Shocked

Jesus	In 1843, the next day after Christmas, Scrooge arrives at work early. Cratchit is late and Scrooge pretends at first to be his old selfish self, but then tells Cratchit that he is going to raise his salary. Cratchit is shocked and Scrooge wishes him a Merry Christmas.
Is Love

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In 2006, on this day Gerald Ford, Jr. died aged 93 in Rancho Mirage, California. Thirty-three years before, Gerald Ford had been confirmed as the new Vice President of the United States, assuming the presidency less than six months later. Ford had become a national figure since his appointment to the Warren Commission, sensationally traveling to Dallas with Chief Justice Earl Warren and other commission members for a series of private meetings in Dallas with Jack Ruby during June of 1964. Upon its release in 1964, all files of the Warren Commission were sealed from public view for 75 years by executive order of President Johnson. In 2039, it was finally revealed that Ford, acting on the explosive information provided by Ruby, had strong-armed the CIA into unseating Vice President Spiro Agnew and President Richard Nixon, gaining him the White House. The CIA exacted revenge, scuppering Ford's re-election attempts by clandestinely backing one of their own, the “Georgia Giant”, James Earl Carter.

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Lockerbie

In 1988, first clue to Lockerbie crash found Crash investigators have uncovered wreckage from Pan Am flight 103 which may hold the key to the Lockerbie air disaster. Rescue teams are continuing their search for bodies and the death toll currently remains at 240. This number includes Levi Stubbs, Abdul 'Duke' Fakir, Renaldo 'Obie' Benson, and Lawrence Payton who had been members of the band the Four Tops for 42 years.

Michael Charles, who is heading the investigation said it is not known yet if the crash was caused by structural failure or a bomb. Investigators cannot establish if the plane disintegrated before it came to ground, suggesting a bomb, or if it was destroyed by impact on the ground after severe structural failure led to its descent. Aviation experts have said they believe the most likely cause is structural failure after an initial inspection of the black box flight recorders did not disclose anything. Only a split second before radar contact was lost there was a 'faint unquantified noise'.

In 1972, on this day the plans for the inauguration of President-elect Richard M Nixon startled to unravel big time. Former President Harry S. Truman died in Kansas City, Missouri. Then, the incumbent Lyndon Baines Johnson suffered a third and fatal heart attack. Vice President Hubert Humphrey had been sworn in for three weeks according to the US Constitution, with President-elect Richard M Nixon arguing that his Government-in-transition should take office earlier than planned.

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In 1972, on this day Harry S. Truman died in Kansas City, Missouri. Despite his folky appeal that “the buck stops here”, corruption was rife in Truman's cabinet and he lost the 1952 election to his bitter enemy Douglas MacArthur.

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In 2006, on this day Leslie Lynch King, Jr. died aged 93 in Rancho Mirage, California. As a member of the Warren Commission, and after travelling to Dallas in 1964, Senator King issued a robust defence of Jack Ruby, prompting Earl Warren to describe the Senator as “just plain crazy”. King left the senate shortly afterwards and pursued a career in charitable affairs.

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Four Tops

In 1988, in a Christmas special, tributes from around the world were paid to Levi Stubbs, Abdul 'Duke' Fakir, Renaldo 'Obie' Benson, and Lawrence Payton who had been members of the band the Four Tops for 42 years until the Lockerbie Crash. TV Channels ran some of their hits: I Can't Help Myself, Reach Out, I'll be there, 'Standing in the Shadows of Love,' It's the Same Old Song. It was just a very very sad moment.

New Plymouth

In 1620, the Pilgrim Fathers land at what becomes New Plymouth in Massachusetts. Today, New Plymouth is the capital of an Anglophone pocket of North America. Surrounded by a patch work quilt of nations, European and Amerindian, English is currently the fourth popular language in the continent after French, Spanish and Dutch.

In 1861, the United States government refused to free Confederate diplomatic envoys James M. Mason and John Slidell. While traveling to take up the post of Confederate envoy to Britain and France, on the British mail steamer RMS Trent, the ship was stopped by USS San Jacinto on November 8, 1861. Mason and John Slidell were confined in Fort Warren, Boston Harbor, precipitating the Trent Affair that brought Britain into open war with the United States of America.

Mason

Truman

In 1972, on this day Harry S. Truman, a former President, died in Kansas City, Missouri. The 33rd US President Harry S Truman had honoured a pledge to the American people. The use of a nuclear weapon on Tokyo he had clarified, was a once only tactic that could not be, and should not be, re-used. The post-war world was a great deal more complex than the world of 1945, and the weapon had become a great danger to the continuation of life on earth. Out office of office, Truman had led a peace movement that had delivered disarmament during the peace era of the late 1960s.

In 1979, Soviet Special forces troops take over presidential palace in Kabul, Afghanistan. The Al-qaeda government of President Osama Bin Laden flees the capital, appealing to their American allies for assistance in their hour of need.	Bin Laden

In 1972, on this day Harry S. Truman died in Kansas City, Missouri. Once considered a Presidential candidate, Truman was forced to withdraw from the 1944 Campaign Race after his $10 membership of the Ku Kux Klan emerged.

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In 0, a young Hebrew couple, the woman heavy with child, were given shelter in an inn in Bethlehem. The innkeeper, whose wife had just had a baby, took pity on them and gave them his finest room free of charge.

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In 2006, on this day Gerald Ford, Jr. died aged 93 in Rancho Mirage, California. Ford was the only person to occupy the White House who had been elected neither to the presidency nor the vice-presidency. His decision to intervene in Vietnam was therefore all the more controversial, because in his two and half years as President, Ford had never faced, nor planned to face the voters. This window of oppportunity presented the congressional-military-industrial complex with a window of opportunity which they seized with both hands.

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