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This page features brief excerpts of news stories published by the mainstream media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Highlights
Breaking News
This page features brief excerpts of news stories published by the mainstream media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in each source note. Quotation marks are not used. Because most of our readers read the NYT we usually do not include the paper's stories in HIGHLIGHTS.
Name of source: AFP
SOURCE: AFP (3-27-07)
The cavernous establishment located near the tombs of Portugal's kings and queens is the only place that sells the tiny "pasteis de Belem," named after the riverside neighbourhood where the shop is located.
"There is nothing else like these," said Augusto Moraes, 37, as waiters wearing white shirts and black bow ties hustled back and forth to deliver plates of the tarts which can be eaten in just two or three bites.
While the shop serves other traditional cafe foods, waiters say most people who visit come for the tarts which sell for less than one euro (dollar) each.
It is especially busy on Sundays when entire families along with tourists and young couples fill its tile-walled rooms of differing sizes and a line of customers waiting to get inside often stretches outside its doors.
Around 100 workers make 15,000 of the tarts each day which can be served with a sprinkling of cinnamon or powdered sugar -- or both.
The shop tries to stay faithful to the recipe -- known only by three people -- to ensure the cakes taste the same as when they were first made despite changes over the years to the suppliers of the ingredients causing difficulties.
SOURCE: AFP (3-26-07)
An undersea tremor measuring 5.9 points on the open-ended Richter scale on Sunday toppled a number of exhibits at Argostoli Museum, smashing three of them, the ministry said without offering further details.
The museum building itself sustained minor damage, with cracks appearing in its walls.
Name of source: Telegraph
SOURCE: Telegraph (3-28-07)
The grarse spreading out from its London roots is gradually stifling the graaas, but one of Britain's leading accent experts said yesterday that a larf will never drown out a laff.
Students of the voices that make up a patchwork quilt of spoken English across the country have drawn up a map of the way in which the long"a" of received pronunciation has followed the exodus of Londoners into the rest of southern England.
But a sort of linguistic Hadrian's Wall just south of Birmingham is keeping the long grass out of northern England and the rest of Britain...
Related Links
Sounds Familiar website (British Library) The Big Question: Are regional dialects dying out, and should we care if they are? (Independent)
SOURCE: Telegraph (3-28-07)
When Jorge Martire met his wife-to-be, Maria Laura, he omitted to mention that he had recently gone through hell in the Falklands...
Then in 1992, a decade after the end of the conflict in the Falklands, something inside him snapped...
In his hospital bed, being treated for atypical psychosis -- known by veterans as"Malvinas syndrome" after the Argentine name for the islands -- it all finally came flooding out...On March 1, 1993, he slipped out of the hospital and bought a gun. Then he had a coffee in a bar, and afterwards walked into the lavatory and shot himself...
Britain lost 258 servicemen in the conflict. Twenty-five years later, there are no exact figures, but relatives of the Argentine dead believe that more of their countrymen have now committed suicide because of the trauma than the 650 men who were killed on the battlefield or at sea. The most conservative estimate is 350.
"Only now, is the reality of what we went through finally being talked about," said Edgardo Esteban, a veteran and journalist who has made the one and only feature film in Argentina about the conflict. Illuminated by Fire is not a story of heroes and glory but a catalogue of military incompetence and cruelty, human suffering and shattered lives.
SOURCE: Telegraph (3-28-07)
Today, that long-held belief within the scientific community is rebutted by a leading Darwinian scholar.
Dr John van Wyhe, a Cambridge University academic and director of the Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online, says the reasons why Darwin procrastinated are far more prosaic.
He was obliged to catalogue the vast numbers of specimens he found on his South American voyage on the Beagle, developed an all-consuming obsession with barnacles and was a slow and methodical worker.
By the standard account, Darwin became convinced of evolution in 1837 and was only prompted to publish his work On the Origin of Species in 1859, after receiving a letter from Alfred Russel Wallace, a naturalist and explorer who had arrived at the same idea...
There has been endless speculation about its cause: fears for his reputation; religious persecution; upsetting his religious wife and even disturbing the social order.
Dr van Wyhe's re-evaluation of Darwin's papers, published today in the Notes and Records of the Royal Society, rewrites this pivotal chapter in the story of Darwin's life.
Related Links
Mind the gap: did Darwin avoid publishing his theory for many years? (Notes and Records -- subscription required) Darwin and the 20-year publication gap (Nature -- subscription required)
SOURCE: Telegraph (3-27-07)
As the crisis over the Falklands developed in the early spring, Lord Carrington, who as Foreign Secretary had overall responsibility for Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, was told by intelligence chiefs that Gen Galtieri, the Argentine dictator, had no immediate plans to invade.
"On the Falklands the intelligence was that Galtieri would not take any action to get the Falklands until he had exhausted all the other options at the UN. The truth of the matter is that the intelligence proved to be wrong," said Lord Carrington. "One should never base one's policy solely on intelligence. Mr Blair made the same mistake on the intelligence available on Iraq."
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Speaking on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the conflict, he said he had no regrets about resigning. "What I regret is that the invasion happened in the first place," he said.
SOURCE: Telegraph (3-26-07)
Following emancipation in 1833, the government of the day compensated all slave owners for loss of property and revenue to the tune of about £20 million.
In a radio interview on BBC Radio 4 today, Dr Rowan Williams suggests that organisations which received compensation in the 1830s were still"living off the historical legacy" and had a responsibility to future generations and that apologising for the"terrible things" done in the past is only a start.
His comments will be seen as a moral challenge to a range of institutions, from the Church of England itself to banks, universities and art galleries, whose fortunes were partly built on slavery.
The Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, yesterday called on the Prime Minister to apologise formally on behalf of Britain for its role in the trade.
Related Links
Blair 'sorry' for UK slavery role Caribbean remembers end of slave trade The island of ghosts where slavery is only an echo over the water [Bunce Island, Sierra Leone]
Name of source: Times (of London)
SOURCE: Times (of London) (3-28-07)
The five watercolours are in Galileo’s own copy of Sidereus Nuncius (The Starry Messenger) [published in Venice in 1610] in which he gave details of his revolutionary" celestial discoveries"...
The illustrations show the Moon with ochre and light brown shadings, highlighting the Moon’s craters and valleys. They do not feature in any other copy of the book.
They were authenticated by Professor Horst Bredekamp, head of the Art History Institute at Humboldt University in Berlin, and Professor William R. Shea, holder of the Galileo Chair of the History of Science at Padua University [where they were unveiled this week. The book, turning up after 400 years, was apparently] in a collection in South America...
Professor Bredekamp said that the drawings showed a “refined hand”, reflecting the fact that Galileo was a talented painter. The Italian daily Corriere della Sera, published the illustrations, saying that they helped readers"to imagine the fascination which gripped Galileo as he scanned the night skies above Padua. It wasn’t enough to draw what he saw, he felt impelled to use colour as well to bring his vision alive." The paper said that Padua University hoped to buy the book.
Galileo was the first scientist to report lunar mountains and craters, concluding that the Moon was"rough and uneven, and just like the surface of the Earth itself," rather than a perfect sphere as Aristotle had claimed.
Related Links
Corriere della Sera coverage including pictures
SOURCE: Times (of London) (3-27-07)
They say that the project will destroy an ancient chain of shoals known as Adam’s Bridge, which Hindus believe was built by an army of monkeys to allow Lord Rama to cross to Lanka to rescue his abducted wife. They are also protesting on environmental grounds, arguing that the 30-mile string of limestone shoals, also known as Ram Sethu, protected large parts of India from the 2004 tsunami.
"The bridge is as holy to Hindus as the Wailing Wall is to the Jews, the Vatican to Catholics, Bodh Gaya to Buddhists and Mecca to Muslims,” said Kusum Vyas, president and founder of Esha Vasyam, a US Hindu environmental lobbying group. “It is an unacceptable breach of the religious rights of over one billion Hindus to destroy such a sacred landmark without even consulting us."
The £280 million Sethusa-mudram project has been mired in controversy ever since it was inaugurated by Manmohan Singh, the Prime Minister, in July 2005.
SOURCE: Times (of London) (3-26-07)
Dorothy Scharf was so reticent that she relied on her mother, who lived next door, to communicate on her behalf.
The collection of paintings that she built up until her death two years ago has astonished the art world. Eight masterpieces by Turner, along with paintings by Gainsborough and Constable, are among 51 important watercolours that she has left to the world-renowned Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery in London. The donation is the most significant single addition to the Courtauld in more than a quarter of a century.
The works were created between 1750 and 1850, the golden age of British watercolour painting.
SOURCE: Times (of London) (3-24-07)
She goes on to describe, in remarkably free terms, how she was preparing to sleep with the Russian emperor. "I want to drink your juices," she says, slipping a Russian phrase into a letter written largely in French.
Alexander —- known as “the Liberator” because of his decision to emancipate the Russian serfs —- was married to Princess Marie of Hesse, who bore him six sons and two daughters. Having met Ekaterina "Katya" Dolgorukaya —- descended from a noble Muscovite family —- as a schoolgirl, he decided to install her as a mistress in 1866. She was then 19, he was 48 and already an avid collector of erotica. Katya was given an apartment in the Winter Palace of St Petersburg, a secret staircase connecting her rooms with those of the Tsar.
[Alexander II reigned from 1855 until he was assassinated in 1881. He and Katya had a morganatic marriage in 1880. They had four children, one of whom lived until 1959.]
SOURCE: Times (of London) (3-25-07)
Mohnhaupt, 57, was released from the Aichach prison in Bavaria and picked up by acquaintances, the prison director, Wolfgang Deuschl, said.
A Stuttgart court last month approved parole for Mohnhaupt, ruling that she could go free after serving the minimum 24 years. Combined with an earlier prison term, she has spent 29 years behind bars.
SOURCE: Times (of London) (3-26-07)
The soil invertebrates are allowing researchers to trace the growth and decline of the peoples of the Andes several centuries before the Spanish conquest in 1532 brought written records to the region for the first time.
The evidence gleaned from fossilised mites, preserved in sediments at a lake about 50km (30 miles) from the Inca capital of Cuzco, has shown how the great empire increased in size and complexity in the early 15th century...
The new research suggests that after a period of sharp growth, the Inca civilisation’s power had already started to wane immediately before the arrival of Francisco Pizarro’s conquistadors.
SOURCE: Times (of London) (3-25-07)
Comrade Giegie is getting married. Her wedding will be held in a jungle clearing, which she will enter through an archway of raised assault rifles. The bride and groom will make their vows draped in a red flag bearing the spear and Kalashnikov of the 7,500-strong New People's Army (NPA). Then they will pledge allegiance to the masses, and promise to raise their children as revolutionaries...
Hidden in mountainous Mindanao in the southern Philippines, Giegie's platoon is fighting a rebellion older than most of its members. Her late father was an NPA rebel; her mother is a left-wing activist. Most of the platoon have family members or friends in the NPA; some have been branded from an early age and had no choice but to join.
If the army is diminishing, generation by generation (at its peak it had more than 12,000 members); if its raison d'être seems ever more confused in a post-communist world, Giegie seems unaware.
Name of source: The Scotsman (Edinburgh)
SOURCE: The Scotsman (Edinburgh) (3-28-07)
Scotland's True Heritage Pubs, to be launched at Leslie's Bar in Edinburgh today, lists only about 120 that have kept the same bar for at least 40 years.
During this time, most pubs have gone through a number of refits and typically Scottish features, such as a central bar in the main room, have been lost...
"We want to try to preserve the genuine historic interiors of pubs, as well as preserving the genuine and historic beers," [said Slaughter].
'Island bars' -- such as the fictional TV bar Cheers or the Horseshoe Bar in Glasgow -- have been a distinctively Scottish layout for more than 100 years...
Other particularly Scottish historic features include ornate gantries -- the word gantry comes from the old Scots word gantress or gauntress, meaning a wooden stand for casks -- water taps on the bar for whisky and pubs on the ground floors of tenement flats beside shops.
Name of source: Washington Post
SOURCE: Washington Post (3-28-07)
Cristián Samper, 41, a respected biologist and the director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, was named acting secretary on Monday, and though it was purely water cooler talk, his stock seemed to be up...
Other potential successors to Small from the top rungs of Smithsonian management are Deputy Secretary Sheila Burke and Ned Rifkin, the undersecretary for art and the former director of the Hirshhorn Museum.
In addition to Samper, the names of several Smithsonian scientists have been mentioned, including Hans-Dieter Sues, a paleontologist and associate director for research and collections at Natural History, and Rick Potts, an anthropologist and director of the Human Origins Program, which promotes research and public awareness about human evolution. Two members of the Board of Regents also have both scientific credentials and administrative experience: Shirley Ann Jackson, a theoretical physicist and president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and Walter Massey, a physicist and president of Morehouse College.
Scientists outside the Smithsonian who have been mentioned include Peter H. Raven, a botanist and head of the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis; Neil deGrasse Tyson, an astronomer and the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York; Thomas E. Lovejoy, a tropical biologist and director of the Heinz Center for Science, Economics and the Environment in Washington; and Sir Peter Crane, the former director of the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew, England.
SOURCE: Washington Post (3-28-07)
With the war in Iraq going on for four years, Vietnam vets on both sides of the issue have begun to take leading roles in trying to shape public opinion and direct its course. But which side they take, which reports they believe and whom they trust depends largely on how they fared in the crucible that divided the country more than three decades ago.
SOURCE: Washington Post (3-26-07)
Cristian Samper, a biologist who heads the National Museum of Natural History, was named acting secretary, according to an announcement by Roger Sant, head of the Smithsonian's executive committee.
Small's management of the Smithsonian has been sharply criticized by members of Congress, and his compensation and spending practices have been subjected to scrutiny by the Smithsonian's inspector general.
Related Links
Smithsonian announces Secretary’s resignation (press release) Washington Post full coverage
Name of source: New York Times
SOURCE: New York Times (3-27-07)
The protester, identified as 39-year-old Toyin Agbetu, was then seized by security guards, taken outside and arrested. He has not been charged but remains in police custody, a spokeswoman for the Metropolitan Police said...
The incident took place when the service, marking the enactment of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act in March, 1807, was well underway.
Related Links
Forgotten hero who plotted a route to abolition
Name of source: Guardian
SOURCE: Guardian (3-28-07)
Now his brain, still pickled in a glass box in Rome's crime museum, is at the centre of a row over whether to give him some peace, dragging in his home town mayor, actors, writers and politicians...
After emerging from the crowd in Naples in 1878 during a visit by Umberto I, the 28-year-old mistimed his lunge at the king, instead wounding the prime minister.
Passannante was jailed for life, and chained up in an underground cell. Declared insane after a decade living among his own excrement and sent to an asylum, he died in 1910. His body was fed to pigs, his brain removed to be studied for signs of innate criminality. "I am convinced we must immediately give some peace to the mortal remains of Passannante," [Deputy PM Francesco] Rutelli said.
SOURCE: Guardian (3-28-07)
Lord Goldsmith arranged, with the high court judge Dame Elizabeth Butler-Sloss in 2002, that details of the Queen Mother's will should be kept secret. This emerged yesterday after the Guardian successfully applied to open up a private court hearing challenging the secrecy of royal wills.
In a hearing at the high court, Geoffrey Robertson QC was seeking to unseal the wills of the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret...
Mr Robertson told the head of the family division, Sir Mark Potter, that there had been a royal cover-up over the wills."A secret, unconstitutional and unlawful practice has grown up of the attorney general going to the court and asking to put royal wills outside the law," he said...
The practice had been invented in 1911 to conceal the will of Prince Francis, King George V's brother-in-law, who had given family jewels to a mistress.
Related Links
Philandering Prince Frank set seal on wills
SOURCE: Guardian (3-27-07)
Mr Abe said he echoed a 1993 statement of apology to the victims - known as comfort women - issued by the then chief cabinet secretary, Yohei Kono. The statement expressed the government's "sincere apologies and remorse" for its role in forcing an estimated 200,000 mainly Chinese and Korean women to work in military brothels in the 1930s and 40s.
"I am apologising here and now as the prime minister, as it is stated in the Kono statement," Mr Abe said. "I feel sympathy for the people who underwent hardships, and I apologise for the fact that they were placed in this situation at the time."
Campaigners said what was really needed was an official apology by parliament and compensation, and accused him of trying to placate both international opinion and conservatives in the Liberal Democratic party.
Name of source: AP
SOURCE: AP (3-27-07)
Anderson Republican Kevin Bryant had sponsored the bill, which he called a simple way to"memorialize the dead from the War Between the States."
Several black senators argued against the bill, threatening to attach amendments requiring the state to apologize for slavery -- or putting the Confederate flag back on top of the Statehouse.
The committee voted 14-to-7 to adjourn debate on the bill, with an understanding it wouldn't come up again during this session.
Related Links
In Georgia Senate, Confederate History Month bill to be abandoned
SOURCE: AP (3-27-07)
"It is our firm belief that Bess Houdini would never approve of this," said a statement from her grandnephews, John and Jeffrey Blood."The family believes this is likely being done to promote sales of a recent book on Harry Houdini, suggesting he may have been murdered."
A spokesman for Houdini's grandnephew, who supports the exhumation, and one of the new biography's authors on Tuesday quickly protested the Bloods' suggestion.
"I'm sorry that Bess' side of the family feels that way, because this is not a publicity stunt in any shape or form," said Larry Sloman, co-author of The Secret Life of Houdini."This is not something frivolous. This is a serious scientific study."
SOURCE: AP (3-26-07)
Salazar, prime minister of a repressive right-wing regime also known as the New State from 1932 to 1968, received 41 percent in Sunday evening's final of "Great Portuguese."
The show, broadcast by state-owned RTP, asked viewers to choose people who had contributed to the greatness of Portugal's history. Ten figures were selected for voting, from statesmen like the Marquis de Pombal to explorers like Vasco da Gama.
Salazar's secret police, PIDE, used detentions without trial, torture and kangaroo courts to keep opponents off the streets.
Salazar died in 1970, although his regime continued until 1974, when the regime's unpopular wars against independence movements in its African colonies led to an army revolt, the carnation revolution, which toppled the regime and later gave independence to the colonies.
SOURCE: AP (3-26-07)
The design of the stamp was unveiled Monday at the National Postal Forum, a gathering of companies in the mailing industry.
The forever stamp goes on sale April 12 at 41 cents. The rate for first-class postage rises to 41 cents May 14.
The stamp, which will carry the word"Forever" instead of a price, will remain valid for sending a letter, no matter how much rates go up in the future.
Related Links
USPS press release & photo of stamp
SOURCE: AP (3-26-07)
The campaign in the eastern Ukraine town of Donetsk came after utility rates in Ukraine increased markedly last year and people stopped paying their bills.
Irina Taran, a spokeswoman for Donetsk governing council, said dozens of billboards featuring Stalin appeared in the city last week; commercials featuring old film clips of the Soviet leader also appeared. Ukrainian media reported that the mayor's office initiated the ad campaign, then backed down in the face of protests.
SOURCE: AP (3-26-07)
On beaches and bases, town squares and veterans' clubs, they are building their monuments to America's fallen as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan grind on.
Vietnam, in one way or another, looms large over this impulse to memorialize the war dead in real time. Some are erecting these monuments as anti-war statements against what they regard as another Vietnam; others are doing it to express their gratitude to the troops now, rather than later, as was done with the Vietnam veterans...
SOURCE: AP (3-26-07)
It has long been thought that the island of Ithaki in the Ionian Sea was the island Homer used as a setting for the epic poem "The Odyssey," in which the king Odysseus makes a perilous 10-year journey home from the Trojan War.
But amateur British archaeologist Robert Bittlestone believes the Ithaca of Homer is no longer a separate island but became attached to the island of Kefallonia through rock displacement caused by earthquakes. The theory could explain inconsistencies between Ithaki and Homer's description of Odysseus' island.
Name of source: Press Release -- University Newswire
SOURCE: Press Release -- University Newswire (3-23-07)
A selection of the Deep Throat materials can be viewed in an online exhibition at http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/online , and portions of the materials from the Felt file will be displayed on the first floor of the Ransom Center from Friday, March 23 through Sunday, April 8.
Woodward and Bernstein's papers, including notebooks, memos, interviews, story drafts, clippings and manuscripts for"All the President's Men" and"The Final Days," are housed at the Ransom Center.
SOURCE: Press Release -- University Newswire (3-26-07)
"The struggle in much of the Muslim world today is a war of ideas," said Angel Rabasa, a RAND senior policy analyst and the lead author of the report."This is not a war of civilizations; it's not Islam versus the West. It's a struggle within Islam to define the character of Islam."
"We cannot come in as outsiders, as a non-Muslim country, and discredit the radicals' ideology," Rabasa said."Muslims have to do that themselves. What we can do is level the playing field by empowering the moderates."
Name of source: BBC News
SOURCE: BBC News (3-27-07)
Shakespeare North wants to create an education and community arts complex, including an Elizabethan cockpit-style theatre, in Prescot, Knowsley.
William Shakespeare spent time in the area, staying with the Stanley Family, the Earls of Derby, at Knowsley Hall.
School pupils and local residents are being invited to a series of drama workshops to get to know the Bard.
SOURCE: BBC News (3-26-07)
The 2,200-year-old clay army of 8,000 soldiers, 300 horses and 200 chariots guards the tomb of Qin Shihuang, the first emperor of China.
Soils from different regions contain distinct pollen "signatures", reflecting variations in vegetation.
This could help solve the mystery of where the clay figures were made, says the Journal of Archaeological Science.
SOURCE: BBC News (3-27-07)
Appeal judges in Bordeaux ruled administrative courts could not decide the liability of the operator SNCF.
Last June a court ruled SNCF must pay 61,000 euros ($81,300; £41,400) to the Lipietz family, whose members were taken to a camp near Paris in 1944...
The Lipietz family said it would now go to the highest administrative court, the State Council.
Other plaintiffs will have to go to criminal or civil courts, legal experts say.
However, a similar case in 2003 against SNCF in a civil court was thrown out as the 30-year statute of limitations had expired.
Between 1942 and 1944 some 76,000 Jews were deported from France.
SOURCE: BBC News (3-26-07)
Iraqi Health Ministry figures put the toll at less than 10% of the total in the survey, published in the Lancet.
But the [UK] Ministry of Defence's chief scientific adviser said the [Lancet] survey's methods were "close to best practice" and the study design was "robust". Another expert agreed the method was "tried and tested".
The Iraq government asks the country's hospitals to report the number of victims of terrorism or military action.
Critics say the system was not started until well after the invasion and requires over-pressed hospital staff not only to report daily, but also to distinguish between victims of terrorism and of crime.
The Lancet medical journal published its peer-reviewed survey last October.
Name of source: CNN
SOURCE: CNN (3-26-07)
Maryland follows Virginia in issuing a formal apology.
The vote in the House of Delegates makes the apology official, because a resolution doesn't require the governor's signature. The state Senate already approved it.
The resolution notes that slavery "fostered a climate of oppression not only for slaves and their descendants but also for people of color who moved to Maryland subsequent to slavery's abolition."
Co-sponsor Sen. Nathaniel Exum, a Democrat, said he was exhilarated that Maryland lawmakers decided to finally recognize the painful role the state played in slavery.
"Once we come to that recognition, maybe we will also recognize steps we need to do to get rid of the lingering effects of it on the people," Exum said....
Name of source: Discovery News
SOURCE: Discovery News (3-27-07)
Since almost identical depictions have been found elsewhere throughout Europe, the figurines indicate a shared artistic tradition existed even then.
The findings are published in the current issue of the journal Antiquity.
Co-author Romuald Schild explained that the artifacts offer "a cultural inventory" for the late Magdalenian era (18,000-10,000 years ago).
In the paper, Schild and colleagues Bodil Bratlund, Else Kolstrup and Jan Fiedorczuk describe the carvings as "stylized voluptuous female outlines" that "are cut out of flint flakes."
The same symbolic representations of women displayed in the artifacts extend across Europe, added Schild, a researcher in the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology at the Polish Academy of Sciences.
Name of source: Independent
SOURCE: Independent (3-26-07)
That marker serves as an appropriate symbol for the hidden history of the slave trade. The exchange in Africa of British goods for 3.25 million people (the international figure is nearer to 20 million Africans) to work the plantations of the West Indies and America is the single most important contributory factor in the country's accumulation of wealth in the 19th century. In one sense that history is hidden; in another, it is clear for all to see.
It is there in virtually every major building: the factories, mills and warehouses of the Industrial Revolution, stately homes, churches, banks -- the Bank of England, HSBC and Barclays have their roots in slavery -- the National Gallery, Guy's Hospital, the Houses of Parliament, the London docks, and Bristol and Liverpool. And it is in what we consume: cigarettes, coffee and sugar.
This trip round the Britain of the anti-slavery movement cannot be just a geographical one: it has to be a tour of understanding...
Name of source: American Oriental panel and resolutuion circulated on the Internet by IraqCrisis newsletter
SOURCE: American Oriental panel and resolutuion circulated on the Internet by IraqCrisis newsletter (3-26-07)
organized by Robert Englund and included panelists Jerrold Cooper, Steven Garfinkle and Micah Garen. Among the news that was generated by the presentation was the information that a relatively modest outlay of funds (about 5 million) could help protect the more aggressively looted sites (Umma among them). After some discussion and debate a resolution was formulated that was presented at the business meeting to the membership. The resolution was one vote shy of unanimous passage. It will be posted as a petition on the AOS website where it will accept signatories.
"Whereas the looting of ancient sites in Iraq continues in our day with little sign of abatement, leading to incalculable loss of
historical and cultural knowledge;
And Whereas diverse archaeological and journalistic organizations have already compiled a register of such affected sites;
And Whereas responsible opinion and evaluation, based on
established precedence, have suggested that a relatively modest
numbers of guards can discourage if not stop looting at the most distressed archaeological sites in Iraq;
And Whereas the funding of cohorts of guards at Iraqi
archaeological sites requires, in present dollars, a relatively
modest sum of money;
Therefore, be it Resolved that the American Oriental Society, in
meeting assembled at San Antonio, Texas, on March 18th, 2007, calls on and urges the Congress of the United States of America to legislate with dispatch a program to fund the systematic
safeguarding of distressed sites until such time as the proper
Iraqi authorities are ready to bring such a program under its own
control."
This resolution will be posted at the AOS website. All those
agreeing with it are invited to communicate its sentiments to their senators and congressional representatives.
Name of source: Fox News
SOURCE: Fox News (3-26-07)
He arranged for a federal judge to perform his own citizenship ceremony in front of his fifth-graders, hoping to show what it means to be an American citizen. "I wanted them to know what the experience is like," Macpherson said.
Macpherson and other social studies teachers say they have to shoehorn civics lessons into their regular classes because Tennessee and most other states don't require civics to be taught separately.
Since the federal No Child Left Behind law was passed in 2002, schools have focused on reading and math, and that has squeezed out other subjects like arts, music and civics, educators say. So lawmakers in Tennessee and other states have proposed bills this year to save civics.
Name of source: http://www.palmbeachpost.com
SOURCE: http://www.palmbeachpost.com (3-25-07)
Temple Terrace music teacher Stephen Ulrey is pitching a version of "I Want to Wake Up in the Morning Where the Orange Blossoms Grow" to replace the current state song, also known as "Swanee River."
Critics have said Foster's minstrel show tune is racist. They also say Foster never visited Florida and misspelled Suwannee in the song's most memorable line, "Way down upon the Swanee River."
Supporters Of "Old Folks at Home" argue the controversial lyrics should be — and often have been — replaced. The song was adopted by the state legislature in 1935 and has survived two previous attempts to replace it.
Name of source: Baltimore Sun
SOURCE: Baltimore Sun (3-26-07)
Since the museum's opening in 1993, its central mission has been to advance knowledge of the Holocaust and to preserve the memory of survivors through comprehensive records and individual stories. It's a daunting if not impossible task to find and tell the story of every Holocaust survivor. But to museum officials, every story is important and is worth knowing - if it can be known.
The general facts of the Exodus have long since been established but not the personal stories of many of the passengers. This year, the 60th anniversary of the voyage, museum officials are working to compile a complete passenger manifest since none existed.
Name of source: http://icwales.icnetwork.co.uk
SOURCE: http://icwales.icnetwork.co.uk (3-24-07)
Aberlleiniog Castle, located on the south east corner of Anglesey, has been witness to a long and fascinating series of owners and events.
The little-known castle has been the site of a murder mystery, love triangles and even fatal duels, but few people are aware of its significance and no one has been allowed to visit for almost a thousand years.
All that is now set to change thanks to a £317,500 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund.
Name of source: Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader
SOURCE: Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader (3-26-07)
There were dinosaurs of every kind aboard Noah's ark. Some dinosaurs managed to hang around until just a few hundred years ago. The legend of St. George slaying the dragon? That probably was a dinosaur.
Exhibits showing all this and more will be at the Creation Museum, a $27 million religious showcase nearing completion in Northern Kentucky.
The museum, in Boone County near the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, is being built by a non-profit group called Answers in Genesis. It is scheduled to open on Memorial Day...
The museum is based on a literal interpretation of the Bible: The world was created in six, 24-hour days, some time between 6,000 and 10,000 years ago. Humans appeared on Day 6, and they didn't evolve from anything.
But Eugenie Scott, a former University of Kentucky anthropologist who is director of the California-based National Center for Science Education, said the information provided in the museum"is not even close to standard science."...
Some of the exhibits would be the envy of any natural history museum.
There are, for example, 10,000 minerals from a collection that was donated to the museum, fossil dinosaur eggs from China that Ham says are worth $40,000, and a donated collection of dinosaur toys that has been valued at $50,000.
There also will be an exhibit suggesting that belief in evolution is the root of most of modern society's evils. It shows models of children leaving a church where the minister believes in evolution. Soon the girl is on the phone to Planned Parenthood, while the boy cruises the Internet for pornography sites.
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Name of source: Vatican News Service
SOURCE: Vatican News Service (3-26-07)
"[I]n demographic terms, it must unfortunately be noted that Europe seems set on a path that could lead to its exit from history," Pope Benedict XVI stated at the event commemorating the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Rome on March 25, 1957, which formed the foundations of today’s European Union.
"It could almost be imagined that the European continent is actually losing faith in its own future," the Pope said. The rejection of Europe’s Christian heritage, seen increasingly in the policies of national leaders, neglects the desires of a majority of the population, he said, undermining efforts to create a uniform European identity.
Name of source: Derry Journal/Derry Today (Northern Ireland)
SOURCE: Derry Journal/Derry Today (Northern Ireland) (3-26-07)
Vandals caused substantial damage to the waterproof covering on the roof of the Bogside museum sometime late on Wednesday night.
A spokesperson for the Trust said..."The damage caused could run into thousands of pounds to repair and, while there is no way that anyone can get into the museum through the roof...rain has been pouring through the holes throughout the night and could have ruined many of the historically priceless artefacts on display."
Name of source: Forbes
SOURCE: Forbes (3-26-07)
Life will continue to have an online presence where Time plans to push ahead with its plans to post the magazine's entire collection of 10 million photographs online by the end of the year.
Life became a magazine icon during its first incarnation as a weekly magazine from 1936 to 1972. Time resuscitated the title in 1978 as a monthly, closing it again in 2000. In October 2004, Life was revived as a weekly newspaper insert.
Name of source: Kathimerini (Athens)
SOURCE: Kathimerini (Athens) (3-26-07)
Militants yelled anti-Turk slogans and distributed pamphlets urging resistance to closer ties between Greece and Turkey. Riot police eventually broke up the demonstration.
Chryssi Avgi’s protest also coincided with a student march in Athens on Saturday marking Greece’s Independence Day.
Education Minister Marietta Giannakou said yesterday that the book may be modified. The Church of Greece and some Greek parents have criticized the book for glossing over key moments in Greek history.
Name of source: BBC
SOURCE: BBC (3-26-07)
The apology comes after Mr Abe was criticized by Asian neighbors for previous comments casting doubt on whether the women were coerced.
Mr Abe told parliament: "I apologies here and now as prime minister."
This appears to be part of a concerted bid to reduce the fall-out of earlier comments, a BBC correspondent says.
Mr Abe said, during a debate in parliament's upper house, that he stood by an official 1993 statement in which Japan acknowledged the imperial army set up and ran brothels for its troops during the war.
"As I frequently say, I feel sympathy for the people war."
Name of source: UPI
SOURCE: UPI (3-25-07)
Laleh Bakhtiar, a woman of Iranian-American descent, told the New York Times she has been strongly criticized by Islamists who claim her translation of the word"draba" from the Koran is wholly inaccurate.
The word is used in a section of the Koran that details how a rebellious woman should be treated and most experts have translated the word as"beaten."
Bakhtiar said she discovered during her studies that draba means"to go away," a revelation experts have been quick to strike down. [Her translation, The Sublime Quran, 769 pp., will be published by Kazi Publications, Chicago, March 30.]
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