title: Syndrome

text: There is no set common convention for the naming of newly identified syndromes. In the past, syndromes were often named after the physician or scientist who identified and described the condition in an initial publication. These are referred to as "eponymous syndromes". In some cases, diseases are named after the patient who initially presents with symptoms, or their home town (Stockholm syndrome). There have been isolated cases of patients being eager to have their syndromes named after them, while their physicians are hesitant. When a syndrome is named after a person, there is some difference of opinion as to whether it should take the possessive form or not (e.g. Down syndrome vs. Down's syndrome). North American usage has tended to favor the non-possessive form, while European references often use the possessive. Even in Europe, there has been a trend away from the possessive form, over the period between 1970 and 2008.


title: Syndrome

text: Avicenna, in "The Canon of Medicine" (published 1025), pioneered the idea of a syndrome in the diagnosis of specific diseases. The concept of a medical syndrome was further developed in the 17th century by Thomas Sydenham.


title: Syndrome

text: Even in syndromes with no known etiology, the presence of the associated symptoms with a statistically improbable correlation normally leads the researchers to hypothesize that there exists an unknown underlying cause for all the described symptoms.


title: Slider (sandwich)

text: A slider is an American term for a small sandwich, typically around 2 inches (5 cm) across, made with a bun. Sliders can be served as hors d'oeuvres, snacks, or entrées. They have since become a popular game day appetizer in the United States.


title: Slider (sandwich)

text: "Slider" is believed to have been first used to describe the onion-steamed small burgers at White Castle restaurants. The term has since been picked up by other restaurants, usually to describe a small hamburger, but sometimes used to describe any small sandwich made with a slider bun. White Castle later trademarked the spelling variant "Slyder" and used it between 1985 and 2009.


title: Slider (sandwich)

text: The etymology of the term "slider" is uncertain. Food historian George Motz has cited two competing origin stories for the term: There are two stories about the history of the word 'slider,' both from White Castle. One is that they’re so small they slide down your throat—that’s the obvious choice. The other choice, which I like better, is that in the old days, White Castle was sort of like a show. You’d walk in and there would be two or three men behind the counter in white paper caps and clean white aprons on. They’d greet you when you came in, it was sort of a fun, happy environment. And if you were sitting at the counter, they would make your burger – everything was served on porcelain – and they would slide the burger down the counter to you. That’s how they became known as sliders. White Castle likes both stories; they haven’t picked a favorite.


title: Vaikuntha

text: Vaikuntha (), also called Vishnuloka (), and Tirunatu (Tirunāṭu) in Tamil, is the abode of Vishnu, the supreme deity in the Vaishnava tradition of Hinduism, and his consort, Lakshmi, the supreme goddess.


title: Vaikuntha

text: According to Ramanuja, Vaikuntha is the "Parama Padam" or "Nitya Vibhuti," an "eternal heavenly realm", and is the "divine imperishable world that is God's abode". In Vaishnava literature, Vaikuntha is described as the highest realm above the fourteen "lokas" (worlds), where the devotees of Vishnu go upon achieving liberation. It is guarded by the twin deities, Jaya and Vijaya, the gatekeepers of Vaikuntha. The army of Vishnu, stationed at Vaikuntha, is led by Vishvaksena. The planets of Vaikuntha are described to be full of golden palaces and hanging gardens that grow fragrant fruits and flowers.


title: Vaikuntha

text: The planets of Vaikuntha begin 26,200,000 yojanas (209,600,000 miles) above Satyaloka. In most of the extant Puranas and Vaishnava traditions, Vaikuntha is located in the direction of the "Makara Rashi," which coincides with the constellation of the Capricorn. One version of the cosmology states that Vishnu's eye is present at the south celestial pole, from where he watches the cosmos.


title: Vaikuntha

text: The Vedas do not mention Vaikuntha, but a verse in the "Rigveda" mentions Vishnu's feet as a potential abode:


title: Vaikuntha

text: Vaikuntha and its characteristics are described in the Bhagavata Purana, a revered text in Vaishnavism, which was composed between the eighth and the tenth century CE, and maybe as early as the 6th century CE.


title: Vaikuntha

text: Edwin Bryant, in his book from 2003, comments about the verses describing Vaikuntha in the text of Bhagavata Purana:


title: Vaikuntha

text: In the work of Nammalvar, Vaikuntha is referred to as "Tirunatu" (sacred land) in the Tamil literary tradition. In Sri Vaishnava tradition, this abode is listed as the one hundred and eighth, and the last of the Divya Desams, the divine realms of Vishnu on earth and beyond. The verses of the Tiruvaymoli describe this abode as the following:


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: TRG, also known as Tiny Raskal Gang or Raskals, is a mainly ethnically Cambodian gang based in Eastside Long Beach, California. In the 1990s we began to see Mexican Mafia "green light" or hit lists with the TRG gang featured at the top. Soon all Southern Hispanic or Sureño gangs were at war with the Tiny Rascal Gang. The Mexican Mafia ordered West Side Longo to put aside its rivalry with East Side and support their former rivals against TRG and the black gang.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: The gang was founded by Cambodian juvenile youth groups in 1981. With both male and female members, the initial function of the gang was to protect Cambodians from various other gangs in Long Beach.As time passed, however, membership would open to other Asian Americans.The Tiny Raskals has over 65,000 active members, making them the largest Asian gang in the United States. Members of the Tiny Raskal Gang from the Long Beach area have been deported. As an outcome of these deportations, members of TRG have recruited in their ethnic home of Cambodia. Today the Long Beach Tiny Raskals in Long Beach consist of Asians, Cambodians, Filipinos, Latinos and African Americans. TRG is an established network of individual "sets" or local gangs. The members identify gray as their gang's color of distinction although color association with gangs is a custom and practice that has waned. Cambodians form the majority of their members and are the foundation of the gang,although others are allowed membership.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: The United States began admitting its first Cambodian refugees in 1979, and until 1991, nearly 158,000 Cambodians were admitted; most of whom were resettled in the states of California, Massachusetts, Virginia, and New York. As with many refugee groups, lack of knowledge concerning the culture and society of the host nation in addition to their limited command of the English language resulted in a socio-cultural barrier. Upon suffering from various issues individually or on a smaller scale, such as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, their socio-economic disadvantage and environmental setbacks contributed to their adversity in North America. Cambodian-American communities were largely underprivileged and deeply affected by poverty, among other things.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Action setting in the mid-1980s, a fight occurred between a Latino student and a Cambodian student in Long Beach, an event which led to the formation of the Tiny Rascals. As a means of protection, other Cambodian youths began to form street gangs which later laid the foundation of TRG. While conforming to their various cultural influences and Western society, many Cambodian youths began to understand their positions in society, most of whom had instead recognized their disadvantage, resulting in their gang epidemic in the 1990s. Original gang hand-signs, graffiti, fashion, and other practices were originated and constantly changing in the 1980s and 90s. Shortly after their collectivization, TRG began committing several crimes which included extortion, murder, kidnapping, robbery, burglary, home invasion, drugs and weapons trafficking. Some of the Tiny Rascal members were originally members of the Asian Boyz, a rival gang, and transferred gangs due to friction between other fellow Tiny Rascal members.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Feuding in the early 90s, members of the Tiny Rascals Gang had a violent rivalry with the Long Beach-based East Side Longos MUIE who were predominantly Hispanic. Similarly, while TRG and the Asian Boyz have bitter rivalries, peace and truces have been practiced between the two groups.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Activity of gang members such as Cambodians of other ethnic and cultural groups are known to have been recruited. There are over 65,000 members nationwide, based primarily on the West Coast, the Southwest and New England. In the 1990s, females were allowed to represent the gang and an all-female branch was formed as "LRG (Lady Rascal Gang)".


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: As with many other gangs, potential members must first be initiated in a "jump in" where they would have to fight other members of the gang or endure a beating for a specific amount of time. Newer recruits are allegedly required to commit a notable crime as a means to earn respect, whether it be murder, home invasion, drive-by shootings on rival gangs or enemies, or robbery. Respect and credibility within the gang revolved around a number of crimes individuals would commit either on behalf of or in favor of the gang. Their gang colors are grey and black. In contrast to their rivals, the Asian Boyz, their gangs are more ethnically exclusive and distinct, as most of their members are known to be Khmer.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Further, there is a presence of TRG members/sets within the US army as well. None can be found in the airforce or navy. There are also some TRG sets found within various prisons in the USA including South Carolina. It is important to note that because of the low percentage of Asian Americans in some prisons, all Asian gang members clique up to represent an Asian set regardless of their hood's historical rivalries with each other.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Although the Tiny Rascals are involved in a wide range of criminal activities which include extortion, robbery, burglary, auto theft, gang protection, and murder, which are some of the more publicized criminal activities. While young members of the gang are mostly involved in street crimes, some members have progressed towards serious organized criminal activities larger in scale. The older sets maintain a working relationship with similar sets of a fellow Southeast Asian gang called Asian Boyz. They have formed alliances with Chinese organizations such as the 14K, Wah Ching and Wo Hop To in California, and the New York City-based Ghost Shadows. Although in some cities such as Long Beach the claim EBK as there is not a gang that sees them as Allie's .


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In the late 1980s and early 1990s, several Rascals violently retaliated to the ongoing harassment of East Side Longos within California, especially Long Beach, and in the Seattle, Washington area. This sparked a deadly war of which resulted in over a hundred casualties suffered among both gangs.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Such cities such as Anchorage, Alaska and Portland, Oregon have had some recorded but less extravagant TRG presence, involved with gun and drug distribution. In smaller towns, in North Carolina, particularly Forest Oaks and Pleasant Garden, sets exist which include many non-Cambodian and non-Asian members. Car thefts and reports of gunfire originated from the gang.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In the late 1980s, A car load of TRG gang members pulled up to a car full of East Side Longo gangsters at Anaheim Street and Cherry Avenue in Eastside Long Beach. First the occupants of both cars traded insults and hand signs, and then TRG fired into the Longo car killing a 16-year-old Oswaldo Carbajal.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In 1994, five TRG gang members broke into a San Bernardino home and executed Son (Henry) Nguyen, 44; his wife, Trinh Yen Tran, 35; daughter, Doan Hoang, 15, and sons Daniel Nguyen, 11, and David Nguyen, 10. A 3-year-old son was shot but lived. The child was wounded and left alone overnight with the bodies of his parents and siblings. Henry was shot in the head and neck. One shot was fired with the gun's muzzle placed directly against his skull. He was also shot in the chest at close range while lying on the floor. Four superficial cuts on the back of his neck had been inflicted by a sharp object, like a knifepoint. Trinh was shot once in the thigh and twice in the head, at very close range. Two of her teeth were detached by the force of the bullets. The oldest child, Doan, was shot in the leg, chest, and head. Another bullet pierced a hand that she had held up to protect her face. Daniel was shot in the lower leg and chest. David was shot twice in the chest and once in the back of the head.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In 1994, seven TRG members broke into a house in Tustin resulting in the victim being killed, while her baby was home.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In 1994, TRG gang members raped, robbed and strangled a mother in her Tustin home. She survived by playing dead. Her 3-year-old son was home at the time.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: on July 27, 1995, TRG gang members broke into an apartment and killed Quyen Luu and her husband, Hung Dieu Le,47-year-old Hung Le died from a single gunshot to the chest. The second victim, 73-year-old Nghiep Le, was shot in the arm and directly in the face, with the bullet entering through the upper lip.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In 1995, TRG gang members broke into a house and Spokane police responded around 7:30 the next morning to find the bodies of 27-year-old Johnny Hagan, Jr., and 23-year-old Thi Hong Nga Pham. Pham's hands were tied with phone cord, and speaker wire was wrapped around her neck. She was shot in the head, face, and chest. The face and the chest shots came from close range. Pham's jaw was broken in two places; she had also been cut several times in the face and neck. A wedding ring and engagement ring were found inside her mouth. Hagan had also been bound with phone cord and speaker wire. He was shot in the ear, at the base of the skull, and through the back of the head. Two shots  were fired from only an inch or two away. Hagan had bruising and a cut across the front of his neck wedding ring and engagement ring were found inside her mouth. Hagan had also been bound with phone cord and speaker wire. He was shot in the ear, at the base of the skull, and through the back of the head. Two shots  were fired from only an inch or two away. Hagan had bruising and a cut across the front of his neck. Officers found a bloody knife on a counter and several shell casings from a .45-caliber automatic near the bodies. Police interviewed one of the survivors, four-and-a-half-year-old Joe Hagan, Jr.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: On August 6, 1995, TRG defendant gave Evans a gun and followed two men in a red Toyota who they believed were members of the Oriental Boyz, an enemy gang. The driver, later identified as Bunlort Bun, let the passenger out and sped away. Defendant gave chase while Pan and Evans took turns shooting at the car until it swerved to a stop. Defendant pulled up next to the car. Bun was shot five times, with three fatal wounds to the chest and abdomen. The downward trajectory of the bullets was consistent with shots fired into a slumped-over body.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: On August 8, 1995, two days after Buns shooting and the day before elm street shootings TRG gang members saw a man in a white pickup truck, defendant made a U-turn, drove at the truck, and pulled a gun. Pan told the women to duck. The truck's driver left the scene. The passenger, Miguel Avina Vargas, died of massive internal bleeding from a bullet to the heart. Ten cartridge casings were recovered from the area.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Although, the Californian expect gang identifier (Mikkeller Prince) changed laws and impacted Tiny Rascal Gang members as well. Basically, if police can identify a person as a gang member, that person can be arrested. This was seen in Sacramento when a member of a set was arrested after police found out he was in the gang, later he would be charged with more. Sacramento also houses at least 100 members and drug dealing appears to be its main source of income.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In 2007, one of the Sacramento sets killed a police officer. Detective Nguyen had been shot three times—in the neck, in the abdomen, and in the lower back. All three injuries were potentially fatal. Nguyen's finger was on the trigger of his gun, but the gun had not been fired. The TRG member was 16 when he did it, defendant repeatedly claimed "That cop deserved it." There was evidence that defendant had stated to a police officer in March 2007 that he was TRG "for life."A lay witness opined that TRG had a "strong–ass hatred over officers" and that TRG saw this attitude "as part of the gang life."


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Difference between the two gang rivalry between Asian Boyz and Tiny Rascal Gang had involved innocent people, including the accidental shooting of a pregnant woman in 2006 in Fresno.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In 2012, TRG members in Oakland fatally shot 18-year-old Hiroshi Kai in a drive-by shooting. Police took over 30 minutes to arrive, and Hiroshi was found dead at the scene along with his younger sister who made a call for EMS.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In 2016, six people, including four of the gang's members, were rounded up in a multi-county raid in connection with the late-night killing of 16-year-old Juan Carlos Rodriguez. Connected to a tagging crew in Tustin. Rodriguez, shot in the back, died after being shot during a shower of bullets that rained down outside a house party. His killer, according to Tustin police, is a member of TRG.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: in 2019, twelve TRG gang members were connected to a mass shooting at a pre-Halloween party in Eastside Long Beach that left three dead 25-year-old Maurice Poe Jr.,35-year-old Melvin Williams II, and 28-year-old Ricardo Torres. Nine were wounded, including Jasmine Johnson, who was hit by a bullet that shattered her T-3 vertebrae, leaving her paralyzed from the chest down, according to LBPD Sgt. Chris Valdez.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Altogether Tiny Rascal Gang also has a presence among the Cambodian-American communities of Lowell, Massachusetts. According to local police, several hundred TRG members have lived within the Lowell and Lynn areas historically, and are still extant within the region. The gang was connected to over five homicides and several assaults throughout Lowell and Lynn within 1998 and 2021.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In Providence, there are reports of a rivalry between the Surenos and TRG. There were reports of underage drinking by TRG members who had connections with the staff.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Among the Tiny Rascal Gang in Virginia have been connected to many crimes including property crimes, extortion, robberies, drug distribution, stabbings, assaults, shootings, and murder. Virginia, primarily in the Northern Virginia area adjacent to Washington, D.C., is home to approximately 5,000 to 8,000 Cambodians, many of whom live in Arlington, Fairfax County, Falls Church, and Richmond. There is also a community in Silver Spring, Maryland. Virginia now has what it says are the toughest gang laws in the nation, partly because of the violent actions of gangs such as the TRG. One of the first murders in the Virginia/Maryland area happened in 1996 at a South Arlington, Virginia apartment complex which left a teenage gang member dead.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In February 1998, a fatal drive-by shooting occurred near George C. Marshall High School, in which a 17-year-old boy was killed by a .22 rifle. The gunman, an 18-year-old TRG member, was sentenced to life imprisonment in August 1998. Two others TRG members, including a driver, were found guilty of felony assault for their roles in the attack, and received sentences of 20 years and 17 years. A third teenager was sentenced to 4 years in the Juvenile Detention Center for his role in the shooting.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Violence was reported in the Richmond area in 2009, which was a shooting into a house with no injuries.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Sentencing in all aforementioned cases ranged from 5 to 25 years incarceration, deportation, and life imprisonment.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Within Columbus there was a shooting on Christmas Day 2015 from a Tiny Rascal Gang member. The member appeared Caucasian yet the victim has an Asian name, so it is unclear the racial make-up of the Columbus sets. It is also unclear if the murder was gang-related.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Although, Tiny Rascal Gang has a presence within Salt Lake City with their main rivals being other Asian gangs such as Oriental Laotian Gang, Asian Deuce and Laos Boy Crips. They are also allies with Tiny Oriental Posse and Viet Family. Asian gangs in the area are considered to be very nomadic and not turf oriented. Utah's Asian gangs have been linked with violent crime and home invasions.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Amongst at least 500 gangs in the Fort Worth and Dallas Asian and Hispanic gangs remain the main ethnic gangs. Of Asian gangs in Texas the Tiny Rascal Gang and Asian Boyz remain the main national gangs. These gangs are known to facilitate a great deal of illegal activity, such as drug distribution, not only in their home turf (in metropolitan Dallas/Fort-Worth) but in suburban areas which are located at interstate points or major highways in the Dallas County and Tarrant County. Once they have run out of drug supplies they will return home to stock up. The product of this is that there are now some sets within the suburban areas.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Many TRG gang members can be found in Holland and are currently having a dispute with Latin Kingswhich led to an attempted murder of a Filipino TRG member in 2016. There is also a sub-set of TRG called TRG Jnrs. Much like many Mid-Western gangs, the Tiny Rascal Gang has alliances with the Folk Nation. Possibly explaining the turf war between Latin Kings.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: Police came as Tiny Rascal Gang to considered them as the largest Asian gangs in Philadelphia along with D-Block and Red Scorpions. In South Philadelphia TRG rivals with Red Scorpions, with shooting flaring up every few years. The two main sets of Philadelphia TRG include Sixth Street and Fifteenth Street. In 2005 Tiny Rascal gang got into a feud with D-Block which resulted in the murder of a female associate and a TRG member. The South Philadelphia sets are known to extort money and run prostitution rings. Something which is considered similar to Italian Organised Crime in Philadelphia. In 2000 an Asian Blood Gangmember was brutally robbed by four TRG members. All four members were convicted, as a result of the trial the Blood gang member was murdered shortly after


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In La Vegne a Nashville set of TRG did an armed robbery. The youth were all charged. Their presence according to TBI in 1999 suggests they have sets in Rutherford County and Davidson County.


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: In Bowling Green, Kentucky, the Asian Boyz and Tiny Rascal gang have presence. However the Cochran chapter of Tiny Rascal Gang have a main rivalry with the Asian Mafia. Also in Bowling Green circa 1997 there was a shooting of an Asian couple by Laotian Tiny Rascal Gang members during a home invasion resulting in a death. The gang calls new members 'Baby Rascals' and older members 'The G's'


title: Tiny Rascal Gang

text: "Rascal Love" and "Cambodian Son", have been about Tiny Rascal members. "Gangland" has also dedicated an episode to Tiny Rascal Gang sets in Fresno.


title: Tradescantia

text: Tradescantia () is a genus of 85 species of herbaceous perennial wildflowers in the family Commelinaceae, native to the Americas from southern Canada to northern Argentina, including the West Indies. Members of the genus are known by many common names, including inchplant, wandering jew, spiderwort, and dayflower.


title: Tradescantia

text: "Tradescantia" grow , and are commonly found individually or in clumps in wooded areas and open fields. They were introduced into Europe as ornamental plants in the 17th century and are now grown in many parts of the world. Some species have become naturalized in regions of Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia, and on some oceanic islands.


title: Tradescantia

text: The genus's many species are of interest to cytogenetics because of evolutionary changes in the structure and number of their chromosomes. They have also been used as bioindicators for the detection of environmental mutagens. Some species have become pests to cultivated crops and considered invasive.


title: Tradescantia

text: "Tradescantia" are herbaceous perennials and include both climbing and trailing species, reaching in height. The leaves are long, thin and blade-like to lanceolate, from . The flowers can be white, pink, purple or blue, with three petals and six yellow anthers (or rarely, four petals and eight anthers). The sap is mucilaginous and clear.


title: Tradescantia

text: A number of species have flowers that last for only a day, opening in the morning and closing by the evening.


title: Tradescantia

text: The scientific name of the genus chosen by Carl Linnaeus honours the English naturalists and explorers John Tradescant the Elder (c. 1570s – 1638) and John Tradescant the Younger (1608–1662), who introduced many new plants to English gardens. Tradescant the Younger mounted three expeditions to the new colony of Virginia. From there the type species, "Tradescantia virginiana", was brought to England in 1629.


title: Tradescantia

text: Plants of the genus are called by many common names, varying by region and country. The name "inchplant" is thought to describe the plant's fast growth, or the fact that leaves are an inch apart on the stem. "Spiderwort" refers to the sap which dries into web-like threads when a stem is cut. The name "dayflower", shared with other members of the Commelinaceae family, refers to the flowers which open and close within a single day.


title: Tradescantia

text: The controversial name "wandering Jew" originates from the Christian myth of the Wandering Jew, condemned to wander the earth for taunting Jesus on the way to his crucifixion. In recent years there have been efforts to stop using this and other potentially offensive common names, in favour of alternatives such as "wandering dude".


title: Tradescantia

text: In Spanish, "Tradescantia" plants are sometimes referred to as "flor de Santa Lucía" (Saint Lucy's flower), in reference to the Saint's reputation as the patron saint of sight, and the use of the juice of the plant as eye drops to relieve congestion.


title: Tradescantia

text: The number of species and infrageneric taxa has changed throughout history. The first major classification proposed by Hunt (1980) included 60 species divided into eight sections, with one section divided into a further four series. Hunt's 1986 revision united several small genera with "Tradescantia" as sections, resulting in a total of twelve sections comprising 68 species, and this infrageneric classification was accepted for several decades.


title: Tradescantia

text: A recent study by Pellegrini (2017) proposed a new classification based on recent morphological research, dividing the genus into five subgenera. The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew currently recognises 85 species.


title: Tradescantia

text: The first species described, the Virginia spiderwort, "T. virginiana", is native to the eastern United States from Maine to Alabama, and Canada in southern Ontario. Virginia spiderwort was introduced to Europe in 1629, where it is cultivated as a garden flower.


title: Tradescantia

text: The natural range of the genus as a whole spans nearly the entire length and width of mainland North America, from Canada through Mexico and Central America, and thrives in a great diversity of temperate and tropical habitats. It is frequently found in thinly wooded deciduous forests, plains, prairies, and healthy fields, often alongside other native wildflowers.


title: Tradescantia

text: The western spiderwort "T. occidentalis" is listed as an endangered species in Canada, where the northernmost populations of the species are found at a few sites in southern Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta; it is more common further south in the United States to Texas and Arizona.


title: Tradescantia

text: Spiderworts are popular in Europe and North America as ornamental plants. Temperate species are grown as garden plants while tropical species, such as "T. zebrina" and "T. spathacea", are used as house plants. Their popularity and easy spreading nature has led to some species being considered serious weeds in certain places (see below).


title: Tradescantia

text: Most cold-hardy garden plants belong to the Andersoniana Group (often referred to with the invalid name "Tradescantia" × "andersoniana"). This is a group of interspecific hybrids developed from "Tradescantia virginiana", "T. ohiensis", and "T. subaspera", which have overlapping ranges within continental North America. These plants are clump-forming herbaceous perennials, with individual cultivars mainly differing in flower colour. The cultivars in this group include 'Blue Stone', 'Isis', 'Innocence', 'Snowcap', 'Osprey', 'Iris Pritchard', 'Pauline', 'Red Cloud' and 'Karminglut' ('Carmine Glow'). 'Caerulea Plena' is a double-flowered variety with dark blue flowers. 'Concord Grape' (Andersoniana Group) has won the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.


title: Tradescantia

text: A wide range of tender tropical species are cultivated as houseplants or outdoor annuals, including "Tradescantia zebrina", "T. fluminensis", "T. spathacea", "T. sillamontana", and "T. pallida". They are typically grown for their foliage, and many have colourful variegated patterns of silver, purple, green, pink, and gold. Popular tropical cultivars include "T. zebrina" 'Silver Plus', "T. zebrina" 'Burgundy', "T. fluminensis" 'Lavender', "T. fluminensis" 'Variegata', "T. mundula" 'Laekenensis', "T. pallida" 'Purple Heart', "Tradescantia" 'Nanouk', and "Tradescantia" 'Pale Puma'. The species "Tradescantia zebrina", and the cultivars "Tradescantia" 'Quicksilver' and "Tradescantia pallida" 'Purpurea' have received the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.


title: Tradescantia

text: Due to its ready propagation from stem fragments and its domination of the ground layer in many forest environments, "T. fluminensis" has become a major environmental weed in Australia, New Zealand and the southern United States. Other species considered invasive weeds in certain places include "T. pallida", "T. spathacea", and "T. zebrina".


title: Tradescantia

text: Some members of the genus "Tradescantia" may cause allergic reactions in pets (especially cats and dogs) characterised by red, itchy skin. Notable culprits include "T. albiflora" (scurvy weed), "T. spathacea" (Moses in the cradle), and "T. pallida" (purple heart).


title: Tradescantia

text: Native Americans used "T. virginiana" to treat a number of conditions, including stomachache. It was also used as a food source. The cells of the stamen hairs of some "Tradescantia" are colored blue, but when exposed to sources of ionizing radiation such as gamma rays or pollutants like sulphur dioxide from industries, the cells mutate and change color to pink; they are one of the few tissues known to serve as an effective bioassay for ambient radiation levels.


title: Boidae

text: The Boidae, commonly known as boas or boids, are a family of nonvenomous snakes primarily found in the Americas, as well as Africa, Europe, Asia, and some Pacific Islands. Boas include some of the world's largest snakes, with the green anaconda of South America being the heaviest and second-longest snake known; in general, adults are medium to large in size, with females usually larger than the males. Five subfamilies, comprising 12 genera and 49 species, are currently recognized.


title: Boidae

text: The Old Tupi name for such snakes was mbói, which figures in the etymology of names such as "jibóia" and "boitatá" (the Brazilian name for the mythical giant anaconda).


title: Boidae

text: Like the pythons, boas have elongated supratemporal bones. The quadrate bones are also elongated, but not as much, while both are capable of moving freely so when they swing sideways to their maximum extent, the distance between the hinges of the lower jaw is greatly increased.


title: Boidae

text: Boids are, however, distinguished from the pythons in that none has postfrontal bones or premaxillary teeth, and that they give birth to live young. When labial pits are present, these are located between the scales as opposed to on them. Also, their geographical distributions are almost entirely mutually exclusive. In the few areas where they do coexist, the tendency is for them to occupy different habitats.


title: Boidae

text: Formerly, boas were said to be found in the New World and pythons in the Old World. While this is true of boine boas, other boid species are present in Africa, much of southern Eurasia, Madagascar, New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands, so this is not accurate. However, they seem more abundant in evolutionarily isolated areas. South America was isolated until a few million years ago, with a fauna that included marsupials and other distinctive mammals. With the formation of the Panamanian land bridge to North America about three million years ago, boines have migrated north as colubrids (and various Nearctic mammals) have migrated south, as part of the Great American Interchange.


title: Boidae

text: Most species are found in North, Central, and South America, as well as the Caribbean, while a few are found in southeastern Europe and Asia Minor, Northern, Central and East Africa, Madagascar, the Arabian Peninsula, Central and southwestern Asia, India and Sri Lanka, the Moluccas, and New Guinea through to Melanesia and Samoa.


title: Boidae

text: Prey is killed by constriction; after an animal has been grasped to restrain it, a number of coils are hastily wrapped around it. Then, by applying and maintaining sufficient pressure, the snake prevents its prey from inhaling, so that it eventually succumbs to asphyxiation. Recently, the pressures produced during constriction have been suggested as the cause of cardiac arrest by interfering with blood flow, but this hypothesis has not yet been confirmed.


title: Boidae

text: Larger specimens usually eat animals about the size of a house cat, but larger food items are not unknown: the diet of the common anaconda, "Eunectes murinus", is known to include subadult tapirs. Prey is swallowed whole, and may take several days or even weeks to fully digest. Despite their intimidating size and muscular power, they are generally not dangerous to humans.


title: Boidae

text: Contrary to popular belief, even the larger species do not crush their prey to death; in fact, prey is not even noticeably deformed before it is swallowed. The speed with which the coils are applied is impressive and the force they exert may be significant, but death is caused by suffocation, with the victim not being able to move its ribs to breathe while it is being constricted.


title: Boidae

text: Most species are ovoviviparous, with females giving birth to live young. This is in contrast to the pythons, which all lay eggs (oviparous).


title: Boidae

text: Pythons were historically classified as a subfamily of Boidae (called Pythoninae), but it was later determined that they are not closely related to boas despite having superficial similarities.


title: Boidae

text: Almost all of the non-boine boids are frequently elevated to their own full family: Calabariidae/inae, Candoiidae/inae, Erycidae/inae, Charininae, Ungaliophiidae/inae, Sanziniidae/inae, and Calabariidae/inae. The taxonomy of boid snakes has long been debated, and ultimately the decision whether to assign a particular clade to a particular Linnaean rank (such as a superfamily, family, or subfamily) is arbitrary.


title: Boidae

text: The subfamily Ungaliophiinae was formerly made up of four genera. Two of these ("Tropidophis" and "Trachyboa") are actually more closely related to red pipesnakes than to boas, and are now placed in the Tropidophiidae within the Amerophidia. The other two genera, "Ungaliophis" and "Exiliboa", are the sister group of the "Charina-Lichanura" clade, within Boidae.


title: Associative property

text: In mathematics, the associative property is a property of some binary operations, which means that rearranging the parentheses in an expression will not change the result. In propositional logic, associativity is a valid rule of replacement for expressions in logical proofs.


title: Associative property

text: Within an expression containing two or more occurrences in a row of the same associative operator, the order in which the operations are performed does not matter as long as the sequence of the operands is not changed. That is (after rewriting the expression with parentheses and in infix notation if necessary), rearranging the parentheses in such an expression will not change its value. Consider the following equations:


title: Associative property

text: Even though the parentheses were rearranged on each line, the values of the expressions were not altered. Since this holds true when performing addition and multiplication on any real numbers, it can be said that "addition and multiplication of real numbers are associative operations".


title: Associative property

text: Associativity is not the same as commutativity, which addresses whether the order of two operands affects the result. For example, the order does not matter in the multiplication of real numbers, that is, , so we say that the multiplication of real numbers is a commutative operation. However, operations such as function composition and matrix multiplication are associative, but (generally) not commutative.


title: Associative property

text: Associative operations are abundant in mathematics; in fact, many algebraic structures (such as semigroups and categories) explicitly require their binary operations to be associative.


title: Associative property

text: However, many important and interesting operations are non-associative; some examples include subtraction, exponentiation, and the vector cross product. In contrast to the theoretical properties of real numbers, the addition of floating point numbers in computer science is not associative, and the choice of how to associate an expression can have a significant effect on rounding error.


title: Associative property

text: Here, ∗ is used to replace the symbol of the operation, which may be any symbol, and even the absence of symbol (juxtaposition) as for multiplication.


title: Associative property

text: If a binary operation is associative, repeated application of the operation produces the same result regardless of how valid pairs of parentheses are inserted in the expression. This is called the generalized associative law. For instance, a product of four elements may be written, without changing the order of the factors, in five possible ways:


title: Associative property

text: If the product operation is associative, the generalized associative law says that all these expressions will yield the same result. So unless the expression with omitted parentheses already has a different meaning (see below), the parentheses can be considered unnecessary and "the" product can be written unambiguously as


title: Associative property

text: As the number of elements increases, the number of possible ways to insert parentheses grows quickly, but they remain unnecessary for disambiguation.


title: Associative property

text: An example where this does not work is the logical biconditional . It is associative; thus, is equivalent to , but most commonly means , which is not equivalent.


title: Associative property

text: In standard truth-functional propositional logic, "association", or "associativity" are two valid rules of replacement. The rules allow one to move parentheses in logical expressions in logical proofs. The rules (using logical connectives notation) are:


title: Associative property

text: "Associativity" is a property of some logical connectives of truth-functional propositional logic. The following logical equivalences demonstrate that associativity is a property of particular connectives. The following (and their converses, since is commutative) are truth-functional tautologies.


title: Associative property

text: A binary operation formula_8 on a set "S" that does not satisfy the associative law is called non-associative. Symbolically,


title: Associative property

text: Also although addition is associative for finite sums, it is not associative inside infinite sums (series). For example,


title: Associative property

text: Some non-associative operations are fundamental in mathematics. They appear often as the multiplication in structures called non-associative algebras, which have also an addition and a scalar multiplication. Examples are the octonions and Lie algebras. In Lie algebras, the multiplication satisfies Jacobi identity instead of the associative law; this allows abstracting the algebraic nature of infinitesimal transformations.


title: Associative property

text: Other examples are quasigroup, quasifield, non-associative ring, and commutative non-associative magmas.


title: Associative property

text: In mathematics, addition and multiplication of real numbers is associative. By contrast, in computer science, the addition and multiplication of floating point numbers is "not" associative, as rounding errors are introduced when dissimilar-sized values are joined together.


title: Associative property

text: Even though most computers compute with 24 or 53 bits of mantissa, this is an important source of rounding error, and approaches such as the Kahan summation algorithm are ways to minimise the errors. It can be especially problematic in parallel computing.


title: Associative property

text: In general, parentheses must be used to indicate the order of evaluation if a non-associative operation appears more than once in an expression (unless the notation specifies the order in another way, like formula_16). However, mathematicians agree on a particular order of evaluation for several common non-associative operations. This is simply a notational convention to avoid parentheses.


title: Associative property

text: A left-associative operation is a non-associative operation that is conventionally evaluated from left to right, i.e.,


title: Associative property

text: Both left-associative and right-associative operations occur. Left-associative operations include the following:


title: Associative property

text: Non-associative operations for which no conventional evaluation order is defined include the following.


title: Associative property

text: William Rowan Hamilton seems to have coined the term "associative property" around 1844, a time when he was contemplating the non-associative algebra of the octonions he had learned about from John T. Graves.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: Eleanor of Austria (15 November 1498 – 25 February 1558), also called Eleanor of Castile, was born an Archduchess of Austria and Infanta of Castile from the House of Habsburg, and subsequently became Queen consort of Portugal (1518–1521) and of France (1530–1547). She also held the Duchy of Touraine (1547–1558) in dower. She is called "Leonor" in Spanish and Portuguese and "Eléonore" or "Aliénor" in French.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: Eleanor was born in 1498 at Leuven, the eldest child of Philip of Austria and Joanna of Castile, who would later become co-sovereigns of Castile. Her father was also the son of the reigning Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I and his deceased consort Mary of Burgundy, while her mother was the daughter of the Catholic Monarchs; namely Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile. Her siblings were Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I, Queen Isabella of Denmark, Queen Mary of Hungary and Queen Catherine of Portugal. She was named after her paternal great-grandmother, Eleanor of Portugal, Holy Roman Empress. After the death of her father in September 1506 Eleanor was educated at her aunt's court in Mechelen.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: When she was a child, Eleanor's relatives tried to marry her to the future King of England, Henry VIII, to whom she was betrothed. However, when Henry's father died and he became King, Henry decided to marry Eleanor's aunt, Catherine of Aragon, who was the widow of King Henry's older brother, Arthur, Prince of Wales. Her relatives also tried to marry her to the French Kings Louis XII or Francis I or to the Polish King Sigismund I, but nothing came of these plans. Eleanor was also proposed as a marriage candidate for Antoine, Duke of Lorraine, in 1510.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: In 1517 Eleanor may have had a love affair with Frederick II, Elector Palatine. Her brother King Charles, who had succeeded their elderly grandfather King Ferdinand as King of Spain the year before, once discovered her reading a love letter from Frederick. Charles forced Eleanor and Frederick to swear in front of an attorney that they were not secretly married, after which he expelled Frederick from court. She followed her brother to Spain in 1517.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: Eleanor married her uncle by marriage, King Manuel I of Portugal, after a proposed marriage with her cousin, the future King John III of Portugal, did not occur. Her brother Charles arranged the marriage between Eleanor and the King of Portugal to avoid the possibility of Portuguese assistance for any rebellion in Castile. Manuel had previously been married to two of Eleanor's maternal aunts, Isabella of Aragon and Maria of Aragon.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: Manuel and Eleanor married on 16 July 1518. They had two children: the Infante Charles (born 18 February 1520 – died 15 April 1521) and the Infanta Maria (born 8 June 1521, and who was later one of the richest princesses of Europe). She became a widow on 13 December 1521, when Manuel died of the plague. As Queen Dowager of Portugal, Eleanor returned to the court of Charles in Spain. Eleanor's sister Catherine later married Eleanor's stepson, King John III of Portugal.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: In July 1523, Eleanor was engaged to Charles III, Duke of Bourbon, in an alliance between Charles and Bourbon against France, but the marriage never took place. In 1526, Eleanor was engaged to King Francis I of France during his captivity in Spain.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: The Treaty of Cambrai (1529; called "La Paz de las Damas" - "The Ladies' Peace") paused the conflict between Francis and Charles. It included the stipulation that the previously agreed upon marriage of Eleanor and Francis would take place.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: Eleanor left Spain in the company of her future stepsons, who had been held hostage by her brother. The group met Francis at the border, and then departed for an official entrance to Bordeaux. She was married to Francis on 4 July 1530. Eleanor was crowned Queen of France in Saint-Denis on 31 May 1531. She was dressed in purple velvet at her coronation. They had no children.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: Eleanor was ignored by Francis, who seldom performed his marital obligations and preferred his lover Anne de Pisseleu d'Heilly. At the official entrance of Eleanor to Paris, Francis displayed himself openly to the public in a window with Anne for two hours.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: Queen Eleanor performed as the queen of France at official occasions, such as the wedding between her stepson Henry and Catherine de' Medici in 1533. She also performed charity and was praised for this. She also took her stepdaughters, Madeleine and Margaret, into her household to raise them further.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: As queen, Eleanor had no political power; however, she served as a contact between France and Emperor Charles. Queen Eleanor was present at the peace negotiations between Francis and Charles in Aigues-Mortes in 1538. In 1544, she was given the task of entering peace negotiations with Charles and their sister Mary of Hungary. In November 1544, she visited Charles in Brussels.


title: Eleanor of Austria

text: As a queen dowager, Eleanor left France for Brussels in 1548. She witnessed the abdication of Charles in October 1555 and left for Spain with him and their sister Mary in August 1556. She lived with her sister in Jarandilla de la Vera, where they often visited their brother, who retired to a monastery nearby. In 1558, she met her daughter Maria in Badajoz for the first time in 28 years. Eleanor died in 1558 on the return trip from Badajoz.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Jack Allan Abramoff (; born February 28, 1959) is an American lobbyist, businessman, film producer, writer, and convicted felon. He was at the center of an extensive corruption investigation led by Earl Devaney that resulted in his conviction and 21 other people either pleading guilty or being found guilty, including White House officials J. Steven Griles and David Safavian, U.S. Representative Bob Ney, and nine other lobbyists and congressional aides.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff was College Republican National Committee National Chairman from 1981 to 1985, a founding member of the International Freedom Foundation, allegedly financed by apartheid South Africa, and served on the board of directors of the National Center for Public Policy Research, a conservative think tank. From 1994 to 2001 he was a top lobbyist for the firm of Preston Gates & Ellis, and then for Greenberg Traurig until March 2004.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: After a guilty plea in the Jack Abramoff Native American lobbying scandal and his dealings with SunCruz Casinos in January 2006, he was sentenced to six years in federal prison for mail fraud, conspiracy to bribe public officials, and tax evasion. He served 43 months before being released on December 3, 2010. After his release from prison, he wrote the autobiographical book "Capitol Punishment: The Hard Truth About Washington Corruption From America's Most Notorious Lobbyist" which was published in November 2011.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff's lobbying and the surrounding scandals and investigation are the subject of two 2010 films: the documentary "Casino Jack and the United States of Money", released in May 2010, and the feature film "Casino Jack", released on December 17, 2010, starring Kevin Spacey as Abramoff.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Jack Abramoff was born February 28, 1959, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. His parents were Jane (née Divac) and Franklin Abramoff, who was president of the Franchises unit of Diners Club credit card company.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff's family moved to Beverly Hills, California, when he was ten (in 1969). After seeing the film version of "Fiddler on the Roof" at age twelve, Abramoff decided to practice Orthodox Judaism. In California, Abramoff attended Beverly Hills High School. In high school, he played football and became a weight-lifting champion. Pulitzer prize-winning food critic Jonathan Gold, who was the same year at Beverly Hills High as Abramoff, recounted to the "Jewish Journal" a time when Abramoff pushed him and his cello down a flight of stairs.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: As an undergraduate at Brandeis University, Abramoff served as Chairman of the Massachusetts Alliance of College Republicans, which organized student volunteers for Ronald Reagan's 1980 presidential campaign. He graduated with a B.A. in English in 1981. He earned his Juris Doctor from the Georgetown University Law Center in 1986.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: According to Nina Easton, Abramoff gained much of his credibility in the conservative movement through his father, Franklin Abramoff. As president of Diners Club International, Abramoff's father worked closely with Alfred S. Bloomingdale, a personal friend of Reagan.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: After graduating from Brandeis, Abramoff ran for election as chairman of the College Republican National Committee (CRNC). After a campaign which cost over $11,000 and was managed by Grover Norquist, Abramoff won the election. His chief competitor, Amy Moritz was persuaded to drop out. (Later, as Amy Ridenour, she became a founding director of the National Center for Public Policy Research. She was treated to several trips funded by Jack Abramoff when he was working as a lobbyist.) Abramoff "changed the direction of the [college] committee and made it more activist and conservative than ever before", notes the CRNC. "It is not our job to seek peaceful coexistence with the Left", Abramoff was quoted as saying in the group's 1983 annual report. "Our job is to remove them from power permanently."


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Norquist served as executive director of the committee under Abramoff. He later recruited Ralph Reed, a former president of the University of Georgia College Republicans chapter, as an unpaid intern. According to Reed's book "Active Faith", Reed introduced Abramoff to Pamela Clarke Alexander, and they later married.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: At the CRNC, Abramoff developed political alliances with College Republican chapter presidents across the nation. Many would later hold key roles in state and national politics and business, and some would later interact with Abramoff in his role as a lobbyist. Some of those relationships were at the core of the federal investigation.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: At the CRNC, Abramoff, Norquist and Reed formed what was known as the "Abramoff-Norquist-Reed triumvirate". After Abramoff's election, the trio purged "dissidents" and re-wrote the CRNC's bylaws to consolidate their control over the organization. According to Easton's "Gang of Five", Reed was the "hatchet man" and "carried out Abramoff-Norquist orders with ruthless efficiency, not bothering to hide his fingerprints".


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In 1983, the CRNC passed a resolution condemning "deliberate planted propaganda by the KGB and Soviet proxy forces" against the government of South Africa, at a time when the country's government was under worldwide criticism for its apartheid regime.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In 1984, Abramoff and other College Republicans formed the "USA Foundation", a non-partisan tax-exempt organization which held two days of rallies on college campuses around the United States celebrating the first anniversary of the invasion of Grenada. In a letter to campus Republican leaders, Abramoff claimed:


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In 1985, Abramoff joined Citizens for America, a pro-Reagan group that helped Oliver North build support for the Nicaraguan Contras. Citizens for America staged an unprecedented meeting of anti-Communist rebel leaders known as the Democratic International in Jamba, Angola. This conference included leaders of the Mujahedeen from Afghanistan, UNITA from Angola, the Contras, and opposition groups from Laos. Out of this largely ceremonial conference came the International Freedom Foundation. Abramoff helped to organize, and also attended the conference.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff's membership ended on a sour note when Citizens for America's sponsor Lewis Lehrman, a former New York gubernatorial candidate, concluded that Abramoff had spent his money carelessly.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff spent 10 years in Hollywood. He developed (wrote the story) and produced, with his brother Robert, the 1989 film "Red Scorpion". The film ultimately cost $16 million (from an $8 million initial budget) and starred Dolph Lundgren playing the Spetsnaz-like Soviet commando Nikolai, sent by the USSR to assassinate an African revolutionary in a country similar to Angola. Nikolai sees the evil of the Soviets and changes sides, becoming a freedom fighter for the African side. Abramoff also executive-produced its 1994 sequel "Red Scorpion 2".


title: Jack Abramoff

text: The South African government financed the film via the International Freedom Foundation, a front-group chaired by Abramoff, as part of its efforts to undermine international sympathy for the African National Congress.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On April 27, 1998, Abramoff wrote a letter to the editor of "The Seattle Times" rebutting an article critical of him and his alleged role as effectively a Public Relations puppet of the then-apartheid South African military. Abramoff rebutted:


title: Jack Abramoff

text: The IFF was a conservative group which I headed. It was vigorously anti-Communist, but it was also actively anti-apartheid. In 1987, it was one of the first conservative groups to call for the release of Nelson Mandela, a position for which it was roundly criticized by other conservatives at the time. While I headed the IFF, we accepted funding only from private individuals and corporations and would have absolutely rejected any offer of South African military funding, or any other kind of funding from any government – good or evil.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: During this period in South Africa, Abramoff first met South African-born rabbi David Lapin, who would become his religious advisor. He also met Lapin's brother and fellow rabbi Daniel Lapin, who allegedly introduced Abramoff to Congressman Tom DeLay (R-TX) at a Washington, DC dinner shortly after the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994. Lapin later claimed that he did not recall making that introduction.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In December 1994, Abramoff was hired as a lobbyist at Preston Gates Ellis & Rouvelas Meeds LLP, the lobbying arm of the law firm "Preston Gates & Ellis LLP" based in Seattle, Washington. According to "The Seattle Times", following the Republican takeover of Congress in 1995, partner Emanuel Rouvelas determined that the firm "didn't have a conservative, Christian Coalition Republican with strong ties to the new Republican leadership". The traditionally Democratic-leaning firm hired Abramoff for the specific purpose of attaining these wanted ties. Abramoff was described in a press release as having close ties to Newt Gingrich and Dick Armey, the former the Republican Speaker of the House and the latter the Republican House Majority Leader.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: According to "The Seattle Times", Abramoff used Preston Gates & Ellis to access a higher pedigree of clientele.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In 1995, Abramoff began representing Native American tribes with gambling interests. He became involved with the Mississippi Band of Choctaw, a federally recognized tribe. One of Abramoff's first acts as a tribal gaming lobbyist was to defeat a Congressional bill to tax Native American casinos, sponsored by Bill Archer (R-TX) and Ernest Istook (R-OK). According to "Washington Business Forward", a lobbying trade magazine, "Tom DeLay was a major factor in those victories, and the fight helped cement the alliance between the two men". DeLay has called Abramoff "one of (his) closest and dearest friends".


title: Jack Abramoff

text: "The Washington Post", on December 29, 2005, reported: "Jack Abramoff liked to slip into dialogue from "The Godfather" as he led his lobbying colleagues in planning their next conquest on Capitol Hill. In a favorite bit, he would mimic an ice-cold Michael Corleone facing down a crooked politician's demand for a cut of Mafia gambling profits: 'Senator, you can have my answer now if you like. My offer is this: nothing.'"


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Salon.com political writer Thomas Frank considers Abramoff to have acted as a con man. Alex Gibney, director and writer of the 2010 documentary film


title: Jack Abramoff

text: "Casino Jack and the United States of Money," elaborated on Abramoff's criminal modus operandi. Gibney said, "one of his (Abramoff's) great gifts was being able to tell people what they wanted to hear, and this was how he was able to sell things and get them into trouble." He was interviewed with former U.S. Representative Bob Ney and former Greenberg Traurig lobbyist Neil Volz on Kojo Nnamdi's National Public Radio affiliate WAMU-FM radio show.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff and his law firm were paid at least $6.7 million by the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) from 1995 to 2001. It made manufactured goods labeled with "Made in the USA", but it was not subject to U.S. labor and minimum wage laws. After Abramoff paid for DeLay and his staffers to go on trips to the CNMI, they crafted policy that extended exemptions from federal immigration and labor laws to the islands' industries. Abramoff also negotiated with the Marianas for a $1.2 million no-bid contract for "promoting ethics in government" to be awarded to David Lapin, brother of his associate Daniel Lapin.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff secretly funded a trip to the Marianas for Congressmen James E. Clyburn (D-SC) and Bennie Thompson (D-MS). In 1999 Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) went on an Abramoff-funded trip to the Marshall Islands with John Doolittle (R-CA) and Ken Calvert (R-CA); delegates of Guam, American Samoa, and the Virgin Islands; and eight staffers.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Documentation indicates that Abramoff's lobbying team helped prepare Rep. Ralph Hall's (R-TX) statements on the House floor in which he attacked the credibility of escaped teenaged sex worker "Katrina", in an attempt to discredit her testimony regarding the state of the sex slave industry in the Marianas. "Ms." magazine reported Abramoff's dealings in the CNMI and the plight of garment workers like Katrina in a major article published in their spring 2006 issue.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff arranged for mailings from a Ralph Reed marketing company to Christian conservative voters. He bribed Roger Stillwell, a high-ranking political appointee at the Department of the Interior who was responsible for some Native American gaming policy; Stillwell pleaded guilty in 2006 to accepting gifts from Abramoff. All government officials and employees are prohibited from accepting gifts from consultants, businesses and lobbyists.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Executives of Naftasib, a Russian energy company, funneled almost $3.4 million to Abramoff and DeLay advisor Ed Buckham between 1997 and 2005. About $60,000 was spent on a trip to Russia in 1997 for Tom DeLay, Buckham, and Abramoff. In 1998, $1 million was sent to Buckham via his organization U.S. Family Network to "influence DeLay's vote in 1998 on legislation that helped make it possible for the International Monetary Fund to bail out the faltering Russian economy". DeLay voted for the legislation. The money was funneled through the Dutch company Voor Huisen, the Bahamas company Chelsea Enterprises, and the London law firm James & Sarch Co.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: The executives involved, who met DeLay during the 1997 trip, were Marina Nevskaya and Alexander Koulakovsky. Nevskaya was also involved in Abramoff's support of an Israeli military academy, as indicated by an email sent to Abramoff.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In 1999, eLottery hired Abramoff to block the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act, which he did by enlisting Ralph Reed, Norquist, and Tom DeLay's former chief of staff, Tony Rudy.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Emails from 2000 show that Susan Ralston helped Abramoff pass checks from eLottery to Lou Sheldon's Traditional Values Coalition (TVC) and also to Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform (ATR), en route to Ralph Reed's company, Century Strategies.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On January 8, 2001, Abramoff left Preston Gates to join the Government Relations division of the Washington, D.C. law firm Greenberg Traurig, which once described him as "directly involved in the Republican party and conservative movement leadership structures" and "one of the leading fund raisers for the party and its congressional candidates". With the move to Greenberg Traurig, Abramoff took as much as $6 million worth of client business from his old firm, including the Marianas Islands account. At Greenberg Traurig, Abramoff recruited a team of lobbyists known familiarly as "Team Abramoff". The team included many of his former employees from Preston Gates and former senior staffers of members of Congress.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Around the time he joined Greenberg Traurig, Abramoff's choice of lobbying clients changed to focus much more on Native American tribes. While Abramoff was a registered lobbyist for 51 clients while working at Preston Gates, with only four being tribes, Abramoff would eventually represent 24 clients for whom he was registered lobbyist at Greenberg Traurig, of which seven were tribes.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Former White House Deputy Counsel Timothy Flanigan left his job in December 2002 to work as General Counsel for Corporate and International Law at Tyco International. He immediately hired Abramoff to lobby Congress and the White House on matters relating to Tyco's Bermuda tax-exempt status. Flanigan stated to the Senate Judiciary Committee that Abramoff "bragged" that he could help Tyco avoid tax liability aimed at offshore companies because he "had good relationships with members of Congress".


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Tyco Inc. claimed in August 2005 that Abramoff had been paid $1.7 million for "astroturfing", or the creation of a fake "grassroots" campaign to oppose proposals to penalize US corporations registered abroad for tax reasons. The work allegedly was never performed, and most of the fee Tyco paid Abramoff to lobby against the legislation was "diverted to entities controlled by Mr. Abramoff".


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff's team represented the government of Malaysia, and worked toward improving Malaysian relations with the United States, particularly with trade relations.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff also met with the government of Sudan, offering a plan to deflect criticism from American Christian groups over the regime's alleged role in the Darfur conflict. Abramoff promised to enlist Reed to assist, as well as starting a grassroots campaign to improve the image of Sudan in America.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff was a lobbyist for the school TV news service Channel One News. From 1999 to 2003, Channel One retained him to ensure Congress did not block funds to their service. Not only did Channel One face frequent campaigns by political groups to persuade Congress to limit its presence in schools, but it also derived much of its advertising revenue from U.S. government sources, including the Office of National Drug Control Policy and military recruitment. Since Abramoff and Channel One parted ways, Channel One's advertising revenues have dropped substantially, but a cause-and-effect relationship would be difficult to establish.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On October 18, 2005, "The Washington Post" reported that Bob Ney, as chair of the House Administration Committee, approved a 2002 license for an Israeli telecommunications company to install antennas for the House of Representatives. The company, then Foxcom Wireless, an Israeli start-up telecommunications firm, (which has since moved headquarters from Jerusalem to Vienna, Virginia, and been renamed MobileAccess Networks) later paid Abramoff $280,000 for lobbying. It also donated $50,000 to the Capital Athletic Foundation charity that Abramoff sometimes used to secretly pay for some of his lobbying activities. In Michael Scanlon's plea agreement, this activity was described as public corruption.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff maintained four skyboxes at major sports arenas for political entertaining at a cost of over $1 million a year. Abramoff hosted many fundraisers at these skyboxes including events for politicians publicly opposed to gambling, such as Representative John Doolittle (R-CA).


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Then Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Max Baucus returned $18,892 in contributions that his office found to be connected to Abramoff. Included in the returned donations was an estimated $1,892 that was never reported for Baucus' use of Abramoff's skybox at a professional sports arena and concert venue in downtown Washington in 2001.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff also was co-owner of Signatures Restaurant, a high-end Washington establishment which he used to reward friends and associates. His fellow lobbyist Kevin A. Ring treated Justice Department official Robert E. Coughlin to free tickets to the skyboxes and took him out to Signatures multiple times in exchange for favors.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: DeLay, Ney and Florida Republican Representative Tom Feeney have each gone on golf trips to Scotland that were apparently arranged or funded by Abramoff. These trips took place in 2000, 2002 and 2003. Ney and Feeney each claimed that their trips were paid for by the National Center for Public Policy Research, but the group denied this. Spokespeople for Ney and Feeney blamed others for filing errors. Ney later pleaded guilty to knowing that Abramoff had paid for the trip.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: A former top procurement official in the Bush administration, David H. Safavian, has been convicted of lying and obstruction of justice in connection with the Abramoff investigation. Safavian, who traveled to Scotland with Reed and Ney on a golf outing arranged by Abramoff, was accused of concealing from federal investigators information about Abramoff's plans to do business with the General Services Administration at the time of the golf trip – in particular, seeking help finding property for his private religious school, Eshkol Academy, and for one of his tribal clients. Safavian was then GSA chief of staff. However, this conviction was overturned on appeal.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Jack Abramoff was a highly influential figure as lobbyist and activist in the Bush administration. In 2001, Abramoff was a member of the Bush administration's 2001 Transition Advisory Team assigned to the Department of the Interior. Abramoff befriended the incoming Deputy Secretary of the Interior J. Steven Griles.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: The draft report of the House Government Reform Committee said the documents – largely Abramoff's billing records and e-mails – listed 485 lobbying contacts with White House officials over three years, including 10 with top Bush aide Karl Rove. The report said that of the 485 contacts listed, 345 were described as meetings or other in-person contacts; 71 were described as phone conversations and 69 were e-mail exchanges.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In the first ten months of 2001, the Abramoff lobbying team logged almost 200 contacts with the Bush administration. He may have used these senior level contacts to assist in his lobbying for Indian tribes concerning tribal gaming. The Department of the Interior has Federal regulatory authority over tribal affairs such as tribal recognition and gaming. From 2000 to 2003, six Indian tribes paid Abramoff over $80 million in lobbying fees.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: The Department of the Interior Office of Insular Affairs has authority over policy and grants to US territories such as the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI). This may have assisted Abramoff in lobbying for textile interests in the islands. U.S. Senator Conrad Burns (R-MT) and DeLay also heavily lobbied the CNMI for opposing the minimum wage.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff asked for $9 million in 2003 from the president of Gabon, Omar Bongo, to arrange a meeting with Bush and directed his fees to an Abramoff-controlled lobbying firm, GrassRoots Interactive. Bongo did meet with Bush in the Oval Office on May 26, 2004. There has been no evidence in the public record that Abramoff had any role in organizing the meeting, or that he received any money or had a signed contract with Gabon.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: White House and State Department officials described Bush's meeting with Bongo, whose government is regularly accused by the United States of human rights abuses, as routine. The officials said they knew of no involvement by Abramoff in the arrangements. Officials at Gabon's embassy in Washington did not respond to written questions.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Susan Ralston, Rove's assistant since 2001, previously worked as an administrative assistant for both Abramoff and Reed.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: According to former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, Abramoff was paid $1.2 million to arrange a meeting between Mahathir and Bush, allegedly at the direction of The Heritage Foundation. Mahathir insisted that someone unknown to him had paid for the meeting.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On May 9, 2001, Chief Raul Garza of the Kickapoo tribe of Texas met with Bush, with Abramoff and Norquist in attendance. Abramoff was identified in the background of a photo taken at the meeting. Days before the meeting, the tribe paid $25,000 to Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform at Abramoff's direction. According to the organization's communications director, John Kartch, the meeting was one of several gatherings with Bush sponsored by ATR. On the same day, the chief of the Louisiana Coushattas also attended an ATR-sponsored gathering with Bush. The Coushattas also gave $25,000 to ATR soon before the event.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: The details of the Kickapoo meeting and a letter dated May 10, 2001, from ATR thanking the Kickapoos for their contribution were revealed to the "New York Times" in 2006 by former council elder Isidro Garza, who with Raul Garza (no relation), is under indictment in Texas for embezzling tribal money. According to Isidro Garza, Abramoff did not say the donation was required to meet Bush; the White House denied any knowledge of the transaction.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Other photos have surfaced of Abramoff and Bush meeting at the White House and Oval Office on either December 22 or 23, 2002. The photos were found on a site that published many pictures of governmental events, ReflectionsOrders.com. The owner of the site removed the photos almost immediately when the presence of Abramoff and Bush together was discovered. Some Internet users located the photos and preserved copies of some of them. The owner of the site gave thousands of dollars to the Bush campaign and Republican National Committee, according to public FEC contribution records.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: An NPR news report from March 2006 stated that: "... Abramoff recently granted a rare press interview to "Vanity Fair" magazine, where he asserts President Bush and other prominent figures in Washington know him very well. He called them liars for denying contact with him".


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In June 2006, Abramoff began secretly granting exclusive interviews to former "Boston Globe" investigative reporter Gary S. Chafetz, without the knowledge of Abramoff's attorneys or the federal prosecutors with whom Abramoff had been cooperating. These interviews – conducted before and during Abramoff's imprisonment – continued until May 2008. In September 2008, Chafetz's book, "The Perfect Villain: John McCain and the Demonization of Lobbyist Jack Abramoff" was rushed into print prior to the 2008 presidential election. In his book, Chafetz asserted that Abramoff, though guilty of some of the charges, was the victim of misleading and sensational reporting by the "Washington Post", vengeance and mendacity on the part of Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), and strong-arm tactics of the Justice Department who forced Abramoff into confessing to crimes he did not believe he was guilty of. Chafetz also accused federal prosecutors of abusive – and possibly illegal – tactics in their reliance on private and public honest services fraud, which he characterized as vague and controversial.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff has founded or run several non-profit organizations, including Capital Athletic Foundation and Eshkol Academy; as well as lobbying firms and political think tanks such as American International Center, GrassRoots Interactive, and the National Center for Public Policy Research. While these organizations had varying degrees of legitimate activities, it has come to light that Abramoff used these organizations to channel millions of dollars to recipients not related to the organizations.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Although Federal tax records show that various Indian tribes donated more than $6 million to the Capital Athletic Foundation, less than 1% of the money went to athletic programs, the stated purpose of the foundation. The majority of the funds went to the Eshkol Academy in Maryland, an Orthodox Jewish school founded by Abramoff in 2002. Hundreds of thousands of dollars from CAF were also spent on golf trips to Scotland for Abramoff, Ney, Ralph Reed Safavian, as well as purchases of camping equipment sent to a high school friend. Abramoff solicited Safavian's help in looking for property deals for Eshkol Academy and tribal clients, leading to Safavian's conviction.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: GrassRoots Interactive, now defunct, was a small Silver Spring, Maryland, lobbying firm controlled by Abramoff and PJ Johnson. Millions of dollars flowed into GrassRoots Interactive in 2003, the year it was created, and then flowed out again to unusual places. At least $2.3 million went to a California consulting firm that used the same address as the law office of Abramoff's brother, Robert. A separate check for $400,000, from GrassRoots, was made out to Kay Gold LLC, another Abramoff family company.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff was a board member and secretary/treasurer of the Maldon Institute for at least five years (1999–2003). He was one of only four board members, including PJ Johnson and John Rees.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In late 2004, the Senate Indian Affairs Committee began to investigate Abramoff's lobbying on behalf of American Indian tribes and casinos. In September he was called before the Committee to answer questions about that work, but pleaded the fifth.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On August 11, 2005, Abramoff and Adam Kidan were indicted by a federal grand jury in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on fraud charges arising from a 2000 deal to buy SunCruz Casinos from Gus Boulis. Abramoff and Kidan are accused of using a fake wire transfer to make lenders believe that they had made a $23 million down payment, in order to qualify for a $60 million loan. Ney also was implicated in helping to consummate the deal.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: After the partners purchased SunCruz in September 2000, the business relationship with Boulis deteriorated, culminating in a fistfight between Kidan and Boulis in December 2000. In February 2001 Boulis was murdered in his car in a Mafia-style attack. The murder investigation included three individuals who had received payments from Kidan. Two of the suspects received life sentences for the murder charges, while a third associate pled guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and was sentenced to 6 and half years time served already after he testified against his co-conspirators.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On January 4, 2006, Abramoff pleaded guilty to conspiracy and wire fraud in Miami, related to the SunCruz deal. The plea agreement called for a maximum sentence of just over seven years and would run concurrently with the sentence in the Washington corruption case, but could be reduced if Abramoff cooperated fully. The remaining four counts in the Florida indictment were dismissed.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On March 29, 2006, Abramoff and Kidan were both sentenced in the SunCruz case to the minimum amount of 70 months, and ordered to pay US$21.7 million in restitution. According to the "memorandum in aid of sentencing", the sentencing judge, U.S. District Judge Paul C. Huck, received over 260 pleas for leniency from various people, including "rabbis, military officers and even a professional hockey referee."


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In 2002 Abramoff was retained under a secret contract by the Guam Superior Court to lobby against a bill proposing to put the Superior Court under the authority of the Guam Supreme Court. On November 18, 2002, a grand jury issued a subpoena demanding that the administrator of the Guam Superior Court release all records relating to the contract. On November 19, 2002, U.S. Attorney Frederick A. Black, the chief prosecutor for Guam and the instigator of the indictment, was unexpectedly demoted and removed from the office he had held since 1991. The federal grand jury investigation was quickly wound down and took no further action. In 2005 Public Auditor Doris Flores Brooks initiated a new investigation of the Abramoff contract, which is continuing.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In 2006 California attorney and Marshall Islands lobbyist Howard Hills, and Tony Sanchez, a former administrator of the Guam Superior Court, were indicted for unlawful influence, conspiracy for unlawful influence, theft of property held in trust, and official misconduct for allegedly authorizing 36 payments of $9,000 vis a vis a pre-existing contract between Hills and the Guam Superior Court, each written out to Hills, but funneled to Abramoff. Hills, trusting Sanchez as a court official at face value, assumed that this was a temporary circumstance and agreed to help facilitate transition for what he thought was a standard government contract between Abramoff and the court. For this Hills received no compensation. Before indictments or investigations were initiated, Hills halted his temporary contract with Abramoff and reported what he thought was potentially suspicious behavior to public officials when it occurred to him that something may be wrong. In 2007, superseding indictments were issued against Hills and Sanchez, and in 2008 further related indictments were handed down against Abramoff and Abramoff's firm at the time, Greenberg Traurig. The charges against both attorney Howard Hills and Greenberg Traurig have since been dismissed.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff and his partner, Michael Scanlon (a former Tom DeLay aide), conspired to bilk Native casino gambling interests out of an estimated $85 million in fees. The lobbyists also orchestrated lobbying against their own clients in order to force them to pay for lobbying services. These practices were the subject both of long-running criminal prosecution and hearings by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. On November 21, 2005, Scanlon pleaded guilty to conspiring to bribe a member of Congress and other public officials.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On January 3, 2006, Abramoff pleaded guilty to three felony counts – conspiracy, fraud, and tax evasion – involving charges stemming principally from his lobbying activities in Washington on behalf of Native American tribes. The four tribes Abramoff and his associates had been involved with included Michigan's Saginaw Chippewas, California's Agua Caliente, the Mississippi Choctaws, and the Louisiana Coushattas.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: As a result, Abramoff and other defendants must make restitution of at least $25 million that was defrauded from clients, primarily the Native American tribes. Further, Abramoff owes the Internal Revenue Service $1.7 million as a result of his guilty plea to the tax evasion charge. In the agreement, Abramoff admits to bribing public officials, including Ney. Also included: the hiring of congressional staffers and conspiring with them to lobby their former employers – including members of Congress – in violation of a one-year federal ban on such lobbying.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Later in 2006 Abramoff lobbyists Neil Volz and Tony Rudy pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges; in September 2006 Ney himself pleaded guilty to conspiracy and making false statements.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On September 4, 2008, a Washington court found Abramoff guilty of trading expensive gifts, meals and sports trips in exchange for political favors, and U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle sentenced him to a four-year term in prison, to be served concurrently with his previous sentences. Abramoff cooperated in a bribery investigation involving lawmakers, their aides, and members of the Bush administration.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff served four years of a six-year sentence. On November 15, 2006, he began serving his term in the minimum security prison camp of Federal Correctional Institution, Cumberland, Maryland, as inmate number 27593-112. The Justice Department had requested that he serve his sentence there so as to be accessible to agents in Washington for cooperation as the investigations related to his associates intensified. Abramoff worked as a clerk in the prison chaplain's office for 12 cents an hour. He was also teaching courses in public speaking and screenwriting to his fellow inmates and instituted a popular movie night.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On June 8, 2010, he was released from federal prison and was transferred to a halfway house in Baltimore, Maryland, until the end of his six-year sentence. In late June he began working as an accountant at the kosher pizzeria Tov Pizza, working about 40 hours a week from 10:30 a.m. till 5:30 p.m., earning between $7.50 and $10.00 per hour. He finished working at Tov Pizza when he was released from the halfway house on December 3, 2010.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff has returned to lobbying since his release from prison, having attempted to arrange meetings between then President-elect Donald Trump and foreign leaders. He is registered as a lobbyist.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: On June 25, 2020, Abramoff and CEO Roland Marcus Andrade were charged in San Francisco federal court with fraud in connection with a $5 million cryptocurrency deal. Abramoff agreed to a negotiated plea of guilty. On July 14, 2020, Abramoff pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy and violating the Lobbying Disclosure Act in relation to the AML BitCoin case. Abramoff faces up to five years in prison for each count. Notably, this makes Abramoff the first person to be convicted under the Lobbying Disclosure Act, which was amended as a result of his previous misconduct.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: In November 2011, the book "Capitol Punishment: The Hard Truth About Washington Corruption From America's Most Notorious Lobbyist" Abramoff wrote after he was released from prison was published. The 300-page memoir is an account of his life in Washington as a lobbyist. In its last chapter, titled "Path to Reform", Abramoff portrays himself as someone who supports genuine reform and lists a number of proposals to eliminate bribery of government officials, such as barring members of Congress and their aides for life from becoming lobbyists.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff has become a critic of the lobbying industry and has appeared on radio and television, "trying ... to redeem and rebrand himself". He has a Facebook page and game app called "Congressional Jack", and a feature film in the works about the lobbying milieu. He plans to charge for giving talks about corruption in Washington, and has briefed F.B.I. agents on the nature of corruption. He has joined the United Republic anticorruption nonprofit organization and has started in February 2012 as one of the lead bloggers at United Republic's newly launched , described as "an anti-corruption blog focusing on how self-interested dollars are warping the public-interest responsibilities of America's democratic institutions" by the "Huffington Post".


title: Jack Abramoff

text: He has appeared as a guest on CNN to talk about lobbying and the Affordable Care Act healthcare reform law. In July 2012, Premier Networks announced it was launching "The Jack Abramoff Show" on XM Satellite Radio's "Talk Radio" channel, on which Abramoff would hold forth on political reform.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Following Abramoff's return to lobbying after his time in prison, lawmakers passed the Justice Against Corruption on K Street (JACK) Act, which requires convicts such as Abramoff to disclose their criminal history when they re-register to lobby.


title: Jack Abramoff

text: Abramoff has been married to Pamela Clarke Abramoff (née Alexander), a co-manager and executive assistant at Capital Athletic Foundation, since July 1986. The couple has five children. Pamela is a convert to Orthodox Judaism.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England did not enter the competition until 1950, but have entered all 18 subsequent tournaments. They have failed to qualify for the finals on three occasions, 1974 (West Germany), 1978 (Argentina) and 1994 (United States), and have failed to advance from the group stage on three occasions; in 1950, 1958 and 2014. Their best performance is winning the cup in the 1966 tournament held in England; they also finished in fourth place in 1990 in Italy, and in 2018 in Russia. Other than these, the team have also reached the quarter-finals on seven other occasions, the latest of which was in 2022 in Qatar.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England's first qualifying campaign for the FIFA World Cup doubled as the 1950 British Home Championship. The series began for England on 15 October 1949 at Ninian Park, Cardiff, against Wales. Stan Mortensen gave England the lead after 22 minutes, and seven minutes later Jackie Milburn doubled the lead. This was the first goal of Milburn's hat trick, which left England 4–0 up with 20 minutes to play. Mal Griffiths scored a consolation goal for Wales ten minutes from time, but England held on for a comfortable victory.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: A month later, England welcomed Ireland to Maine Road, and it began well for the home side as Jack Rowley scored inside six minutes. England were already 6–0 up, thanks to Jack Froggatt, two for Stan Pearson, Mortensen and a second from Rowley, by the time Ireland struck back through Samuel Smyth after 55 minutes. Rowley added two more goals to his tally in the three minutes following Smyth's goal, leaving the score at 8–1 after an hour. The match ended 9–2, with Pearson scoring England's ninth, and Bobby Brennan scoring for Ireland.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: In May 1950, England travelled to Hampden Park to face Scotland, who were also undefeated after their games against Ireland and Wales. With the top two from the group qualifying, both teams were guaranteed progression to the finals, and the game was solely for the honour of winning the British Home Championship, and the seeding advantage to be enjoyed upon reaching Brazil. A goal from Roy Bentley gave England the victory and top spot in the group.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England were seeded for the finals, which meant they were the favourites to progress from Group 2, which also contained Spain, Chile and the United States. They began against Chile in Rio de Janeiro and won 2–0, with goals from Mortensen and Wilf Mannion.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: Their troubles began four days later when they faced the Americans in Belo Horizonte, as Joe Gaetjens scored the only goal of the match to give the United States an unlikely victory, which has gone down as one of the World Cup's greatest upsets. A myth arose that the English newspapers were so confident of an English victory that when the result was telegrammed back, they assumed a misprint and printed the score as 10–1 in England's favour. However, this has proven to be untrue.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: This left England needing to beat Spain in Rio to stand any chance of qualifying. Spain's Zarra scored the only goal of the game, eliminating England from the competition.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England's qualifying group for the 1954 edition also constituted the 1953–54 British Home Championship. They played Wales at Ninian Park as their first match once again, and the 4–1 result was the same as four years earlier. Ivor Allchurch gave the home side a half-time lead, but England scored four within eight minutes of the restart with two each for Dennis Wilshaw and Nat Lofthouse.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: At Goodison Park against Northern Ireland, Harold Hassall scored for England after ten minutes, and although Eddie McMorran equalised just before the hour mark, further goals from Hassall and Lofthouse completed a comfortable 3–1 win for England.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: With the top two in the group qualifying for the finals, the final game between England and Scotland, at Hampden Park, settled nothing except the placings within the group, despite Scotland having dropped a point with a 3–3 draw at home to Wales. Allan Brown put the home side ahead after just seven minutes, but it was all square again thanks to Ivor Broadis just four minutes later. Johnny Nicholls gave England the lead for the first time just after half time, and they extended the lead with Ronnie Allen's 68th-minute goal. Jimmy Mullen added a fourth seven minutes from time, and although Willie Ormond scored a consolation for Scotland, England topped the competition for the second time in a row.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England were drawn in Group 4 for the finals, with Switzerland, Italy and Belgium. In an odd twist, unique to the 1954 tournament, England and Italy, as the two seeded teams in the group, did not have to play each other.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England's first game in Switzerland was against Belgium in Basel, and they suffered a shock as Pol Anoul put the Belgians into the lead after just five minutes. Two goals from Broadis and one from Lofthouse gave England a 3–1 lead just after the hour, but Henri Coppens hit back four minutes later before Anoul levelled the scores again. Drawn matches in the group stage went to extra time, and in the added period Lofthouse added a fourth for England, but Jimmy Dickinson scored an own goal three minutes later to leave the final score at 4–4.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England's second group game was against the hosts Switzerland in Bern. This proved to be an easier game for the Three Lions, and they scored one goal in each half, from Mullen and Wilshaw, to give them a comfortable 2–0 win. England progressed as group winners, along with Switzerland, who won a play-off against Italy.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England faced the defending champions Uruguay, the winners of Group 3, in the quarter-finals. Carlos Borges gave the South Americans the lead inside five minutes, but Lofthouse put England back on terms ten minutes later. Obdulio Varela and Juan Alberto Schiaffino scored further goals for Uruguay, but Tom Finney made the score 3–2 in the 67th minute. However, Javier Ambrois restored the two-goal lead with twelve minutes to play and England were eliminated after losing 4–2.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: For the first time, England had to play against countries other than the Home Nations to reach the Finals in Sweden. They were drawn against the Republic of Ireland and Denmark. In the qualifying round, England won three out of the four games and drew the other. Four months before the World Cup, Roger Byrne, Duncan Edwards, David Pegg and Tommy Taylor were all killed in the Munich air disaster while playing for Manchester United. At the finals, which is the only tournament to have seen all Home Nations take part, the Home Nations were all drawn in different groups.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England were drawn against the Soviet Union (2–2), Brazil (0–0) and Austria (2–2), who finished third in the 1954 World Cup. At the end of the group stage, Soviet Union and England each had three points, and had scored four goals and conceded four goals. This meant there was a play-off to decide the second-placed team in the group, the winner to qualify. England lost the play-off 1–0 and were thus knocked out. The only consolation for England was that they were the only team to play the eventual winners Brazil and not lose.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: The third World Cup which took place in South America, saw England qualify from the group, which contained Portugal and Luxembourg, defeating Luxembourg on both occasions, and defeating Portugal at home, and drawing in Lisbon.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: At the finals, England were drawn in a group with Hungary, Argentina and Bulgaria. England defeated Argentina 3–1, thanks to goals from Ron Flowers, Bobby Charlton and Jimmy Greaves, before playing out a goalless draw with Bulgaria, and a 2–1 defeat to Hungary.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: England finished in second place behind Hungary and played the winners of group 3, defending champions Brazil, in the quarter-finals. Brazil scored first through Garrincha, before an equaliser for Gerry Hitchens before half time. However, second-half goals from Garrincha and Vavá meant Brazil won the game 3–1, and eliminated England from the competition. This defeat was manager Walter Winterbottom's last game in charge. Winterbottom had led England to four World Cup Finals. From May 1963, Alf Ramsey became the manager of England.


title: England at the FIFA World Cup

text: In the 1966 World Cup Finals, England used their home advantage and, under Ramsey, won their first, and only, World Cup title. England played all their games at Wembley Stadium in London, which became the last time that the hosts were granted this privilege. England did not concede a goal in any of their first four matches at the tournament, starting with a 0–0 draw in the opening game against former champions Uruguay, followed by 2–0 wins over France and Mexico to see them finish top of their group and qualify for the quarter-finals.