The Aachen Memorandum
''The Aachen Memorandum'' is a 1995 thriller novel by Andrew Roberts. The author has described it as "a dystopian vision of what Britain might turn into if it became a minor satrapy of a vast protectionist, illiberal anti-American, politically correct EU." Plot The novel presupposes a referendum to have taken place in the United Kingdom in 2015, on whether the country should join a United States of Europe (a development of the European Union) as part of a Treaty of Aachen. The referendum gives a narrow majority to supporters of the Treaty (51.86% to 48.14%).Roberts (1995), p. 110. Thirty years later the book's anti-hero, the historian Horatio Lestocq, a member of All Souls College at Oxford University, researching the referendum for a series of articles in ''The Times'', comes across evidence revealing that the referendum was rigged by a pro-European elite. After a series of violent events, including murder and an attempt on the life of the émigré William Mountbatten-Winds ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Thriller (genre)
Thriller is a genre of fiction, having numerous, often overlapping subgenres. Thrillers are characterized and defined by the mood (psychology), moods they elicit, giving viewers heightened feelings of suspense, Psychomotor agitation, excitement, Surprise (emotion), surprise, anticipation (emotion), anticipation and anxiety. Successful examples of thrillers are Alfred Hitchcock filmography, the films of Alfred Hitchcock. Thrillers generally keep the audience on the "edge of their seats" as the plot builds towards a climax (narrative), climax. The cover-up of important information is a common element. Literary devices such as red herrings, plot twists, unreliable narrators, and cliffhangers are used extensively. A thriller is often a villain-driven plot, whereby they present obstacles that the protagonist must overcome. The most common genres that overlap with the thriller genre include crime fiction, crime, horror fiction, horror and detective fiction. Characteristics Writer Vla ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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EU Directive
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been described as a '' sui generis'' political entity (without precedent or comparison) combining the characteristics of both a federation and a confederation. Containing 5.8per cent of the world population in 2020, the EU generated a nominal gross domestic product (GDP) of around trillion in 2021, constituting approximately 18per cent of global nominal GDP. Additionally, all EU states but Bulgaria have a very high Human Development Index according to the United Nations Development Programme. Its cornerstone, the Customs Union, paved the way to establishing an internal single market based on standardised legal framework and legislation that applies in all member states in those matters, and only those matters, where the states have agreed to act ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Socialist Review
The ''Socialist Review'' is a monthly magazine of the British Socialist Workers Party. As well as being printed it is also published online. Original publication: 1950–1962 The ''Socialist Review'' was set up in 1950 as the main publication of the Socialist Review Group (SRG). It began as a duplicated magazine, the parent group only being able to afford to have it printed from 1954 onwards. In its last years it lost its central importance to the SRG due to the launch in 1960 of a new journal ''International Socialism'' and in 1961 a newspaper, ''Industrial Worker'' that then became ''Labour Worker'' and subsequently the weekly ''Socialist Worker''. ''Socialist Review'' was discontinued in 1962 – the year in which the SRG became the International Socialists. Monthly magazine: 1978–2005 In 1978 the title ''Socialist Review'' was launched by the Socialist Workers Party, as the IS had become known. The monthly magazine was renamed ''Socialist Worker Review'' in the 1990s late ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Chattering Classes
The chattering classes is a politically active, socially concerned and highly educated section of the "metropolitan middle class",''Chattering Classes'' 2006 especially those with political, media, and academic connections. It is a generally derogatory term, coined by English journalist ,''P.McGuinness cha ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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2016 United Kingdom European Union Membership Referendum
The United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, commonly referred to as the EU referendum or the Brexit referendum, took place on 23 June 2016 in the United Kingdom (UK) and Gibraltar to ask the electorate whether the country should remain a member of, or leave, the European Union (EU). It was organised and facilitated through the European Union Referendum Act 2015 and the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. The referendum resulted in 51.9% of the votes cast being in favour of leaving the EU. Although the referendum was legally non-binding, the government of the time promised to implement the result. Membership of the EU had long been a topic of debate in the United Kingdom. The country joined the European Communities (EC), principally the European Economic Community (EEC) or Common Market, the forerunner to the European Union, in 1973, along with the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), and the European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC or Eu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Oslo
Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of in 2019, and the metropolitan area had an estimated population of in 2021. During the Viking Age the area was part of Viken. Oslo was founded as a city at the end of the Viking Age in 1040 under the name Ánslo, and established as a ''kaupstad'' or trading place in 1048 by Harald Hardrada. The city was elevated to a bishopric in 1070 and a capital under Haakon V of Norway around 1300. Personal unions with Denmark from 1397 to 1523 and again from 1536 to 1814 reduced its influence. After being destroyed by a fire in 1624, during the reign of King Christian IV, a new city was built closer to Akershus Fortress and named Christiania in honour of the king. It became a municipality ('' formannskapsdistrikt'') on 1 January 1838. The city fu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pentonville Prison
HM Prison Pentonville (informally "The Ville") is an English Category B men's prison, operated by His Majesty's Prison Service. Pentonville Prison is not in Pentonville, but is located further north, on the Caledonian Road in the Barnsbury area of the London Borough of Islington, north London. In 2015 the justice secretary, Michael Gove, described Pentonville as "the most dramatic example of failure" within the prisons estate. The prison today Pentonville is a local prison, holding Category B/C adult males remanded by local magistrates' courts and the Crown Court, and those serving short sentences or beginning longer sentences. The prison is divided into these main wings: * A wing: Remand and convicted * J wing: Induction wing * C wing: Remands and convicted prisoners * D wing: Remands and convicted * E wing: Remands and convicted * F wing: Detoxification Unit (F4 F5 Vulnerable Prisoners) * G wing: remands and convicted (G5 enhanced only) G wing has an education departmen ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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John Redwood
Sir John Alan Redwood (born 15 June 1951) is a British politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Wokingham in Berkshire since 1987. A member of the Conservative Party, he was Secretary of State for Wales in the Major government and was twice an unsuccessful candidate for the leadership of the Conservative Party in the 1990s. Redwood subsequently served in the Shadow Cabinets of William Hague and Michael Howard; he has remained a backbencher since then. Redwood is a veteran Eurosceptic who was described in 1993 as a "pragmatic Thatcherite". He was the co-chairman of the Conservative Party's Policy Review Group on Economic Competitiveness until 2010. He has the role of Chief Global Strategist of investment management company Charles Stanley & Co Ltd (part of Charles Stanley Group). Redwood is a long-term critic of the European Union and of the United Kingdom's former membership of it. He supported Brexit in the 2016 EU referendum, and is a member of the British ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Michael Gove
Michael Andrew Gove (; born Graeme Andrew Logan, 26 August 1967) is a British politician serving as Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and Minister for Intergovernmental Relations since 2021. He has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Surrey Heath since 2005. A member of the Conservative Party, he has served in various Cabinet positions under Prime Ministers David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak. Gove has twice run to become Leader of the Conservative Party, in 2016 and 2019, finishing in third place on both occasions. Born in Aberdeen, Gove was in care until being adopted aged four months old, after which he was raised in the Kittybrewster area of the city. He attended the independent Robert Gordon's College and studied English at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. He then began a career as a journalist at '' The Press and Journal'' before having a long tenure as a leader writer at ''The Times''. Elected for Surrey Heath at the 2005 genera ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Niall Ferguson
Niall Campbell Ferguson FRSE (; born 18 April 1964)Biography Niall Ferguson is a Scottish-American historian based in the who is the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the at and a senior fellow at the [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Iain Duncan-Smith
Sir George Iain Duncan Smith (born George Ian Duncan Smith; 9 April 1954), often referred to by his initials IDS, is a British politician who served as Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from 2001 to 2003. He was Secretary of State for Work and Pensions from 2010 to 2016. He has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Chingford and Woodford Green, formerly Chingford, since 1992. The son of W. G. G. Duncan Smith, a Royal Air Force flying ace, Duncan Smith was born in Edinburgh and raised in Solihull. After education at the training school and Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, he served in the Scots Guards from 1975 to 1981, seeing tours in Northern Ireland and Rhodesia. He joined the Conservative Party in 1981. After unsuccessfully contesting Bradford West in 1987, he was elected to Parliament at the 1992 general election. He was not a minister during the premiership of John Major. During the leadership of William Hague he served as Shadow Secretary o ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hywel Williams
Hywel Williams (born 1953) is a Welsh Plaid Cymru politician serving as the Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) for Arfon (UK Parliament constituency), Arfon, previously Caernarfon (UK Parliament constituency), Caernarfon, since 2001 United Kingdom general election, 2001. He announced his intention to retire in 2022. Early life Williams was born in Pwllheli in 1953, and received his education at Ysgol Troed yr Allt, Pwllheli Grammar School and then Ysgol Glan y Môr. He studied Psychology at the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire (now Cardiff University) before qualifying as a social worker at University College of North Wales (now Bangor University) in 1977/78. He was a mental health social worker in the Dwyfor area before joining the Centre for Social Work Practice at the University of Wales, Bangor in 1985. He was a project worker at the centre, specialising in developing practice through the medium of Welsh language, Welsh, dev ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |