The term "cosmopolitan distribution" usually should not be taken literally, because it often is applied loosely in various contexts. Commonly the intention is not to include polar regions, extreme altitudes, oceans, deserts, or small, isolated islands. For example, the housefly is nearly as cosmopolitan as any animal species, but it is neither oceanic nor polar in its distribution. Again, the term "cosmopolitan weed" implies no more than that the plant in question occurs on all continents except Antarctica; it is not meant to suggest that it covers the continents entirely.
| 1861 | Lord Lyons, The British minister to America presents a formal complaint to secretary of state, William Seward, regarding the Trent affair. | |
| 1900 | The Federal Party, which recognizes American sovereignty, is formed in the Philippines. | |
| 1919 | Great Britain institutes a new constitution for India. | |
| 1921 | Warren G. Harding frees Socialist Eugene Debs and 23 other political prisoners. | |
| 1933 | Pope Pius XI condemns the Nazi sterilization program. | |
| 1937 | London warns Rome to stop anti-British propaganda in Palestine. | |
| 1939 | The first Canadian troops arrive in Britain. | |
| 1940 | Chiang Kai-shek dissolves all Communist associations in China. | |
| 1941 | Despite throwing back an earlier Japanese amphibious assault, the U.S. Marines and Navy defenders on Wake Island capitulate to a second Japanese invasion. | |
| 1944 | General Dwight D. Eisenhower confirms the death sentence of Private Eddie Slovik, the only American shot for desertion since the Civil War. | |
| 1947 | President Harry S Truman grants a pardon to 1,523 who had evaded the World War II draft. | |
| 1948 | Japan’s Prime Minister, Hideki Tojo and six other collaborators are hanged for war crimes. | |
| 1950 | General Walton H. Walker, the commander of the Eighth Army in Korea, is killed in a jeep accident. Lieutenant General Matthew B. Ridgeway is named his successor. | |
| 1967 | U.S. Navy SEALs are ambushed during an operation southeast of Saigon. | |
| 1974 | The B-1 bomber makes its first successful test flight. | |
| 1986 | The Voyager completes the first nonstop flight around the globe on one load of fuel. The experimental aircraft, piloted Americans Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, landed at Edwards Air Force Base in California after nine days and four minutes in the sky. | |
| 1990 | In a referendum on Slovenia’s independence from Yugoslovia, 88.5% vote in favor of independence. | |
| 2002 | An Iraqi MiG-25 shoots down a US MQ-1 Predator drone. |
A Texas man was arrested after killing two in what appears to be a road rage shooting.
| 1135 | Stephen of Blois is crowned the king of England. | |
| 1775 | Esek Hopkins takes command of the Continental Navy — a total of seven ships. | |
| 1807 | Congress passes the Embargo Act, which halts all trading completely. It is hoped that the act will keep the United States out the European Wars. | |
| 1829 | The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad opens the first passenger railway line. | |
| 1918 | The last of the food restrictions, enforced because of the shortages during World War I, are lifted. | |
| 1929 | Soviet troops leave Manchuria after a truce is reached with the Chinese over the Eastern Railway dispute. | |
| 1941 | Japanese troops make an amphibious landing on the coast of Lingayen Gulf on Luzon, the Philippines. | |
| 1942 | The Soviets drive German troops back 15 miles at the Don River. | |
| 1944 | During the Battle of the Bulge, General Anthony McAuliffe responds to a German surrender request with a one word answer: “Nuts!” | |
| 1945 | The United States recognizes Tito’s government in Yugoslavia. | |
| 1965 | The EF-105F Wild Weasel makes its first kill over Vietnam. | |
| 1966 | The United States announces the allocation of 900,000 tons of grain to fight the famine in India. | |
| 1989 | The Romanian government of Nicolae Ceausescu is overthrown, ending 42 years of communist rule. | |
| 1989 | The division of East and West Germany effectively ends when the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin reopens for the first time in nearly 30 years. | |
| 1992 | What became known as the Archives of Terror are discovered in a police station near the capital of Paraguay, records detailing tens of thousands of Latin Americans who had been secretly imprisoned, tortured and / or killed by the security services of several South American governments. | |
| 1997 | Hussein Farrah Aidid relinquishes his disputed title of President of Somalia, an important step toward reconciliation in the country. | |
| 2001 | President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, takes over an interim government. | |
| 2001 | A passenger on American Airlines Flight 63 from Paris, Richard Reid, unsuccessfully attempts to destroy the plane in flight by igniting explosives he’d hidden in his shoes. | |
| 2008 | Some 1.1 billion gallons of coal fly ash slurry flood part of Tennessee after an ash dike breaks at a solid waste containment area in Roane County, in the eastern part of the state. | |
| 2010 | US President Barack Obama signs a law officially repealing the 17-year-old policy known as “Don’t ask, don’t tell”; the new law permits homosexuals to serve openly in the US military. |
As a child the two most important posters on my wall were my Flags of the World poster and my map of the Star Wars Galaxy.See all the flags at at Kelly’s website dedicated to the project and read how some of them were designed here.
15 years on, now as an art director, I begun the process of putting those two worlds together. I started designing a flag for every planet in the Star Wars universe. This not only included those featured in the films, but comic books, animated series and video games. As of writing this, I have completed 103 flag designs - those who know Star Wars well, will know I have a good few more planets to finish.
Our understanding of how a clock should run is second nature, making this variation almost impossible to read, even as it continues to tell the right time. Kwade’s whimsical clock captures her interest in the systems we invent to make sense of our lives and the world. In doing so, it prompts us to see “reality” from a new perspective.
![Ethan Couch [WFAA-TV]](http://www.rawstory.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Ethan-Couch-WFAA-TV-478x257.jpg)
Irish
moss is a cash crop that grows wild in the waters off Prince Edward
Island, Canada. When storms uproot it and send it washing into the surf,
farmers hook up horses to dredges and scoop it up. Brian Barth
describes the process in Modern Farmer. He talked to 60-year old Joe Dorgan, a lifelong resident of the island:I asked Dorgan what I thought was an obvious question: Why horses? When the tradition started on PEI in the 1930s, draft horses were still commonly used in agriculture, so it makes sense that their strength would be harnessed to pull heavy clumps of seaweed ashore. But surely a more efficient mechanized approach would have been devised by the time the industry hit its peak in the ’70ss. Dorgan’s answer wasn’t particularly scientific: “The horses don’t mind the water, and they’re good workers, and that’s just been the way it was,” he says. “Our ancestors done it that way and it’s still done that way today.”
I suspect that the problems associated with using motorized machinery in saltwater, like accelerated rust and corrosion, may have been a practical obstacle. But perhaps the industry was never big enough to warrant R&D investment anyways—a $6 million industry can hardly be called an industry.
| 68 | Vespian, a gruff-spoken general of humble origins, enters Rome and is named emperor by the Senate. | |
| 1620 | The Pilgrims land at or near Plymouth Rock. | |
| 1708 | French forces seize control of the eastern shore of Newfoundland after winning a victory at St. John’s. | |
| 1790 | Samuel Slater opens the first cotton mill in the United States (in Rhode Island). | |
| 1862 | The U.S. Congress authorizes the Medal of Honor to be awarded to Navy personnel who have distinguished themselves by their gallantry in action. | |
| 1866 | Indians, led by Red Cloud and Crazy Horse, kill Captain William J. Fetterman and 79 other men who had ventured out from Fort Phil Kearny to cut wood. | |
| 1910 | Over 2.5 million plague victims are reported in the An-Hul province of China. | |
| 1928 | President Calvin Coolidge signs the Boulder Dam bill. | |
| 1944 | German troops surround the 101st Airborne Division at Bastogne in Belgium. | |
| 1945 | General George S. Patton dies at the age of 60 after being injured in a car accident. | |
| 1946 | An earthquake and tidal wave kill hundreds in Japan. | |
| 1963 | The Turk minority riots in Cyprus to protest anti-Turkish revisions in the constitution. | |
| 1964 | Great Britain’s House of Commons votes to ban the death penalty. | |
| 1965 | Four pacifists are indicted in New York for burning draft cards. | |
| 1969 | American draft evaders gather for a holiday dinner in Montreal, Canada. | |
| 1986 | 500,000 Chinese students gather in Shanghai’s People’s Square calling for democratic reforms, including freedom of the press. | |
| 1988 | Pan Am Flight 103 from London to New York explodes in midair over Lockerbie, Scotland, an hour after departure. All 259 passengers were killed in the explosion caused by a bomb– hidden inside an audio cassette player — that detonated inside the cargo area when the plane was at an altitude of 31,000 feet. A shower of airplane parts falling from the sky also killed 11 Lockerbie residents. | |
| 1994 | Popocatepetl, a volcano in Mexico spews forth gases and ash after nearly a half-century of dormancy. | |
| 1995 | The city of Bethlehem passes from Israeli to Palestinian control. | |
| 2004 | A suicide bomber attacks the forward operating base next to the US military airfield at Mosul, Iraq, killing 22 people; it is the deadliest suicide attack on US soldiers during the Iraq War. |
"The goal isn't to catch them in the act, that's for the police," said Menzer. "The goal is to make it confusing and frustrating. So they come and steal a box, and they get home and it's a bunch of rocks, there's a good chance that they're probably not going to come back to steal another box."It's a strategy that works best when a large number of residents--ideally most of them--are participating.
