Welcome To The World's First Murdochracy
Adelaide is Australia's festival city. Its arts festival is currently in swing. Polite debate, aesthetics and high-octane wine are putting the world to rights. With one exception. Adelaide is where Rupert Murdoch began his empire. The voracious trail starts here. No statue stands; his is a spectral presence, controlling the only daily newspaper, even the printing presses. Across Australia, he owns almost 70 percent of the capital city press and the only national newspaper and Sky Television and much else. Welcome to the world's first murdochracy.
What is a murdochracy? It is where the fealty and augmentation of Murdoch's editors and managers are undisguised, an inspiration to his choir on seven continents, where even his competitors sing along, and wise politicians heed the Murdochism: "What'll it be? A headline a day or a bucket of shit a day?" Mississippi school prom off after lesbian's date request
A northern Mississippi school district will not be hosting a high school prom this spring after a lesbian student sought to attend with her girlfriend and wear a tuxedo.
The Itawamba County school district's board decided Wednesday to drop the prom because of what it called recent distractions but without specifically mentioning the girl's request, which was backed by the American Civil Liberties Union.
The student, 18-year-old high school senior Constance McMillen, said the cancellation was retaliation for her efforts to bring her girlfriend, also a student, to the April 2 dance."A bunch of kids at school are really going to hate me for this, so in a way it's really retaliation," McMillen told The Clarion-Ledger of Jackson. Calls to McMillen by The Associated Press late Wednesday went unanswered.
School policy requires that senior prom dates be of the opposite sex. The ACLU of Mississippi had given the district until Wednesday to change that policy, arguing that banning same-sex prom dates violated McMillen's constitutional rights.
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Early in December 1952, a cold fog caused Londoners to burn more coal than usual. When the resulting pollution was trapped by the dense mass of cold air, concentrations of pollutants built up dramatically. By the time it lifted, the smog had caused or advanced the deaths of thousands of people—most of whom were very young or elderly or had pre-existing respiratory problems—leading to a new focus on the dangers of air pollution. Even indoor events were cancelled during the Great Smog; why? 
On the morning of March 11, 2004, 10 explosions occurred aboard four commuter trains in Madrid. The series of coordinated bombings killed 191 people and wounded 2,050, making it thedeadliest terrorist attack in Spain's history. Although a Basque militant group was originally suspected of the attack, an investigation revealed that it was carried out by an al-Qaeda-inspired terrorist cell. The bombings occurred three days before Spain's general elections and exactly 911 days after what event? 
Tasso, an Italian poet, was one of the foremost writers of the Renaissance as well as one of its tragic figures. After penning many popular works, Tasso became psychologically unstable andwas intermittently confined to a hospital in his later life. He is best known for writing Gerusalemme liberata—Jerusalem Delivered—an epic of chivalric exploits during the First Crusade. Considered his masterpiece, it has influenced countless poets. Why, then, did Tasso heavily revise it? 
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