit was commissioned into the Royal Air Force for national service in the rank of pilot officer. He was promoted to flying officer in April 1952. During his time in the RAF Tebbit flew Meteor and Vampire jets. In July 1954, at RAF Waterbeach near Cambridge, he had to escape from a burning Meteor 8 by breaking open the canopy, unknowingly fracturing two of his vertebrae in the accident.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: On leaving the RAF, he joined BOAC in 1953 as a navigator and pilot, while initially continuing to fly in the Royal Auxiliary Air Force with 604 (County of Middlesex) Squadron at North Weald in Essex. Of his airline navigation training, he later said: "In those days it was a considerable academic syllabus. You had to be up to speed on spherical trigonometry to get through it".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: During his time at BOAC, he was an official in the British Air Line Pilots' Association. He flew Avro Yorks, Argonauts, Britannias, DC7Cs and the Boeing 707.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit was elected as MP for Epping in 1970 and then for Chingford in February 1974. He is recorded as an MP member of the Conservative Monday Club in 1970.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit's first intervention as an MP was to ask a question of the then Minister at the Board of Trade, Frederick Corfield, on 6 July 1970. His question was on the subject of a crash of a Comet-4 aircraft in Spain on 3 July, which killed all the 112 people on board at the time.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In 1975, six men (the 'Ferrybridge Six') were dismissed from their jobs because of the introduction of a closed shop and were denied unemployment benefit. The Secretary of State for Employment, Michael Foot, commented: "A person who declines to fall in with new conditions of employment which result from a collective agreement may well be considered to have brought about his own dismissal". Tebbit accused Foot of "pure undiluted fascism" and affirmed that this "left Mr Foot exposed as a bitter opponent of freedom and liberty". The next day (2 December) "The Times" first leader —titled ""—quoted Tebbit and went on:


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Mr Foot's doctrine is intolerable because it is a violation of the liberty of the ordinary man in his job. Mr Tebbit is therefore using fascism in a legitimate descriptive sense when he accuses Mr. Foot of it. We perhaps need to revive the phrase "social fascism" to describe the modern British development of the corporate state and its bureaucratic attack on personal liberty. The question is not therefore: "is Mr. Foot a fascist?" but "does Mr. Foot know he is a fascist?"


title: Norman Tebbit

text: During the Grunwick dispute, when workers went on strike over pay and working conditions, the owner George Ward refused to recognise their trade union, and there was a split in the Conservative Shadow Cabinet between the conciliatory approach of Jim Prior, the Shadow Employment Secretary, and Keith Joseph. Tebbit involved himself in that dispute by making a controversial speech on 12 September 1977, in which he said:


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Inside Britain there is a ... threat from the Marxist collectivist totalitarians. ... Just to state that fact is to be accused of 'union-bashing'. ... Such people are to be found in the Conservative, Liberal and Labour Parties. Their politics may be different but such people share the morality of Laval and Pétain ... they are willing not only to tolerate evil, but to excuse it. ... Both Jim Prior and Keith Joseph know that George Ward and Grunwick are not perfect, nor was Czechoslovakia perfect in 1938. But if Ward and Grunwick are destroyed by the red fascists, then, as in 1938, we will have to ask, whose turn is it next? Yes, it is like 1938. We can all see the evil, but the doctrine of appeasement is still to be heard.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit was accused of comparing Prior to Laval and at that year's Conservative Party conference, he attempted to avoid personalising the issue, and openly splitting the party, without retracting what he had said. Tebbit said of these differences: "I'm a hawk—but no kamikaze. And Jim's a dove—but he's not chicken".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: During a debate in Parliament on 2 March 1978, Michael Foot labelled Tebbit a "semi-house-trained polecat" in response to a question from Tebbit asking if he accepted that the legislation being proposed that made it compulsory for people to join a Trade Union was an act of Fascism. When he was made Lord Tebbit in 1992, he chose a polecat as one of the symbols on his coat of arms. Later, in the debate Tebbit asked Foot whether he would "put a bridle on his foul-mouthed tongue".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: After the Conservative Party regained power after the general election of 1979, Tebbit was appointed Under-Secretary at the Ministry of Trade.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In the September 1981 Cabinet reshuffle, Thatcher appointed Tebbit as Employment Secretary. This was seen as a shift to a 'tougher' approach to the trade unions than had been the case under Tebbit's predecessor, James Prior. Tebbit introduced the Employment Act 1982 which raised the level of compensation for those unfairly dismissed from a closed shop and prohibited closed shops unless 80% of relevant workers approved the arrangement in periodic ballots. It also removed trade unions' immunity from liability in tort – i.e. made trade unions liable for civil damages if they committed unlawful acts, and made injunctions possible against such acts. In his memoirs Tebbit said that the 1982 Act was his "greatest achievement in Government".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In March 2021 Tebbit was reported by "The Times" to have said, during a Zoom meeting, that Special Branch had regularly spied on union leaders while he was employment secretary.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In the aftermath of the 1981 riots in Handsworth and Brixton, Tebbit responded to a suggestion by the Young Conservative National chairman, Iain Picton that rioting was the natural reaction to unemployment:


title: Norman Tebbit

text: I grew up in the '30s with an unemployed father. He didn't riot. He got on his bike and looked for work, and he kept looking till he found it.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: As a result, Tebbit is often misquoted as having directly told the unemployed to "get on your bike", and he was popularly referred to as "Onyerbike" for some considerable time afterwards.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: The former Conservative Prime Minister Harold Macmillan once remarked of Tebbit: "Heard a chap on the radio this morning talking with a cockney accent. They tell me he is one of Her Majesty's ministers". Peter Dorey of Cardiff University wrote that "it was Norman Tebbit... who was perhaps the public face or voice of Essex Man, and articulated his views and prejudices".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: The Nuffield study of the 1983 general election found that Tebbit was the second most prominent Conservative on radio and television news broadcasts during the campaign with 81 appearances (after Thatcher's 331 appearances).


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In the post-election October 1983 reshuffle, Tebbit was moved from Employment to become Trade and Industry Secretary, replacing Cecil Parkinson, who had resigned. Thatcher had actually wanted Tebbit to become Home Secretary, but William Whitelaw vetoed this.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit was injured in the IRA's bombing of the Grand Hotel, Brighton during the 1984 Conservative Party conference. His wife, Margaret, was permanently disabled.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In 1985, Tebbit was appointed Chairman of the Conservative Party and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, as Thatcher wanted to keep him in the Cabinet. During the Westland affair Tebbit was against the Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation taking over Westland Aircraft. In 1986, Tebbit opposed the American bombing raid on Libya from British bases and objected to Thatcher's refusal to consult the Cabinet fully on the matter. However, he did criticise the BBC for its supposedly biased reporting of the raid. During the same year, he disbanded the Federation of Conservative Students for publishing an article, penned by Harry Phibbs, following Nikolai Tolstoy's accusation that former Conservative Prime Minister Harold Macmillan was complicit in the forced repatriation of Cossacks in the aftermath of the Second World War.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: On 13 April 1986, Tebbit and his chief of staff Michael Dobbs visited Thatcher at Chequers to present her with the results of polling by Saatchi & Saatchi which found that with inflation down and the trade unions weakened, "the Prime Minister's combative virtues were being received as vices: her determination was perceived as stubbornness, her single-mindedness as inflexibility, and her strong will as an inability to listen". Tebbit and Dobbs told her this was becoming known as the "TBW factor": TBW standing for "That Bloody Woman". They recommended Thatcher take a lower profile in the forthcoming general election.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: A few weeks later, Tebbit gave an interview to John Mortimer for "The Spectator" where he said of Thatcher: It's a question of her leadership when our aims aren't clearly defined. When people understand what she's doing there's a good deal of admiration for her energy and resolution and persistence, even from those people who don't agree with her. Now there's a perception that we don't know where we're going so those same qualities don't seem so attractive. Thatcher disagreed and her biographer claims she was suspicious of Tebbit's motives. Furthermore, Thatcher commissioned the firm Young and Rubicam to carry out their own polling, which concluded that Thatcher's leadership was not the problem. Throughout the rest of 1986 and into the 1987 election, Thatcher continued to use Young and Rubicam, which eventually caused tensions with Tebbit during the election campaign.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: For quite a while, Tebbit was seen as Thatcher's natural successor as Party leader. During early 1986, when Thatcher's popularity declined in the polls, commentators began to suggest that the succession of the Conservative leadership would lie between Michael Heseltine and Tebbit.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: At the 1986 Conservative Party Conference in Bournemouth, Tebbit—along with Saatchi and Saatchi, Dobbs and the Conservatives' Director of Research, Robin Harris—came up with the next party slogan—'The Next Move Forward'. For the first time, the Conservatives employed pre-conference advertising to publicise the new-style conference. Tebbit persuaded Thatcher that ministers would state their objectives that they would achieve in the next three years; Saatchi & Saatchi would use these to design posters, leaflets, and brochures to be deployed as each minister finished their speech. The aim "was that in 1986 the media should reflect the image I wanted—of a Government confident, united, clear in where it was going—and determined to get there". According to Tebbit the conference "was more successful than I had dared to hope ... the opinion polls which had us 7% behind in June and still 5% down in September now put us back into first place—a position we never relinquished from then right through the election campaign. The Prime Minister's ratings were immediately restored".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: A MORI opinion poll in March 1987 saw Tebbit as second-favourite amongst voters as Thatcher's successor (Heseltine: 24% vs Tebbit: 15%); however, amongst Conservative voters, Tebbit was the front-runner with (Heseltine: 14% vs Tebbit: 21%). In October 1988, MORI asked the same question, with similar results (Heseltine: 22% vs Tebbit: 15%) and (Heseltine: 20% vs Tebbit: 26%) amongst Conservative voters. However, Thatcher apparently once told Rupert Murdoch: "I couldn't get him elected as leader of the Tory party even if I wanted – nor would the country elect him if he was".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: On 6 January 1987, the journalist Hugo Young published a quote attributed to Tebbit in "The Guardian" newspaper. Tebbit's chief of staff, Michael Dobbs, responded by writing a letter to the newspaper citing Young's dislike of Tebbit, adding "Perhaps this explains the invention of the quotation he [Mr Young] attributed to Mr Tebbit". The quote was "No-one with a conscience votes Conservative". Before this letter was published, however, the words "the invention of" had been removed. Despite publishing this letter "The Guardian" subsequently repeated the quote, and Young again attributed it to him in a letter to "The Spectator". Tebbit feared that if no action was taken against "The Guardian" the Labour Party would use this quote against the Conservatives in the forthcoming general election. With Thatcher's consent Tebbit threatened the newspaper with legal action if they did not retract the quotation and apologise to Tebbit. The case continued until 1988 when "The Guardian" apologised, published a retraction and paid £14,000 in libel damages in an out-of-court settlement.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: During the 1987 general election, Tebbit and Saatchi & Saatchi spearheaded the Conservative campaign, focusing on the economy and defence. However, when on 'Wobbly Thursday' it was rumoured a Marplan opinion poll showed a 2% Conservative lead, the 'exiles' camp of David Young, Tim Bell and the Young and Rubicam firm advocated a more aggressively anti-Labour message. This was when, according to Young's memoirs, Young got Tebbit by the lapels and shook him, shouting: "Norman, listen to me, we're about to lose this fucking election". In his memoirs, Tebbit defends the Conservative campaign: "We finished exactly as planned on the ground where Labour was weak and we were strong—defence, taxation, and the economy". During the election campaign, however, Tebbit and Thatcher argued. Tebbit had already informed Thatcher at the beginning of the campaign that he would leave the government after the election to care for his wife.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Thatcher said to her friend Woodrow Wyatt on the Sunday after polling day in 1987: "He'll carry the scar of that Brighton bombing all his life. I didn't want him to go. Whenever he is away from her he can't even attend to business properly. He's always ringing up to find out if the nurses are looking after his wife all right". In her memoirs, Thatcher said she "bitterly regretted" losing a like-minded person from the Cabinet.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: As Trade and Industry Secretary, Tebbit had privatised British Telecom in November 1984. He became a director of the company on 3 November 1987; this gave him an additional salary plus shares in the company.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In late 1987 and 1988, Tebbit formed a temporary alliance with Michael Heseltine in campaigning for the abolition of the Inner London Education Authority, which they succeeded in achieving through a backbench amendment.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit was also prominent in an unsuccessful Conservative backbench rebellion against a Bill to give 50,000 households (around 250,000 people) from Hong Kong British citizenship.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In April 1988, Tebbit caused much controversy when, in front of an audience of South African dignitaries, he accused critics of South African apartheid of cowardice and stinking hypocrisy. He said that, although black critics attacked apartheid in South Africa, they did not speak out against violence among black tribes in South Africa. Archbishop Desmond Tutu was visiting London at the time and called on Thatcher to repudiate the remarks; instead, she defended Tebbit.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In April 1990, he proposed the "Cricket test", also known as the "Tebbit Test", when he argued that whether people from ethnic minorities in Britain supported the England cricket team (rather than the team from their country of ancestry) should be considered a barometer—but not the sole indicator—of whether they are truly British: "A large proportion of Britain's Asian population fail to pass the cricket test. Which side do they cheer for? It's an interesting test. Are you still harking back to where you came from or where you are?"


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit told Woodrow Wyatt in 1991 that he did not think certain immigrant communities would assimilate "because some of them insist on sticking to their own culture, like the Muslims in Bradford and so forth, and they are extremely dangerous". In August 2005, after the 7 July 2005 London bombings, which were carried out by three young men of Pakistani descent and one of Jamaican descent, Tebbit claimed vindication for these views.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In a conversation with Woodrow Wyatt on 19 December 1988, Tebbit said he would not go back into politics unless Thatcher "was run over by the proverbial bus and he didn't like the look of the person he thought might get her job and destroy the work they've done". On another occasion (22 February 1990), Tebbit said to Wyatt that he would stand for the Conservative leadership if Thatcher suddenly resigned; but when Alec Douglas-Home suggested that Thatcher would not stand at the next election because she must be tired, Tebbit disagreed: "She has got amazing stamina".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Following Geoffrey Howe's resignation from the government in November 1990, Thatcher asked Tebbit to return to the Cabinet as Education Secretary, but he refused on the grounds that he was looking after his largely crippled wife. During the 1990 Conservative leadership election, Tebbit was on Thatcher's campaign team with the job of assessing her support amongst Conservative MPs. According to Thatcher's biographer John Campbell, Tebbit was "her most visible cheerleader...who characteristically took the fight to Heseltine by holding a cheeky press conference on his Belgravia doorstep". After the first ballot but before the results became known, Tebbit wanted Thatcher to make a clear commitment to fight the second ballot if her vote fell short of the amount needed to win outright. When Tebbit saw Thatcher on 21 November he told her she was the candidate with the best chance of beating Heseltine. However, Thatcher withdrew from the contest the next day. Tebbit wanted to stand, but never did. Tebbit subsequently switched his support to John Major.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: After Major came back from Maastricht with an opt-out from the Social Chapter and the single currency, Tebbit was one of the few MPs in the debate on 18 December 1991 to criticise the new powers the Community would acquire. He claimed the government had been on the defensive against "federalist follies" and that Maastricht had seen "a series of bridgeheads into our constitution, into the powers of this House, and into the lives of individuals and businesses".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit decided not to stand in the 1992 election, to devote more time to caring for his disabled wife. After the election he was granted a life peerage and entered the House of Lords, having been created Baron Tebbit, of Chingford in the London Borough of Waltham Forest, on 6 July 1992. His former seat of Chingford was aggregated in 1997 with Woodford Green in boundary changes and was held for the Conservative Party by his successor and protégé Iain Duncan Smith. Tebbit famously said: "If you think I'm right-wing, you should meet this guy".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: On 11 August 1992, Woodrow Wyatt noted in his diary: "[Thatcher] also seems to have formed a new alliance with Tebbit who stirs her up and talks a lot of nonsense [about the Treaty]."


title: Norman Tebbit

text: At the October 1992 Conservative Party Conference in Brighton, Tebbit embarrassed John Major's government when he made a speech attacking the Treaty. As he walked up onto the podium he was applauded by some sections of the audience, described as "young, in t-shirts, aggressively self-confident – the lager louts of our party" in the diary of the Conservative Party chairman of the time, Norman Fowler. Tebbit held aloft a copy of the Treaty and asked the conference a series of questions about the Treaty: did they want to see a single currency or be citizens of a European Union? The audience shouted back "No!" after each question. Tebbit received a tumultuous standing ovation and walked into the centre of the conference hall waving amongst the cheers. Gyles Brandreth, a Conservative whip, wrote in his diary:


title: Norman Tebbit

text: The talk of the town is Norman Tebbit's vulgar grand-standing barn-storming performance on Europe. He savaged Maastricht, poured scorn on monetary union, patronised the PM...and brought the conference (or a good part of it) to its feet roaring for more. He stood there, arms aloft, acknowledging the ovation, Norman the conqueror.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In his memoirs, Major accused Tebbit of hypocrisy and disloyalty because Tebbit had encouraged Conservative MPs to vote for the Single European Act in 1986 but was now campaigning for Maastricht's rejection.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In March 2007, Tebbit became patron of the cross-party Better Off Out campaign, which advocated British withdrawal from the EU. Tebbit issued a statement explaining his support:


title: Norman Tebbit

text: From being a supporter of British membership of the Common Market in 1970 I have come to believe that the United Kingdom would be Better Off Out of the developing European Republic of the 21st century. We British have a thousand year history of self-government. We have been free and democratic longer than any other nation. The European Union is too diverse, too bureaucratic, too corporatist and too centralist to be a functioning democracy. We are happy to trade with our European friends and the rest of the world – but we would prefer to govern ourselves.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit privately said of John Major on 17 November 1994: "He has the mulishness of a weak man with stupidity". When asked what would it take for him to support Major, Tebbit responded: "Have an entirely new department, the sole job of which would be to deal with the Brussels machinery in every aspect. I agree that we don't want to leave the EU, but we've got to manipulate it and block every single advance we don't like. No, no, no must be his weapon. Veto everything he disapproves of or that we disapprove of".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In 1995, Tebbit publicly backed John Redwood's bid for the Conservative Party leadership, praising his "brains, courage and humour".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In an interview for the "New Statesman" magazine in June 2000, Tebbit praised Hague's right-ward shift and said that he had "never been a [Michael] Portillo fan". He also mused on not standing for the Conservative leadership after Thatcher's resignation: "When I look at what happened to the party, I tell myself that perhaps I failed in a duty. I suppose I am one of those who have it on my conscience that I allowed Mr Blair to become Prime Minister". When asked if he regretted also allowing Major to become Prime Minister, Tebbit responded:


title: Norman Tebbit

text: I helped him. If I'd opposed him, he wouldn't have been on the radar screen. I'd have been opposing Michael Heseltine. I had to make the decision quickly. I didn't want to go back on my word to my wife that I'd retired from front-line politics. How would it all work? Was No 10 suitable for someone in a wheelchair? All these things go through one's mind. Then if Michael had won...he would have had to ask me to join his government, and I didn't want that. I asked myself: why am I risking all this? And I made my decision...I might have been an absolute disaster in the job. It's possible. So I am left there. You can't rewrite it. You can't rerun it.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In August 2002, Tebbit called on the then leader of the Conservatives, Iain Duncan Smith, to "clear out" Conservative Central Office of "squabbling children" who were involved with infighting within the Party. He named Mark MacGregor, a former leader of the Federation of Conservative Students which Tebbit disbanded for "loony Right libertarian politics", as one of them. Then, in October the same year, Tebbit accused a group of Conservative "modernisers" called "The Movement" of trying to get him expelled from the Party. Tebbit said that The Movement consisted of a "loose" grouping of thirteen members who had previously supported Kenneth Clarke and Michael Portillo for Party leader. Duncan Smith subsequently denied that Tebbit would ever be expelled and Thatcher publicly said she was "appalled" at attempts to have Tebbit expelled and telephoned him to say that she was "four square behind him".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In February 2003, Tebbit gave a speech to an audience of the Chartered Institute of Journalists at London's Reform Club in Pall Mall, urging journalists to reject political correctness in favour of "open, honest and vigorous debate". He blamed "timid" politicians, including members of his own party, for allowing PC language and ideas to take hold in Britain by default.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: On 30 January 2006, he accused the Conservative Party of abandoning the party's true supporters on the Right, and opposed the new Leader David Cameron's attempts "to reposition the party on the 'Left of the middle ground'".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In an interview with "The Times" in September 2007, Tebbit said the Conservatives lack somebody of the standing of Thatcher, and said that although it did not matter if Cameron's team were educated at Eton, "what a lot of people will suggest is that they don't know how the other half lives. David and his colleagues – the very clever young men they have in Central Office these days – are very intellectually clever, but they have no experience of the world whatsoever. He has spent much of his time in the Conservative Party and as a public relations guy. Well, it's not the experience of most people in the streets. That's the real attack and that's damaging to him, I think".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In February 2008, after a magazine article written by shadow education secretary Michael Gove, Tebbit publicly criticised what he characterised as "the poisonous tree of Blairism", which he said had been "planted" in the Conservative Party front bench.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit is the vice-president of the Conservative Way Forward group. He continued his criticism of the Conservative Party's move to a more "centre-right" position by stating that their abandonment of the traditional right vote has created a political vacuum, contributing to the rise of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), including two MP defections, both from the Conservatives.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit retired from the House of Lords on 31 March 2022, under provision in the House of Lords Reform Act 2014.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Speaking in the Lords on 26 November 1996, Lord Tebbit criticised aid to Africa, saying that most aid sent to Africa goes down a "sink of iniquity, corruption and violence" and does little to help the poor. A spokesman for the charity Oxfam said Tebbit's view was "simplistic and unhelpful". Later Lord Tebbit defended his statement that most money went "into the pockets" of politicians "to buy guns for warlords".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In a letter to "The Daily Telegraph" in November 1998, Tebbit said homosexuals should be barred from being Home Secretary. A Conservative Party spokesman said Tebbit was "out of touch" and the official spokesman for William Hague, then Conservative Party leader, said Hague disagreed with Tebbit. In 2013, he wrote in his "Telegraph" blog that his views concerning whether a homosexual person could be Home Secretary had changed.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In 2004, he opposed the British Government's Civil Partnership Act 2004. In an interview for "The Big Issue" in May 2013, Lord Tebbit said that the coalition government's determination to pass the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill had alienated grassroots Tories. He also speculated that it could mean that a lesbian queen could give birth to a future monarch by artificial insemination, and that the legislation might allow him to marry his own son to escape inheritance tax.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In 2018, Tebbit said that he would not attend services at St Edmundsbury Cathedral conducted by new dean Joe Hawes, because of Hawes' civil partnership with another clergyman. Tebbit described Hawes as a "sodomite". Hawes said that he felt "absolutely no ill will" towards Tebbit for his comments and stated: "I have always admired the way in which Lord Tebbit has cared for his wife with such devotion following the Brighton bomb."


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In October 1999, he spoke out against the plans to abolish the Royal Ulster Constabulary. Tebbit said he was against throwing the Constabulary's name and badge "into the modernisation trash can" and that the RUC had been "the thin green line standing between bloody anarchy and the rule of law". Tebbit also mocked Blair's pledge at the Labour conference to "set people free": "He has set them free. More than 250 terrorists, bombers and extortionists. Kneecappers, kidnappers, arsonists and killers have been set free. But their victims remain imprisoned. Some are imprisoned within broken bodies. Some imprisoned in grief for their loved ones. Some imprisoned by death in their graves".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In an article for "The Spectator" in May 2001 Tebbit said that retired British security service agents from the Foreign Office had infiltrated James Goldsmith's Referendum Party in the 1990s and then later infiltrated UKIP. Tebbit called for an independent enquiry into the matter.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Those mining communities had good working class values and a sense of family values. The men did real men's heavy work going down the pit. There were also some very close-knit communities which were able to deal with the few troublesome kids. If they had any problems they would take the kid round the back and give them a good clip round the ear and that would be the end of that. Many of these communities were completely devastated, with people out of work turning to drugs and no real man's work because all the jobs had gone. There is no doubt that this led to a breakdown in these communities with families breaking up and youths going out of control. The scale of the closures went too far. The damage done to those communities was enormous as a result of the strike.


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In June 2014, in response to an alleged Islamist plot to infiltrate schools in Birmingham, Tebbit wrote in "The Daily Telegraph", "No one should have been surprised at what was going on in schools in Birmingham. It is precisely what I was talking about over 20 years ago and Enoch Powell was warning against long before that. We have imported far too many immigrants who have come here not to live in our society, but to replicate here the society of their homelands."


title: Norman Tebbit

text: In 2017, Lord Tebbit criticised a Lords amendment to the Brexit bill which would guarantee the rights of EU citizens to live and work within the UK after Brexit. He also criticised the Lords for "thinking of nothing but the rights of foreigners" and "[looking] after the foreigners and not the British", as Theresa May had hoped to leave this amendment out of the bill to secure the rights of British citizens living in EU countries post-Brexit. His comments produced "loud gasps" from the majority of peers (but gained audible support by a number on the Conservative benches), adding that "Of course we don't have the power to look after our citizens overseas, not in these days when we don't have many gunboats".


title: Norman Tebbit

text: Tebbit currently lives in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk. He is an agnostic. He remarked tongue-in-cheek in a March 2011 interview, when asked whether he thinks God exists, "I'm not sure. He ought to. Things would work better." He has two sons and a daughter. He has been described as a 'keen amateur chef', and has published a book on cooking game.