The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the United Kingdom and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please improve this article and discuss the issue on the talk page. (August 2011)

Tabloid journalism tends to emphasize topics such as sensational crime stories, astrology, gossip columns about the personal lives of celebrities and sports stars, and junk food news. Such journalism is commonly associated with tabloid sized newspapers like the National Enquirer, Globe or the Daily Mail and the former News of the World. Not all newspapers associated with such journalism are in tabloid size, for example, the format of Apple Daily is broadsheet while the style is tabloid. The terms "tabloids", "supermarket tabloids", "gutter press", and "rag", refer to the journalistic approach of such newspapers rather than their size.^{[citation needed]}

Often, tabloid newspaper allegations about the sexual practices, drug use, or private conduct of celebrities is borderline defamatory; in many cases, celebrities have successfully sued for libel, demonstrating that tabloid stories have defamed them. It is this sense of the word that led to some entertainment news programs to be called tabloid television.^{[citation needed]}

History[link]

An early pioneer of tabloid journalism was Alfred Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe (1865–1922), who amassed a large publishing empire of halfpenny papers by rescuing failing stolid papers and transforming them to reflect the popular taste, which yielded him enormous profits. Harmsworth used his tabloids to influence public opinion, for example, by bringing down the wartime government of Prime Minister Herbert Henry Asquith in the Shell Crisis of 1915.

Supermarket tabloid[link]

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2011)

In the U.S. "supermarket tabloids" are large, national versions of these tabloids, usually published weekly. They are named for their prominent placement along the checkout lines of supermarkets. Supermarket tabloids are particularly notorious for the over-the-top sensationalizing of stories, the facts of which can often be called into question.^{[citation needed]} These tabloids—such as The Globe and The National Enquirer—often use aggressive and usually mean-spirited tactics to sell their issues. Unlike regular tabloid-format newspapers, supermarket tabloids are distributed through the magazine distribution channel, similarly to other weekly magazines and mass-market paperback books. Leading examples include The National Enquirer, Star, Weekly World News (now defunct), and Sun.

Most major supermarket tabloids in the U.S. are published by American Media, Inc., including The National Enquirer, Star, The Globe, National Examiner, ¡Mira!, Sun, Radar and Weekly World News, which is now a Sun insert and web site. Columbia has a supermarket tabloid—El Espacio (Tabloid)

The oldest tabloid known to date is the American "Daily News" in 1919. If it did not have any news, it would simply make it up and use a photograph staged by the newspaper staff, then use an editing technique called the composograph. Broadway Brevities was a notorious New York tabloid founded in 1916 but had its heyday in the 1930s with a circulation of 50,000 for its mix of sexual sensationalism and gossip.^[1]

Red top[link]

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Look up red top in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Collectively called the "tabloid press", tabloid newspapers in Britain tend to be simply and sensationally written, and to give more prominence than broadsheets to celebrities, sports, crime stories and even hoaxes; they also less subtly take a political position (either left-wing or right-wing) on news stories, ridiculing politicians, demanding resignations and predicting election results. The term "red tops"^[2] refers to tabloids with red nameplates, such as The Sun, the Daily Star, the Daily Mirror and the Daily Sport,^[3] and distinguishes them from the Daily Express and Daily Mail. Red top newspapers are usually simpler in writing style, dominated by pictures, and directed at the more sensational end of the market.

A recent British survey alleged "journalists on newspapers such as The Sun, Mirror or Daily Star" to be considerably less trustworthy than both politicians and estate agents, with fewer than 10% of people trusting them to reliably report the truth.

See also[link]

Journalism portal

Wikinews has related news: An interview with gossip columnist Michael Musto on the art of celebrity journalism

• Broadcast syndication
• Gossip magazine
• Yellow journalism

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Colin Sparks; John Tulloch (2000). Tabloid tales: global debates over media standards. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-8476-9572-0. 
• Martin Conboy (2006). Tabloid Britain: constructing a community through language. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-35553-7. 
• Barbie Zelizer, ed. (2009). The changing faces of journalism: tabloidization, technology and truthiness. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-0-415-77824-4. 
• Paula E. Morton (2009). Tabloid Valley: supermarket news and American culture. University Press of Florida. ISBN 978-0-8130-3364-8. 
• Herman Wasserman (2010). Tabloid Journalism in South Africa: True Story!. Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-22211-4. 

The Residents are an American art collective best known for avant-garde music and multimedia works. The first official release under the name of The Residents was in 1972, and the group has since released over sixty albums, numerous music videos and short films, three CD-ROM projects and ten DVDs. They have undertaken seven major world tours and scored multiple films. Pioneers in exploring the potential of CD-ROM and similar technologies, The Residents have won several awards for their multimedia projects. Ralph Records, a record label focusing on avant-garde music, was started by The Residents.

Throughout the group's existence, the individual members have ostensibly attempted to operate under anonymity, preferring instead to have attention focused on their art output. Much outside speculation and rumor has focused on this aspect of the group. In public, the group appears silent and costumed, often wearing eyeball helmets, top hats and tuxedos - a long-lasting costume now recognized as their signature iconography. Their albums generally fall into two categories: deconstructions of Western popular music, or complex conceptual pieces, composed around a theme, theory or plot. They are noted for surrealistic lyrics and sound, disregard for conventional music composition, and the over the top, theatrical spectacle of their live performances.

History[link]

Origins[link]

The Residents hail from Shreveport, Louisiana, where they met in high school in the 1960s. In 1966 the members headed west for San Francisco, but after their truck broke down in San Mateo, California, they decided to remain there.

While attempting to make a living, they began to experiment with tape machines, photography, and anything remotely to do with art that they could get their hands on. Word of their experimentation spread and in 1969, a British guitarist and multi-instrumentalist named Phil Lithman^[1] and the mysterious N. Senada (whom Lithman had picked up in Bavaria where the aged avant-gardist was recording birds singing) paid them a visit, and decided to remain.

The two Europeans would become great influences on the band. Lithman's guitar playing technique earned him the nickname Snakefinger, after his frantic playing on the violin during the performance with the Residents at The Boarding House in San Francisco 1971, where his fingers' speed made them look like snakes in the eyes of the less-musically proficient, but imaginative Residents.

The group purchased crude recording equipment, instruments and began to make tapes, refusing to let an almost complete lack of musical proficiency stand in the way. Like all information pertaining to the early days of the band, this is provided by The Cryptic Corporation and may or may not be invented.

1969–1972: Residents Unincorporated[link]

In 1969 the group began to make the first of their unreleased tapes. Rumors have surfaced of two (of perhaps hundreds) unreleased reel-to-reel items titled Rusty Coathangers for the Doctor and The Ballad of Stuffed Trigger. The actual titles are in question (as is the notion that these were album-length recordings), but the first title has been confirmed by a former head of the now defunct Smelly Tongues fan club. Further evidence of pre-1970 recordings surfaced with the release of the song I Heard You Got Religion, supposedly recorded in 1969, and released originally as a downloadable track from Ralph America in 1999. Cryptic says there are lots of tapes dating back decades, but they were all recorded before the group had officially become The Residents so the band does not consider them to be part of their discography.

The album The Ballad of Stuffed Trigger has never been released in any form.^[2] "Uncle Willie", former Residents fan club president, wrote in his book Uncle Willie's Highly Opinionated Guide to The Residents that, while searching through the band's archives, he came across "a suite named The Ballad of Stuffed Trigger," but not a complete album.

In 1971 the group sent a reel-to-reel tape to Hal Halverstadt at Warner Brothers, since he had worked with Captain Beefheart (one of the group's musical heroes). Halverstadt was not overly impressed with the Warner Bros. Album (He describes it as "okay at best" in Uncle Willie's Cryptic Guide to the Residents), but awarded the tape an "A for Ariginality". Because the band had not included any name in the return address, the rejection slip was simply addressed to "The Residents". The members of the group then decided that this would be the name they would use, first becoming "Residents Unincorporated", then shortening it to the current name.

The first performance of the band using the name "The Residents" was at The Boarding House in San Francisco in 1971. That same year another tape was completed called Baby Sex. The original cover art for the tape box was a silk-screened copy of an old photo depicting a woman fellating a small child. (Considered artistically rude at that time, it would be viewed as child pornography today).

In 1972 they moved to San Francisco and formed Ralph Records.^[3] By this time, The Cryptic Corporation was operating as a partnership and incorporated to take over the running of Ralph Records.

1972–1980: Album era[link]

Before the Santa Dog single and while recording Meet the Residents, The Residents undertook one of their first major projects: the ambitious Vileness Fats film project. Intended to be the first-ever long form music video, The Residents saw this project as the opportunity to create the ultimate cult film. After four years of filming (from 1972 to 1976) the project was reluctantly canceled because of time, space and monetary constraints. Fifteen hours of footage were shot for the project yet only about three-quarters of an hour of that footage has ever been released.

Santa Dog is considered by The Residents themselves and their fans to be the "official" start of the band's recorded output. This is so because it was the first to be released to the public. Shortly after this release, the band left San Mateo and relocated to San Francisco. They sent copies of Santa Dog to west coast radio stations with no response until Bill Reinhardt, program director of KBOO-FM in Portland, Oregon received a copy. Santa Dog had the strange kind of sonic weirdness he was looking for and it was played heavily on his popular (Radio Lab) show. Bill met The Residents at their Sycamore St. studio in the summer of 1973 with the news of his broadcasts. They were overjoyed that they had finally got media acceptance and he was celebrated with the news that KBOO was the first station to play a Residents record on the air. Inviting him in and treating him like family, The Residents gave Reinhardt exclusive access to all their eclectic recordings, including copies of the original masters of Stuffed Trigger, Baby Sex and the Warner Bros. Album. He promoted these along with Meet the Residents regularly on his radio program. There was considerable resistance to the commercial viability of Residents material. To aid in their promotion, Bill was given 50 of the first 1,000 copies of Meet the Residents. Some were sent to friends, listeners and critics and two dozen were left for sale on consignment at Music Millennium Records where they sat unsold for months. KBOO DJ, Barry Schwam (Schwump, who also recorded with The Residents) promoted them on his program as well. Eventually KBOO airplay attracted many loyal fans and Portland became the epicenter of a worldwide cult phenomenon.

The Residents, at this time, were at a rough point in their career. According to official Residents lore, there was internal turmoil which resulted in a large, "embarrassing" food fight; they decided to resolve this tension in 1974 by recording what would later become Not Available —representative of N. Senada's Theory of Obscurity taken to its logical conclusion. The album was recorded and then placed in storage in order to be issued only when everyone had forgotten about it. However, contractual obligations related to the much-delayed release of Eskimo forced its release in 1978 after the band had almost forgotten about it. The Residents were not bothered by this deviation from their plan since the 1978 decision to release the album would not affect the philosophical conditions under which it was originally recorded.

The Third Reich 'n Roll came next, a pastiche on 1960s rock and roll with an overarching Nazi theme, represented visually on the album cover, which featured Dick Clark in an SS uniform holding a carrot, with a number of Hitlers dancing on clouds behind him. On each side of the record was a single composition, approximately 17½ minutes long, using recordings of classic rock and roll songs that were spliced, overdubbed and edited with new vocals, instrumentation and tape noises.^[3] The original songs were finally removed leaving entirely new and bizarre performances. The music video for this album was shot on the sets that were built for Vileness Fats.

Following The Third Reich 'n' Roll came Fingerprince, a particularly ambitious project not unlike the earlier Not Available recordings. The band's original intention with Fingerprince was to release it as the very first "three-sided" album – they had found a way to simulate a third side by arranging the grooves on one side of the vinyl album to play a completely different program of tracks depending on which series of grooves the needle was dropped on. However, this idea was dropped when the band discovered that the Monty Python comedy troupe had executed the very same idea three years earlier with their Matching Tie and Handkerchief album. The "third side" was later released as an EP titled Babyfingers, and the Babyfingers tracks have since been re-integrated into the Fingerprince album on the CD reissues.

The Residents followed Fingerprince with their Duck Stab/Buster & Glen album – their most easily comprehensible album up to that point. This album got the band some attention from the press (namely NME, Sounds and Melody Maker), and dropped most of their reliance upon the Theory of Obscurity.

Eskimo (1979) contained music consisting of non-musical sounds, percussion, and wordless voices. Rather than being songs in the orthodox sense, the compositions sounded like "live-action stories" without dialogue. The Residents remixed the "songs" in disco style, the results of which appeared on the EP Diskomo. Eskimo was reissued in surround sound on DVD in 2003. Eskimo's cover presents the first instance of the group wearing their signature eyeball masks and tuxedos, which would be featured in many subsequent releases, films, live appearances, and promotional materials.

Commercial Album (1980) consisted of 40 songs, each consisting of a verse and a chorus and lasting one minute.^[3] The songs pastiched the advertising jingle although the songs were not endorsements of known products or services. The liner notes state that songs should be repeated three times in a row to form a "pop song". The Residents purchased 40 one-minute advertising slots on San Francisco's most popular Top-40 radio station at the time, KFRC, such that the station played each track of their album over three days. This prompted an editorial in Billboard magazine questioning whether the act was art or advertising.

When MTV was in its infancy, The Residents' videos were in heavy rotation since they were among the few music videos available to broadcasters. The Residents' earliest videos are in the New York Museum of Modern Art's permanent collection and were eventually released together in 2001 on the Icky Flix DVD, which includes an optional audio track of remixes.

1981-1990: Performance art and concept albums[link]

The Mole Trilogy and The Mole Show (1981-83)[link]

In 1981, a trilogy of albums, starting with Mark of the Mole, was to be released.^[3] A tour ensued, and was narrated nightly by Penn Jillette. The Mole Trilogy is made up of parts I, II and IV. The performance featured The Residents performing behind a burlap screen, occasionally wearing disguises (such as their iconic eyeball masks), while dancers and actors appeared in front of painted backdrops used to help illustrate the story. Penn Jillette would come out between songs telling long intentionally pointless stories. The show was designed to appear to fall apart as it progressed: Penn pretended to grow angrier with the crowd, and lighting effects and music would become increasingly chaotic, all building up to the point where Penn was dragged off stage and returned, handcuffed to a wheelchair, to deliver his last monologue. During one performance, an audience member assaulted Penn while he was handcuffed to the wheelchair.

The 13th anniversary show (1985-86)[link]

After their Japanese distributor approached them for a two-week run in Japan, The Residents created the 13th Anniversary tour. While the musical performance was more mainstream, the stage show was another over-the-top spectacle, featuring inflatable giraffes, dancers in eye ball masks illuminating the darkened stage with work lights, and a lead vocalist who seemed to change costumes throughout the show from wearing his eyeball mask to wearing a Richard Nixon mask, and at one point wearing only a wig and fake ears. After the two-week run in Japan, the Residents took the show through the US. During the US leg of the tour the band encountered a few problems, including having the tour manager having to fan a member's keyboard because of overheating, being booked in a pool hall and having someone run on stage only to be thrown back into the audience.

Backstage at the Hollywood Palace show on December 26, 1985, one member's eyeball mask (Mr. Red Eye) was stolen, so it was replaced with a giant skull mask.^{[citation needed]} The eye was returned by a devoted fan who discovered where the thief lived and stole it back, although Homer Flynn said the person who returned the mask was most probably the thief. It was put into retirement because they said it was "unclean" and in a bad condition—a superfluous shell. After this, the lead Resident was known as Mr. Skull.^{[citation needed]}

The last show of this tour was in January 1987 at The Warfield in San Francisco, with a special appearance by Penn & Teller.^{[citation needed]}

Cube E (1989-1990)[link]

"Cube E" was a three-act performance covering the history of American music. It was a step up from previous shows, featuring more elaborate dance numbers and sets. It was also the first show composed exclusively of music written for the show. The show was almost entirely backlit, with blacklights highlighting fluorescent pieces of costumes and set.

They introduced the first part, which covered cowboy music, on German television as "Buckaroo Blues". It featured the singer and two dancers wearing giant cowboy hats around a glowing campfire. Part two was called "Black Barry" and focused on slave music and the blues. The act ended when a giant cube head rose from the back of the stage. Part three, "The Baby King," featured Elvis songs performed by an elderly Elvis impersonator for his grandchildren. The show ended with an inflated Elvis dying as a result of the British Invasion.

Other works[link]

In the late 1980s, they created the epic recording God in Three Persons, a story about the exploitation of two Siamese twins with healing powers by a male dominant force and The King & Eye, a surreal biography of Elvis Presley and the birth of rock and roll.

1991-97: Multimedia projects[link]

In the 1990s, they created Freak Show. This marked the beginning of The Residents' obsession with emerging computer technology in the 1990s.^[3] Much of the music was made with MIDI devices. Freak Show also served as the name for a CD-ROM released by the Voyager Company on January 1994^[4], shortly after Laurie Anderson's first multimedia CD-ROM experiment, Puppet Motel. Freak Show was also a stage performance by a theater company at the Archa Theater in Prague that premiered on November 1, 1995, and a comic book. Several of the songs were also performed live during the 1997 25th anniversary concerts at the Fillmore in San Francisco. After the CD-ROM's success, the album was re-released as The Freak Show Soundtrack with a different cover. A limited edition, The Freak Show Special Edition, was released in 2002 to mark their 30th anniversary.

Other multimedia projects by The Residents included The Gingerbread Man and Bad Day on the Midway.

1998-2008: Tours and storytelling projects[link]

Wormwood (1998-99)[link]

Based on Bible stories, Wormwood featured the Residents departing from pre-programmed music and again using a live band. The band wore ecclesiastical robes and performed in a brightly lit fluorescent cave. The male and female lead singers switched leads, depending on what characters they needed. Act one consisted of one-off stories about individual Bible characters. Act 2 focused on suites of songs about Bible figures such as Abraham, Moses, and King David. During a performance in Athens, Greece, Nolan Cook, their guitarist, had to leave the stage after taking a rock to the head from an audience member.

Demons Dance Alone and Animal Lover (2002-05)[link]

The Residents recorded the dramatic album Demons Dance Alone (also a tour and DVD in 2002) and Animal Lover in 2005. Singer Molly Harvey began as a Ralph employee but by the mid-90s contributed to virtually all of The Residents' many projects. The Residents' increased reliance on Harvey, essentially handing her half of the vocal duties since at least Demons Dance Alone, parallels their artistic revitalization. Nolan Cook, Carla Fabrizio, Toby Dammit, Eric Drew Feldman, and many other artists continuously worked with the band over the last five years, recording and performing live. The new artists helped to counter what Allmusic derided as a "sonic palette [confined to] factory presets from their new Macintosh audio" of the CD-ROM era.^[5]

In February 2005, The Residents toured Australia as part of the What is Music? festival, performing a two hour retrospective set titled the 33rd Anniversary Tour: The Way We Were. These shows saw a fairly minimal band; three eyeball-headed Residents (one on guitar and two laptop/sample operators), a "stage hand" performer, and a male and female vocalist in costumes reminiscent of the Wormwood Tour. Video projections and unusual flexible screens were added to the stage set, creating an unsettling ambiance. The performances on the Way We Were tour were recorded and were released on CD and DVD in 2005.

Storytelling projects (2006-09)[link]

Summer of 2006 brought the internet download project, River of Crime (Episodes 1–5). River of Crime was their first project with Warner Music Group's Cordless Label. Following the success of River of Crime, The Residents launched their weekly Timmy video project on YouTube. In 2007 they did the music for the documentary Strange Culture and also released a double instrumental album, Night of the Hunters. On the Fourth of July, 2007, the planned October release of their latest project with Mute Records, The Voice of Midnight (a music theater adaptation of E.T.A. Hoffmann's short story "Der Sandmann"), was announced on their website.

On the May 21 they announced on their website that their first North America tour since Demons Dance Alone for a project titled The Bunny Boy was set to begin on October 9 in New York – later an earlier date was added for Santa Cruz. Soon, it was announced that the tour would also include Europe, starting November 13. On June 3, the Residents.com website boasted the planned release of The Bunny Boy which was released on September 1. The website had posted information in which Foxboro claimed this would be a Farewell Tour; it was later revealed that this was nothing more than a mistake by Foxboro.

November 3, 2009 saw three new releases. The Ughs! is a mostly instrumental album made up of music composed earlier in their career, which had been completely reworked for the Voice of Midnight album. Ten Little Piggies is a futurist compilation, ten songs from projects that may or may not be released in the future. Finally Is Anybody Out There is a DVD collecting all the Bunny Boy videos from the series posted on YouTube. The episodes are streamlined and not exactly the same as the originals.

2010-present: Talking Light and beyond[link]

In January 2010 the Residents began a series of tours titled Talking Light, touring North America and Europe. During the tours, which lasted until April 2011, The Residents appeared as a trio (with the explanation that the fourth member "Carlos" had grown tired of the music business and "gone home" to Mexico to care for his mother) and adapted new identities and costumes. The singer, Randy, wore an old man mask, and the other two, keyboardist Chuck and guitarist Bob, wore dread lock wigs and some kind of illuminated optical gear over their faces. The songs were stories about various characters' obsessions with ghosts, imaginary people and supernatural phenomena. One of these performances was featured as part of the edition of the All Tomorrow's Parties festival curated by Matt Groening in May 2010 in Minehead, England. The band released several albums related to the Talking Light concept, including the instrumental albums Dollar General and Chuck's Ghost Music, live album Bimbo's Talking Light, and studio album Lonely Teenager.

In October and November 2011, the Residents presented an early version ofSam's Enchanted Evening at The Marsh performance center in Berkeley, with the lead singer appearing as Randy Rose.^[6]. A new version of "Sam's Enchanted Evening" was subsequently performed in March 2012 at Henry Street Settlement in New York City in a production directed by Travis Chamberlain, co-starring Joshua Raoul Brody and Jibz Cameron (aka, Dynasty Handbag).

On January 10, 2012, The Residents released "Coochie Brake"; it focused on an ambient, slightly ethnic sound, with lyrics in Spanish spoken by, apparently, a new singer.

Identity[link]

Much of the speculation about the members' true identities swirls around their management team, known as "The Cryptic Corporation."^[7] Cryptic was formed as a corporation in California by Jay Clem (born 1947), Homer Flynn (born April 1945), Hardy W. Fox (born 1945), and John Kennedy in 1976, all of whom denied having been band members. (Clem and Kennedy left the Corporation in 1982, much to the chagrin of some fans.^[8]) The Residents themselves do not grant interviews, though Flynn and Fox have conducted interviews with the media.

Nolan Cook, a prominent collaborator with the group in both their live and studio work (as well as being a live member of I Am Spoonbender), denied in an interview that Fox and Flynn are the Residents, saying that he has come across such rumors, and they are completely false. However, Cook himself is considered a member of the band by some, as he is known to wear the same head coverings as the rest of the group during live shows, even wearing the trademark eyeball mask during the Wormwood tour.

William Poundstone, author of the Big Secrets books, compared voiceprints of a Flynn lecture with those of spoken word segments from the Residents discography in his book Biggest Secrets. After noting similar patterns in both, he concluded "the similarities in the spectograms second the convincing subjective impression that the voices are identical." He posited that "It is possible that the creative core of the Residents is the duo of Flynn and Fox." A subset of that belief is that Flynn is the lyricist and that Fox writes the music. In addition BMI's online database of the performance rights organization (of which the Residents and their publishing company, Pale Pachyderm Publishing (Warner-Chappell), have been members for their entire careers), lists Flynn and Fox as the composers of all original Residents songs. This includes those songs written pre-1974 (the "Residents Unincorporated" years), the year Cryptic formed.^[9]

Simon Reynolds wrote in his book Rip It Up and Start Again: Post Punk 1978-1984 that "The Residents and their 'representatives' were one and the same",^[10] elaborating on one of his blogs that "this was something that anybody who had any direct dealings with Ralph figured out sooner rather than later." Reynolds quotes Helios Creed, who identifies The Residents as a keyboardist named "H", a singer named Homer, and "this other guy called John"; and Peter Principle of Tuxedomoon, who claims that "we eventually figured out that the guy doing the graphics and the engineer in the studio were in fact the Residents."^[11]

Cryptic openly admits the group's artwork is done by Flynn (among others), under various names that, put together, become Pornographics, but the pseudonym is rarely spelled the same way twice (examples: Porno Graphics, Pore No Graphix, Pore-Know Graphics); and that Fox is the "sound engineer" — meaning that he is the main producer, engineer, master, and editor of all their recordings. (Since 1976, the Residents' recordings have all listed their producer as "The Cryptic Corporation," presumably meaning Fox in particular.) Many other rumors have come and gone over the years, one being that 60s experimental band Cromagnon shared members with the band.

Most recently, the group's Facebook presence lists the members of the Residents as "Randy, Chuck and Bob." Furthermore, a synopsis for their 2012 stage production Sam's Enchanted Evening provides the name Randy Rose as that of "the Residents' lead singer." While it is clear that the Cryptic Corporation has chosen to share this information publicly, no further confirmation--nor any context as to the roles of "Chuck" and "Bob" in the group, or if these names are, indeed, the names of the group's members--appears to have been issued to date.

Discography[link]

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Meet the Residents – America's most eccentric band!, Ian Shirley, SAF Publishing, Wembley, UK, 1998 ISBN 0-946719-12-8
• Richard Gehr (April 1986). Take a good hard look at America's preeminent underground avant-pop ensemble — you might like what you see. Spin Magazine. p. 59. http://books.google.com/books?id=xdLsQBjl0-IC&pg=PA59&dq=spin+magazine+1986+take+a+good+hard+look&hl=en&ei=9PWLTObxDo30swO-nbymBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2010-09-11. 

External links[link]

• The Residents Official Historical Site
• Official MySpace page
• Official YouTube page
• Residents Lovers Forum
• The Moles present The Residents

Nikki Haley
116th Governor of South Carolina
Incumbent
Assumed office January 12, 2011
Lieutenant	Glenn McConnell
Preceded by	Mark Sanford
Member of the South Carolina House of Representatives from the 87th district
In office January 3, 2005 – November 8, 2010
Preceded by	Larry Koon
Succeeded by	Todd Atwater
Personal details
Born	Nimrata Nikki Randhawa (1972-01-20) January 20, 1972 (age 40) Bamberg, South Carolina, U.S.
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	Michael Haley
Children	2
Alma mater	Clemson University (B.S.)
Website	www.governor.sc.gov

Nimrata Nikki Randhawa Haley (Born on January 20, 1972), an American politician, is the 116th and current Governor of South Carolina. A member of the Republican Party, Haley represented Lexington County in the South Carolina House of Representatives from 2005 to 2010.^[1]

In the 2010 South Carolina gubernatorial election, Haley was endorsed for the Republican nomination by former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, and the Tea Party movement.^[2][3][4][5] On June 8, 2010, she finished first in the four-way Republican primary election with 49% of the vote, but fell short of the 50% required to avoid a runoff election. Haley won the runoff on June 22 with 65%,^[6] and proceeded to win the general election by a 51–47% margin.

Haley is the first woman to serve as Governor of South Carolina, and the second Indian-American governor in the country. At the age of 40, Haley is the youngest current governor in the US.^[7][8] Haley signed a law cracking down on illegal immigration in June 2011.^[9] She also supports a law requiring photo identification at the polls.^[10]

Early life, education and career[link]

Haley was born Nimrata Nikki Randhawa^[11] in Bamberg, South Carolina, on January 20, 1972, to a Jatt Sikh family of Randhawa Clan. Her parents, Dr. Ajit Singh Randhawa and Raj Kaur Randhawa, are Sikh immigrants from Amritsar District, Punjab, India. She has two brothers, Mitti and Charan, and a sister, Simran.^[12] Haley is a graduate of Orangeburg Preparatory Schools, and later of Clemson University with a B.S. in accounting^[13] and joined the FCR Corporation (a waste management and recycling company),^[14][15] before joining her mother's business, Exotica International, an upscale clothing firm, in 1994.^[16] The family business grew to a multi-million dollar company.^[16]

Haley was named to the Board of Directors of the Orangeburg County Chamber of Commerce in 1998.^[17] She was named to the Board of Directors of the Lexington Chamber of Commerce in 2003. Haley became treasurer of the National Association of Women Business Owners in 2003 and president in 2004.^[17] She chaired the Lexington Gala to raise funds for the local hospital.^[16] She also serves on the Lexington Medical Foundation, Lexington County Sheriff’s Foundation, West Metro Republican Women, President of the South Carolina Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners, Chairman for 2006 Friends of Scouting Leadership Division campaign and is a member of the Rotary Club in Lexington.^[18]

State legislature[link]

Elections[link]

In 2004, she ran for the South Carolina House of Representatives for a district in Lexington County. She faced incumbent representative Larry Koon in the Republican primary. Koon, who had served since 1975, was the longest-serving member of the House. In the primary election, Haley won 40% of the vote (2,247 votes) to Koon's 42% (2,354 votes), thus forcing a runoff.^[19] Her platform was anti-tax and fiscally conservative with an emphasis on education.^[20] In the runoff, Haley won with 54.7% (2,928 votes) of the total. She then ran unopposed for the House seat; no Democrat even filed in this heavily Republican district. She became the first Indian-American to hold office in South Carolina.^[21][22]

She was unopposed for reelection in 2006,^[23] and defeated Democrat Edgar Gomez with 83 percent of the vote in 2008.^[24]

Tenure[link]

Haley served as secretary of the Medical, Military, Public and Municipal Affairs committees. She also was elected chairman of the freshman caucus in 2005 and elected as majority whip in the South Carolina General Assembly.^[18] She was the only freshman legislator named to a whip spot.^[25]

Awards[link]

This biographical section of an article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (September 2011)

• 2005 "Friend of the Taxpayer" – South Carolina Association of Taxpayers
• 2006
  • "Palmetto Leadership Award" – South Carolina Policy Council (a limited-government advocacy group)
  • "Strom Thurmond Excellence in Public Service and Government Award" – South Carolina federation of Republican Women
• 2009 "Friend of the Taxpayer" – South Carolina Association of Taxpayers
• 2010 "Taxpayer Hero" – South Carolina Club for Growth
• 2011 "India Abroad Person of the Year 2010" – India Abroad

Voting Record[link]

Abortion and fetal rights[link]

Haley is pro-life and consistently votes for bills that restrict abortion and bills that protect fetuses. She has also voted for bills that allow abortions in circumstances in which abortion might be necessary to save the woman's life. Bills Haley has voted for that were passed are the Penalties for Harming an Unborn Child/Fetus, Pre-Abortion Ultrasound, and the 24 Hour Waiting Period for Abortions. The Penalties for Harming an Unborn Child/Fetus says that any act of violence against a fetus is like a criminal act against the mother. The Pre-abortion Ultrasound requires the woman considering an abortion to look at an ultrasound before she is allowed to have an abortion. In addition, the 24 Hour Waiting Period for Abortions requires the woman to wait one day from the time of the ultrasound before she is allowed to have an abortion.

Haley also voted yes on some bills that were tabled or rejected relating to abortion, including the Inclusion of Unborn Child/Fetus in Definition for Civil Suits Amendment, Prohibiting Employment Termination Due to Abortion Waiting Period, and Exempting Cases of Rape from Abortion Waiting Period. The Exempting cases of Rape from Abortion Waiting Period would have allowed specific cases of women to not have to wait the mandatory 24 hours before having an abortion.^[26]

Taxation[link]

One of Haley's stated goals is to lower taxes. Haley voted against a bill to override the governor's veto (when Mark Sanford was still in office) to place a surtax on every cigarette produced. The funds earned would be appropriated to smoking prevention programs and cancer research related to smoking.^[27] She voted for a bill that raised sales taxes to six percent. The bill exempted sales tax on unprepared food such as canned goods. The same bill also exempts property tax on 'owner-occupied residential property' except for the taxes due from what is still owed on the property.^[28]

Immigration[link]

Haley, the daughter of legal immigrants, has stated she believes the immigration laws should be enforced. She voted in favor of the law that requires employers to be able to prove that any newly hired employees are legal residents of the United States, and also requires all immigrants to carry documentation at all times proving that they are legally in the United States. The law was adopted, but is currently the subject of a lawsuit initiated by the United States Justice Department on numerous grounds, including claims the immigration law violates the Supremacy Clause. Rob Godfrey, a spokesman for Haley, said, "If the feds were doing their job, we wouldn't have had to address illegal immigration reform at the state level. But, until they do, we're going to keep fighting in South Carolina to be able to enforce our laws."^[29]

Education policies[link]

Haley has said that funds allocated for public education can be utilized more effectively. She has proposed a plan that would determine a teacher's salary based not only on seniority and qualifications but also on job performance. Their performance rating would be determined by evaluations and reports from principals, students and parents.^[30] During her gubernatorial campaign, Haley stated that she would be in favor of school choice and more charter schools.^[31] She has said that wasteful spending occurs when funds allocated for education sit too long in departmental accounts before being spent.^{[citation needed]}

Economic policies[link]

Haley supports lower taxes and opposes regulation. In inviting business to move to South Carolina she has said:

"What I'm saying is, if you come to South Carolina, the cost of doing business is going to be low here. We are go going to make sure that you have a loyal, willing workforce and we are going to be one of the lowest union-participation states in the country."^[32][33]

"Little girl" incident[link]

Following a trip to Europe to meet with potential companies that might invest in South Carolina and create jobs, Haley was criticized for the amount of taxpayer dollars spent on the trip. Over $127,000 was spent over the duration of the weeklong trip. She was criticized for spending the money on what seemed to some as unnecessary luxuries like five star hotels. Female reporter Renee Dudley, of The Post and Courier of Charleston, asked Haley about an article that had criticized her trip and spending. On "The Laura Ingraham Show" Haley said, "God bless that little girl at The Post and Courier. I mean her job is to try and create conflict. My job is to create jobs. In the end I'm going to have jobs to show for it." Haley was then attacked by many for what she later admitted was her poor choice of words.^[34]

2010 campaign for Governor[link]

County-by-county results

On May 14, 2009, Haley announced that she would be running for the Republican nomination for Governor of South Carolina in 2010.^[3] On November 11, 2009, she was endorsed by former Massachusetts governor and GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney, as well as Jenny Sanford, the incumbent first lady of South Carolina.^[4][5][35] However, she remained in last place among primary candidates in the polls and also in fundraising until former Alaska governor and GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin endorsed her.^{[citation needed]} The Republican gubernatorial primary took place on June 8, 2010, and Haley captured 49% of the vote, necessitating a runoff election on June 22.^[36] Haley won handily in the runoff vote.^[37]

In October 2010 South Carolina pollster Crantford & Associates reported Haley barely edging Democratic challenger Vincent Sheheen in general election polling 45% to 41%.^[38]

Haley is also part of the Tea Party movement.^[39][40]

Haley was elected governor on November 2, 2010 over the Democratic candidate, Vincent Sheheen 51% to 47%.^[41]

Racial commentary against Haley[link]

On June 3, 2010, on the Internet political talk show Pub Politics, State Senator Jake Knotts, a South Carolina lawmaker and supporter of Haley opponent Andre Bauer, repeatedly referred to Haley as a "raghead" because of her Sikh background (male Sikhs wear turbans as part of their religious uniform). Knotts said "We've already got a raghead in the White House, we don't need another raghead in the governor's mansion." The Republican state legislator later apologized for the slur, saying the remarks about President Barack Obama and Haley were meant as a joke.^[42][43]

Haley campaign manager Tim Pearson called Knotts "an embarrassment to our state and to the Republican Party." Jenny Sanford, the former First Lady of South Carolina reaffirmed her support for Haley stating that "I can't help but think that these attacks are being leveled at Nikki Haley because of the courageous stands she has taken over the years in defense of taxpayers and government reform - stands that offend many of the most powerful interests in state government. I am more convinced than ever that Nikki Haley is the best person to be South Carolina's next Governor."^[44]

Allegations of affairs[link]

On May 24, 2010, Will Folks, former press secretary for South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, made a claim on his blog that he had an inappropriate physical relationship with Haley "several years ago".^[45] Haley has denied the claim, stating "I have been 100 percent faithful to my husband throughout our 13 years of marriage. This claim against me is categorically and totally false."^[46] Folks attempted to substantiate his claim by releasing phone records that he said show 700 calls between the two while Folks was working as a political consultant for the Haley campaign.^[47][48] Folks said he was "forced" to reveal the alleged affair as a preemptive measure after discovering Haley's political foes were attempting to publicize the story.^[49]

On June 3, 2010, Larry Marchant, a consultant for Andre Bauer's gubernatorial campaign, made a statement alleging he and Haley had a one-time sexual encounter.^[50]

In a June 2010 interview, Haley said that if she were elected governor and the claims were later validated she would resign the office.^[51]

Personal life[link]

Haley was born and raised as a Sikh. On September 6, 1996, she married Michael Haley in both a Methodist church ceremony and a Sikh gurdwara.^[52] Haley identifies herself today as a Christian,^[53] but attends both Sikh and Methodist services out of respect for her parents' culture.^[39][54] She sits on the board for Mt. Horeb United Methodist Church.^[55]

Michael is a federal employee with the United States Department of the Army and an officer in the South Carolina Army National Guard.^[56] The couple have two children, Rena and Nalin.^[57][58] Haley's brother Mitti was an active duty officer who served in the U.S. Army for 20 years.^[59]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Nikki Haley

	Biography portal
	Politics portal
	South Carolina portal

• Governor Nikki Haley official state website
• Nikki Haley for Governor official campaign website
• Biography at the National Governors Association
• Biography, interest group ratings, public statements, vetoes and campaign finances at Project Vote Smart
• Biography at WhoRunsGov.com at The Washington Post
• Issue positions and quotes at On the Issues
• Campaign contributions at FollowTheMoney.org
• Appearances on C-SPAN programs
• Appearances at the Internet Movie Database
• Collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• Profile at Notable Names Database
• Nikki Haley – The First Indian-American Woman Governor, SpeakBindas

v t e Governors of South Carolina J. Rutledge Lowndes J. Rutledge Mathews Guerard Moultrie T. Pinckney C. Pinckney Moultrie Vanderhorst C. Pinckney E. Rutledge Drayton J. Richardson P. Hamilton C. Pinckney Drayton Middleton Alston D. Williams A. Pickens Geddes Bennett Wilson Manning I Taylor Miller J. Hamilton Hayne McDuffie Butler Noble Henagan Richardson II Hammond Aiken Johnson Seabrook Means J. Manning Adams Allston Gist F. Pickens Bonham Magrath Perry Orr Scott Moses Chamberlain Hampton Simpson Jeter Hagood Thompson Sheppard Richardson III Tillman Evans Ellerbe McSweeney Heyward Ansel Blease Smith Manning III Cooper Harvey McLeod Richards Blackwood Johnston Maybank Harley Jefferies Johnston R. Williams Thurmond Byrnes Timmerman Hollings Russell McNair West Edwards Riley Campbell Beasley Hodges Sanford Haley