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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: NPR
SOURCE: NPR (8-3-09)
Human fossils have been found from the Ethiopian highlands to the Indonesian island of Java. However, the single site with the biggest deposits is located in northern Spain.
About 150 miles north of Madrid, a jeep pulls up to a clump of trees in the Sierra de Atapuerca, a collection of hills that are rich with caves.
A man with a helmet and a miner's headlamp gets out. He looks more like a mountain guide than a scientist. He's Juan Luis Arsuaga, Spain's best-known paleontologist.
He walks into a large cave, which is marked by a pirate flag. "This is the entrance to the site that has produced the most human fossils in history," Arsuaga says. "What better way to mark it?"
The Atapuerca hills are made of what's called karstic limestone, which means they're riddled with subterranean tunnels and caverns. In the 19th century, a British mining company discovered them when it blasted through a hill to lay down a railway.
At first, only animal bones were found. Then in 1976, a paleontology student found the first human remains. Since then, an abundance of human fossils and stone tools have been found.
Inside the cave, a group of paleontologists prepares to go even deeper underground. One of them is Rolf Quam, a paleoanthropologist from Binghamton University in New York.
"In the field of human evolution, which is what I'm in, Atapuerca is a world reference site," Quam says. "This is the richest fossil bearing deposits in the world. And every single site in Atapuerca that has been excavated has yielded human remains, which is something that is very unusual."
Last year, the team uncovered a 1.2 million-year-old jawbone fragment from a species known as Homo antecessor. It's the oldest hominid fossil ever found in western Europe...
About 150 miles north of Madrid, a jeep pulls up to a clump of trees in the Sierra de Atapuerca, a collection of hills that are rich with caves.
A man with a helmet and a miner's headlamp gets out. He looks more like a mountain guide than a scientist. He's Juan Luis Arsuaga, Spain's best-known paleontologist.
He walks into a large cave, which is marked by a pirate flag. "This is the entrance to the site that has produced the most human fossils in history," Arsuaga says. "What better way to mark it?"
The Atapuerca hills are made of what's called karstic limestone, which means they're riddled with subterranean tunnels and caverns. In the 19th century, a British mining company discovered them when it blasted through a hill to lay down a railway.
At first, only animal bones were found. Then in 1976, a paleontology student found the first human remains. Since then, an abundance of human fossils and stone tools have been found.
Inside the cave, a group of paleontologists prepares to go even deeper underground. One of them is Rolf Quam, a paleoanthropologist from Binghamton University in New York.
"In the field of human evolution, which is what I'm in, Atapuerca is a world reference site," Quam says. "This is the richest fossil bearing deposits in the world. And every single site in Atapuerca that has been excavated has yielded human remains, which is something that is very unusual."
Last year, the team uncovered a 1.2 million-year-old jawbone fragment from a species known as Homo antecessor. It's the oldest hominid fossil ever found in western Europe...
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 22:43
Comments
Name of source: McClatchy
SOURCE: McClatchy (8-3-09)
The false allegation that President Barack Obama was born in another country is more than a fact-free smear.
Marked by accusations and backstabbing, it's the story of how a small but intense movement called"birthers" rose from a handful of people prone to seeing conspiracies, aided by the Internet, magnified without evidence by eager radio and cable TV hosts, and eventually ratified by a small group of Republican politicians working to keep the story alive on the floors of Congress and the campaign trails of the Midwest.
It's a powerful story about what experts call political paranoia over a new face in a time of anxiety and rapid change - the sort of viral message that can take hold among a sliver of the populace that's ready to believe that their new president is a fraud, and just as ready to angrily dismiss anyone who disagrees with them as part of the conspiracy.
Related Links
Slate: What If Obama Really Was Born in Kenya? World Net Daily: Is this really smoking gun of Obama's Kenyan birth?
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 18:23
Name of source: Telegraph (UK)
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (8-3-09)
Almost 400 British servicemen killed by guerillas in Cyprus in the 1950s are finally to be honoured after Telegraph readers helped raise £80,000 to build a memorial to them.
A monument bearing the names of all 371 soldiers, sailors and airmen killed during four years of bloodshed will be unveiled on Remembrance Day in a military cemetery on the island.
The vast majority of those who died at the hands of Greek-Cypriot terrorists were young men carrying out National Service, some of the last British conscripts to lose their lives in service of their country, but their sacrifice had remained largely unrecognised for 50 years.
A monument bearing the names of all 371 soldiers, sailors and airmen killed during four years of bloodshed will be unveiled on Remembrance Day in a military cemetery on the island.
The vast majority of those who died at the hands of Greek-Cypriot terrorists were young men carrying out National Service, some of the last British conscripts to lose their lives in service of their country, but their sacrifice had remained largely unrecognised for 50 years.
The campaign for a memorial to them was highlighted in The Daily Telegraph in April, and drew a magnificent response from readers, whose generosity has enabled the British Cyprus Memorial Trust to press ahead with its plans.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 16:06
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (8-3-09)
A monument bearing the names of all 371 soldiers, sailors and airmen killed during four years of bloodshed will be unveiled on Remembrance Day in a military cemetery on the island.
The vast majority of those who died at the hands of Greek-Cypriot terrorists were young men carrying out National Service, some of the last British conscripts to lose their lives in service of their country, but their sacrifice had remained largely unrecognised for 50 years.
The campaign for a memorial to them was highlighted in The Daily Telegraph in April, and drew a magnificent response from readers, whose generosity has enabled the British Cyprus Memorial Trust to press ahead with its plans.
The vast majority of those who died at the hands of Greek-Cypriot terrorists were young men carrying out National Service, some of the last British conscripts to lose their lives in service of their country, but their sacrifice had remained largely unrecognised for 50 years.
The campaign for a memorial to them was highlighted in The Daily Telegraph in April, and drew a magnificent response from readers, whose generosity has enabled the British Cyprus Memorial Trust to press ahead with its plans.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 07:57
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (7-29-09)
St Andrew's Church in South Warnborough in Hampshire, whose youngest member is eight months and whose oldest is 92, has won Country Life magazine Village Church for Village Life Award.
The church suffered poor lighting, cramped pews, cluttered space and had no facilities to enable the building to be used for more than regular Sunday worship. But after a call for help from the parochial church council it was transformed by the South Warnborough Gentlemen's Working Club which was set up to oversee the project.
The church suffered poor lighting, cramped pews, cluttered space and had no facilities to enable the building to be used for more than regular Sunday worship. But after a call for help from the parochial church council it was transformed by the South Warnborough Gentlemen's Working Club which was set up to oversee the project.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 16:33
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (8-2-09)
At the height of the Blitz in 1940, thousands were huddled in the dimly lit tunnels of the London Underground, sheltering from the German bombs raining on the capital.
Exhausted, afraid and not knowing whether their houses would still be standing when they emerged from their refuge, the civilians' spirits were in need of a lift.
It came in the form of Sgt Walter Huntley, a soldier and ventriloquist, and his life-size dummy, Gunner Jimmy Turner, who ventured into the tunnels and made their audience laugh, helping them to forget, for a while, the horrors of war.
Exhausted, afraid and not knowing whether their houses would still be standing when they emerged from their refuge, the civilians' spirits were in need of a lift.
It came in the form of Sgt Walter Huntley, a soldier and ventriloquist, and his life-size dummy, Gunner Jimmy Turner, who ventured into the tunnels and made their audience laugh, helping them to forget, for a while, the horrors of war.
Sgt Huntley and Gunner Jimmy performed to civilians and soldiers across the UK during the Second World War as part of the army's entertainment unit.
On Thursday, weeks before the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of war, they will perform, briefly and poignantly, for one last time before Jimmy, still in uniform, is handed over to the Imperial War museum in London. He will take up residence at the museum on display as a reminder of how entertainment to raise the morale of service personnel and civilians became an important part of the war effort.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 10:23
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (8-2-09)
The Cuban president Raul Castro has warned the US and Europe he will not 'restore capitalism' and will never renounce the revolution.
Mr Castro said the Caribbean country's socialist political system was non-negotiable.
In a speech marking the end of the annual parliamentary session, which has been dominated by Cuba's grave economic crisis, he said he would be willing to "discuss everything" with foreign leaders except the island's political and social system.
Mr Castro said the Caribbean country's socialist political system was non-negotiable.
In a speech marking the end of the annual parliamentary session, which has been dominated by Cuba's grave economic crisis, he said he would be willing to "discuss everything" with foreign leaders except the island's political and social system.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 10:19
Name of source:
A Bronx woman has been charged with murder and robbery in the death of an 89-year-old Nazi concentration camp survivor, and police said a man is still being sought in connection with the death.
Angela Murray, 30, was arrested Saturday, according to the Manhattan district attorney's office, and is accused of strangling Guido Felix Brinkmann on Thursday in his Upper East Side apartment
Brinkmann, a native of Latvia, was a Holocaust survivor who escaped death for a year while he was in the Mauthausen, Ebensee and Auschwitz camps. He had been slated for the gas chambers five times, but each time, he used his fluency in German to talk his way out, said his son, Rick Brinkman, who spells his last name differently.
Angela Murray, 30, was arrested Saturday, according to the Manhattan district attorney's office, and is accused of strangling Guido Felix Brinkmann on Thursday in his Upper East Side apartment
Brinkmann, a native of Latvia, was a Holocaust survivor who escaped death for a year while he was in the Mauthausen, Ebensee and Auschwitz camps. He had been slated for the gas chambers five times, but each time, he used his fluency in German to talk his way out, said his son, Rick Brinkman, who spells his last name differently.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 15:55
Name of source: Independent (UK)
SOURCE: Independent (UK) (8-3-09)
During the first fortnight of August as the Tokyo summer gets into its sticky stride, its citizens gear up for a string of painful Second World War anniversaries, climaxing on the 15th – the date the nation surrendered.
Fresh controversy invariably flares over how to remember the conflict: as a shameful stain, or a futile but honourable attempt to resist foreign aggressors.
The true spiritual home of revisionist debate is Yasukuni, a Shinto temple in the heart of Tokyo that enshrines the nation's war dead. For many, it is a monument to Japan's undigested militarism – the shrine is host every year to nationalist speeches praising the war as a glorious episode that helped free Asia from white colonialism. This year, however, the controversy is set to move to Hiroshima.
Rarely have the nationalists dared to make those claims in the city that writer Ian Buruma calls "the centre of Japanese victimhood" – until now. But on Thursday, the 64th anniversary of Hiroshima's incineration by a US nuclear bomb, the former general Toshio Tamogami will break that unspoken rule by giving a speech called, "Casting doubt on the peace of Hiroshima".
Nobody but Tamogami knows what it contains, but it is likely to make headlines around the world: last year he admitted he might have used nuclear weapons against the US had he been a general in 1945.
Fresh controversy invariably flares over how to remember the conflict: as a shameful stain, or a futile but honourable attempt to resist foreign aggressors.
The true spiritual home of revisionist debate is Yasukuni, a Shinto temple in the heart of Tokyo that enshrines the nation's war dead. For many, it is a monument to Japan's undigested militarism – the shrine is host every year to nationalist speeches praising the war as a glorious episode that helped free Asia from white colonialism. This year, however, the controversy is set to move to Hiroshima.
Rarely have the nationalists dared to make those claims in the city that writer Ian Buruma calls "the centre of Japanese victimhood" – until now. But on Thursday, the 64th anniversary of Hiroshima's incineration by a US nuclear bomb, the former general Toshio Tamogami will break that unspoken rule by giving a speech called, "Casting doubt on the peace of Hiroshima".
Nobody but Tamogami knows what it contains, but it is likely to make headlines around the world: last year he admitted he might have used nuclear weapons against the US had he been a general in 1945.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 15:11
Name of source: Observer (UK)
SOURCE: Observer (UK) (8-2-09)
For a few weeks only, visitors to Westminster Abbey can gaze on the second-last resting place of Oliver Cromwell, the grave which the Lord Protector occupied for less than three years before being dug up, ritually executed, decapitated, and buried again in quicklime at the foot of the gallows.
The stone slabs engraved in the 19th century with the name of Cromwell and his relatives are usually covered by a blue carpet bearing the RAF crest. Recently moths were discovered in the building's historic textiles. So the carpet has been lifted and sent off to be deep frozen to kill any grubs, leaving the chapel's extraordinary history exposed until the end of August.
"Few people come here following the trail of Oliver Cromwell, but this opportunity adds one more layer to the extraordinary richness of the history of this building," a spokeswoman said.
The stone slabs engraved in the 19th century with the name of Cromwell and his relatives are usually covered by a blue carpet bearing the RAF crest. Recently moths were discovered in the building's historic textiles. So the carpet has been lifted and sent off to be deep frozen to kill any grubs, leaving the chapel's extraordinary history exposed until the end of August.
"Few people come here following the trail of Oliver Cromwell, but this opportunity adds one more layer to the extraordinary richness of the history of this building," a spokeswoman said.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 08:18
Name of source: BBC
SOURCE: BBC (8-3-09)
Karlheinz Schreiber, 75, is wanted for tax evasion, bribery and fraud in Germany, and has been fighting extradition for nearly 10 years.
He figured in a fund-raising scandal involving ex-Chancellor Helmut Kohl.
Mr Schreiber, who denies wrongdoing, arrived in Germany early on Monday after losing his extradition battle.
He figured in a fund-raising scandal involving ex-Chancellor Helmut Kohl.
Mr Schreiber, who denies wrongdoing, arrived in Germany early on Monday after losing his extradition battle.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 07:12
SOURCE: BBC (8-2-09)
Two newly discovered pieces of piano music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart are to be performed in the Austrian city of his birth, Salzburg.
The pieces had long been in the archive of the International Mozarteum Foundation but only recently were they identified as compositions by Mozart.
The foundation has released very few details about the music.
It is to be played at a house where the composer lived from 1773-1780, which is now the Mozart's Residence museum.
The pieces had long been in the archive of the International Mozarteum Foundation but only recently were they identified as compositions by Mozart.
The foundation has released very few details about the music.
It is to be played at a house where the composer lived from 1773-1780, which is now the Mozart's Residence museum.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 10:07
SOURCE: BBC (8-1-09)
Rare Buddhist treasures, not seen for more than 70 years, have been unearthed in the Gobi Desert.
The historic artefacts were buried in the 1930s during Mongolia's Communist purge, when hundreds of monasteries were looted and destroyed.
The relics include statues, art work, manuscripts and personal belongings of a famous 19th Century Buddhist master.
A total of 64 crates of treasures were buried in the desert by a monk named Tudev, in an attempt to save them from the ransacking of the Mongolian and Soviet armies.
The historic artefacts were buried in the 1930s during Mongolia's Communist purge, when hundreds of monasteries were looted and destroyed.
The relics include statues, art work, manuscripts and personal belongings of a famous 19th Century Buddhist master.
A total of 64 crates of treasures were buried in the desert by a monk named Tudev, in an attempt to save them from the ransacking of the Mongolian and Soviet armies.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 02:29
Name of source: The Times (UK)
SOURCE: The Times (UK) (8-2-09)
On March 2, 1882, Roderick Maclean brandished a pistol outside Windsor railway station and attempted to shoot Queen Victoria.
Things did not go according to plan. The monarch lived and Maclean was charged with high treason, but “acquitted on the grounds of insanity”. Ordered “to be kept in strict custody and gaol until Her Majesty’s pleasure shall be known”, he spent the rest of his life in Broadmoor Hospital.
His case is one of 1.4 million criminal trials from the 18th and 19th centuries which feature in registers that go online for the first time on Monday.
A murderous doctor who claimed to be Jack the Ripper, the crook thought to have inspired Fagin and a notoriously inept highwayman are all listed in the carefully handwritten ledgers that can be browsed on the ancestry.co.uk website from Monday.
Things did not go according to plan. The monarch lived and Maclean was charged with high treason, but “acquitted on the grounds of insanity”. Ordered “to be kept in strict custody and gaol until Her Majesty’s pleasure shall be known”, he spent the rest of his life in Broadmoor Hospital.
His case is one of 1.4 million criminal trials from the 18th and 19th centuries which feature in registers that go online for the first time on Monday.
A murderous doctor who claimed to be Jack the Ripper, the crook thought to have inspired Fagin and a notoriously inept highwayman are all listed in the carefully handwritten ledgers that can be browsed on the ancestry.co.uk website from Monday.
The records, published in a collaboration between the website and the National Archives, include every criminal trial in England and Wales that was reported to the Home Office between 1791 and 1892.
It was a deadly period to be a criminal — the era of the “Bloody Code” when 222 different offences carried the death penalty — and the documents detail no fewer than 10,300 executions as well as 97,000 transportations and 900,000 sentences of imprisonment.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 02:51
Name of source: Foxnews
SOURCE: Foxnews (8-2-09)
A well-preserved 4,500-year-old skeleton of a man was found on a beach south of Rome, Italian police told Reuters.
The man is believed to be a warrior killed by an arrow in the chest, Reuters reported.
Six small vases were also found buried near the man.
The skeleton was discovered during a routine air patrol of areas of archaeological interest.
The man is believed to be a warrior killed by an arrow in the chest, Reuters reported.
Six small vases were also found buried near the man.
The skeleton was discovered during a routine air patrol of areas of archaeological interest.
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 02:49
SOURCE: Foxnews (8-1-09)
F.D.R. threw keggers and J.F.K. was a Heineken man, while Theodore Roosevelt didn't touch the stuff.
The most pressing question of the week was what brands of brew would be quaffed at the White House "beer summit," the presidential peer-mediation between the Harvard prof and the Cambridge cop. Some foodie followers were dismayed to hear that President Obama chose to drink Bud Light, which some dismiss as the very symbol of corporate, mass-produced, flavorless beer-like product.
This is a rather recent obsession. French wines were commonplace at 1600 Pennsylvania up until Lyndon Johnson made drinking American a matter of national pride. He banished the old parlez-vous mouthwash, not only in the president's house, but also at every embassy and government function. The main effect of this was that for years the only fizzy wine in the White House was New York "champagne."
The most pressing question of the week was what brands of brew would be quaffed at the White House "beer summit," the presidential peer-mediation between the Harvard prof and the Cambridge cop. Some foodie followers were dismayed to hear that President Obama chose to drink Bud Light, which some dismiss as the very symbol of corporate, mass-produced, flavorless beer-like product.
This is a rather recent obsession. French wines were commonplace at 1600 Pennsylvania up until Lyndon Johnson made drinking American a matter of national pride. He banished the old parlez-vous mouthwash, not only in the president's house, but also at every embassy and government function. The main effect of this was that for years the only fizzy wine in the White House was New York "champagne."
The last time the question of presidential beer was considered quite so newsworthy came in spring of 1933, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt acted to make 3.2 beer legal, setting the stage for the elimination of Prohibition altogether. At the stroke of midnight, April 7, beer started flowing, and within minutes a shiny new truck from Washington's Abner-Drury Brewery was hurtling down a rain-slick Pennsylvania Ave, led by an escort of motorcycle cops. Inside the truck were two cases of freshly brewed beer; outside was a banner proclaiming, "President Roosevelt, the first real beer is yours!" Other beer makers were quick to follow suit. No dummy, F.D.R. had the bottles distributed to the thirsty gentlemen of the press.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 10:15
SOURCE: Foxnews (8-1-09)
Days after publication, "Bobby and Jackie, A Love Story," climbed to number eight on the New York Times bestseller list. To research and write about the love affair between Bobby Kennedy and Jackie Kennedy, author C. David Heymann, three-times-nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, spent more than twenty years in heavy-duty interviewing with friends, acquaintances and observers of the Kennedys.
Heymann believes it was the grief that Bobby and Jackie shared after the assassination of President Kennedy that brought them together for their four-year affair before she wed Greek shipowner Aristotle Onassis. According to Heymann, Bobby, who was wed to Ethel Kennedy, with whom he had 11 children, was Jackie’s “true love.”
Heymann’s written biographies of Elizabeth Taylor, separate biographies of RFK and Jackie, John and Caroline Kennedy, Amy and Robert Lowell, Ezra Pound, and others. Three have been made into NBC miniseries. His well-written books stir controversy, with numerous quotes from the deceased, but many subjects he interviewed for this bombshell bestseller about Bobby and Jackie are alive.
Heymann believes it was the grief that Bobby and Jackie shared after the assassination of President Kennedy that brought them together for their four-year affair before she wed Greek shipowner Aristotle Onassis. According to Heymann, Bobby, who was wed to Ethel Kennedy, with whom he had 11 children, was Jackie’s “true love.”
Heymann’s written biographies of Elizabeth Taylor, separate biographies of RFK and Jackie, John and Caroline Kennedy, Amy and Robert Lowell, Ezra Pound, and others. Three have been made into NBC miniseries. His well-written books stir controversy, with numerous quotes from the deceased, but many subjects he interviewed for this bombshell bestseller about Bobby and Jackie are alive.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 02:07
Name of source: NYT
SOURCE: NYT (8-1-09)
With bipartisan health care negotiations teetering, Democrats are talking reluctantly — and very, very quietly — about exploiting a procedural loophole they planted in this year’s budget to skirt Republican filibusters against a health care overhaul.
They are talking reluctantly because using the tactic, officially known as reconciliation, would present a variety of serious procedural and substantive obstacles that could result in a piecemeal health bill. And they are whispering because the mere mention of reconciliation touches partisan nerves and could be viewed as a threat by the three Republicans still engaged in the delicate talks, causing them to collapse.
Yet with the discussions so far failing to produce an agreement, Democrats are exploring whether they could use the tactic as a last resort to secure a health care victory if they have to go it alone. The answer: It would not be pretty and it would not be preferable, but it could be doable...
...Under the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, reconciliation bills were given special Senate protection and allowed to pass by simple majority votes, after limited debate, to give senators the ability to make the kinds of tough decisions required to cut the deficit...
They are talking reluctantly because using the tactic, officially known as reconciliation, would present a variety of serious procedural and substantive obstacles that could result in a piecemeal health bill. And they are whispering because the mere mention of reconciliation touches partisan nerves and could be viewed as a threat by the three Republicans still engaged in the delicate talks, causing them to collapse.
Yet with the discussions so far failing to produce an agreement, Democrats are exploring whether they could use the tactic as a last resort to secure a health care victory if they have to go it alone. The answer: It would not be pretty and it would not be preferable, but it could be doable...
...Under the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, reconciliation bills were given special Senate protection and allowed to pass by simple majority votes, after limited debate, to give senators the ability to make the kinds of tough decisions required to cut the deficit...
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 01:27
SOURCE: NYT (8-2-09)
The girls have toured the Eiffel Tower and ogled the stone majesties of the Pantheon. They have swooned over the Jonas Brothers, giggled over wax likenesses of their parents and romped with friends at Camp David, all in the span of two blissfully school-free months.
Welcome to Sasha and Malia Obama's fabulous summer vacation, a hodgepodge of foreign travel, concerts, birthday parties and just plain fun carefully organized by the president and first lady. (The first lady has dubbed it Camp Obama.)
But President Obama and his wife, Michelle, have also tried to ensure that this first summer in the White House is about more than lighthearted fare. They have incorporated history lessons, community service and healthy eating and exercise into their daughters' time off, offering yet another glimpse of the parenting style behind the walls at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
The Obamas discussed the slave trade with their girls during a visit to a slave port in Ghana. They focused on volunteering at Fort McNair in Virginia, where the girls helped stuff backpacks with books and toys for the children of military families....
Welcome to Sasha and Malia Obama's fabulous summer vacation, a hodgepodge of foreign travel, concerts, birthday parties and just plain fun carefully organized by the president and first lady. (The first lady has dubbed it Camp Obama.)
But President Obama and his wife, Michelle, have also tried to ensure that this first summer in the White House is about more than lighthearted fare. They have incorporated history lessons, community service and healthy eating and exercise into their daughters' time off, offering yet another glimpse of the parenting style behind the walls at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
The Obamas discussed the slave trade with their girls during a visit to a slave port in Ghana. They focused on volunteering at Fort McNair in Virginia, where the girls helped stuff backpacks with books and toys for the children of military families....
Monday, August 3, 2009 - 01:26
SOURCE: NYT (8-1-09)
Seventy years have passed since members of the Thorsch family fled
German-occupied Czech lands in 1939. They left behind a lucrative oil
refinery business that was seized by the Nazis, nationalized after
World War II and then taken over by the Communist government.
Marie and Alfons Thorsch in the mid-1930s before fleeing to Canada. Their granddaughter says Czech laws have stymied her attempts to get compensation for an oil refinery the Nazis seized.
Marie Warburg — granddaughter of Alfons and Marie Thorsch, who owned the Privoz refinery and escaped the Holocaust by emigrating to Canada — laments that her family has received no compensation for its loss. She says the Thorsches are blocked by a law under which only Czech citizens can qualify for restitution of businesses or homes.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 14:27
SOURCE: NYT (7-31-09)
The government went back and checked its numbers — back, in some cases, 60 years — and on Friday it released the results, with changes big and small as the statisticians tried to calculate how well the economy had done and where Americans were spending their money.
The results? The American economy was a little stronger than we thought when times were good, but worse when times were bad.
The government decided that it should measure the impact of big disasters in a different way to avoid distortions in some statistics and that it had been overestimating the amount of consumer spending that goes to health care.
The result was revisions in economic statistics going all the way back to 1947, when it turns out a downturn was a little deeper than had been thought.
The results? The American economy was a little stronger than we thought when times were good, but worse when times were bad.
The government decided that it should measure the impact of big disasters in a different way to avoid distortions in some statistics and that it had been overestimating the amount of consumer spending that goes to health care.
The result was revisions in economic statistics going all the way back to 1947, when it turns out a downturn was a little deeper than had been thought.
Saturday, August 1, 2009 - 20:09
Name of source: Media Matters (liberal watchdog website)
SOURCE: Media Matters (liberal watchdog website) (7-27-09)
From the July 27 edition of Fox News' The Live Desk (hat tip to Twitter user StefanoScalia):
[HNN: Wikipedia map of the Middle East]
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 16:46
Name of source: AP
SOURCE: AP (8-2-09)
Navy pilot Capt. Michael "Scott" Speicher was shot down over the Iraq desert on the first night of the Gulf War in 1991 and it was there he apparently was buried by Bedouins, hidden in the sand from the world's mightiest military all these years.
In a sorrowful resolution to the nearly two-decade old question about his fate, the Pentagon disclosed Sunday it had received new information last month from an Iraqi citizen that led Marines to recover bones and skeletal fragments — enough for a positive identification.
The top Navy officer said the discovery is evidence of the military's commitment to bring its troops home. "Our Navy will never give up looking for a shipmate, regardless of how long or how difficult that search may be," said Adm. Gary Roughead, Chief of Naval Operations.
In a sorrowful resolution to the nearly two-decade old question about his fate, the Pentagon disclosed Sunday it had received new information last month from an Iraqi citizen that led Marines to recover bones and skeletal fragments — enough for a positive identification.
The top Navy officer said the discovery is evidence of the military's commitment to bring its troops home. "Our Navy will never give up looking for a shipmate, regardless of how long or how difficult that search may be," said Adm. Gary Roughead, Chief of Naval Operations.
Sunday, August 2, 2009 - 14:16
Name of source: Boston Herald story summarized by The Daily Beast
SOURCE: Boston Herald story summarized by The Daily Beast (8-1-09)
The explosion of peace, love, and understanding brought on by President Obama's beer summit continues unabated. This time it's Henry Louis Gates Jr. moving things forward, sending a bouquet of flowers to Lucia Whalen, the woman who made the 911 call that eventually landed Gates in jail. "It was an expression of gratitude," her lawyer and Daily Beast contributor, Wendy Murphy, told the Boston Herald. She wouldn't disclose the contents of the note, but the recent release of tapes of the 911 call showed that Whalen did not describe Gates or his driver, who were trying to get into Gates' house, as black. In the call, Whalen also suggested they might live at the house and not be burglars.
Saturday, August 1, 2009 - 19:54
Name of source: Boston Globe
SOURCE: Boston Globe (7-31-09)
Until this week, Officer Justin L. Barrett was a young Boston patrolman with no record of misconduct, who had served his country in Iraq and once tackled an armed man inside the Mattapan police station where he worked.
Now, Mayor Thomas M. Menino has called him a cancer and said the 36-year-old should be fired for writing an e-mail comparing a black professor to a “jungle monkey.’’
To many of the city’s black leaders, he is a painful reminder of racial tensions that still exist in the city and within the Police Department. To high-ranking police officials, he is another obstacle in their effort to gain and keep the trust of those in minority neighborhoods, where most of the worst crimes occur.
“This kind of attitude will tar all of our efforts, set us back 30 years,’’ said the Rev. Jeffrey Brown, head of the Boston TenPoint Coalition, which works with police to stop gang violence.
Now, Mayor Thomas M. Menino has called him a cancer and said the 36-year-old should be fired for writing an e-mail comparing a black professor to a “jungle monkey.’’
To many of the city’s black leaders, he is a painful reminder of racial tensions that still exist in the city and within the Police Department. To high-ranking police officials, he is another obstacle in their effort to gain and keep the trust of those in minority neighborhoods, where most of the worst crimes occur.
“This kind of attitude will tar all of our efforts, set us back 30 years,’’ said the Rev. Jeffrey Brown, head of the Boston TenPoint Coalition, which works with police to stop gang violence.
Saturday, August 1, 2009 - 19:42
Name of source: Stone Pages Archaeo News
SOURCE: Stone Pages Archaeo News (8-1-09)
Genetic evidence is revealing that human populations began to expand in size in Africa during the Late Stone Age approximately 40,000 years ago. A research team led by Michael F. Hammer (Arizona Research Laboratory's Division of Biotechnology at the University of Arizona) found that sub-Saharan populations increased in size well before the development of agriculture. This research supports the hypothesis that population growth played a significant role in the evolution of human cultures in the Late Pleistocene.
There has been a longstanding disagreement whether humans began to increase in number as a result of innovative technologies and/or behaviors formulated by hunter-gatherer groups in the Late Pleistocene, or with the advent of agriculture in the Neolithic. Hammer's team surveyed the genetic material of 184 individuals from seven human populations and used a computational approach to simulate the evolution of genetic lineages over time. The researchers found that both hunter-gathers and food-producing groups best fit models with approximately ten-fold population growth beginning well before the origin of agriculture. For the first time ever, Hammer's team was able to investigate the timing of human population expansion by applying sophisticated inferential statistics to a large multilocus autosomal data set re-sequenced in multiple contemporary sub-Saharan African populations.
There has been a longstanding disagreement whether humans began to increase in number as a result of innovative technologies and/or behaviors formulated by hunter-gatherer groups in the Late Pleistocene, or with the advent of agriculture in the Neolithic. Hammer's team surveyed the genetic material of 184 individuals from seven human populations and used a computational approach to simulate the evolution of genetic lineages over time. The researchers found that both hunter-gathers and food-producing groups best fit models with approximately ten-fold population growth beginning well before the origin of agriculture. For the first time ever, Hammer's team was able to investigate the timing of human population expansion by applying sophisticated inferential statistics to a large multilocus autosomal data set re-sequenced in multiple contemporary sub-Saharan African populations.
Saturday, August 1, 2009 - 12:40
SOURCE: Stone Pages Archaeo News (8-1-09)
Every object unearthed by an archaeological dig must have its exact position recorded. This is normally a painstaking process involving measuring rods and string, but a device that uses technology originally developed to guide robots could speed up the process. Gran Dolina in central Spain is a Palaeolithic site that contains important hominin remains which date from between 780,000 and 300,000 years ago. Thousands of fossils are discovered there every year, but registering them all by hand makes progress frustratingly slow. So archaeologists working on the site contacted Angélica de Antonio Jiménez and Fernando Seco at the Institute of Industrial Automation in Madrid, to see if they could come up with a better way.
Antonio Jiménez and Seco were working on an ultrasound system to help blind people and robots navigate, in which a mobile transmitter sends signals to a network of fixed nodes. The time taken for the signal to arrive at each node determines the precise location of the transmitter. To adapt the system for archaeological sites, Antonio Jiménez developed a 2-metre-long pointer, like a big pencil, to act as the transmitter. To prevent the user's body blocking the signals, it has two transmitters, one at the top and one 70 centimetres below it. When a researcher finds an object, they trace its outline with the pointer, transmitting ultrasound data to a network of nodes above the site. Software then reconstructs not only the position of the object, but also its size, shape and orientation, to an accuracy of about 5 millimetres.
Antonio Jiménez and Seco were working on an ultrasound system to help blind people and robots navigate, in which a mobile transmitter sends signals to a network of fixed nodes. The time taken for the signal to arrive at each node determines the precise location of the transmitter. To adapt the system for archaeological sites, Antonio Jiménez developed a 2-metre-long pointer, like a big pencil, to act as the transmitter. To prevent the user's body blocking the signals, it has two transmitters, one at the top and one 70 centimetres below it. When a researcher finds an object, they trace its outline with the pointer, transmitting ultrasound data to a network of nodes above the site. Software then reconstructs not only the position of the object, but also its size, shape and orientation, to an accuracy of about 5 millimetres.
Saturday, August 1, 2009 - 12:39
SOURCE: Stone Pages Archaeo News (8-1-09)
Andrew Hemmings walked on a Florida (USA) beach that man hasn't set foot on in more than 13,000 years. Not because it isn't a popular stretch of real estate - it's just that few people are able to don full scuba gear and dive 40 feet under water in the Gulf of Mexico for a stroll in the sand. The University of Texas archaeologist is part of an elite team of scientists led by James Adovasio of Mercyhurst College in Erie. Adovasio is looking for evidence of the earliest North American settlements along the coast of Florida that were submerged thousands of years ago by glacial ice melting. "What we're looking for is evidence of the first Floridians," Adovasio said. "Their economy could have involved shells, sea mammals, fresh-water and marine fish."
Saturday, August 1, 2009 - 12:37
