A Ton of Crap (122 page)

Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm
Saddam Hussein’s actions created a threat to the United States, especially relating to the oil production in the Persian Gulf. With the approval of Saudi Arabia, President George H. W. Bush sent ground troops and warplanes to Saudi Arabia as Iraqi troops began approaching the borders of Saudi Arabia, indicating an interest in the oil fields. The U.S. deployment sent out to defend Saudi Arabia was known as Operation Desert Shield. It was the largest deployment since the Vietnam War. Thirty other nations joined the United States. On January 17, 1991, with the understanding that Saddam Hussein would not withdraw, Desert Shield turned into Desert Storm.

JOURNALISM

The
Oxford Gazette
One of the most important milestones in the history of journalism was the publication of the
Oxford Gazette
in 1665. The
Oxford Gazette
was the first newspaper that was ever printed. The paper was available to every class, and most significantly, the text was separated into columns. The
Gazette
was printed twice a week under the same name, which was also a major change. Other newspapers during this time that were published twice a week would alternate titles. The
Gazette
, the official publication of King Charles II, was printed in two locations: London and Oxford. The
Oxford Gazette
later changed its name to the
London Gazette
, and it still exists to this day.

CATEGORY THEORY

Functors
Categories can be thought of as even more abstract. A category is a kind of structure, and as such, one can search for processes that preserve this type of structure. Those processes are known as functors. What functors do is associate an object of a category to another object from another category (and with every morphism in the first, a morphism in the second is associated). Functors allow one to study the relationships among a variety of classes of structures; a fundamental concept in areas such as algebraic topology.

TYPES OF ANIMALS

Mammals
There are several characteristics that differentiate mammals from other animals. Mammals have hair or fur that covers the body (even some cetaceans, i.e., whales and dolphins, have a thin covering of hair); they are warm-blooded, meaning they are capable of regulating the temperature of their bodies; and they give birth to babies that are fully formed. Cetaceans are considered mammals because they breathe air with lungs, give birth to live offspring, have some hair, and are warm-blooded, just like humans, cats, dogs, elephants, and primates.

AMHARIC

Grammar
Amharic is considered to be a pro-drop language. This means that pronouns can be dropped when speaking and are in some way inferable. Sentences without any elements emphasized will not feature independent pronouns. In Amharic, the verbs agree with the person, gender, and number of the subject. Gender is expressed in several different ways, and nouns are either masculine or feminine. The feminine gender not only indicates sex, but it is also used when indicating something little or when expressing sympathy or tenderness.

GULF WAR

Scud Missile Attacks
Iraq had Scud missiles, tactical ballistic missiles developed by the Soviet Union that were designed to carry chemical and nuclear warheads. Casualties from Scuds ranged from extensive to very little. On January 17, Iraq fired a total of seven Scud missiles at Israel, which the Israelis were prepared for. The United States pleaded with Israel to not counterattack, which Israel agreed to, due to the fact that the United States promised to target and destroy all Scud missile sites in Iraq.

JOURNALISM

The Civil War
By the American Revolution, newspapers were fairly common. By 1800, there were more than 200 newspapers in the United States. These newspapers, however, were not independent and objective pieces, but usually ways for political parties to get their messages across. The Civil War, however, changed the way newspapers wrote. Reporters were hired to act as war correspondents and report on what was happening. With the rail system and the telegraph, information could travel faster. Due to how much it cost to send telegraph messages, the writing had to be concise. This molded the way stories are written to this day.

CATEGORY THEORY

What Categories Are Made Of
A category, known as C, is made up of three entities. Class ob(C) features elements that are referred to as objects. Class hom(C) features elements that are morphisms (which are really arrows). The morphism (known as
f
) features a source object that is unique (known as
a
) and an object it targets (known as
b
), so it would be expressed as:
f
: 
a
 → 
b
(which can be stated as
f
is a morphism from
a
to
b
). The last mathematical entity that a category is made up of is a binary operation (shown as
○
). This is known as the composition of morphisms, and can be broken down as this:

hom(
a
,
b
) × hom(
b
, 
c
) → hom(
a
, c)

f:
 
a
 → 
b
and
g:
 
b
 → 
c
is written as
g
○
f

TYPES OF ANIMALS

Reptiles
Reptiles have several distinct characteristics. Though they breathe air through their lungs like mammals, they are cold-blooded, meaning they do not have the ability to regulate the temperature of their bodies. In other words, the temperature of their bodies is dependent on the temperature of their environment. Reptiles live on land and in water, their bodies are covered in scales, and most lay eggs (vipers and boas are two examples of reptiles that give birth to live young, but this is uncommon for reptiles). The largest group of reptiles is snakes and lizards.

AMHARIC