Obituaries

[Hintergrund]

(09-09-2019, 06:54 AM)sbarrera Wrote:

(09-09-2019, 05:01 AM)Hintergrund Wrote: Sorry to hear that. May she Rest in Peace, Steve.

To make it clear, my Mom is a survivor mentioned in the obituary. The deceased was her companion, James Edward Jones.

My bad.

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Former President of Indonesia:


Bacharuddin Jusuf Habibie (Indonesian: [baxaˈrudːin ˈjusuf haˈbibi] (listen); 25 June 1936 – 11 September 2019) was an Indonesian engineer and politician who was the President of Indonesia from 1998 to 1999. He succeeded Suharto who resigned in 1998, only two months after his inauguration as Vice President. His presidency is seen as a transition to the post-Suharto era. Upon becoming president, he liberalized Indonesia's press and political party laws, and held an early democratic election in 1999, which resulted in the end of his presidency. His presidency was the third, and the shortest, after independence.

Much more at Wikipedia.

Thomas Boone Pickens Jr. (May 22, 1928 – September 11, 2019) was an American capitalist. Pickens chaired the hedge fund BP Capital Management. He was a very well-known takeover operator and corporate raider during the 1980s. As of November 2016, Pickens had a net worth of $500 million.[1]


Much more at Wikipedia.

[Eric the Green]

Pickens was doing some good work investing in wind energy in recent years. Surprised to see him go. What good will all his money do him now?

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(09-11-2019, 11:20 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Pickens was doing some good work investing in wind energy in recent years. Surprised to see him go. What good will all his money do him now?

Carnegie endowed libraries as a window on the world for multitudes of hick towns before there was radio and television. (It is arguable that the libraries do more good in hick towns than do radio and television). Stanford and Vanderbilt endowed great universities. Hughes established one of the finest centers for medical research. Danny Thomas established St. Jude's Research Hospital (although he was more a pitchman for fundraising -- that too is important). We have the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations. 

The question is what good his money will do the rest of us. If it simply goes to heirs to finance right-wing politics and sybaritic lifestyles as with descendants of Sam Walton, then it does little good. 

There are questions about some foundations, as with the late Jeffrey Ep-swine with his revival of the cranky mad pseudoscience of eugenics.

[sbarrera]

I didn't realize he was so old (75) since I always thought of The Cars as an 80s band. I figured they would be Jonesers.

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/sinc...26820.html

Ric Ocasek (March 23, 1944 – September 15, 2019)
Lead singer for The Cars

from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ric_Ocasek

[A]an American singer, songwriter, musician, record producer and painter. He was best known as the lead vocalist, rhythm guitarist and songwriter for the rock band the Cars. In 2018, Ocasek was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Cars.[1] That same year, he revealed a number of his paintings in a national tour which included an exhibit at the Wentworth Galleries in Tysons Corner, Virginia.

...

Early life

Ocasek grew up in Baltimore, Maryland. When Ocasek was 16 years old, his family moved to Cleveland, Ohio, where he graduated from Maple Heights High School in 1963. Ocasek briefly attended Antioch College and Bowling Green State University, but dropped out to pursue a career in music.

...

The Cars


Main article: The Cars


Ocasek's breakout success was as a founding member of the Cars, recording numerous hit songs from 1978 to 1988. He played rhythm guitar and sang lead vocals for a majority of songs (bassist Benjamin Orr was lead vocalist on the remaining tracks). After splitting writing duty with Orr in the 1970s, Ocasek became the principal songwriter of the band, and wrote nearly all of the Cars' material, sharing credit on only a few songs with bandmate Greg Hawkes as co-writer. In 2010, Ocasek reunited with the surviving original members of the Cars to record their first album in 24 years, titled Move Like This, which was released on May 10, 2011.

...

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Two distinguished broadcast journalists:

Sander Vanocur:

Sander "Sandy" Vanocur (/ˌvænˈoʊkər/) (born Alexander Vinocur, January 8, 1928 - September 16, 2019) [1] was an American television journalist who focused on national electoral politics.



Vanocur was born in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Rose (Millman) and Louis Vinocur, a lawyer. His family is of Russian Jewish descent.[2] Vanocur moved to Peoria, Illinois when he was twelve years old.[3] After attending Western Military Academy in Alton, Illinois,[3] he earned a bachelor's degree in political science from the Northwestern University School of Speech (1950). He began his journalism career as a reporter on the London staff of The Manchester Guardian and also did general reporting for The New York Times.


Broadcast journalism career[edit]

Described as "one of the country's most prominent political reporters during the 1960s,"[4] Vanocur served as White House correspondent and national political correspondent for NBC News in the 1960s and early 1970s.[5] He was one of the questioners at the first Kennedy-Nixon debate in 1960 and was also chosen as one of the questioners in the 1992 presidential debate[6] as well as one of NBC's "four horsemen," its floor reporters at the political conventions in the 1960s—the other three were John Chancellor, Frank McGee, and Edwin Newman.[7] While White House correspondent during the Kennedy administration, Vanocur was one of the first reporters to publicly ask Kennedy to justify the failure of the Bay of Pigs Invasion. Vanocur also dubbed Kennedy's coterie the "Irish mafia."[8]

Later, Vanocur covered the 1968 United States presidential election in which Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated. Vanocur, who had interviewed Kennedy on June 4, 1968, shortly before the Democratic candidate was shot, reported on the incident from The Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California, for the entire night. On the final night of the Republican National Convention in Miami Beach, during a convention-wrapping Thursday night round-table discussion with his fellow NBC floor reporters in the vacated folding chairs on the convention hall floor, Vanocur suggested that the Republicans had "kissed off the black vote" in 1968, a comment which caused a media uproar in the ensuing week.[citation needed]

Vanocur also served as host of First Tuesday, a monthly newsmagazine that premiered in 1969 and continued after Vanocur left the network.[9] His work at NBC earned him a place on the Nixon administration's "enemies list".

After leaving NBC in 1971, Vanocur worked for PBS and as a television writer for The Washington Post. He joined ABC News in 1977 and worked there until 1991, holding various positions, including Chief Diplomatic Correspondent, Senior Correspondent in Buenos Aires, and anchor for Business World, the first regularly scheduled weekly business program. He covered the 1997, 1998, and 1999 World Economic Summits and was Chief Overview Correspondent during the 1980 and 1984 presidential elections. In 1984, Vanocur moderated the Vice Presidential debate between incumbent George H. W. Bush and Congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro. He made a cameo appearance as himself in the movie Dave and was one of the major performers, again playing himself, in the sci-fi television special Without Warning as one of the main news anchors linking the various scenes together.
Vanocur hosted two of the History Channel's primetime series: Movies in Time and History's Business.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sander_Vanocur

Also:

Mary Martha Corinne Morrison Claiborne Roberts (née Boggs;[1] December 27, 1943 – September 17, 2019), known as Cokie Roberts, was an American journalist and bestselling author.[2] Her career included decades as a political reporter and analyst for National Public Radio and ABC News, with prominent positions on Morning Edition, The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour, World News Tonight, and This Week.

Roberts, along with her husband, Steven V. Roberts, wrote a weekly column syndicated by United Media in newspapers around the United States. She served on the boards of several non-profit organizations such as the Kaiser Family Foundation[3] and was appointed by President George W. Bush to his Council on Service and Civic Participation.[4]

Roberts was a reporter for CBS News in Athens, Greece.[10] She also produced and hosted a public affairs program on WRC-TV in Washington, D.C. Roberts was also a president of the Radio and Television Correspondents' Association.[11]

Roberts began working for NPR in 1978, where she was the congressional correspondent for more than ten years.[12] Roberts was a contributor to PBS in the evening television news program The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour. Her coverage of the Iran-Contra Affair for that program won her the Edward Weintal Prize for Diplomatic Reporting in 1988.[13] From 1981 to 1984, in addition to her work at NPR, she also co-hosted The Lawmakers, a weekly public television program on Congress.[14]

She went to work for ABC News in 1988 as a political correspondent for ABC's World News Tonight with Peter Jennings, continuing to serve part-time as a political commentator at NPR.[12]

While working in Guatemala in 1989 helping poor indigenous Guatemalans learn how to read, Sister Dianna Ortiz, a Catholic nun from New Mexico, was abducted, raped, and tortured by members of a government-backed death squad, who believed she was a subversive.[15] During a subsequent interview, Roberts contested Ortiz's claim that an American was among her captors. (The United States provided significant military aid to Guatemala at the time.) Roberts implied that Ortiz was lying about the entire episode, although Ortiz later won a lawsuit against a Guatemalan general she accused in the case.[16]


Starting In 1992, Roberts served as a senior news analyst and commentator for NPR. She was usually heard on Morning Edition, appearing on Mondays to discuss the week in politics.[17] Roberts was the co-anchor of the ABC News' Sunday morning broadcast, This Week with Sam Donaldson & Cokie Roberts from 1996 to 2002, while serving as the chief congressional analyst for ABC News.[18] She covered politics, Congress and public policy, reporting for World News Tonight and other ABC News broadcasts.[19]


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cokie_Roberts

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William Barron Hilton (October 23, 1927 – September 19, 2019) was an American business magnate, philanthropist and sportsman. The son and successor of hotelier Conrad Hilton, he was the chairman, president and chief executive officer of Hilton Hotels Corporation and chairman emeritus of the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation. Hilton, a notable pilot and outdoorsman, was also a founder of the American Football League as the original owner of the Los Angeles Chargers, and helped forge the merger with the National Football League that created the Super Bowl. Like his father before him, he pledged 97 percent of his wealth to the humanitarian work of the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation[5].[1]

Before joining his father in the hotel industry, Barron Hilton honed his business skills in a variety of entrepreneurial ventures. He acquired the Los Angeles-area distributorship of Vita-Pakt Citrus Products, co-founded MacDonald Oil Company, and founded Air Finance Corporation, one of the nation's first aircraft leasing businesses. In 1954, Barron was elected vice president of Hilton Hotels, running the company's franchise operations and creating the Carte Blanche credit card as a service to the company's customers.[4]


In 1959, Lamar Hunt offered Hilton the Los Angeles franchise in the new American Football League. Hilton named his team the Chargers, but denied that he did it to create synergy with his new credit card business. A fan had nominated the name in a contest, and Hilton selected it because of the bugle call and "Charge!" cheer that was often sounded during USC football games at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. The Chargers began playing at the Coliseum in 1960, but in spite of winning the Western Division, the club found it difficult to compete for fans with the Rams of the National Football League in their own stadium. Hilton moved the team to San Diego in time for the 1961 season and played in tiny Balboa Stadium.[5]



Hilton began working with the local newspapers to engender support for construction of a state-of-the-art stadium. Encouraged by San Diego Union sports editor Jack Murphy, among others, a referendum was passed in 1965, and the Chargers began play in new San Diego Stadium in 1967. With the availability of a new stadium, the city received a baseball expansion franchise from the National League, and the San Diego Padres began play in 1969. It was named Jack Murphy Stadium after Murphy's death in 1980, and is now known as SDCCU Stadium.[5]

Hilton also served as AFL president in 1965, and helped forge the merger between the AFL and the NFL, announced in 1966, which created the Super Bowl. In all, the Chargers won five divisional titles, and one AFL Championship, during Hilton's six years at the helm of the club. In 1966, directors of Hilton Hotels Corporation asked Hilton to succeed his father as president and chief executive officer of the company, provided that he drop his football responsibilities. He sold his majority interest in the team for $10 million—a record for any professional sports franchise at the time—after an initial investment in a franchise fee of just $25,000.[5]


With the death of the Bills' Ralph Wilson in 2014, Hilton became the last surviving member of the Foolish Club – the nickname the original AFL owners gave each other, as they absorbed the start-up expenses and player salaries necessary to compete with the established NFL.

Once charged with the responsibility for Hilton Hotels Corporation, Barron Hilton soon showed his father's genius for cost controls and real estate deals. In 1970, he convinced the board to expand into Las Vegas by purchasing the International and the Flamingo from financier Kirk Kerkorian. Hilton Hotels thus became the first company listed on the New York Stock Exchange to venture into the gaming market. Renamed the Las Vegas Hilton and the Flamingo Hilton, the two resorts tapped a new source of income from gambling in a state where it had been legal since 1931. Barron could also see that Las Vegas would become a leading convention destination, capitalizing on the company's strength in that important market segment.[6]


Hilton personally introduced two innovations that have become standard features of casinos everywhere. Calling on his background in photography, he installed video cameras throughout the casinos to replace the "eye in the sky" system of observers peering through two-way mirrors in the ceiling.[7] He also introduced progressive Pot o' Gold slot machines that produced a succession of world record jackpots, generating free publicity around the world.

Las Vegas would also become the self-proclaimed Entertainment Capital of the World. Of all the headliners to perform at the Hilton or the Flamingo, the most successful and spectacular was Elvis Presley. After a decade in the movies, he began performing in front of live audiences again in 1969 at the opening of the International (a few years later renamed the Las Vegas Hilton). He went on to star at the Las Vegas Hilton two months a year—performing two shows a night, seven nights a week—until shortly before his death in 1977. Presley set a world entertainment record at the Las Vegas Hilton for selling out 837 consecutive concerts.[8] The Las Vegas Hilton also left its mark on boxing, hosting the famous upset of Muhammad Ali by Leon Spinks in 1978, and the 1986–1989 heavyweight tournament won by Mike Tyson that made him a household name.

The company's expansion into Nevada had an immediate impact on its bottom line. By 1972, the two resorts contributed 45 percent of the company's income (before interest income, interest expense, write down of investments and sales of properties), nearly matching the income from the other 160 Hilton hotels in the United States.[9]
On the hotel front, in 1975, Hilton sold a 50 percent interest in six of the company's largest hotels to Prudential Insurance Company for $83 million. He took a leaseback to manage the properties, collecting lucrative management fees and a percentage of their gross profits. Perhaps more importantly, the sale proved that these hotels were worth double their book value, demonstrating the underlying value of the company's real estate holdings.[10] The transaction also enhanced the value of the stock held by every HHC shareholder. Hilton used the proceeds to pay down high interest debt, and repurchase 20 percent of the company's stock—all at market rate—which was still trading well below the company's book value.[11]
Hilton continued to expand the domestic hotel chain through franchising and the selective acquisition of management contracts and hotels in emerging markets. In 1977, he completed a hotel purchase that his father had initiated 28 years earlier. When Conrad Hilton bought the Waldorf-Astoria in 1949, he actually bought the hotel's operating company and its 30-year lease to run the hotel. The building, and the land under it, were still owned by the realty arm of the Penn Central Railroad. Knowing that the lease would expire in 1979, Hilton deftly negotiated to buy the hotel and real estate from the railroad. The landmark property, whose current value is estimated around $1 billion, was purchased by Hilton for just $35 million.[12]

As competitors aggressively spread across the U.S. in the '80s, Barron held his own by rehabbing his own hotels and increasing revenues in Las Vegas. Through a series of massive additions to the Flamingo Hilton and the Las Vegas Hilton, the company nearly tripled its rooms in Las Vegas by 1990, from 2277 to 6703. He also launched Conrad International in the '80s,[13] and Hilton Garden Inn in the '90s,[14] adding two brands that covered important price points at opposite ends of lodging's pricing spectrum.

In contrast to his gamble on gaming, Hilton earned a well-deserved reputation as a financial conservative. After seeing his father struggle to overcome the effects of the Great Depression and World War II, he maintained the strongest balance sheet in the industry. Throughout his 30 years as CEO, he carried a low debt-to-capital ratio and a high credit rating, enabling him to gobble up such properties as Bally's Reno (formerly the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino-Reno). The 2000-room resort was opened in 1978 for $230 million, and purchased by Hilton in 1992 for $88 million. With strong cash flow and plenty of liquid investments on hand, he was able to weather the inevitable recessions and business interruptions that struck the industry from the mid-'60s to the mid-'90s.[15]
Hilton continued as chairman of the board through the next decade as his hand-picked successor, Steve Bollenbach, dramatically expanded the company through a series of mergers and acquisitions. The advent of friendly capital markets in the late '90s enabled him to acquire such popular brands as Embassy Suites, Doubletree, Hampton Inn, Homewood Suites, Bally's and Caesars.[16] Then, in 2005, he reacquired Hilton International, 38 years after it had been sold to TWA. With the company now strategically complete, Bollenbach spun off the gaming business, which merged with Harrah's in 2005 and was renamed Caesars Entertainment.[17] In 2006, the gaming company was acquired by two private equity funds, Apollo Management and Texas Pacific Group, and still operates as Caesars Entertainment.

In the meantime, the hotel business continued to soar. With the best known and most respected name in the industry—and popular domestic brands ripe for expansion overseas—Hilton Hotels Corporation proved to be irresistible to The Blackstone Group. In 2007, the private equity firm purchased Hilton Hotels Corporation, consisting of 2,800 hotels with 480,000 rooms in 76 countries and territories. Blackstone paid $47.50 per share, a 32 percent premium over the July 2 closing price. The $26 billion, all-cash transaction included $7.5 billion of debt.[18]

Host Hotels & Resorts veteran Chris Nassetta was hired to manage the company, which was renamed Hilton Worldwide, Inc. and is now known as Hilton, Inc. Now celebrating the 100th year since Conrad Hilton purchased his first hotel, the company has expanded to include 17 brands, 5800 hotels, and 939,00 rooms in 114 countries of the world[19]. With another 373,000 rooms in the development pipeline[20], the company has all but assured the continued presence of the Hilton brand in the global lodging marketplace through the 21st Century and beyond.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barron_Hilton

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NFL Hall-of-Fame running back Howard Cassady


Cassady played football for the Ohio State Buckeyes from 1952 to 1955. During his college career, he scored 37 touchdowns in 36 games. He also played defensive back; a pass was never completed on him in his four years at the university. He was twice selected as a consensus All-American, in 1954 and 1955. The 1954 Buckeyes finished the season 10–0 and won a consensus national championship. That year Cassady finished third in the vote for the Heisman Trophy, behind Alan Ameche of Wisconsin. In 1955, he won the Heisman Trophy (by the largest margin at the time) and the Maxwell Award, and was named the Associated Press Athlete of the Year. During his playing days, he was 5'10" and 170 pounds.


Cassady earned the nickname "Hopalong" during his first game as a freshman for Ohio State. Columbus sportswriters who saw him play said he "hopped all over the field like the performing cowboy", a reference to the fictional character Hopalong Cassidy. In that game, Cassady came off the bench to score three touchdowns in a win over Indiana University.

During an Ohio State practice in 1953, Cassady was having trouble executing an off-tackle run. At this point Coach Woody Hayes told Cassady to take a seat and brought in backup running back Robert Croce, who executed the play flawlessly and carried the ball for 20+ yards. Hayes then told Cassady, "Cassady, did you see that Croce was just slow enough to hit the hole. You're hitting the line too fast!"
Cassady held some Ohio State career records for many years following his graduation. He held the career rushing record (2,466 yards) until it was surpassed by Jim Otis in 1969, the career all-purpose yards record (4,403 yards) until surpassed by Archie Griffin in 1974, and the scoring record (222 points) until surpassed by Pete Johnson in 1975.

Cassady also played baseball for Ohio State. He led the team in home runs in 1955, and stolen bases in 1956. He also became a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity there.

He was a member of The Pigskin Club Of Washington, D.C. National Intercollegiate All-American Football Players Honor Roll.


Cassady also played baseball for Ohio State. He led the team in home runs in 1955, and stolen bases in 1956. He also became a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity there.

He was a member of The Pigskin Club Of Washington, D.C. National Intercollegiate All-American Football Players Honor Roll.

After retiring from football, Cassady became an entrepreneur forming a company manufacturing concrete pipe. He then served as a scout for the New York Yankees baseball team, and as the first base coach for their former AAA affiliate, the Columbus Clippers.

His son Craig Cassady played defensive back at Ohio State, and briefly in the NFL for the New Orleans Saints in the 1970s.[1] Cassady died on September 20, 2019 at his home in Tampa, Florida.[2][3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Cassady

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First German in space:


Sigmund Werner Paul Jähn (13 February 1937 – 21 September 2019) was a German cosmonaut and pilot who, in 1978, became the first German to fly into space as part of the Soviet Union's Interkosmos programme.

Jähn was born on 13 February 1937 in Morgenröthe-Rautenkranz, in the Vogtland region of Saxony, Germany. From 1943 to 1951 he attended school in his hometown. He trained as a printer until 1954 and then managed the pioneer program in a local school.[1][2]
On 26 April 1955 he joined the East German Air Force, where he became a pilot. From 1961 to 1963 he was deputy commander for political work as an adamant socialist and in 1965 became responsible for air tactics and air shooting. From 1966 to 1970 he studied at the Gagarin Air Force Academy in Monino, in the Soviet Union. From 1970 to 1976, he worked in the administration of the East German air force, responsible for pilot education and flight safety.[1]

On 25 November 1976, Jähn and his backup Eberhard Köllner were selected for the Interkosmos program. After a brief period of basic training, they devoted a year to mission-specific training.[1] He trained in Star City near Moscow.[3] He flew on board Soyuz 31, launched 26 August 1978 to the Soviet space station Salyut 6, where he conducted experiments in remote sensing of the earth, medicine, biology, materials science, and geophysics. After 124 orbits he returned on Soyuz 29 and landed on 3 September 1978, having spent 7 days, 20 hours, and 49 minutes in space.[1][4] Because the Soviet and American space programs maintain distinctive vocabularies, he was a cosmonaut rather than an astronaut.

[/url]
Jähn's national space patch from the airforce of the [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_People%27s_Army]National People's Army

During and after the flight, he and the socialist authorities of the GDR acclaimed him as "the first German in space", emphasizing an East German victory over West Germany.[3][5]

Upon his return he headed the East Germany Army's Cosmonaut Training Center near Moscow until German unification in 1990, when he left the East German military with the rank of major general.[1] Jähn was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 3 September 1978.[6] In 1983 he received a doctorate at the Zentralinstitut für Physik der Erde [de] in Potsdam, specialising in remote sensing of the earth.[1] He was instrumental in forming the Association of Space Explorers. He was a founding member in 1985 and served for several years on its Executive Committee.[1]

Starting in 1990, after Germany was reunited, he worked as a freelance consultant for the German Aerospace Center[5] and from 1993 also for the European Space Agency (ESA) to prepare for the Euromir missions. He retired in 2002. In 2011, on the 50th anniversary of the first manned space flight by Yuri Gagarin, he explained to Der Spiegel that his taking a toy figure on his flight was not a personal choice. He took a Sandmännchen, an animated character featured on an East German children's television show, in order to film material for the show. Because he and fellow cosmonaut Vladimir Kovalyonok joked about Sandmännchen marrying another toy figure of the Russia mascot Masha, authorities found the material unsuitable for the public.[3]
Jähn was married and had two children. He lived in Strausberg in the later part of his life and enjoyed reading and hunting. He died on 21 September 2019 at the age of 82.[7][8]


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_J%C3%A4hn

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Jacques Chirac, French politician:

Jacques René Chirac (UK: /ˈʃɪəræk/ SHEER-ak,[1][2] US: /ʃɪəˈrɑːk/ (listen) sheer-AHK,[2][3][4] French: [ʒak ʁəne ʃiʁak] (listen); 29 November 1932 – 26 September 2019) was a French politician who served as President of France and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra from 1995 to 2007. Chirac was previously the Prime Minister of France from 1974 to 1976 and from 1986 to 1988, as well as the Mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995.


After completing his degree at Sciences Po, a term at Harvard University, and the École nationale d'administration, Chirac began his career as a high-level civil servant, and entered politics shortly thereafter. Chirac occupied various senior positions, including Minister of Agriculture and Minister of the Interior. Chirac's internal policies initially included lower tax rates, the removal of price controls, strong punishment for crime and terrorism, and business privatisation.[5] After pursuing these policies in his second term as Prime Minister, he changed his views. He argued for more socially responsible economic policies, and was elected President in the 1995 presidential election with 52.6% of the vote in the second round, beating Socialist Lionel Jospin, after campaigning on a platform of healing the "social rift" (fracture sociale).[6] Then, Chirac's economic policies, based on dirigisme, allowing for state-directed investment, stood in opposition to the laissez-faire policies of the United Kingdom under the ministries of Margaret Thatcher and John Major, which Chirac famously described as "Anglo-Saxon ultraliberalism".[7]

He was also known for his stand against the American-led assault on Iraq, his recognition of the collaborationist French Government's role in deporting Jews, and his reduction of the presidential term from 7 years to 5 through a referendum in 2000. At the 2002 French presidential election, he won 82.2% of the vote in the second round against the far-right candidate, Jean-Marie Le Pen. During his second term, however, he had a very low approval rating, and was considered one of the least popular presidents in modern French history.

On 15 December 2011, the Paris court declared Chirac guilty of diverting public funds and abusing public confidence, and gave him a two-year suspended prison sentence.

More at Wikipedia

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Paul Badura-Skoda, pianist:

A student of Edwin Fischer, Badura-Skoda first rose to prominence by winning first prize in the Austrian Music Competition in 1947. In 1949, he performed with distinguished conductors including Wilhelm Furtwängler and Herbert von Karajan; over his long career, he recorded with conductors including Hans Knappertsbusch, Hermann Scherchen, and George Szell. Along with his contemporaries Friedrich Gulda and Jörg Demus, he was part of the so-called "Viennese Troika".


He was best known for his performances of works by Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert, but had an extensive repertoire including many works of Chopin and Ravel. Badura-Skoda was well known for his performances on historical instruments, and owned several (his recording of the complete piano sonatas of Schubert is on five instruments from his private collection). A prolific recording artist, Badura-Skoda made over 200 records, including many duplicates created to highlight the sound of different pianos. For instance, in a 2013 record, he recorded Schubert's last sonata three times on instruments from the 1820s, 1920s, and early 2000s (having already recorded the piece several times before); one of his box sets of the complete piano sonatas of Beethoven similarly included three different versions of the "Hammerklavier" Sonata. Indeed, he is the only pianist to have not only recorded the complete piano sonatas of Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert, but to have done so on both historic and modern instruments.

His frequent collaborations with Demus included several duet recordings and performances, and a book on the interpretation of Beethoven's piano sonatas. Badura-Skoda also collaborated with Frank Martin, producing editions and recordings of his music, and several articles on it. In 1974 he completed an extensive and highly acclaimed tour of all the large cities in Southern Africa.[1]
Badura-Skoda, who was considered as one of the major pianists of his time[2], was also well known for his musical scholarship, often along with his wife Eva Badura-Skoda. The Badura-Skodas edited one of the volumes of Mozart's piano concertos for the Neue Mozart-Ausgabe (Serie V/Werkgruppe 15/Band 5, consisting of K. 453, 456, and 459). They also produced books on the interpretation of the piano music of Mozart and the keyboard music of Johann Sebastian Bach, which were translated into several languages.
He died on 25 September 2019 at the age of 91.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Badura-Skoda

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Joseph Wilson, diplomat  

Former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson died from organ failure on Friday, according to a report by The New York Times. He was 69.
Wilson, whose diplomatic career spanned more than 20 years, was a key figure in undermining the Bush administration’s narrative surrounding the decision to invade Iraq.
In a 2003 New York Times op-ed, Wilson questioned Bush’s claim that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had purchased materials for a nuclear weapon from Africa. Wilson had traveled to Niger in 2002 on behalf of the CIA to investigate whether Hussein had purchased a form of uranium known as “yellowcake.” Wilson concluded after the trip that the reported Iraq-Niger deal did not exist.
Shortly after the op-ed published, the Bush administration leaked the name of Wilson’s then-wife, Valerie Plame, a covert CIA agent, in an attempt to undercut Wilson. That move effectively ended Plame’s career with the agency. (Wilson and Plame divorced in 2017.)
In an interview with the Times on Friday, Plame called Wilson “an American hero” for speaking out against the Bush administration.
“He did it because he felt it was his responsibility as a citizen,” she said. “It was not done out of partisan motivation, despite how it was spun.”
“He had the heart of a lion. He’s an American hero,” added Plame, who is now running for Congress in New Mexico.
In 2007, a federal jury found Scooter Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, guilty of lying about the role he played in leaking Plame’s identity and of obstructing the probe into the leak.

Bush commuted Libby’s sentence in 2007, which spared him from serving a prison sentence.
President Donald Trump pardoned Libby in 2018, which drew criticism from Wilson, who said it showed the president’s disregard for America’s national security.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/joseph-wi...e7604c9ca8

[David Horn]

(09-27-2019, 11:04 PM)Marypoza Wrote: RlP lEllie May Clampett. She was 91 yrs old, almost as old as Granny

I assume you mean Donna Douglas who played the part of Elly Mae.  She was 82.

[Marypoza]

(09-28-2019, 09:55 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(09-27-2019, 11:04 PM)Marypoza Wrote: RlP lEllie May Clampett. She was 91 yrs old, almost as old as Granny

I assume you mean Donna Douglas who played the part of Elly Mae.  She was 82.

-- the obit l saw said she was 91. I thought that was sort of old. But then I thought between make up & good genes maybe she was able 2 play a person on TV much younger than her actual age. Even @ 82 that means she was 30ish some 50 odd yrs ago when that show was on the air

[pbrower2a]

He may have made one of the toughest choices that anyone could ever make:

Nguyễn Hữu Hạnh (July 26, 1926 – September 29, 2019) was a Vietnamese military officer who served in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, rising to the rank of Brigadier General. His first son Second Lieutenant Nguyen Huu Tai, born in 1948, was killed in a raid on Chau Thanh district, Tien Giang province.
Hạnh assisted South Vietnam President Dương Văn Minh in the announcement that there would be a transfer of power to the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam.
Hạnh died on 29 September 2019, aged 93.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nguy%E1%BB...E1%BA%A1nh

[pbrower2a]

A great voice is stilled:

Jessye Norman, the renowned international opera star whose passionate soprano voice won her four Grammy Awards, the National Medal of Arts and the Kennedy Center Honor, has died, according to family spokesperson Gwendolyn Quinn. She was 74.
A statement released to The Associated Press on Monday said Norman died at 7:54 a.m. EDT from septic shock and multi-organ failure secondary to complications of a spinal cord injury she suffered in 2015. She died at Mount Sinai St. Luke's Hospital in New York, and was surrounded by loved ones.

"We are so proud of Jessye's musical achievements and the inspiration that she provided to audiences around the world that will continue to be a source of joy. We are equally proud of her humanitarian endeavors addressing matters such as hunger, homelessness, youth development, and arts and culture education," the family statement read.


Norman was a trailblazing performer, and one of the rare black singers to attain worldwide stardom in the opera world, performing at such revered houses like La Scala and the Metropolitan Opera, and singing title roles in works like "Carmen," ''Aida" and more. She sang the works of Wagner, but was not limited to opera or classical music, performing songs by Duke Ellington and others as well.


"I have always been drawn to things other people might consider unusual. I'm always taken by the text and beautiful melody. It's not important to me who has written it. It's just more reasonable to have an open mind about what beauty is," Norman said in a 2002 interview with the Chicago Sun-Times. "It's important for classical musicians to stretch and think beyond the three B's (Bach, Beethoven and Brahms). They were wonderful composers, but they went to the great beyond a long time ago. There's lots of music that will live for a very long time."
In that same interview she profoundly said, "Pigeonholing is only interesting to pigeons."

Norman certainly knew no boundaries or limits. She broke barriers and had hoped her industry would see more faces like hers.
"It is a more diverse place, thank goodness," Norman said of the opera world in a 2004 interview with NPR, "I wish it were even more diverse than it is."

Norman was born on September 15, 1945 in Augusta, Georgia, in segregationist times. She grew up singing in church and around a musical family that included pianists and singers. She earned a scholarship to the historically black college Howard University in Washington, D.C., to study music, and later studied at the Peabody Conservatory and the University of Michigan.

Much more, WRC-TV (NBC-4, Washington DC)

[Eric the Green]

(09-28-2019, 12:53 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(09-28-2019, 09:55 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(09-27-2019, 11:04 PM)Marypoza Wrote: RlP lEllie May Clampett. She was 91 yrs old, almost as old as Granny

I assume you mean Donna Douglas who played the part of Elly Mae.  She was 82.

-- the obit l saw said she was 91. I thought that was sort of old. But then I thought between make up & good genes maybe she was able 2 play a person on TV much younger than her actual age. Even @ 82 that means she was 30ish some 50 odd yrs ago when that show was on the air

It's hard to think of her as old, let alone dead. She was 82 when she died in 2015.

[pbrower2a]

(10-02-2019, 11:48 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(09-28-2019, 12:53 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(09-28-2019, 09:55 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(09-27-2019, 11:04 PM)Marypoza Wrote: RlP lEllie May Clampett. She was 91 yrs old, almost as old as Granny

I assume you mean Donna Douglas who played the part of Elly Mae.  She was 82.

-- the obit l saw said she was 91. I thought that was sort of old. But then I thought between make up & good genes maybe she was able 2 play a person on TV much younger than her actual age. Even @ 82 that means she was 30ish some 50 odd yrs ago when that show was on the air

It's hard to think of her as old, let alone dead. She was 82 when she died in 2015.

...and then you realize that Marilyn Monroe would be 93 if she were still living, and Judy Garland would be 97. 

It is part of the perception. Marilyn Monroe and Judy Garland both died while they still had active careers. Doris Day practically retired from stage and screen and died at age 97 this year. Betty White kept performing until rather recently and we identify her as old... and didn't Angela Lansbury appear in the Mary Poppins? Likewise. Marilyn Monroe never reached middle age; Judy Garland barely reached it...

[pbrower2a]

The only elected Jewish legislator in the Arab world...Now that is something!

(Tunisia is one of the few countries in the Arab world with anything resembling a democracy):

Joseph Roger Bismuth (4 November 1926 – 1 October 2019)[1] was a Tunisian businessman and senator. He was elected into the newly formed upper chamber, the Chamber of Advisors in July 2005 and was the only Jewish elected legislator in the Arab world. Senator Bismuth was also a member of the International Council of Jewish Parliamentarians, formed in 2002 as a platform for Jewish lawmakers to cooperate on issues of common concern such as battling anti-Semitism, forging strong interfaith relationships, and working toward social reform. A successful businessman, he founded the Tunisian-American Chamber of Commerce. He was a self-made man. Starting out as a construction worker, Roger Bismuth worked his way into ownership of several corporations. His main holding company was Groupe Bismuth based out of Tunis, Tunisia. He was married to a Danish national, Aase, and they had three children: Stephan, Jean, and Peter. From his first wife Yvette, he had one son and two daughters, Jacqueline, Michelle and Philippe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Bismuth

(He missed by less than a month of reaching his number in the periodic table). 

[pbrower2a]

Diahann Carroll, entertainer.


Carroll's big break came at 18, when she appeared as a contestant on the DuMont Television Network program, Chance of a Lifetime, hosted by Dennis James. On the show, which aired January 8, 1954, she took the $1,000 top prize for a rendition of the Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein song, "Why Was I Born?" She went on to win the following four weeks. Engagements at Manhattan's Café Society and Latin Quarter nightclubs soon followed.[3]


Carroll's film debut was a supporting role in Carmen Jones (1954) as a friend to the sultry lead character played by Dorothy Dandridge. That same year, she starred in the Broadway musical, House of Flowers. In 1959, she played Clara in the film version of George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, but her character's singing parts were dubbed by opera singer Loulie Jean Norman. She made a guest appearance in the series Peter Gunn, in the 1960 episode "Sing a Song of Murder". She starred with Sidney Poitier, Paul Newman, and Joanne Woodward in the 1961 film Paris Blues. In 1962, Carroll won the Tony Award for best actress (a first for a black woman) for the role of Barbara Woodruff in the Samuel A. Taylor and Richard Rodgers musical No Strings. In 1974, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for the film Claudine. The role of Claudine had been written specifically for actress Diana Sands, (who had made guest appearances on Julia as Carroll's cousin Sara) but shortly before filming was to begin, Sands found out that she was terminally ill with cancer. Sands attempted to carry on with the role, but as filming began, she became too ill to continue, and recommended her friend Carroll take over the role. Sands would not live to see Claudine. She died in September 1973; Claudine, starring Diahann Carroll and James Earl Jones, was released in April 1974.

[/url]
Carroll and [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sammy_Davis_Jr.]Sammy Davis Jr. on The Hollywood Palace, 1968

Carroll is well known for her titular role in the 1968 television series Julia, which made her the first African-American actress to star in her own television series where she did not play a domestic worker. That role won her the Golden Globe Award for "Best Actress In A Television Series" in 1968,[4] and a nomination for an Emmy Award in 1969. Some of her earlier work also included appearances on shows hosted by Jack Paar, Merv Griffin, Johnny Carson, Judy Garland, and Ed Sullivan, and on The Hollywood Palace variety show. In 1984, Carroll joined the nighttime soap opera Dynasty as the mixed-race jet set diva Dominique Deveraux, half-sister of Blake Carrington. Her high-profile role on Dynasty also reunited her with schoolmate Billy Dee Williams, who briefly played her onscreen husband Brady Lloyd. Carroll remained on the show until 1987, simultaneously making several appearances on its short-lived spin-off, The Colbys. She received her third Emmy nomination in 1989 for the recurring role of Marion Gilbert in A Different World.
In 1991, Carroll played the role of Eleanor Potter, the wife of Jimmy Potter, portrayed by Chuck Patterson, in The Five Heartbeats, a musical drama film in which Jimmy manages a vocal group. In this role, Carroll was a doting, concerned, and protective wife alongside actor and musician Robert Townsend, Michael Wright, and others. In a 1995 reunion with Billy Dee Williams in Lonesome Dove: The Series, she played Mrs. Greyson, the wife of Williams' character. In 1996, Carroll starred as the self-loving and deluded silent movie star Norma Desmond in the Canadian production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical version of the classic film Sunset Boulevard. In 2001, Carroll made her animation début in The Legend of Tarzan, in which she voiced Queen La, an evil sorceress and ruler of the ancient city of Opar.

In 2006, she appeared in the television medical drama Grey's Anatomy as Jane Burke, the demanding mother of Dr. Preston Burke. In December 2008, Carroll was cast in USA Network's series White Collar as June, the savvy widow who rents out her guest room to Neal Caffrey.[5] In 2010, Carroll was featured in UniGlobe Entertainment's breast cancer docudrama titled, 1 a Minute, and she appeared as Nana in two Lifetime movies: At Risk and The Front, movie adaptations of two Patricia Cornwell novels.[6]

Carroll was present on stage for the 2013 Emmy Awards, to briefly speak about being the first African American nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award. She was quoted as saying, "talented Kerry Washington better win!" Washington erroneously stated that Carroll was the first black performer ever to be nominated for an Emmy. Actually, at least three black performers were nominated before Carroll, who was first nominated in 1963.[7] These performers include: Ethel Waters for a guest appearance on Route 66, in 1962; Harry Belafonte, nominated in 1956 and 1961 and winning in 1960; and Sammy Davis Jr., who was nominated in 1956 with Belafonte.

More at Wikipedia.