U.S. coastal areas
Coastal areas are home to
a wealth of natural and economic resources and are the most developed areas in
the nation. The narrow fringe comprising
17 percent of the contiguous U.S. land area is home to more than half of the
nation's population. Between the years
1980 and 2003, population in coastal counties increased by 33 million people or
by 28 percent. The largest gain was seen
in the Pacific region. Additionally, in
2003, 23 of the 25 most densely populated counties were in coastal areas. http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/population.html
Australian coastal areas
Since European settlement,
most Australians have congregated along the thin strip of the coastline. Only a small proportion have inhabited the
sparse inland. The proportion of the population living in the country has
declined since World War II and will probably continue to do so. Around, 85 per cent of Australians live within
50 kilometres of the coast.
In Gulliver's Travels, Jonathan Swift satirizes party politics, religious
differences, and Western Culture in ways still relevant to today's world. During Swift's life the English political
scene was dominated by two major political parties, the Whigs and the Tories. Just as in Swift's England, Lilliput is
dominated by two rival factions, the high
heels and the low heels. Swift writes that "that for above seventy
Moons past there have been two struggling Parties in this Empire, under the
Names of Tramecksan and Slamecksan, from the high and low Heels on their shoes,
by which they distinguish themselves."
Swift makes the differences between the high heels and low heels seem
trivial to satirize what Swift considered were really trivial differences between
the Whigs an Tories. Another target of
Swift's sharp pen is religion, particularly the conflicts between Protestants
and Catholics. Lilliput has long been
plagued by internal religious problems the difference between the two sects is
where they cut their hard boiled eggs. The Lilliputians cut their eggs at the little
end, and are Little-endians, while
the Blefuscians cut their eggs at the big end and are Big-endians. The damage of
the wars has been, "That our Histories tell us there have been six
Rebellions raised on that account; wherein one Emperor lost his Life, and
another his Crown. These civil
Commotions were constantly fomented by the Monarchs of Blefuscu; and when they were quelled, the Exiles always
fled for Refuge to that Empire. It is
computed, that eleven thousand Persons have, at several times, suffered Death,
rather than submit to break their Eggs at the smaller End." The split between the big and little endians
is a satire of the split of Protestantism from Catholicism, which Swift
believes was a matter of small differences. However, these small differences
led to many wars between Catholics and Protestants, particularly during the 30
Years War.
June 15 is Flag Day in Denmark. It is the
anniversary of the Battle of Valdemar in 1219 in Lyndanisse, Estonia, where
according to legend, the ("Dannebrog")
fell from the sky. It is also the
anniversary of the return of North
Slesvig in 1920 to Denmark following the post-World War I
plebiscite. Other June flag days are
listed for the 2nd, 4th, 6th, 7th, 14th, 20th and 26th at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_Day
Oregon health officials believe a man in a Bend hospital has been infected
with the "black death" plague, a bacterial infection that affects the
blood stream. According to The
Oregonian, the man became ill with the bubonic plague - the cause of the
"black death" - after he was bitten on the hand by a stray cat while
trying to get a mouse out of its mouth. He
marks the fifth case discovered in Oregon since 1995. Often transmitted by fleas that are infected
with the Yersinia pestis bacteria, people often get black plague through a
bite, according to the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention. During
the "Black Death" period starting in the late 1340s and lasting for
centuries, 25 million lives were claimed, according to National
Geographic. . On average, 10 to 20
people are diagnosed with the disease each year in the U.S., with worldwide
rates reported at 1,000 to 3,000 cases a year. While four people have died from the plague
since 1934, the last four cases - one in 1995, two in 2010 and one in 2011 -
all survived, according to the Oregonian. While a plague vaccine exists, it is no longer
sold in the U.S. http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-57452519-10391704/oregon-man-diagnosed-with-black-death-plague/
June 18th, 1812,
President James Madison and the United States Congress declared war on Great
Britain. Battles raged throughout the
continent for over two years before peace was negotiated. http://www.visit1812.com/
Maryland—whose
governor has participated in 1812 re-enactments—has issued War of 1812 license
plates, and an official bicentennial commission has plans for a three-year, $25
million commemoration. The bicentennial
also is being promoted by the U.S. Navy, which traces
many traditions to the war and hopes to use it to remind Americans, in a time
of military budget cuts, of its own importance.
Canadians have their uses for the bicentennial, to which the federal
government has committed $28 million. Plans include a new war memorial in Ottawa;
more than 100 events, including re-enactments; commemorative stamps and coins;
renovation of historic sites; and a phone app for battlefield tours. The war killed the idea of America as an
agrarian nation with a weak military, static borders and a quasi-isolationist
foreign policy. President Jefferson had
tried to withdraw the nation from European trade to avoid war, and he was
notoriously suspicious of manufacturing and its attendant "wage
slavery." When the war was over, Winfield
Scott and other veterans reformed the Army to avoid a repetition of the
mistakes they'd seen. The war
established that the United States would not expand into Canada and would grow
west and south. The defeat of Britain's
Creek Indian allies cleared the way for the spread of slave-based cotton planting
into Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi and set the stage for the Civil War. It was the end of Federalists, the party of
Washington and John Adams, who bitterly
opposed the war and looked foolish after Jackson's victory. Although there is much debate over who won
the War of 1812, it's clear who lost it: Native Americans east of the Mississippi. The Indians in the Great Lakes states hoped
for British support for a sort of buffer state against American expansion. With the end of the war, they lost any hope of
independence from, or equality with, the settlers. By
repulsing the American invasion, the Canadian colony began its march toward
self-rule in 1867 and created a pantheon of national heroes.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2012-06-14/war-of-1812-bicentennial/55603666/1
Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture depicting Russian and
French armies colliding at the Battle of Borodino has an American companion
piece on the June 17 Baltimore Symphony Orchestra program. It's
"Overture for 2012," newly written by Baltimore-born Philip Glass, a
major figure in the genre known as minimalism.
His 12-minute orchestral work
will not be quite as noisy as Tchaikovsky's.
"No cannons," said Matthew Spivey, the BSO's vice president of
artistic operations. "It does have
an anvil, though. And there's some
martial-sounding percussion, with snare drum, and some fanfare-ish brass
writing. It's unmistakably by Philip
Glass." The piece is the result of
an effort to add extra spice to this year's anniversary. The effort to generate a new work involved
two bicentennial organizations, two countries, two cities and two orchestras.
"Overture for 2012" receives simultaneous premieres by the BSO and
the Toronto
Symphony Orchestra. http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2012-06-06/news/bs-ae-glass-overture-20120616_1_tchaikovsky-borodino-overture
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