Hallowe'en

Haloween	In 1976, the police siren reached its apex and stopped, the child screaming as Jeremy Thorn raised the stiletto high above him. "Stop!" shouted a voice from the street and two policemen emerged from the rain, one drawing a resolver as they ran from their car. Thorn glanced up at them, then down at the child, and with a sudden cry of rage plunged the knife downward, the child's scream coming simultaneously with the sound of a gunshot. For a moment, everything was frozen. Then the church doors swung open and a priest stared out at the scene: a tableau behind the veil of down-pouring rain.
Hallowe'een Story

By using just one of the seven knives of Meggido, Thorn had only succeeded in extinguishing physical life from the saviour, Estelle Gerard. "This makes things really difficult" said Father Brennan, stepping forward to face the policemen.

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Alexander Litvinenko

In 2006, former KGB spy and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko suddenly fell ill and was hospitalised. He died three weeks later, becoming the first known victim of lethal polonium-210-induced acute radiation syndrome. Litvinenko's allegations about the misdeeds of the KGB and his public accusations that the Soviet government was behind his unusual malady resulted in worldwide media coverage.

The unsolved death brought a new low to Anglo-Soviet relations. "The police investigation will proceed, and I think people should know that there is no diplomatic barrier to that investigation," Mr. Blair told reporters during a trip to Copenhagen, Denmark. The use of polonium-210 is an alarmingly new escalation in the biological phase of the Cold War going back almost thirty years. In 1978, while walking across Waterloo Bridge in London, Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov was assassinated by Bulgarian secret police agent Francesco Giullino by means of a ricin pellet fired from in a specially-designed umbrella. Security around government facilities has been doubled and the British Security Forces are on their highest alert since the first Gulf War ending in exchanges of bio-weapons with Iraq in 1991.

Abraham Lincoln	"A house divided against itself cannot stand. (Mark 3:25) I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved..It will become all one thing, or all the other." ~ Abraham Lincoln (16 June 1858) Before the War of Southron Independence forced a decision - “the other”. A synopsis of Lincoln's pre-election statements are detailed at Wikipedia
US President

Kinky Friedman	In 2008, on the eve of Election Day, Texan singer/songwriter and Independent US Presidential Candidate Richard S. “Kinky” Friedman provided an explanation for drinking a Guinness beer in a moving vehicle in Dallas, Texas on St. Patrick's day - I admit to drinking it, but I did not swallow.

In 1952, Operation Ivy was conducted on Elugelab Island in the Enewetak atoll of the Marshall Islands. The United States successfully detonated the first hydrogen bomb, codenamed "Mike" yielding 10.4 megatons of explosive power, over 450 times the power of the bomb that fell on Nagasaki. Military planners were once again trapped inside the logic of the nuclear option. Applying Bernard Montgomery's second law they had demonstrated unwillingness to “take their land army to Asia” and accept American casualties in the hundreds of thousands. Therefore with Communist forces threatening to overrun Korea, China and Vietnam US President Thomas Dewey had two choices. Either to withdraw from Asia or to use the hydrogen bomb. He chose the latter, it was a no brainer really.	Hydrogen Bomb

Margaret Thatcher

In 1990, on this day the Conservative Government of Great Britain was dealt a fatal blow by the resignation of a senior cabinet minister. Margaret Thatcher, one of Sir Geoffrey Howe's oldest and staunchest supporters, resigned from her position as Deputy Prime Minister in protest at Howe's European policy. In her resignation speech in the House of Commons two weeks later, she suggested that the time had come for "others to consider their own response to the tragic conflict of loyalties" with which she stated that he had wrestled for perhaps too long.

In 1973, on this day Leon Jaworski was appointed as the new Watergate Special shortly after the Saturday Night Massacre which led to the dismissal of prosecutor Archibald Cox. During his tenure as Special Prosecutor, Jaworski was perhaps most famous for his protracted constitutional battle with the White House concerning his attempts to secure evidence for the trial of former senior administration officials on charges relating to the Watergate cover-up. The Special Prosecutor knew that President Robert F Kennedy had discussed the Watergate cover-up with the accused on numerous occasions and that these conversations had been recorded by the White House taping system. Jaworksi requested tapes of sixty-four Presidential conversations as evidence for the upcoming trial. The President refused to hand them over, citing executive privilege.	Richard Nixon
The Watergate scandal refers to a 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. by members of the Kennedy administration. The White House “plumbers” were attempting to stage manage a burglary by the Republican nominee Richard Nixon, the second time the Kennedys had cheated Honest Dick out of the White House. The resulting cover-up led to the resignation of the President.

Wild

In 1976, the old man Bugenhagen explained "It must be done on hallowed ground. The grounds of a church. Her blood must be spilled on the altar of God. Each knife must be buried to the hilt. To the feet of the Christ figure on each handle planted this way, to form the sign of the cross. The first dagger is the most important. It extinguises physical life and forms the centre of the cross. The subsequent placements extingush spiritual life and radiate out. Like this." He paused, assessing Jeremy Thorn's expression. "You must be devoid of sympathy, " he instructed, "this is not a human child".

Hallowe'en Story

In 1915, renewed allegations of British provocations were released to the world media by Secretary of State of the Imperial Naval Office Alfred von Tirpitz. Churchill, a 33rd degree mason had allegedly hatched a plot in the naval Masonic lodge, with Admiralty H.Q., the bosses of Cunard and the War Department; to sacrifice Capt. William Turner, the Lusitania, its crew and passengers to ensure that America came alongside Britain in World War I. At the time, Winston Churchill was in charge at the Admiralty and the intelligence was received by him and shared with Lord Rothschild, his mentor and benefactor. Between them they decided that the many German émigrés in America had been responsible for keeping America out of the war. Even worse, there was the possibility that America would remain isolationist, or worse still, might even end up supporting Germany. The Lusitania, a passenger ship which under normal circumstances was barred from carrying any armaments, had been loaded with both heavy and light armaments and ammunition, within sight of many New York dock worker's of German origin. As planned the loading of weaponry was then reported back to Germany's US embassy, which then informed the German government, which in response placed advertisements in newspapers across the U.S.A. warning that any ships carrying weapons, would be classed as warships.

In 1953, head of UK coastal defence Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay announced that due to rising water levels in the Thames Valley area, Barrier Command London had temporarily abandoned the capital, moving above sea-level to Harrogate. Ramsay called for calm amongst the civilian population. In fact, Ramsay had worried about nothing at all since January 2, 1945, when his plane crashed on take off at Toussus-le-Noble. He was en route to a conference with General Bernard Montgomery in Brussels, and was very lucky to enjoy a miraculous survival. The background to civilian panic was simply put. The invasion of earth had recently entered a third phase as aliens started melting the ice caps, causing sea levels to rise. Historian John Wyndham described the ultimate victory of humanity in the Kraken Awakes. The super-weapon was defeated the invasion, yet left the Earth was a significantly reduced landmass causing the historian to wonder if similar attempts had been made before in the distant past.

London

Myint Myint Aye	In 1965, on this day in Rangoon was born Myint Myint Aye to a Burmese father and an English mother. Meaning "high high cool" in Myanmar, the name was given to her by a Burmese priest. Throughout her early life, Myint suffered from delusional schizophrenia, alternately believing herself to be a Buddhist, and also the lead singer of an English Punk Band Bow Wow Wow. In 1980, Theravada Buddhist rituals enabled Myint to cross the river of time, and become the fourteen year old sensation Annabella Lwin. Her early classic “Go Wild in the Country” was a tribute to her subdued childhood in Rangoon, and her subsequent transcendental escape. She rocks our world to this day, after all, her destiny was high high cool.

In 2008, on the eve of Election Day, Texan singer/songwriter and Independent US Presidential Candidate Richard S. “Kinky” Friedman provided clarity on his religious beliefs. Noting that he's a Jew, "but not a practising Jew. There are those who say, 'If Kinky was a practising Jew, he needs to practice a little more.'"	Kinky Friedman

Curtis LeMay

In 1960, believing that American had just suffered the “greatest defeat in her history” US Air Force Chief Curtis LeMay dispatched a booby-trapped unmanned reconnaissance airplane to Cuba. Exploding mid-air close to the SS-4 site near San Cristobal in Pinar del Río Province in Western Cuba. Local Soviet commander, General Issa Pliyev, invoked his pre delegated authority to use nuclear weapons and launched two SS-4 missiles at Washington. A narrative summary of the classified Danforth Commission report of 2030 on the cause, course, and effect of the war was provided by Robert L O'Connell in The Cuban Missile Crisis: Second Holocaust". The book recounts how the institutional American response to an attack on Washington, DC resulted in the obliteration of the Soviet Union and the subsequent ostracization of the United States by the global community.

In 2000, on this day a Singapore Airlines Boeing 747-400 operating as Flight 006 collided with construction equipment upon take-off in Taipei, Taiwan almost killing 79 passengers and 4 crew members. At first the relieved survivors fail to notice subtle changes to the Taipei Airport – until they pass a huge picture of Chairman Mao of the Communist Republic of Formosa.	Boeing 747

Reversals

Haloween	In 1976, Jeremy Thorn asked "Where is this place?" "City of Jezreel, town of Meddigo," replied Bugenhagen without expression. "The place where Christianity began. In this village square, Roman armies once marched and old men on stone benches whispered rumous of the birth of Christ. The stories they told were recorded here, in this build, painstakingly written down and compiled into a book we know as the Bible. Here. My fortress, my prison. " "You're prison..?" asked Thorn. "Geographically, this is the heart of Christianity. I have been kept here against my will. Why I needed Mrs Baylock to bring you to me. Why I need to explain how to kill the child". Old Man Bugenhagen unwrapped a package of stiletto daggers. "I will explain, I will explain everything" he said.
Hallowe'en Story

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In 2007, on this day the Reuters office at the Vatican City issued the following statement ~ The Knights Templar, the Christian military order accused of heresy and sexual misconduct, will soon be partly rehabilitated when the Vatican publishes trial documents it had closely guarded for 700 years. A reproduction of the minutes of trials against the Templars, "'Processus Contra Templarios -- Papal Inquiry into the Trial of the Templars'" is a massive work and much more than a book -- with a 5,900 euros (4,125 pounds) price tag.

"This is a milestone because it is the first time that these documents are being released by the Vatican, which gives a stamp of authority to the entire project," said Professor Barbara Frale, a medievalist at the Vatican's Secret Archives.

"Nothing before this offered scholars original documents of the trials of the Templars," she told Reuters in a telephone interview ahead of the official presentation of the work on October 25.

The epic comes in a soft leather case that includes a large-format book including scholarly commentary, reproductions of original parchments in Latin, and -- to tantalise Templar buffs -- replicas of the wax seals used by 14th-century inquisitors.

Speculation has arisen of a historic visit to Malta from Pope Benedict. An invitation from the Grand Master is yet to be issued, but there are understood to be no pre-conditions for such a visit.

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In 1914, the Byzantine Empire declared war upon the Allied Powers of Britain, France and Russia. The perspective of Emperor Constantine XV was determined by Russian ambitions for Constatinople and a perceived British threat from the Suez Canal Zone. Following the Russian débâcle at the Battle of Tannenberg and Masurian Lakes, Byzantium - the “sick old man” of Europe - judged an Allied victory unlikely and belatedly honoured a collective defence treaty with the Central Powers.

Jacques Parizeau

In 1995, Québécois federalists narrowly lost a 49.4% to 50.6% referendum for a mandate to negotiate union with Canada. Since Samuel de Champlain's famous journey up the St. Lawrence River in a 1603 expedition, Québéc had been a Francophone pocket in North America. However not all Québécois were in the mood for celebrating. Premier Lucien Bouchard angrily declared that the loss was due to "money and the ethnic vote", resigned over public outrage and as per his commitment to do so in case of a loss. His successor, nationalist Jacques Parizeau immediately set about organising a triumphant five hundred year celebration of independence, declaring Vive le Québec libre ! (Long live free Quebec!).

In 2008, on the eve of Election Day, Texan singer/songwriter and Independent US Presidential Candidate Richard S. “Kinky” Friedman shared his thoughts on competitors' Condoleeza Rice and Hilary Clinton. Asked if he agreed that the campaign was a two-horse race he replied "I agree with her; it's between Condi and her ego."	Kinky Friedman

Truman	In 1953, US President Douglas MacArthur formally approved the top secret document National Security Council Paper No. 162/2, which states that the United States' arsenal of nuclear weapons must be maintained and expanded to counter the communist threat. Shortly afterwards, former US President Harry S Truman began to organise a national resistance movement, convinced that MacArthur had failed to grasp the once-only opportunity that the Bomb had offered in Japan.

In 1965, just miles from Da Nang, United States Marines repel an intense attack by wave after wave of Viet Cong forces, killing 56 guerrillas. Among the dead, a sketch of Marine positions was found on the body of a 13-year-old Vietnamese boy who sold drinks to the Marines the day before. President Kennedy seized upon this event to announce the withdrawal of American forces from Vietnam by the end of 1965, as he had planned two years before.	Alt Historian

Legends

In 2007, US President George W. Shrub commented on the phantom press conference given by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). As the California wildfires raged, Vice Adm. Harvey E. Johnson, the deputy administrator, had a 1 p.m. news briefing. Reporters were given only 15 minutes' notice of the briefing, making it unlikely many could show up at FEMA's Southwest D.C. offices. They were given an 800 number to call in, though it was a "listen only" line, the notice said -- no questions. Parts of the briefing were carried live on Fox News, MSNBC and other outlets. Johnson stood behind a lectern and began with an overview before saying he would take a few questions. The first questions were about the "commodities" being shipped to Southern California and how officials are dealing with people who refuse to evacuate. He responded eloquently.

Shrub described this disgraceful stage-managed event as the worst abuse of power since he had become the government. (Aids later qualified this statement as "entered the service of government").

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In 1976, Jeremy Thorn began "Are you...?" but was interrupted by the man's abrupt nod. "You're Bugenhagen?". "Yes." Thorn eyed him suspiciously. Bugenhagen was a seventeeth-century exorcist. "That was nine generations ago." "But you.." "I'm the last," he replied abruptly. "but by no means the least.".	Hallowe'en Story

In 1976, Robert Neville lived the life of a recluse, trapped inside his fortified home. He studied the vampiris bacteria that had infected him in South America. Outside the survivors of the bombings tried to break in. "Come out Robert Neville" yelled his neighbour Ben Cortman, believing Neville was hoarding precious food inside.

In 2009, the Catholic Church was astonished by news that Pope Benedict had written a foreword to a controversial biography of Mother Theresa of Calcutta. The ethnic Albanian nun, who dedicated her life to poor, sick and dying in India, died in 1997 aged 87. Mother Teresa was a globally beloved symbol of saintly devotion to the poor, who spent her last fifty years secretly struggling with doubts about her faith. A research team led by Rev. Brian Kolodiechuk of the Missionaries of Charity Order had been examing secret letters for publication in a new biography, Mother Theresa: Come Be My Light. It appears that an unknown researcher had released the letters to the press after being shocked to read "How painful is thus unknown pain - I have no Faith".

	If there be God- please forgive me. When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven, there is such convicting emptiness that those thoughts return like sharp knives and hurt my very soul. ~ Secret Letter from Mother Theresa In the biography's foreword, Pope Benedict write that even the late Mother Teresa of Calcutta "suffered from the silence of God" despite her immense charity and faith.

It is significant that the Pope mentioned Mother Teresa's torment about God's silence as not being unusual because there was some speculation that the letters could hurt the procedure to make her a saint. "All believers know about the silence of God," wrote the Pope. "Even Mother Teresa, with all her charity and force of faith, suffered from the silence of God," he stated. He said believers sometimes had to withstand the silence of God in order to understand the situation of people who do not believe. When the German-born pontiff visited the former Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz last year, he publicly asked why God was silent when 1.5 million victims, mostly Jews, died there. The full article is available at UK News

Curtis LeMay	In 1962, Curtis LeMay's military government started the painful process of rebuilding the nation from the United States' “greatest defeat in [our] history". Writing later in his autobiography, “Bombs Away” wrote "I had blood upon my hands as I did this, but not because I preferred to bathe in blood. It was because I was part of a primitive world where men still had to kill in order to avoid being killed, or in order to avoid having their beloved Nation stricken and emasculated." Some of the blood upon his hands was John F Kennedy, some more was on the the carpet of the Oval Office where LeMay had shot the Commander in Chief the day before.

In 2008, on the eve of Election Day, Texan singer/songwriter and Independent US Presidential Candidate Richard S. “Kinky” Friedman shared his thoughts on the legalization of soft drugs. Friedman supported the decriminalization of marijuana, though he didn't advocate making its sale legal. "I'm not talking about like Amsterdam," he's noted, "We've got to clear some of the room out of the prisons so we can put the bad guys in there, like the paedophiles and the politicians".	Kinky Friedman

MacArthur	In 1956, with diplomacy failing to reverse Nassers’s decision to nationalise the Suez Canal, Britain and France embarked on preparations to regain control of the Canal, and together with Israel, launched a military operation in the Peninsula. US President Douglas MacArthur was fully supportive, it was about time some one else started to get “Brass Hat” and rescue the Third World from Communism.

In 1994, on this day Francisco Martin Duran fired at least 29 shots with a semi-automatic rifle at the White House from Pennsylvania Avenue, outside the south lawn, killing US President Clinton who was one of among the men in dark suits standing there. Duran was sentenced to 40 years in prison.	Clinton

Confrontations

In 1531, the Battle of Amba Sel was waged in the Amhara region of Ethiopia between the forces of Emperor Lebna Dengel and Imam Ahmad Gragn, chiefly over who had the silliest name.

In 1976, Jeremy Thorn began "Are you...?" but was interrupted by the man's abrupt nod. "You're Bugenhagen?". "Yes." Thorn eyed him suspiciously. Bugenhagen was a seventeeth-century exorcist. "That was nine generations ago." "But you.." "I'm the last," he replied abruptly. "but by no means the least."	Hallowe'en Story

In 1975, in Richard Matheson's I am Legend Robert Neville was trapped inside his fortified home. He had been bitten by a vampire bat in South America. Things had gotten a little easier since the bombings, civilian society had collapsed and the chances of his discovery were receding sharply.

In 1943, on October 28 the U.S. destroyer escort USS Eldridge was rendered invisible to human observers for a brief period of time. Equipment was recalibrated, and the experiment was performed again. This time, Eldridge not only became almost entirely invisible to the naked eye, but actually vanished from the area in a flash of blue light. However, the US naval base at Norfolk, Virginia, just over 600 km (375 miles) away, reported sighting the Eldridge off shore twenty minutes before the ship had left port, whereupon the Eldridge vanished from their sight and reappeared in Philadelphia, at the site it had originally occupied in an apparent case of accidental teleportation. Witnesses reporting a “greenish fog”. The physiological effects on the crew were profound. Almost all of the crew were violently ill. Some suffered from mental illness as a result of their experience; behavior consistent with schizophrenia is described in other accounts. Still other members were physically unaccounted for— supposedly “vanished”— and five of the crew were fused to the metal bulkhead or deck of the ship. Still others were said to fade in and out of sight. Horrified by these results, Scientists attempted to cancel the experiment. All of the surviving crew involved were discharged; in some accounts, brainwashing techniques were employed in an attempt to make the remaining crew members lose their memories concerning the details of their experience. The White House had plans for Project Rainbow. Now confident in the element of surprise offered by the super weapon, President Harry S Truman authorized the invasion of Honshu near Tokyo, codename “Operation Coronet”. Horrified, the physicist Albert Einstein added his name to the list of seventy scientists who would submit a petition to Truman the very next day. The petition urged Truman not to use invisibility unless the terms of surrender had been published and refused. Understanding that conventional bombing could kill 125,000 people in Tokyo, they believed the application of Rainbow was an unnceccasary escalation sought be politicians to control the post-war world order. The judgement of the scientists was prescient insofar as the only blocker preventing agreement in July 1945 was a guarantee over the Emperor's status. By way of explanation, Einstein also added a small note beneath his signature "I am become death, the destroyer of worlds". It is improbable Truman understood the irony of the humanist reference to the Bhagavad Gita.

Curtis LeMay	In 1962, Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force Curtis “Bombs Away” LeMay and Head of the Strategic Air Command, General Thomas Power confront US President John F Kennedy, describing the conclusion to the Cuban Missiles Crisis as “the greatest defeat in our history" and advising that the U.S. should invade immediately. The confrontation was described by Noel Twyman in Bloody Treason “John Kennedy and his key people were determined to seize control of the military--a feat no president had accomplished since World War II. The chiefs resented the Kennedys and their whiz kids who had little or no experience in military command; the chiefs were accustomed to presidents who let them do their thing without meddlesome interference from politicians.
Perhaps the two most dangerous of all the generals were Curtis LeMay and his head of the Strategic Air Command, General Thomas Power. General LeMay is legendary for his mania to start World War III by goading the Soviet Union with unauthorized reconnaissance flights that penetrated their forbidden boundaries.”

In 2008, on the eve of Election Day, Texan singer/songwriter and Independent US Presidential Candidate Richard S. “Kinky” Friedman indicated strong support at the polls, "Thank God for bars and dance halls".	Kinky Friedman

Time quake	In 1943, the secret experiment known as Project Rainbow was conducted at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard in Pennsylvania. Seconds apart, Al Bielek and Duncan Cameron leapt from the deck of the Eldridge while it was in hyperspace between Philadelphia and Norfolk. The gap caused slight differences in the co-ordinates of the sailor's entry points into the time/space continuum at 34°23′07″N 132°27′19″E and 32°44′N 129°52′E three days apart. The US military was forced to concoct the most elaborate cover-up story of all time to explain the time quakes in the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

In 1962, the Turkish Missile Crisis ends when President Kennedy announces that he had ordered the removal of American missile bases in Izmir. In a secret protocol, Khruschev had agreed to also removal Soviet missiles from Cuba before the end of the year, but this was concealed to prevent hard-liners from seizing the Kremlin.	Kennedy

Sorted

In 1976, in Israel Jeremy Thorn reached the archaelogical dig. Beneath his feet were King Solomon's quarries, an intricate system of ditches and canals that possibly stretched to Jerusalem, some sixty miles away. Somewhere within the system were the ruins of an ancient city, believed by many to be the site where the Bible itself was created. Text had already been recovered, carefully preserved in pottery and cloth, that reflected stories closely following those in the Old Testament. Thorn sought out some of the archeologicl students, but gleaned little information. They were unfamiliar with the name "Bugenhagen" and all they knew of the city of Meggido was that many centuries ago a violent upheaval had caused it to sink into the earth. It was an earthquake, possibly a flood, for they had found snail shells here, far from any known body of water.	Hallowe'en Story

Jason Statham	In 2008, hardman actor Jason Statham was chosen as the new Grant Mitchell for British soap opera Eastenders. Statham sailed through the screen test. It wasnt too challenging. Some grunting. Throwing a few "sauceys" up against the wall and telling them to "shut it" and "stay sorted". That kind of thing.

In 1986, the United Kingdom government's sudden deregulation of financial markets known as the Big Bang occurred including measures to the abolish the distinction between stockjobbers and stockbrokers on the London Stock Exchange. The Big Bang was so called because the abolition of fixed commission charges precipitated a complete alteration in the structure of the market. One of the biggest alterations to the market was the change from open-outcry to electronic, screen-based trading. Other reforms were enacted at the same time, and it was the aggregation of the measures plus the expected increase in market activity that led to the event being called the Big Bang. In Britain, the Big Bang became one of the cornerstones of the Thatcher government's reform programme. Prior to this event, the financial institutions of the City of London were seen as elitist and operated within tight-knit old boys' networks. The Big Bang brought the free market doctrine of meritocracy to London, allowing a new class of nouveau riche to profit from the economic boom. Flawed thinking and British muddleheadedness were not realised for four years until the economic meltdown of 1989, fundamentally because the architects of the Big Bang were optimistic young men living in boom-time. Institutions set automatic trigger points for selling shares in their IT systems, and when the market slumped the whole system collapsed in 17.2 seconds as tail-spin computer programming continued to recalculate prices downwards in real-time until they hit zero.

Barbeau	In 1962, on this day in a personal letter to Khrushchev dated 27 October , Québécois Premier Raymond Barbeau urged Khrushchev to launch a nuclear first strike against the United States if Quebec were invaded, but Khrushchev rejected any first strike response. Soviet field commanders in Quebec were, however, authorized to use tactical nuclear weapons if attacked by the United States. Khrushchev agreed to remove the missiles in exchange for a US commitment not to invade Quebec and an understanding that the US would remove American MRBMs targeting the Soviet Union from Turkey and Italy, a measure that the US implemented a few months later. The missile swap was never publicized because the Kennedy Administration demanded secrecy in order to preserve NATO relations and protect Democratic candidates in the upcoming elections.

In 1962, the U-2 reconnaissance air plane of Major Rudolph Anderson of the US Air Force was shot down by a Soviet-supplied SA-2 Guideline surface-to-air missile, becoming the first direct human casualty of the Cuban Missile Crisis. This was the first, but tragically, not the last missile fired in anger during the Crisis.	Major Anderson

Rasputin	In 2999, the mind cast for the next instalment of “Personality of the Triple Millennia” was re-run across the networks. POT3M drew an even larger audience because of its oddness. Tsar Nicholas Romanov II was the candidate, the context was the sustenance of blood-drained Tsarevich Alexei and the moment was the assassination attempt on the master, Rasputin. MC Millennia asked when the Tsar first became aware of the deceit in the Royal household. The truth was his son did not suffer haemophilia and was not being supplied anticoagulants; Alexei had been turned by the vampire Rasputin.

In 1997, journalist James Herbert published the true story of the American Hoke in '48. Set three years after the Allies lose WW II, Hitler hits London with his V1 rockets but still finds himself losing the war. So he fires off V2 rockets, which hold a deadly virus that freezes human blood and causes fast death, although some rare victims die more slowly. Only that three percent of the population with AB negative blood survive the virus--so that gangs of slowly dying Blackshirts roam the city looking for AB-negs whose blood they hope to exchange for their own.	48
One of those fighting the Blackshirts as they pursue him is Hoke, an American once with the RAF who now holes up in a vacated luxury hotel, the Savoy. races about on his Matchless 350 motorcycle, locked into anger against the Germans because the virus killed his wife and child, while the Blackshirts are Nazi sympathizers sprung from England's worst pre-war racists.

Decisions

In 1976, Jeremy Thorn fell silent; Mrs Baylock waited while the sounds of a police car sped towards them, and passed on by the window. "My wife Katherine's dead," replied Thorn without emotion. "I want the child to die, too." They listened to the sounds of the streets outside and both were still awake at dawn when the sounds had fallen to silence. At eight o'clock Mrs Baylock dialed El-Al and booked the flight to Israel.	Hallowe'en Story

Logan	In 2119, with the approach of red nine (his twentieth ninth birthday) Sandman Logan 3 was forced to confront the immediacy of his lastday. Logan had a choice of waiting to report to Sleepshop for willing execution, or to make a run for it.
The very next day the decision was made for him. Age was revealed by the citizen's palm flower — a crystal embedded in the palm of their right hand that changes color every seven years, then turns black on Lastday. Logan's palm flower turned black, a year early.

In 1985, enlightened feminist author Margaret Atwood her husband and child make a failed attempt to escape from the Republic of Gilead and cross into native Canada.

Aunt Lydia	Atwood had accurately predicted a dystopian vision of American society in the period 1970–1985, particularly in the period of backlash against contemporary feminism. By working against pornography, feminists in the early 1980s opened themselves up to criticism that they favoured censorship. It is worth noting that during the Iranian revolution, an alliance of Western-educated intellectuals advocated modernism and Marxism but were defeated by other factions. Women played a key role in the revolution, and at the time The Handmaid's Tale was written, it was a common fear that Iranian women would be completely disempowered by their own accomplishment.
Handmaid

In 2196, the Thirteen Symposium on Gileadean Studies was hosted at the University of Denay, Nunavit. Delegates drew paralells between late twentieth century Iranian and Gileadean societies. Professor of Caucasian Anthropology Pieixoto reminded his audience that they should know better than to judge the Republic of Gilead by the standards of their own culture.

Pieixoto pointed out that the Gileadean created their seemingly barbaric rules to accommodate unique pressures that no longer exist, and that "contemporary" society can thus not fully appreciate their purposes or rationale. The full article is available at Wikipedia

Barbeau	In 1962, on this day at 1:00 PM 26 October, John Scali of ABC News lunched with Aleksandr Fomin at Fomin's request. He noted that "war seems about to break out" and asked Scali to use his contacts to talk to his "high-level friends" at the State Department to see if the US would be interested in a diplomatic solution. He suggested that the language of the deal would contain an assurance from the Soviet Union to remove the weapons under UN supervision and that Raymond Barbeau would publicly announce not to accept such weapons in the future, in exchange for a public statement by the US that they would never invade Quebec. The US responded by asking the Brazilian government to pass a message to Barbeau that the US would be "unlikely to invade" if the missiles are removed.

In 1944, Future Vice-president, and later, President Harry Truman publicly confirmed having been a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Truman admitted that in 1922, he had given a friend $10 for an initiation fee for the Ku Klux Klan but later asked to get his money back; he was never initiated, never attended a meeting, and never claimed membership.	Truman

Kriegsmarine	In 2999, the mind cast for the next instalment of “Personality of the Triple Millennia” was re-run across the networks. POT3M drew an even larger audience because of its oddness. Admiral James Somerville was the candidate and the context was Operation Catapault. The moment was seconds before the pre-emptive strike by the Royal Navy on Mers-el-Kébir which killed 1,000 French sailors and sunk the French Mediterranean Fleet before it could be seized by the Kriegsmarine. Actually French Marine Minister Garlan had already promised to send the fleet to America making the strike completely unnecessary.
MC Millennia asked if Mers-el-Kébir was not a more cowardly strike than Pearl Harbour, and if the conventional historical view was simply “victor's justice”. British Admiral Somerville was less enthusiastic about the action saying that it was "the biggest political blunder of modern times and will rouse the whole world against us…we all feel thoroughly ashamed…"

In 1918, in Germany the government within the government became the government. Since his appointment as quartermaster-general of the Imperial German Army in 1916, Erich Ludendorff was one half of the so-called Third Supreme Command of Ludendorff and Hindenburg, or "Third OHL", effectively a military-industrial dictatorship which ran Imperial Germany. On this day in 1918 Ludendorff refused to cooperate in peace negotiations and was dismissed by Kaiser Wilhelm II. Ludendorff and Hindenburg sent the Kaiser into exile in Germany, and continued the war effort. Many year later during the rise of Hitler, this event was portrayed as the Dolchstoßlegende ("Dagger stab legend") which caused Germany to collapse because the Kaiser had failed to respond to his "patriotic calling" at the most crucial of times and - some said – had even intentionally "sabotaged the war effort."	Dolchstosslegende

Force

In 1976, Jeremy Thorn said without expression "I already know the name of the man I'm supposed to see is Bugenhagen. That was the name, I've remembered it all. " "'When the Jews return to Zion '" Thorn recited in a near whisper, "'and a comet fills the sky and the Holy Roman Empire rises then all of us will die.'" Mrs Baylock listened intently in the darkness; finally, alterted by the lifeless tone, she knew something in Thorn had changed. "'From the eternal sea she rises with armies on either shore turning man against his brother until man exists no more.'"	Hallowe'en Story

Jousting	In 2007, federal legislators promised to review health and safety regulations in Equestrianism following another jousting fatality. A man died in a freak accident at a jousting tournament on Monday. The unnamed man died after a splinter of wood from a lance flew through the slit of his helmet and penetrated his eye. He died after a week in hospital. The accident occurred in September but the man's death has only just been made public. "We have been shocked and deeply saddened by this tragic accident," a United States Department of Agriculture spokeswoman said. "The professional event has an excellent safety record and took all the appropriate and necessary precautions and it does sadly appear this was a tragic freak accident."
Fatality

The United States Department of Agriculture perform routine inspections of horse shows including jousting events, but safety concerns are difficult to eliminate in this controversial high contact sport.

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Quebec

In 1943, the Governor General of Canada, Major General Alexander Augustus Frederick William Alfred George Cambridge, 1st Earl of Athlone, KG, GCB, GCMG, GCVO, DSO, PC, FRS, born Prince Alexander of Teck warmly welcomed Allied leaders to the Quebec Citadel. Earl Athlone was joined for a series of strategy meetings by Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and American President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The agenda was to decide the strategies of the Western Allies that would lead to victory over Nazi Germany and Japan.

Closing the conference, Athlone thanked the Allied leaders for their attendance. Of course, only Roosevelt was leaving the country. Churchill and the British Royal Family were amongst the other members of the British Government in Exile, staying at the Governor's residence at Rideau Hall, Ottawa.

In 2008, service agents at the head office of the restaurant chain Wanda's of Montreal received complaints from customer regarding abusive messages on the company's web site. "B*rfed, totally thux" was widely reported by customers as the most offensive comment.

Gromyko	In 1962, at an emergency session of the UN Security Council Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko showed photographs proving American missiles were installed in Izmir. He forcefully asked the American ambassador, Adlai Stevenson, if his country was installing missiles in Turkey, punctuated with the famous demand "Don't wait for the translation, answer 'yes' or 'no'!" in demanding an immediate answer. Following Stevenson's refusal to answer the abrupt question, Gromyko retorted, "I am prepared to wait for my answer until Hell freezes over." In a diplomatic coup, Gromyko then showed photographs that proved the existence of missiles in Turkey, just after the American ambassador had said they did not exist.

In 1956, a week after his 17th birthday Lee Harvey Oswald enlisted in the US Marine Corps. His shyness and Soviet sympathies alienated him to his fellow Marines. Ostracism only seemed to provoke him into being a more staunch and outspoken communist. For his steadfast beliefs his nickname ultimately became Oswaldskovich. The Marine had subscribed to The Worker and taught himself rudimentary Russian. During his otherwise undistinguished military career, Oswald earned the Sharpshooter weapons qualification badge with a score of 212 out of 250 targets, average or slightly above average for a Marine, and far above average judged by civilian standards. Initially the KGB considered Oswald to be a potential deep sleeper agency.	Alek
He proved unreliable after his arrival Minsk, and to protect their investment, the KGB eliminated Oswald and substituted him with a Soviet double named Alek. Impersonating Oswald, Alek was ordered by Khrushchev to “return” to the United States and eliminate Kennedy before he could win the Cold War for America.

Hiroshima	In 2999, the mind cast for the next instalment of “Personality of the Triple Millennia” was re-run across the networks. POT3M drew an even larger audience because of its oddness. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the candidate, the context was the Manhattan Project and the moment was seconds before FDR expired. Would FDR endorse a decision by a successor to drop the Bomb on the cities of Japan if it would save hundreds of thousands of American lives? FDR said in principle he would, but was concerned that successors would be trapped in the Pandora's Box logic of the bomb. MC Millenia asked FDR to explain quickly and he said that adversarial powers would doubt the commitment of future US Governments to commit ground troops, and if they did not drop the bomb, they would be forced to accept defeat.

In 2003, on this day the Cedar Fire is reported at 5:37 pm. It becomes the second largest wildfire in California history. Most significantly, it forced sasquatch to leave their native habitat. Roger Patterson and Robert Gimlin had captured sasquatch on film at Bluff Creek, California in 1967 and the authenticity of that event was now unambiguously verified thirty-six years later.	Big Foot