Thoughts for the Day

Today in History (September 13th):

1759: In the French and Indian War, the British defeated the French near the city of Quebec.

1788: Congress authorized the first U.S. national election, to be conducted the first Wednesday in January next (1789).

1814: During the British attack on Fort McHenry, Md., Francis Scott Key wrote the lyrics of The Star-Spangled Banner.

1851: Birthdays: U.S. Army bacteriologist Walter Reed;

1860: Birthdays: Gen. John Black Jack Pershing, hero of World War I;

1863: Birthdays: British union leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Arthur Henderson;

1876: Birthdays: Author Sherwood Anderson;

1894: Birthdays: English author J.B. Priestley;

1903: Birthdays: Actor Claudette Colbert;

1911: Birthdays: Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass music;

1916: Birthdays: British author Roald Dahl;

1922: The temperature at El Azizia, Libya, reached 136 degrees Fahrenheit, generally accepted as the world’s highest recorded atmospheric temperature.

1925: Birthdays: Singer Mel Torme;

1931: Birthdays: Actor Barbara Bain;

1937: Birthdays: TV producer Fred Silverman;

1938: Birthdays: Miss Manners Judith Martin;

1939: Birthdays: Actor Richard Kiel;

1940: Birthdays: Costa Rican Nobel Peace Prize laureate Oscar Arias;

1941: Birthdays: Singer David Clayton-Thomas;

1944: Birthdays: Singer/songwriter Peter Cetera; Actor Jacqueline Bisset;

1948: Birthdays: Singer/actor Nell Carter;

1951: Birthdays: Actors Jean Smart;

1952: Birthdays: Musician Randy Jones (The Village People); Musician Don Was;

1964: Birthdays: Talk show host Tavis Smiley;

1967: Birthdays: Olympic track gold medalist Michael Johnson;

1969: Birthdays: Entertainment entrepreneur Tyler Perry;

1971: New York state forces stormed and regained control of Attica state prison in a riot that killed 42 people. Birthdays: Fashion designer Stella McCartney;

1975: Birthdays: Country musician Joe Don Rooney;

1977: Birthdays: Singer Fiona Apple;

1980: Birthdays: actor Ben Savage;

1993: In a dramatic ceremony at the White House, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat signed a declaration of principles for Palestinian self-rule.

1996: the Dow closed at more than 5,838, a record high.

1998: George Wallace, former Alabama governor, presidential candidate and one of the most controversial politicians in U.S. history, died in Montgomery, Ala., at the age of 79.

1999: At least 118 people were killed in the bombing of a Moscow apartment building. The blast was the latest in a series of explosions blamed on terrorists from the breakaway republic of Chechnya.
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2000: Los Alamos scientist Wen Ho Lee, accused of stealing sensitive nuclear weapons data, was freed after serving nine months in prison.

2005: The owners of a New Orleans-area nursing home where 34 residents died during Katrina flooding were charged with 34 counts of negligent homicide. Officials said the residents apparently had been left to fend for themselves against the rising waters. U.S. President George W. Bush said he took responsibility for serious problems in the federal government’s response to Hurricane Katrina. He said he wanted to look forward to recovery and do assessments later.

2008: Hurricane Ike, the second Category 2 storm to hit the United States in two weeks, battered Galveston and Houston with heavy rain and 110-mph winds, forcing about 1 million people to flee in advance and leaving millions with no power for more than a week. Officials said Ike claimed 72 lives, 37 of them in Texas. Five bombs exploded within 25 minutes in crowded New Delhi markets, killing 22 and injuring dozens.

2009: A fire at a clinic for drug addicts in the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan killed 38 people. Forty others were rescued.

2010: Violent crime in the United States declined in 2009 for the third consecutive year, down 5.3 percent, the FBI said in its annual report. Property crime was down 4.6 percent.

2011: Suicide bombers and gunmen carried out a coordinated attack on the U.S. Embassy and NATO headquarters in Kabul, Afghanistan. Kabul’s police chief said six people had died and 16 were injured. NATO and U.S. Embassy officials said none of their people were injured. The American poverty rate climbed to 15.1 percent in 2010, the highest since 1993, and the third consecutive year of increases. The U.S. Census Bureau said that translates to a record 46.2 million people in poverty.


Quotes

“I am interested in this world, in this life, not some other world or future life.” – Jawaharlal Nehru

“Those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained.” – William Blake

“I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble. The world is moved along, not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker.” – Helen Adams Keller, lecturer and author (1880-1968)

“There is a certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse; as I have found in traveling in a stagecoach, that it is often a comfort to shift one’s position and be bruised in a new place.” – Washington Irving


Dr. Lawrence J. Peter (1919-1990) US pop psychologist, writer:

“A censor is a man who knows more than he thinks you ought to.”

“A censor is an expert in cutting remarks. A censor is a man who knows more than he thinks you ought to.”

“A man convinced against his will is not convinced.”

“A man doesn’t know what he knows until he knows what he doesn’t know.”

“A pessimist is a man who looks both ways when he crosses the street.”

“Against logic there is no armor like ignorance.”

“America is a country that doesn’t know where it is going but is determined to set a speed record getting there.”

“America is a land of taxation that was founded to avoid taxation.”

“An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn’t happen today.”

“An intelligence test sometimes shows a man how smart he would have been not to have taken it.”


rapacious

PRONUNCIATION: (ruh-PAY-shush)
http://wordsmith.org/words/rapacious.mp3

MEANING: adjective:
1. Greedy; plundering.
2. (Animals) Living on prey: predacious.

ETYMOLOGY: From Latin rapere (to seize). Ultimately from the Indo-European root rep- (to snatch) that also gave us rapid, ravish, ravage, rapt, and rape. Earliest documented use: 1572.

USAGE: “Banana’s history involved enough imperious diplomats, corrupt dictators, rapacious tycoons and exploited workers to fill many volumes.” – Marc Levinson; Please, No More Bananas; The Wall Street Journal (New York); Jul 2, 2012.

Explore “rapacious” in the Visual Thesaurus.
http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=rapacious


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