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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: CNN
SOURCE: CNN (2-13-10)
Most of the correspondence was to Diana's personal beautician, Janet Filderman, but the auction also includes notes to her chauffeur, Steve Davies, and Christmas cards with family portraits sent while she was still married to Prince Charles.
The letters date from 1984 to 1990, and show that the two women exchanged many gifts including flowers, picture frames and opera tickets. Diana frequently mentions in the letters that she liked opening gifts early.
SOURCE: CNN (2-10-10)
The aerial photos were obtained by ABC News after it filed a Freedom of Information Act request last year with the National Institute of Standards and Technology, which had collected the images for its investigation into the towers' collapse.
A couple of the images show one of the twin towers burning after a hijacked airplane had flown into it. Others show it collapsing, and the rest show the clouds of debris and dust spreading below after the towers crumbled.
Each of the 12 images offers a rare look at what the devastation looked like from above.
Hijackers flew two commercial jetliners into the twin towers that day, killing 2,752 people. On the same day, hijackers flew another airplane into the Pentagon in Washington, killing 184 people. A fourth hijacked plane, headed to an unknown target, crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing 40.
SOURCE: CNN (2-10-10)
An all-star lineup including Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Natalie Cole, Smokey Robinson, the Blind Boys of Alabama, John Mellencamp, gospel singer Yolanda Adams and others performed some of the best-known numbers from what Obama called the "soundtrack" of the civil rights movement.
The concert, "In Performance at the White House: A Celebration of Music from the Civil Rights Movement," was originally scheduled for Wednesday night but was moved to Tuesday as another snow storm moved into the Washington area. According to the White House Web site, the concert marked the beginning of the 2010 White House music series and celebrated Black History month.
Name of source: Times (UK)
SOURCE: Times (UK) (2-13-10)
The secret agent, code-named “Knopf”, furnished the intelligence service with information on Hitler’s plans in the Mediterranean and on the Eastern Front, the health of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel and even the location of the “Wolf’s Lair” — the Führer’s headquarters in Eastern Prussia.
Historians have tended to play down the wartime role of MI6 — in comparison with the crucial importance of the messages decoded at Bletchley Park — but the discovery of Agent Knopf by the Cambridge historian Paul Winter shows that Britain obtained accurate and highly valuable intelligence from a network of agents in the upper ranks of the Third Reich.
The documents, uncovered in the Churchill Archives in Cambridge and the National Archives, show that Knopf and his sub-agents alerted British Intelligence to German plans for an invasion of Malta in 1942, relayed Rommel’s intentions in North Africa and revealed Hitler’s fatal obsession with capturing Stalingrad on the Eastern Front.
Name of source: Telegraph (UK)
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-12-10)
But the hilltop town of Carini in Sicily believes that Cesare Lanza may have acted in league with the baroness's husband, Don Vincenzo La Grua, who wanted to remarry.
Her husband also feared that her lover might have tried to claim a part of his estate had she had children from her illicit affair.
The baroness was killed in 1563 in Carini's 11th century castle when she and her lover, Ludovico Vernagallo, were caught in bed together.
"Justice wasn't done back then," said Gaetano La Fata, the mayor of the town 20 miles from Palermo, who has decided to reopen the case and exhume the remains of the lovers....
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-12-10)
A watercolour by the German dictator has come to light that has an inscription on the back that bears the name of Freud's medical practice in Vienna.
While Freud was based in the Austrian city in 1910 it is possible he or one of his staff bought the picture from the struggling artist.
Hitler was a jobbing painter at the time, knocking out postcards and paintings and trying to make a living.
This painting, that measures 8X4 inches, shows what looks like a small church with a background of mountains and is signed "A Hitler 1910."
On the reverse are the Italian words: "Studio Medico Sigmund Freud Vienne."
The painting was taken from Vienna to Italy after the Second World War by an American GI who was told the picture had hung in Freud's consulting rooms.
It raises the tantalising prospect that Hitler and Freud - two giants of the 20th century - were connected by the painting, and might even have met 100 years ago.
Both were in Vienna at the same time and it is said that Jews in the city helped Hitler sell his art.
Freud was driven out of Nazi Germany in the 1930s and moved to England where he lived all his life.
Richard Westwood-Brookes, from Mullock's auctioneers, is selling the painting with a pre-sale estimate of up to 10,000 pounds.
He said: "The possibility that this watercolour once hung on the walls of Freud's consulting rooms in Vienna may seem on the face of it completely bizarre.
"But both men were in Vienna at the same time and we know Hitler was selling his paintings, so it is quite possible that Freud had one on the wall.
"We will never know for certain whether this was Freud's, but it raises the tantalising prospect that the two men might have met.
"Freud famously conducted a psychoanalysis on the composer Gustav Mahler, who was also a Vienna resident, at this time.
"The vendor is Italian and he said it came back from Vienna with an American GI after the second world war. The GI said it had hung in Freud's rooms.
"On the reverse are words in Italian that say "Sigmund Freud's Medical Study, Vienna." It looks as if it has come from a sketch book.
"The scene in the painting is typical of that which Hitler was painting at the time.
"He would paint postcards and also go around people's houses and ask them if they wanted a watercolour of their property.
"It is known that Hitler was popular amongst the Jewish community of Vienna in those days.
"It was the Jewish people who helped him with the sale of his paintings and sketches - one of the most ironic facts of 20th century history.
"This was a time long before the birth of the Nazi Party and long before Hitler's abominable anti-Semitism came to the fore.
"It is therefore quite possible - though supremely ironic - that the great Sigmund Freud could have had a painting by Hitler hanging on the walls of his consulting rooms."
The vendor is from Italy and the sale in Ludlow, Shropshire, takes place on March 2.
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-12-10)
The rank of artificer, affectionately referred to as ''tiffs'' or ''tiffies'', will now fall under the new banner of engineering technicians (ET) - ME for marine engineers and WE for weapons engineers.
A Royal Navy spokeswoman said: ''This change of rank better reflects the job of artificers in the 21st century and recognises the continued evolution of naval engineering.
''As an improved method of training, becoming an ET also improves the career training available to sailors, broadens their employability and increases their opportunities in the Navy.''
Artificers trace their heritage back to Engine Room Artificers, introduced by the Royal Navy in 1868 to take into account the senior service's transition from sail to steam.
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-11-10)
The Los Angeles museum said it would appeal the decision to Italy's highest court and would "vigorously defend" its right to keep the bronze.
The "Victorious Youth" statue, which dates from 300-100BC, was pulled from the sea by Italian fishermen in 1964 off the eastern town of Fano, near Pesaro.
The Italian government, which has been on an international campaign to reclaim looted antiquities, says it was brought into Italy and then exported illegally.
The Getty Museum maintains Italy has no claim to the bronze and says it bought the statue in good faith in 1977 for $4 million (£2.5m).
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-11-10)
The 22 illustrated Valentines were sent by would-be suitors to Catherine Worsley, daughter of Sir William Worsley of Hovingham, in the 1850s.
Three generations of the family later, Katharine Worsley, married into Royalty and is now the Duchess of Kent.
Catherine was considered to be one of the most eligible and lovely women of her day.
The letters and cards are in the form of poems, sonnets and stories, decorated with watercolour and pen and ink sketches. Cupid's hearts and merging family crests depict the serious romantic business of courtship, while others attempt to woo her with domestic scenes of marital bliss to come. One admirer wrote: "I'll gratify your slightest wish, whether t'were small or great, say the word at once you're heard, my pretty pretty Kate."
Some of Catherine's wooers use humour to steer her away from rivals, while another wrote: "I'm ugly I know, but I'll presently show, that I really am not to be sneezed at."
The correspondence provides a glimpse into Victorian courtship and romantic practises, but also the events taking place in the 1850s; one admirer mentioned being sent to Crimea in his letter. Even the fashions and hobbies of the day are represented in the sketches and watercolour images painted round the messages in many of the letters.
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-11-10)
leader John Smith’s death, and that he had the experience and skills to lead the country.
Mr Brown admitted that he and Mr Blair had fights during Labour’s first 10 years in office and that their relationship was “incredibly difficult”. His remarks confirm the simmering feud that characterised much of the time the pair spent at the top of government.
Mr Brown also admitted that they did concoct a deal, once Mr Blair became Labour leader, for Mr Brown to succeed him as prime minister.
The disclosures come in a very personal interview due to be broadcast at the weekend with the former newspaper editor and now television show host Piers Morgan. Mr Brown talks about his student life, alcohol, his wife Sarah and their children. Mr Brown also speaks movingly about the death of his daughter and his son’s illness.
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-11-10)
It was claimed that the move by Sussex University risked jeopardising the nation’s understanding of the subject and “entrenching the ignorance of the present”.
Under plans, research and in-depth teaching into periods such as the Tudors, the Middle-Ages, Norman Britain, the Viking invasion and the Anglo-Saxons will be scrapped, along with the Civil Wars.
The university will also end research into the history of continental Europe pre-1900, affecting the study of the Napoleonic wars and the Roman Empire.
The university said it was “reshaping” its curriculum and research following a £3m cut in Government funding.
Last week, universities across the country were told their budgets were to be slashed by £449 million next year, including a £215m reduction in teaching funding, with threats of further cuts in the future.
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-11-10)
The three men who have become unofficial leaders of the "Green" opposition movement all faced off against police and plain-clothes government security forces as they tried to join government rallies.
There were contradictory reports as to whether Mir Hossein Moussavi, a defeated candidate in last year's presidential election, succeeded in getting through. But cars carrying another reformist candidate, Mehdi Karroubi, and a former president, Mohammad Khatami, were seen being surrounded by plain-clothed security forces....
The government rallies, an annual highlight usually marked by defiant speeches and calls of "Death to America" from huge crowds, commemorate the anniversary of the return of Ayatollah Khomeini from exile in 1979 and the subsequent flight of the Shah.
Government news agencies said tens of millions of people attended in cities across the country. Television pictures showed huge crowds in Freedom Square in Tehran. Opposition activists based abroad said they had been paid to attend, and given food.
In a lengthy speech, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told them that criticism of the regime from the West was because of its fear of Iran's "greatness and glory".
The government had been warning for days that no dissent would be tolerated....
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-10-10)
The Attorney-General, Robert McClelland, sent the petition, written by a military lawyer, Commander James Unkles, last week.
"We don't express a view either way on it," said Mr McClelland's spokesman.
"We sent it because we don't have any jurisdiction to issue a pardon or review a case that was made by a foreign government in a foreign country."
Commander Unkles said there were strong grounds for overturning the 1902 verdict against Morant, Handcock and their co-accused George Witton, who had his death sentence commuted because it contained serious errors.
Related Links
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-10-10)
But a leading academic has cast doubt on how much of The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo he actually penned. A new film will also suggest they were largely written by an unsung assistant.
The importance of the author's "nègre" – the French term for ghost writer – is explained by Claude Schopp, France's leading Dumas expert, in his Dictionary of Alexandre Dumas out next month.
He claims that Auguste Jules Maquet was the real "fourth musketeer", the man who actually came up with the plot for the trilogy featuring Porthos, Athos, Aramis. and d'Artagnan.
The relationship between Dumas, an ogre-like philanderer, and Maquet, a plain, family man is also the subject of L'Autre Dumas (The Other Dumas), a film starring Gérard Depardieu out on Wednesday in France.
SOURCE: Telegraph (UK) (2-10-10)
Lord Justice Thomas and Mr Justice Lloyd Jones want to disclose summaries of information held by the British security services.
Mr Miliband, branded them "irresponsible" in an unprecedented attack on the judiciary, but today three of the country's highest-ranking judges rejected both the minister's accusations and his appeal.
Name of source: ETN
SOURCE: ETN (2-10-10)
This valuable finding was a residential settlement belonging to the beginning of Islam; the Umayyad and Abbasid perhaps earlier, as deciphered from the pieces of pottery and porcelain, glass, steatite, and metal coins found there, that can be dated to 1st and 2nd centuries AH. The site features two-stage architecture; the first one represents the beginning of the residential units that might date back to the first century AH. The second phase witnessed several modifications to the original design of the housing units, as well as many other public utilities, in addition to the level of flooring over the old.
Dr. Ali Al Ghabban, vice president of the archeology and museums sector in SCTA, stated that it is one of the archaeological projects undertaken by SCTA in a number of regions in the Kingdom, pointing out that the excavations at the site began about two months ago by a Saudi team qualified by the Antiquities Office in the Eastern Province, under the supervision of the Antiquities and Museums Division of SCTA.
Each house consists of area of 16 x 12 m at an average and contains three or four rooms of different sizes in addition to an independent external courtyard. Perhaps one of these rooms was used for the storage of date palm, while the rest of the rooms were probably used for residential purpose. The courtyard contains a number of furnaces like the modern day "Tanors."
In the area of excavation, there are three archaeological hills; the first one is marked as area (A), located on the north side, the second one is area (B), located in the middle, and the third (C) is located in the southern part of the site. On the surface of the site, especially on the hills there is a widespread of pottery and broken glass pieces dating back to the early Islamic era. It is also bordered by stone walls along each side.
Next to each group of three houses that constitute the village is found a water system comprised of a circular water well built from medium-sized irregular stones brought in from the nearby seashore. The well is connected to an oval-shaped building, construed to be a water tank with two channels for drainage, one of them flows toward the north side while the other flows towards the south-eastern side. The structure of channels contains pottery jars to control the volume of water drained.
In the end, Dr. Al Ghabban expressed hope that the find would remind Saudis of a long and rich cultural heritage, stating, "These sites have historic value and will help in understanding the history of this region.”
Name of source: Culture 24
SOURCE: Culture 24 (2-11-10)
As cash-strapped Britons look to the past for cheaper options in these financially troubled times, the Imperial War Museum in London is rolling back the years to remind us how we did it during World War Two.
But despite its contemporary resonance, Ministry of Food explores what now seems like another world. In 1940 the government ministry, under the auspices of Lord Woolton, set about the mammoth task of introducing and administering rationing, controlling the flow of food and feeding the nation.
It's a story of fortitude and sacrifice, but also one of bureaucracy, organisation and propaganda.
Colourful posters, photographs and paintings cluster around thematic displays covering everything from the role of the Women's Land Army and public health to the Dig for Victory and War on Waste campaigns.
There are full-scale recreations of a kitchen, a grocer's shop, and a copious greenhouse. Period newsreel and information films flicker and a wealth of artefacts - from powdered egg tins to ration books - reveal the way the nation somehow managed to get through the war years and beyond. Rationing went on for 14-and-a-half years.
By 1954 it may have begun to wear a little thin, but when it was introduced rationing wasn't altogether unpopular.
"For people in the 1920s and 1930s who had already been through a lot of hardship, a lot of the advice the government was giving out in the Second World War was almost second nature to them and they didn’t need to be told," says Terry Charman, Senior Historian at the Imperial War Museum.
That said, at its peak in 1943 the Ministry of Food was still a force to be reckoned with as 50,000 staff worked to get the message across and manage the flow of food.
"I don't think people realise what a mighty organisation the Ministry of Food was," explains nutritionist and food writer Marguerite Patten.
"It had to deal with the buying of food, the supply of food, the growing of food and the science and nutrition of it all."
Now 94, home economist, food writer and broadcaster Patten was called upon to work for the Ministry of Food as a nutritionist – a role that today would probably be termed "food evangelist".
"They set up this Food Advice Division," she recalls. "It was to do exactly that – to give food advice to the public. I always say we were the front line troops. We didn't wait for them, we used to go and find people wherever they may be."
Patten remembers going out into the markets, the hospitals and the workers' canteens. "The people were responsive and they wanted help," she says.
"Don't forget we were already a nation of home cooking, therefore people could accept what you said. It wasn't as if you were entering new territory – they just had to adapt what they already knew to this period of austerity."
The gentle art of persuasion and propaganda remained paramount. In 1944 the Ministry of Food Public Relations Division spent an astonishing £600,000 on posters and publicity. Dr Carrot and Potato Pete became two favourite characters. Pete even had a song about him - sung by Betty Driver of Coronation Street fame.
The films weren't bad either. A stream of lighthearted "Food Flashes" shown in cinemas dispensed useful advice about powdered eggs and milk or the availability of jam in cans. Each minute-long movie reached an audience of 20 million.
But it wasn't all about cheerful wartime Britons making do - or even the mobilization of labour. In the early years of the war the country would have starved if it hadn't been for the sacrifices of the Merchant Navy, which lost 30,000 men supplying Britain and her armies.
Little wonder, then, that the Ministry of Food focussed as much on waste as it did on war production. As one of the many posters on display puts it, "Wasted Food is Another Ship Lost".
"It was a war on waste," confirms Patten. "To waste during wartime was not only illegal, it was immoral as well. And you would be prosecuted if you were discovered to have been wasting food.
"Farmers had toiled night and day with the Land Army to produce it, the Merchant Navy had risked their lives to bring many things across the Atlantic, so therefore we had to respect it. This is something we have forgotten. Food is a very important commodity and we need to cherish it."
That's why Ministry of Food offers some useful food for thought about the way we live and eat now.
Name of source: Portfolio (Hungary)
SOURCE: Portfolio (Hungary) (2-12-10)
The crimes
Plaintiffs, who are Hungarian Jewish victims of the Hungarian Holocaust or their heirs or next of kin, on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated, bring this action for compensation, restitution, reparations, and punitive damages against the defendant MÁV for:
"active participation in the Nazi genocide of 1944 in Hungary by knowingly providing the trains for delivering 437,000 Jews to their deaths in Auschwitz and murdering many of them along the way under the subhuman conditions of the transportation;
aiding and abetting the Nazi genocide of 1944;
looting the plaintiffs’ possessions, valuables, heirlooms, stock certificates, currency, and jewellery from the plaintiffs’ luggage, then destroying the plaintiffs’ baggage receipts, destroying records of these thefts, falsely denying that it committed any of these acts, and engaging in concealment of these crimes to the present day."
Nine years of research
The allegations in the complaint "are the product of nine years’ research, without the cooperation of the Hungarian government or its instrumentalities, into tens of thousands of official documents from East European and German archives and Israeli depositories, from the Raoul Wallenberg archives, from documents in the possession of Holocaust survivors and historians, and from the extensive documentary collection of the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C.," the case document said.
USD 1.24 bn claim
The plaintiffs, who are mostly descendants of Holocaust survivors living in Israel and the US (and one each residing in the UK, Hungary and Brazil), demand compensation worth a total of USD 1.24 billion dollars.
The plaintiffs ask the court to (a) award the plaintiff class the sum of USD 240 million, "as the value of its stolen property", to be adjusted upward from its purchasing power in 1944 to its present-day value; and to (b) award the plaintiff class (2/3) and their attorneys (1/3) the sum of USD 1 billion, "as punitive damages reflecting the heinous and zealous participation by the defendants in genocide and in light of the fact that no other law firm in 66 years has been motivated or has seen fit to bring such a case."
A conservative estimate of the money and valuables looted from the Jews at MÁV’s train stations is 8% of the total value of Jewish wealth in Hungary in 1944. Thus, 8% x USD 3 billion = USD 240 million in 1944 U.S. dollars. The dollar has appreciated approximately 33 times since 1944.
"MÁV knew exactly what it was doing"
"Although the Hungarian genocide was the single most extensive and brutal of all the Nazi genocides of World War II, at the present date not even one per cent of the Hungarian victims’ financial losses has been restituted. This is in sharp contrast to other Holocaust reparations initiatives that have been successfully prosecuted against other states and their instrumentalities. But in the case of Hungary, its agencies and instrumentalities so far have stalled, stonewalled, stridently misled, and falsely denied their role as profiteers from the Hungarian Holocaust. The worst offender has been MÁV, which has not paid a pengő (the Hungarian currency at that time) to the plaintiffs," the complaint said.
"MÁV knew exactly what it was doing. It was using nearly all of its trains day and night to transport people one-way to Auschwitz. The trains were empty as they rattled along the tracks back to Hungary. Without the trains provided by MÁV, hundreds of thousands of Jews could not have been transported to Auschwitz."
Zealous help in genocide
The plaintiff did not want to leave any doubt that MÁV was eager to help the extermination of Jews.
"MÁV chose to operate the death trains to the complete satisfaction of Adolf Hitler’s secretary Adolf Eichmann’s needs."
"It made available the necessary rolling stock, scheduled the trips night and day, and cleaned and disinfected the cars after the trips."
"MÁV supervised and managed every aspect of the transportation process.
"MÁV knew that conditions on the trains would cause many to die. The interior heat of the unventilated cars, coupled with the lack of water to assuage the thirst of the passengers, in fact resulted in many deaths and severe mental impairments. The sick, the elderly, pregnant women, babies and young children were treated with equal brutality by MÁV’s agents."
"The trains bound to Auschwitz would be stopped at intervals, allowing railroad employees to remove the dead bodies and the persons who had gone mad. MÁV employees had dug ditches in advance to receive the dead bodies and bury them."
"The persons who showed signs of mental illness were led to the edge of the ditches and then shot by MÁV employees."
The complaint has been submitted to the Northern District Court of Illinois on 9 February and a judge, Samuel Der-Yeghiayan, has already been appointed.
Name of source: BBC News
SOURCE: BBC News (2-12-10)
At a recent demonstration in Baghdad, there was a palpable sense of anger among the crowd.
"We'll stamp out the Baathists," they chanted. "No to the return of killers to the parliament."
"Many of these people lost their parents, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters," said Yussef Mahmoud, a young doctor. "Many lost their money, their houses or their land. I am the same."
Some were holding up large framed portraits - black-and-white photographs of friends or family members who lost their lives under Saddam Hussein.
The way they see it is as simple as this - people who once served one of the most repressive regimes in the world cannot now be allowed back into politics.
“ Imagine a member of the Nazi Party standing for elections in West Germany in 1952, seven years after the war. What would have happened? ”
Ahmed Chalabi Election vetting committee
"The Baath Party in Iraq, we equate it with the Nazi Party in Germany," says Ahmed Chalabi.
The Baath Party has been outlawed in Iraq. Mr Chalabi sits on a committee charged with purging former Baathists from public life.
In January, he published a list of hundreds of candidates he says should be barred from standing for parliament.
"Imagine a member of the Nazi Party standing for elections in West Germany in 1952, seven years after the war. What would have happened? Would anyone have asked if they had committed a crime or not? He was barred because he was a member of the Nazi Party."
The Baath Party was not so much a political institution as an instrument of state control. For more than 20 years, Saddam Hussein used it to bend Iraq to his own will.
The party's tentacles extended into the military, the civil service, into the very fabric of society. If you wanted to get ahead, you had to join the party.
Baathist clampdown
All of that changed with the invasion in 2003. The US-led coalition toppled Saddam Hussein and then proceeded to dismantle the entire Baathist infrastructure.
“ I did nothing wrong. I committed no crimes. Why deprive the innocent majority of a living? ”
Abu Amer Former Baathist
But there are people here who feel the process went too far and the disbanding of the police, the army, and the civil service was at least in part responsible for the chaos and bloodshed that followed.
And that is fuelling sectarian divisions and a sense of injustice.
About 100km (65 miles) west of Baghdad, near the town of Ramadi, in Anbar province, Abu Amer is working his small farm amid a flock of sheep.
"I have this piece of land, but it's dry. Look at it - there's no water for irrigation," he says.
Abu Amer is not his real name, and he was not always a farmer. For 30 years, he was a schoolteacher, and a member of the Baath Party.
After the invasion he was stripped of his job and now ekes out a meagre living in constant fear of reprisals.
"I did nothing wrong. I committed no crimes. I only worked for the benefit of others, so why did they sack me and leave me to fend for myself?"
'Revenge motive'
Mr Amer believes any Baathist who committed a crime should be tried in the courts.
"But why deprive the innocent majority of a living?" he says. "I wish the old regime were still in place. Anything is better than this. Whatever you do, you come up against de-Baathification."
The most high-profile politician on Mr Chalabi's list of banned candidates is Saleh al-Mutlaq.
Although the list straddles the sectarian divide, Mr al-Mutlaq sees the ban as an attempt to keep the Sunnis from power.
"They can exclude 100, 1,000, 10,000, but they cannot exclude millions of Iraqis."
He believes the bans are motivated by revenge for the years during which Saddam Hussein, a Sunni, ruled over the Shia majority.
In Baghdad, workmen have been tearing down one of the few remaining monuments to the Baath Party in the capital - a giant structure of concrete and steel, rapidly being reduced to rubble.
But purging Iraq of Saddam Hussein's legacy will be a much longer and more painful process, as he continues to cast his divisive shadow over these elections and beyond.
SOURCE: BBC News (2-12-10)
Walter Frederick Morrison conceived and developed his aerodynamic plastic disc in the 1950s, and hundreds of millions have been sold worldwide since.
Frisbee historian Phil Kennedy said Mr Morrison and his future wife, Lu, got the idea from playing with a metal cake pan on the beach in California.
He originally called his toy the Pluto Platter and sold it at local fairs.
The platter's novel aerodynamic shape allowed it to hover briefly or travel surprisingly long distances, kept aloft by its rotation.
In 1957 Mr Morrison sold the rights to the California firm Wham-O, which discovered that youngsters were calling the toy a "Frisbie" after the name of a well-known pie. The company changed the spelling to avoid trademark infringement and the Frisbee was born.
On the official Frisbee website, Wham-O paid tribute to Mr Morrison, who was known as Fred.
"As Frisbee discs keep flying though the air, bringing smiles to faces, Fred's spirit lives on. Smooth flights, Fred," it read.
Mr Morrison's son, Walt, told the Associated Press that his father had suffered from cancer, and that "old age had caught up" with him.
"He was a nice guy. He helped a lot of people. He was an entrepreneur. He was always looking for something to do," he added.
Lawyer Kay McIff, who represented Mr Morrison in a royalties case, said: "That simple little toy has permeated every continent in every country. As many homes have Frisbees as any other device ever invented.
"How would you get through your youth without learning to throw a Frisbee?"
Mr Morrison, who died at his home in Monroe, on Tuesday, is survived by three children.
Walt Morrison said the family planned to hold a memorial service on Saturday at the Cowboy Corral in Elsinore, Utah.
SOURCE: BBC News (2-11-10)
The arrest came after a Polish court last week issued a European arrest warrant for Anders Hogstrom.
The metal sign was stolen in December from above the entrance to the notorious Nazi death camp. It was later recovered, cut into three pieces.
Five Polish men have already been arrested over the theft.
The sign, which weighs 40kg (90lb), was half-unscrewed, half-torn from above the death camp's gate.
The 5m (16ft) wrought iron sign - the words on which translate as "Work sets you free" - symbolises for many the atrocities of Nazi Germany.
The theft caused outrage in Israel, Poland and around the world. More than a million people - 90% of them Jews - were murdered by the Nazis at Auschwitz in occupied Poland during World War II.
SOURCE: BBC News (2-11-10)
In Cape Town, prominent figures took part in a commemorative walk at the prison where he spent the final months of his 27-year imprisonment.
Mr Mandela, now a frail 91-year-old, is expected to make a rare public appearance on Thursday evening.
He became the country's first black president in 1994.
Mr Mandela spent most of his sentence in Robben Island prison, off the coast of Cape Town, and later in Pollsmoor Prison on the mainland.
Before his release, he lived in a cottage in the grounds of Victor Verster prison in a rural area some 50km (31 miles) from Cape Town, with his own cook.
'Gratitude'
Thursday's re-enactment walk went through the gates of Victor Verster prison, now known as Drakenstein prison, where a statue of Mr Mandela stands with its hand upraised.
Hundreds of people, some wearing yellow T-shirts bearing Nelson Mandela's image, retraced his final walk to freedom after 27 years in captivity, chanting "Viva Madiba [his clan name]". Thousands more gathered to watch.
Led by several ANC leaders who spent time in Robben Island prison with Mr Mandela, they marched from the cottage in Victor Verster prison, now known as Drakenstein Prison, where he spent his final months.
In a picture that would have made Mr Mandela proud, black, white and Asian South Africans marched side-by-side through the prison gates, which then closed slowly behind them.
As they passed the statue which has been erected of the prison's most famous former inmate, many raised their fists - recreating the image which has come to symbolise the end of white minority rule in South Africa after years of bitter struggle, led by Mr Mandela.
Cyril Ramaphosa, who was among the veterans of the anti-apartheid struggle taking part in the walk, recalled Mr Mandela's crucial role.
"We are celebrating a life that has been lived in service of our people," he said.
"He knew he needed to continue living for the people that were outside. Without the struggle of our people, Madiba would have never been released," he added, using Mr Mandela's clan name.
Mr Mandela's former wife, Winnnie Mandela, had been due to lead the walk, but a spokesman said on Thursday morning that she would not be appearing because it would have been "too painful".
Poppy Shabalala, a 65-year-old local resident, said she had turned out to celebrate Mr Mandela's legacy.
"He did the unthinkable," she said. "Mandela united black and white people and ended apartheid. I am here today to show my gratitude for what he did."
'Good solution'
Mr Mandela did not join the walk, but he is expected to attend a state of the nation address by South African President Jacob Zuma later.
“ If we really want to make a difference we must recapture the spirit of that day ”
Archbishop Desmond Tutu
"We are trying to ensure that he gets a lot of rest during the day so he could be fresh and energetic in the evening to attend parliament," said his grandson, Mandla Mandela.
Mr Mandela was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964 for plotting to overthrow the government by violence.
During his years in prison he became an international symbol of resistance to apartheid.
In 1990, the South African government responded to internal and international pressure and freed him, at the same time lifting the ban against the anti-apartheid African National Congress (ANC).
Christo Brand, the former prison warden assigned to guard Mr Mandela, said of events 20 years ago: "I hoped there would be no bloodshed. There was no bloodshed. Everything worked out perfectly.
"And I know the way Mandela does negotiations, he was really thinking of the other side, too.
"He not only thinks of the black people of the country, but thinking also of the whites and studying and feeling the fears of the whites in this country.
"And I think through that fear, he came up and thought of a good solution for South Africa."
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, another key player in the fight against apartheid, said the day of Mr Mandela's release was "a day that promised the beginning of the end of indignity".
BBC News Special: Mandela release - 11 February 1990
But he added that while much had been achieved, more remained to be done.
"If we really want to make a difference we must recapture the spirit of that day of Nelson Mandela's release," he said.
In 1991 Mr Mandela became the ANC's leader. He was president of South Africa from 1994 until 1999, when he stood down - one of the few African leaders at the time to voluntarily give up power.
SOURCE: BBC News (2-10-10)
Four paintings worth $160m (£103m) were stolen from Zurich's Emil Buehrle Collection by an armed gang in February 2008.
Although two paintings were later recovered, two are still missing.
The Kunsthaus Museum will reopen the collection of 180 paintings and sculptures from Friday.
The show will move to a new wing of the Kunsthaus - designed by British architect David Chipperfield - in 2015.
The thieves stole works by Cezanne, Degas, Van Gogh and Monet in the heist which was one of the biggest in the world in the last 20 years.
A week after the theft, Monet's Poppies near Vetheuil (1879) and Van Gogh's Chestnut in Bloom (1890) were recovered in an abandoned car parked outside a psychiatric hospital in the city.
Degas' Count Lepic and his Daughters (1871) and Cezanne's Boy in a Red Jacket (1888) have yet to be recovered.
Lukas Gloor, the collection's director, said: "A great many of the pictures of that level that are stolen are recovered in the two to five years after a robbery. If not, then statistics, I'm afraid, turn against us."
SOURCE: BBC News (2-10-10)
A study, published in the journal Nature, says the individual's genome is the oldest to have been sequenced from a modern human.
The researchers say the man, who lived 4,000 years ago, had brown eyes and thick dark hair, although he would have been prone to baldness.
They say the genome also shows that his ancestors migrated from Siberia.
The man has been named Inuk, which means "human" in the Greenlandic language.
"We wanted to acknowledge that he was from Greenland, even though he is not a direct ancestor of modern Greenlanders," said Professor Eske Willerslev from the University of Copenhagen, who took part in the study.
The researchers say an analysis of the genome shows that Inuk was from the Saqqaq culture.
The team now has genetic evidence that Inuk's metabolism and body mass meant he was adapted to living in a cold climate.
The Saqqaq hunted seals and seabirds and relied on the sea for most of their food. Archaeological remains show they lived in tiny tents in winter.
"It's a very hostile environment and I was really surprised that people could live up there," explained Professor Willerslev.
Inuk had shovel-shaped front teeth, according to the research team. He also had dry earwax, which would have made him more vulnerable to ear infections.
He is thought to have died young because, although his genes show susceptibility to baldness, tufts of thick hair were found.
Siberian connection
The analysis took a year and the genome sequence suggested that the Saqqaq's closest living relatives were native populations in north-eastern Siberia, such as the Chuckchis and the Koryaks. The scientists say the Saqqaqs were probably not ancestors of contemporary Inuit or Native American populations.
This suggests, the researchers say, that the Saqqaqs migrated from Siberia to the New World approximately 5,500 years ago. This would have been independent of the movement that gave rise to modern Native Americans and Inuit.
Professor Willerslev explained that it was not known how the people made the crossing from Siberia to Greenland and Alaska.
"There was no land bridge between Siberia and Alaska at that time, so they must have crossed either by boat or in the winter time over the ice. No one knows," he said.
What happened to the Saqqaq people and why they died out also remains a mystery. "Was it climatic change, was it competition from other cultures coming in? We have no idea," said Professor Willerslev.
SOURCE: BBC News (2-10-10)
"Nelson Mandela's first steps back to freedom..."
I can vividly remember the excitement of being able to say those words as I reported on the moment that transformed South Africa for ever… as Nelson Mandela started that long walk which eventually led him from prison to the Presidency.
Nelson Mandela had spent more than half his adult life in prison.
As he walked to freedom, already 71 years old, his largest task still lay ahead. The ANC leader had to negotiate an end to white rule.
Twenty years on, I returned to Cape Town to look back with FW de Klerk - the last white President and the man who finally set Nelson Mandela free - and to revisit Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who led the protest the helped make Nelson Mandela's release inevitable.
Mr de Klerk is in no doubt about the significance of his decisions to unban the African National Congress and the South African Communist Party and to free Mr Mandela at last:
"I realised that after the announcements which I made, South Africa would be changed for ever."
'Blessed'
Archbishop Desmond Tutu heaped praise on Mr de Klerk for breaking the white stranglehold on power.
"He deserves all the credit that you can imagine. He showed incredible courage," the Archbishop said.
"Not every country has a Nelson Mandela. We were blessed, I think. We could so easily have gone up in flames."
And I've been back to one of those black townships in the Cape - which was so often in flames. I often used to go there to report violent clashes with the army and police.
At the time, they fired shotguns from their armoured vehicles, or charged with teargas and whips at anyone daring to demand basic rights in a racist society.
This time, I'm meeting Zongs Liwani. He was one of those protesters. He was just 21 years old when Nelson Mandela was released, and he went to the City Hall in Cape Town to see him that first day. Zongs realised immediately that his life, too, could change:
"The way Nelson Mandela was so sure or - how could I put it? - aggressive about changing South Africa, I knew that he would actually come out and make a difference," he said.
Poor but free
And the difference for Zongs himself? He proudly took me into the new township supermarket. It's large, it's thriving and it's his.
"I'm standing in my own shop," he said.
So I asked him if something on this scale could have happened under apartheid. His view is clear: "That was something way far from us getting into then."
Outside, though, much in Nyanga has not changed. There are many of the same shacks and leaking corrugated iron roofs. There is still a housing crisis in South Africa. There are still squatters living here. There's still poverty, but at least the people are free.
I met South Africans with very strong memories of the day Nelson Mandela was released, but the future of the country belongs, of course, to those too young to know that day except as a day in history.
So I went to the University of Cape Town, which was overwhelmingly white when I lived here, to talk to a group of 20-year-olds of all races and backgrounds.
Neliswa Dludla got a place at this prestigious university after a childhood in the townships. She is in no doubt of the disadvantages she had to overcome, including a lack of the sort of support white children have been used to.
"You don't necessarily have a study room, so you find yourself having to push yourself," she says.
I asked her if she had had to be a fighter.
"Ya, basically," she replies.
Her friend Rachel Mazower, who is from a privileged white background, is delighted to be growing up in a free, non-racial South Africa, but acknowledges it's going to be tougher for her.
"Oh, definitely it's more difficult for us than my parents' generation," she said. "They tell me they just had to scrape through everything. The best jobs were guaranteed for them in those days."
'Need for reconciliation'
It's left to Lynn Leigh-Brandt to inject one note of caution. She's hesitant about voicing it, but then:
"OK, I'll be completely honest… What if Nelson Mandela dies? What could happen," she says.
"Is it still going to be equality for all? Will there still be black economic empowerment?"
And Lynn readily agreed when I suggested that Nelson Mandela was such a unifying force that people behave better as long as he's here.
The last words belong to the former President and the Archbishop.
FW de Klerk is in no doubt: "The commemoration of Mr Mandela's release. It reminds us all of the need for reconciliation," he says.
And Archbishop Desmond Tutu gives me a huge smile at the end of our interview:
"Hey man, God took some time creating God's own country," he breaks into a huge, rolling, infectious laugh.
"Fantastic country… fantastic country."
Name of source: BBC
SOURCE: BBC (2-12-10)
But he told ITV1's Piers Morgan's Life Stories the deal was not made at the Granita restaurant as widely believed.
The prime minister also wept when he spoke about his daughter Jennifer, who died aged 10 days after suffering a brain haemorrhage in 2002.
SOURCE: BBC (2-10-10)
The face of the man, thought to have been of a rank known as Bosun, was created by forensic artists from a skull recovered from the wreck.
It was given to the Mary Rose Trust to be displayed along with other objects found on board the fated warship.
The Mary Rose sank on 19 July 1545 with the loss of more than 400 lives, after 34 years of service.
Only a handful of the crew and soldiers survived and Henry VIII was reported to have heard the screams of the drowning men as he helplessly stood and watched from Southsea Castle.
Archaeologists believe the man was a Bosun because he was found with the emblem of this comparatively senior status, a Bosun's call - a whistle.
There are many theories about why the ship sank, but evidence from the wreck itself suggests the ship put about with its gunports open, was hit by a squall and went down.
Ensuring that the gunports were closed would have been the Bosun's job, which has led researchers to suggest that this man was "at least partly responsible for the disaster".
Name of source: Independent (UK)
SOURCE: Independent (UK) (2-12-10)
A statement issued by the office of Israel's deputy foreign minister, Danny Ayalon, on Wednesday said that a student protester had uttered the words in question as Mr Ayalon faced protests over his appearance at the Union on Monday night.
But the Oxford Student newspaper yesterday quoted second year St Edmund Hall student Noor Rashid as saying he was in fact using the words of a classical Arabic chant commemorating a seventh-century battle between Arabs and Jews at Khayber, in the Arabian Peninsula.
The statement from Mr Ayalon's office maintained that a student had called out "Itbah Al Yahud" which translates as a call to slaughter Jews.
But Mr Rashid said that he had in fact said: "Khaybar ya Yahod." A Jewish Chronicle report yesterday said this referred to a seventh century attack by the Prophet Mohammed on the Jewish community in Khaybar in which the Jews were defeated and made to pay half their income to the Muslim victors.
Name of source: Daily Mail (UK)
SOURCE: Daily Mail (UK) (2-11-10)
The skinhead group from the town of Wels posted photographs of themselves on the Internet wearing the shirts at the site of the Mauthausen camp where tens of thousands of people were gassed, worked to death or killed in hideous medical experiments.
Perhaps the sickest picture of all shows three of the shaven-headed thugs giving the Hitler salute outside the entrance to the gas chambers.
SOURCE: Daily Mail (UK) (2-11-10)
And more than 30 years later it has become clear just how much of a bargain it was - as it has emerged that it's really worth £9,000.
The 18 volumes were printed in 1797 and are thought to be the oldest privately owned set.
SOURCE: Daily Mail (UK) (2-10-10)
Now the first comprehensive biography of Eva Braun reveals how the hidden First Lady of Nazism was the polar opposite of everything her beloved Adolf decreed should be found in a woman.
'Eva Braun: Life With Hitler,' by renowned German historian Heike B. Goertemaker, paints Eva not as an air-head besotted by a dominant man, but a fiercely loyal, independent thinker at odds with Hitler's public proclamations about 'the fairer sex'.
Eva was the only woman, apart from his mother, that touched the soul of Hitler - the mistress of the Berghof in Bavaria and the bunker in Berlin whom he married in the final days of the war.
She would later kill herself with him rather than face life without her husband of just 40 hours.
Born in 1912 to a schoolteacher father, she was 23 years younger than the man she called 'Wolf' - the nickname he was known by among Nazi underlings until the end.
She worked as an assistant for Heinrich Hoffmann, the photographer who became rich as the Fuehrer's personal cameraman, and met Hitler in 1929.
Goertemaker writes of how the blonde, blue-eyed, Eva touched something in the cold heart of Hitler.
It was her personality, her charm and her independence which captivated Hitler until they died together in Berlin on April 30 1945.
In her 350 page book she writes: 'She was completely different from the standard portrait of her. She was capricious but an uncompromising proponent of absolute loyalty to the dictator.
'She led a life of which was totally the opposite of the that of the propaganda films of the Third Reich.
'Since Eva was neither housewife nor mother, and did not want in all probability to be, she corresponded to the needs of a man 23 years older than her who was emotionally retarded with dubious habits. But she was far more than just an attractive young thing.'
In Eva, says the book, Hitler built a bourgeois existence far removed from the titanic struggles of war, conquest and genocide with her as homemaker and he as the tired man-about-the-house at the end of a busy day.
Only last week it emerged in another book in Germany, about Hitler's fragile health, that he took primitive sex potions to prepare himself for intimate encounters with Eva.
Hitler had maintained the myth throughout his reign that the only 'bride' he could countenance was Germany.
Consequently, she was a secret to all but the inner circle of the regime until long after the shooting had stopped.
Germany's Spiegel magazine called Goertemaker's work 'the first scientifically researched biography to correct the image of the stupid blonde at the side of the mass murderer.'
Goertemaker turns on its head the preconceptions about Hitler and Eva - that he was asexual, while she was dim - and uses only material and anecdotes supported by documentation or eye-witness accounts.
The physical side of Eva and 'Wolf's' love is referred to.
Once in 1938, when she saw a photo of British prime minister Neville Chamberlain sitting on the sofa at his Munich flat, she exclaimed to friends: 'If only he knew the history of this sofa!'
In that same year, Hitler wrote in his will that, whatever happened, Eva should receive a pension from Nazi party funds in perpetuity.
His propaganda chief Josef Goebbels, who would die in the bunker on the same day as his patron and her, wrote at the time: 'She is an intelligent girl who means much to the Fuehrer.'
Far from being merely 'arm candy', Eva shared Hitler's passions for architecture and Goertemaker writes how she was deeply involved with his plans to turn his native Linz into the artistic capital of the Reich.
'She was never as banal as she was painted,' said Goertemaker, who also examines the rumours that Hitler ordered his S.S. men to probe into Eva's family tree to make sure she had no Jewish blood.
Eva attempted to commit suicide in 1932 following the death of her father: had she succeeded she would have been the second woman close to Hitler to kill herself.
His niece Geli Raubal, with whom he was obsessed, took her own life in his Munich flat in 1931.
She attempted suicide a second time in 1935 with sleeping pills, an incident which Goertemaker says brought her and Hitler closer together.
Shortly afterwards he installed her at the mountain home - the Berghof - in Bavaria where she became his full-time mistress.
'She was loyal to him unto death,' she writes, 'and it was this unconditional loyalty which Hitler probably held in higher esteem than everything else.'
'Only my Shepherd dog and Ms. Braun are faithful to me and belong to me,' complained Hitler at the end of the war.
SOURCE: Daily Mail (UK) (2-10-10)
But for youngsters under the Third Reich, this board game was invented to teach them the tactics of warfare - against a British foe.
The war time amusement, Adlers Luftverteidigungs spiel, which translates as the Eagle Air Defence Game, involves two or more players attacking enemy positions on a geographically illustrated board while defending friendly territory.
Specifically designed in 1941 to prepare young members of the Hitler Youth 'for an attack on the Fatherland', the box illustration shows a British plane being shot down by a German gunner - indicating exactly where the manufacturers thought such an attack might come from.
Players take turns to roll a die with six symbols on it to decide the success or failure of each military move with points awarded for each successful military move.
A roll of a red cross means 'damage to people' - the highest scoring type of damage in the game.
As well as the die, the game comes with little model airplanes to symbolise aerial attacks.
Various positions on the board represent valuable bombing targets, in a similar way to Battleships, a game familiar to many British children.
Barrage balloons and flak guns helped defend the positions and the game was like a smaller version of the popular pastime of Risk.
The object of Eagle Air Defence was to attack airfields, barracks, gas and electricity works, iron works and radio stations.
And the instruction booklet included with the board and pieces explain that the game was 'developed by an officer of the Luftwaffe with the aim of the defence of our airspace.'
As well as providing entertainment for German children, it explains: 'Its more profound reason is to be prepared for an attack on the Fatherland.'
The game, which is due to be sold at auction for an estimated price of £100, was made in Dresden, the German city which was later subjected to a massive bombing campaign by the Allies.
It was designed to be played by over-12s - all of whom were compulsory members of the Hitler Youth - either two individuals, or two teams from the 150-strong 'Gefolgschaft' groups which met every week.
Children aged 10 to 14 were all members of the Deutsches Jungvolk division of the Hitler Youth.
Roy Butler, from Wallis and Wallis auction house in Lewes, East Sussex, said: 'It came in a box that is about A4 size and there is a picture on the front of a British plane being shot down.
'It's obviously designed for two players or teams and the object is to attack various installations while defending your own.'
He continued: 'The board looks as if you are looking down on top of an aerial photo, although it is a fictional town.
'There is a specially made dice, which is how you move around the board and there is also a booklet of instructions, which is of course in German.
'It is a very interesting item from the war.'
Last year it was revealed that German children collected Nazi photographs of Hitler and his generals like a Panini football sticker album during the war.
The images formed part of Joseph Goebbels's propaganda policy.
SOURCE: Daily Mail (UK) (2-10-10)
These dramatic images were taken by police photographers in helicopters and it is the first time they have been seen, having been released under a Freedom of Information request made by America's ABC News.
Burning buildings can be seen crumpling in on themselves as plumes of smoke rise up over the New York skyline that terrible September morning.
The images show how the police helicopter first began taking images from afar before moving in to reveal the devastation taking place underneath.
They also reveal the horror faced by those trapped in the burning buildings and then the walls of smoke and debris that enveloped the surrounding area as the towers came crashing down.
Released more than eight years after the deaths of 2,752 people on that day, they are powerful reminders of the attack that led to wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Name of source: 2-11-10
SOURCE: 2-11-10 (12-31-69)
Experts will travel in March to southern Mexico and Guatemala to carry out research with priests in Mayan communities, amid fears that sects may capitalize on the theories to sway potential followers.
The recent movie directed by Roland Emmerich refers to Mayans and the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, which was engraved on a stone discovered in Coba in southeast Mexico, and comes to end on December 21, 2012.
Name of source: The Hindu
SOURCE: The Hindu (2-11-10)
The Archaeological Survey of India, the Central body that carries out excavations in the area, has been approached for setting up the museum. The State government is in the process of identifying land near the site of the remains.
No activity is permitted within 100 metres of any ASI excavation site that has historical importance. The Director General of Archaeology, after consulting with the Union Department of Culture, can permit setting up of a museum.
The 114-acre site, a long stretch of high ground extending from north to south, is rocky and unsuitable for cultivation. There have been a series of excavations beginning in 1876.
SOURCE: The Hindu (2-10-10)
The Srivilliputhur palace was declared a protected monument in 1921, but since the local district courts were functioning in the palace, it could not be reclaimed till the courts vacated the premises. The palace is spread over 15,000 sq.ft. and has two halls — the bigger one about 3,600 sq. ft and a smaller one of approximately 2,100 sq.ft and a few smaller rooms.
The ASI is investigating literature from 1623 to find any reference to the palace. A seal of the Queen on the ceiling of the main hall names the place as “Thirumal Naik’s Hall, Srivilliputhur Taluk Cutchery. Decorated in the jubilee year 1887 – of Her Most Gracious Majesty, Victoria, The Empress of India.” A second English writing, of a much later era, commemorates the death of eight persons from the village in World War 1: “From this village 52 men went to the Great War 1914-1919. Of those 8 gave up their lives.”
The local courts vacated in 2008 after the government constructed new buildings to house the courts. In fact, both the palaces of Thirumalai Naicker, in Madurai and Srivilliputhur, housed courts prior to Independence.
Name of source: Huffington Post
SOURCE: Huffington Post (2-11-10)
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton left Washington and headed to New York to be with her husband, who underwent the procedure at New York Presbyterian Hospital.
Stents are tiny mesh scaffolds used to prop open an artery after it is unclogged in an angioplasty procedure. Doctors thread a tube through a blood vessel in the groin to a blocked artery, inflate a balloon to flatten the clog, and slide the stent into place.
That is a different treatment from what Clinton had in 2004, when clogged arteries first landed him in the hospital. He underwent quadruple bypass surgery because of four blocked arteries, some of which had squeezed almost completely shut.
Name of source: NYT
SOURCE: NYT (2-10-10)
The original manuscript, a diary from the mid-1800s, was written by Francis Terry Leak, a wealthy plantation owner in Mississippi whose great-grandson Edgar Wiggin Francisco Jr. was a friend of Faulkner’s since childhood. Mr. Francisco’s son, Edgar Wiggin Francisco III, now 79, recalls the writer’s frequent visits to the family homestead in Holly Springs, Miss., throughout the 1930s, saying Faulkner was fascinated with the diary’s several volumes. Mr. Francisco said he saw them in Faulker’s hands and remembers that he “was always taking copious notes.”
Specialists have been stunned and intrigued not only by this peephole into Faulkner’s working process, but also by material that may have inspired this Nobel-prize-winning author, considered by many to be one of the greatest American novelists of the 20th century....
SOURCE: NYT (2-9-10)
But this glamorous literary campaign was suddenly marred by an absolute philosophical truth: Mr. Lévy backed up the book’s theories by citing the thought of a fake philosopher. In fact, the sham philosopher has never been a secret, and even has his own Wikipedia entry.
In the uproar that followed over the rigors of his research, Mr. Lévy on Tuesday summed up his situation with one e-mailed sentence: “My source of information is books, not Wikipedia.”
Despite his celebrity as a philosopher, Mr. Lévy has a long history of fending off critics who have attacked his research. In the United States, where Mr. Lévy published “American Vertigo,” his version of traveling in the footsteps of Alexis de Tocqueville, Garrison Keillor wrote a scorching critique in The New York Times Book Review in 2006 citing “the grandiosity of a college sophomore, a student padding out a term paper.”
The blunder particularly resonated in Paris, where Mr. Lévy is a ubiquitous presence on talk shows and in magazines, and is known simply as B.H.L.
In his newest book, Mr. Lévy attacked the 18th-century German philosopher Immanuel Kant as a madman, and in support cited the Paraguayan lectures of Jean-Baptiste Botul to his 20th-century followers.
In fact Mr. Botul is the longtime creature of Frédéric Pagès, a journalist with the satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaîné. “We’ve had a big laugh, obviously,” Mr. Pagès said of Mr. Lévy. “This one was an error that was really simple that the media immediately understood.”...
Name of source: Time.com
SOURCE: Time.com (2-11-10)
Melville, an indigenous child placed in the care of her great-aunt after her birth mother lost custody of her in 2001, was not likely to have been crying out of fear of abandonment, but out of sheer agony. She had a festering bone infection from a three-week old fracture in her right leg, which had already spread to her organs. The following morning, according to reports, Deborah was carried outside by her carers — apparently at her own request — and for eight hours she lay dying in the backyard. An autopsy revealed that one and a half liter of pus was found in her right leg. One doctor described the case as the worst bone infection he had ever seen....
...[T]he Aboriginal Child Placement Principle (ACPP), a guideline instated in 1983 to avoid another Stolen Generation scenario, is problematic. Responding to the painful legacy of old laws in which children were forcibly removed from their families and placed thousands of miles away in white Australian homes, the ACPP stipulates that Aboriginal children removed by the state from their parents should be placed with family members or other indigenous Australians whenever possible. But it's a system, the study shows, that is failing the children it was designed to protect. "The present data suggests, as do some of the decisions in the case studies, that in some cases this principle appears to be given primacy over basic child protection considerations," Bath told the Australian.
Name of source: Die Spiegel (Germany)
SOURCE: Die Spiegel (Germany) (2-11-10)
It was Rose Monday in the German city of Cologne and the festivities for the 1934 Carnival were well underway. Of the many floats taking part in the traditional parade, one featured a group of men dressed up as orthodox Jews. The banner above them read "The Last Ones Are Leaving." This was, after all, Carnival under the Third Reich.
The float was one of the many expressions of anti-Semitism marking the German Carnival season during the years leading up to World War II. Another float from 1935 seems a terrible harbinger of the Holocaust to come. In Nuremberg, where the infamous anti-Semitic race laws would be introduced later that year, a papier-mâché figure of a Jew hung from a bar on a model mill as if on a gallows.
Yet until recently, it has been almost taboo to speak about Germany's Carnival and the Nazis in the same breath. Carnival, the pre-Lent festival celebrated in the predominantly Catholic west and south of Germany, displays the cheerful, humorous, raucous side of Germany. Nothing could seem further removed from the horrors perpetrated by Hitler's regime.
Yet, the Nazis "quickly realized the potential of Carnival," says journalist and historian Carl Dietmar. He and fellow historian Marcus Leifeld have shed a spotlight on this aspect of Nazi Germany in their new book "Alaaf and Heil Hitler: Carnival in the Third Reich." Trawling the carnival organizations' own archives, they have uncovered the extent to which the Nazis managed to exert control over the festival.
'Suprisingly Heterogenous'
The Nazis saw that the tradition of Carnival could be used to portray their notions of the German Volk or nation. Yet its anarchic fun and potential to mock those in power was something they sought to strictly control. Right from the beginning of the Nazi regime in 1933, there were orders not to mention Hitler during the festivities. And the many officials charged with putting on the festival -- the presidents of the committees, the so-called Büttenredner (carnival speakers) and those designing the floats -- were all careful to obey that order.
On the whole, the Nazification of the tradition was a gradual and incomplete process. The question of just how Nazified Carnival became varied from club to club and town to town. "It is surprising how heterogeneous it was," Leifeld told SPIEGEL ONLINE. Those in charge of Carnival reflected the wider society: There were convinced Nazis and people who just went along with things. There were also disputes within the clubs, though they rarely reflected any fundamental questioning of the Nazi ideology; mostly they were disagreements on how much tradition should be kept and how far things should be changed to reflect the new era.
The authors also debunk a long-cherished myth that in Cologne, carnival organizers had somehow resisted being taken over by the Nazis. The infamous Narrenrevolte ("Jesters' Revolt") of 1935, which saw the local committee refusing to be taken over by the Nazi leisure organization Kraft durch Freude, was merely a way of holding onto power and to the sizeable profits that accrued during the festival, Dietmar told SPIEGEL ONLINE. Similarly, the president of the Cologne Carnival committee had been a member of the Nazi party since 1932 -- but that didn't prevent him from returning to the helm of organizing the annual event after World War II.
Paying the Ultimate Price for Defiance
Yet there were some rare instances of defiance. For example, one Carnival group in Frankfurt dared to print posters in a newspaper depicting the Führer as a Carnival jester. A team of Nazis was immediately sent out to destroy the club's float and arrest the editors, who spent three weeks in prison.
The famous Cologne Carnival speaker Karl Küppner also fell foul of the authorities after making one too many jokes about the Nazis. During one speech, he stuck out his hand to do the Hitler salute and quipped: "Looks like rain." Küppner ended up in jail and was barred from making any more speeches.
And the president of Düsseldorf's Carnival committee, Leo Statz, paid the ultimate price for his irreverence. He had repeatedly annoyed the Nazis with his satirical Carnival songs and in 1943, after drunkenly questioning whether Germany could win the war, he was arrested by the Gestapo and eventually executed.
Nonetheless, these were the exceptions. On the whole there was a large degree of compliance with the regime. "There were jokes in almost every Carnival speech about Jews as well as other enemies, such as the French or Russians," says Dietmar. Many of the floats mocked the League of Nations, and favourite hate figures were American politicians, such as New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, whose mother was Jewish.
'Less Humor and More Pomp'
However, the Nazis were also wary of the Carnival tradition of cheeky disobedience to the powers-that-be. Largely organized by the lower middle classes, Carnival had traditionally been one of the few ways of expressing criticism of authoritarian rulers. The Nazis made every effort to reign in the unruly aspects of the festival. They placed emphasis on the organized parade, and discouraged the street party aspect of the festivities. During Carnival time, pictures of Nazi leaders had to be taken down for fear they might be defaced by drunken revelers.
The Third Reich tried to turn the celebration into another kind of performance, akin to the rallies Nazis so excelled at. Their carnivals had "less humor and more pomp," says Leifeld. For example, the so-called Prince's Proclamation, which even today still ushers in the Carnival, was a Nazi invention. They also discouraged the traditional cross-dressing, with its connotation of homosexuality. Gone was the tradition of a man dressing up as a lady as part of the trio that leads the Cologne parade. From 1936 on, these roles were played by Fräuleins only.
For the regime, Carnival was a useful propaganda tool to the outside world. There were repeated references to the jobs created and the boost to the economy. The Nazis launched an advertising campaign to attract foreign tourists and to show the country in a favorable light and to show the "peaceful Germans, who didn't want war, but just wanted to have fun," says Leifeld.
The campaign worked, with many foreign tourists travelling to Germany for Carnival, particularly from the Netherlands. Over 1 million guests are thought to have visited Cologne for the last Carnival before the war in 1939.
A Desire to Know About Everyday Life
The history of Carnival is in many ways a reflection of the process by which the Nazis took over society as a whole, says Leifeld. It was slowly but surely, rather than a complete overnight transformation in 1933, when the Nazis came to power. The gradual exclusion of the Jews from carnivals is indicative of this process. Since the 19th century, many Jews had played a prominent role in carnivals, for example in Koblenz and Freiburg, and Jews had even founded their own Carnival club in Cologne in 1922. Yet after 1930 the president of that club emigrated to Los Angeles, and by 1935 each club had to declare that it was completely Aryan.
It is only in the past 10 years or so that people have started to show an interest in this forgotten aspect of German history, rather than wishing to sweep it under the carpet, says Dietmar. People in Cologne and the rest of Germany want to know about everyday life in the Third Reich, and about what things were like locally, Leifeld says.
The history of Carnival shows in some way that Nazis were not outsiders who suddenly imposed their regime on Germany in 1933, but that it was a gradual process of "turning the screw" until society became Nazified, Leifeld argues.
"They weren't aliens from outer space," he says. "They were part of the society."
Name of source: BBC Radio 4
SOURCE: BBC Radio 4 (2-11-10)
There is something strangely prurient about wandering round an abandoned television studio.
Spliced cables and cut wires splay inelegantly from walls and skirting boards and the carpet, no longer able to hide its modesty behind the heavy bookcases of the tape library, reveals dark stains and a thick dust.
Stripped of its camera - that all-seeing eye into which I have stared so many times - I feel at an unfair advantage, as if I am exploiting this room's sudden weakness.
Already harvested of anything of worth, the studio can only hint at its history with the litter that has been left behind: a small plastic ear-piece, a broken biro and a crumpled paper sign warning guests not to fiddle with the volume knobs.
Reporting history
Sitting on my desk, among all the boxes, is a yellowed copy of Ariel, the BBC in-house newspaper, dating back from December 14, 1988.
PARIS BUREAU OPENED! reads the triumphant headline.
A two-page story follows, boasting of the hi-tech, expanded office with its new, "very exciting" camera, making BBC Paris the first television-capable bureau on the Continent.
Its radio history, of course, goes back far further.
At one end of our newsroom is a huge wall painting by Jean Cocteau.
“ Ten years ago, a former colleague here discovered the bureau's considerable archives. ”
Each time the artist visited the bureau to do an interview, he brushed in a little bit more, a thank-you present he said, for the BBC's role in the Second World War.
The painting is still as good as new today, despite a cleaning lady's zealous efforts to scrub away what she believed to be disfiguring graffiti.
Ten years ago, a former colleague here discovered the bureau's considerable archives.
The type-written despatches tell stories of a post-war, hard-up Paris, of the student riots of '68 where the correspondent dutifully reported he had just been kicked in a most sensitive place and of the time the British ambassador had to vouch for an indignant correspondent who had been locked up in the cells after demonstrations over the Algerian war.
Host of stars
There were legendary personalities too.
The formidable French woman who was the backbone of the bureau for nearly 35 years, the colleagues who despised each other so much that they would only speak through an intermediary, and an impressive number of gin-and-whisky-soaked staff who, by day, reported on France and who, by night, drank it dry.
I am quite sure this bureau itself is infused with the energy of these extraordinary tales and their tellers.
When we switch on the lights here, the sockets crackle and spark, alive with a wild voltage which no electrician has yet been able to tame.
This may be the shabbiest building on the smartest street in Paris but its clientele have made sure it has never been socially outclassed.
Up the sharp stairs have come hundreds of famous feet - political heavyweights like Jacques Chirac, Valery Giscard D'Estaing, Lionel Jospin.
During the 1995 presidential elections, two former prime ministers are said to have bumped into each other going out of the studio door. "Ah, the BBC," remarked one to the other, "The last political salon in Paris."
And the bureau has played "green room" to a host of stars from Serge Gainsbourg's Jane Birkin, to Charlotte Rampling, Jarvis Cocker and Sting.
Final transmission
Living life at such a full and fast pace has taken its toll on the place.
She is slightly tatty now, sagging a little at the window frames and decidedly rusty at the joints.
“ Before dusk tonight, the engineers will come to sever the transmission lines ”
A couple of years ago, the French economics minister Christine Lagarde paid her a visit and declared her to be looking "positively Third-World".
But she is fighting her retirement with everything she has got.
Three years ago, when the rumours first started that we planned to move premises, she reacted by bursting her pipes.
For months she dripped her resentment onto our heads, boiling over one day with a biblical flood.
Then she began sealing unwitting guests inside the radio studio, spitefully vacuum-packing them inside a sound-proofed world.
One little old lady, an expert on French cooking, went in to do a live broadcast for Woman's Hour in the morning. By the time she managed to get out, the PM programme was broadcasting the early evening news.
And when major construction works began in the building next door, rather than repel the noise as she had been built to do, the bureau chose to absorb and magnify every shake and shudder so that, every time we went on air, it looked and sounded as if we were on the front line.
Before dusk tonight, the engineers will come to sever the transmission lines.
And so I suppose this is the last broadcast from BBC Paris at Rue du Faubourg St Honore.
I should like to tell you, for posterity's sake perhaps, at precisely what time the red "on air" light was finally switched off.
But removal men are zealous workers. The clock has already been packed.
Name of source: Fox News
SOURCE: Fox News (2-10-10)
In 2005, 454 Life Sciences began a project with the Max Planck Institute to sequence the genetic code of a 30,000 year old Neanderthal woman. Now nearly complete, the sequence will let scientists look at the genetic blueprint of humankind's nearest relative, understand its biology and maybe even create a living person.
The work is possible today thanks to vast increases in computing power over the past few years. 454's Thomas Jarvie told the magazine, "Six years ago if you wanted to sequence E. coli... it would have taken one or maybe two million dollars, and it would have taken a year and 150 people. Nowadays, one person can do it in two days."
The restoration of DNA tens of thousands of years old has been challenged by chemical changes, breakdown of the biological matter and contaminants. And once the DNA sequencing is complete, creating a clone from it is still an inexact science.
SOURCE: Fox News (2-10-10)
Spurred by his younger brother Ron's recent appearance on Joy Behar's Headline News show, Michael Reagan, a Republican strategist, issued a written statement Wednesday saying his father would've supported the movement.
"I believe he would embrace the Tea Party Movement, if he were alive today, and support the work of Sarah Palin, Scott Brown and others who espouse conservative principles, who are opening up the eyes of the public to what is happening to our nation," said Michael Reagan, who runs Reagan PAC, which supports candidates in the Reagan mold.
Ron Reagan, a liberal Democrat, told Behar last month that the Gipper, a conservative icon who would have turned 99 last weekend, would've been turned off by the modern Tea Party.
The public sibling rivalry follows the first National Tea Party convention held in Nashville last weekend in which Palin, the former Republican vice presidential candidate, was they keynote speaker, and a party at the Reagan Library commemorating the 40th president's birthday.
Name of source: AP
SOURCE: AP (2-9-10)
The agency added that civil registry documents confirm she was born on Feb. 2, 1885, in the village of Santa Rosa, where she continues to live.
The highest fully authenticated age was 122 years, 164 days by Jeanne Louise Calment, who died in 1997 in Arles, France.
SOURCE: AP (2-10-10)
The spokeswoman says Wilson died Wednesday of cardiopulmonary arrest.
Wilson represented Texas' 2nd District in the House from 1973 to 1996 and was nicknamed "Good Time Charlie" for his partying ways.
Name of source: Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs
SOURCE: Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2-10-10)
The Madaba Map – an ancient mosaic map in a church in Jordan from the sixth-seventh century CE, which depicted the Land of Israel in the Byzantine period, explicitly showed: the entrance to Jerusalem from the west was via a very large gate that led to a single, central thoroughfare on that side of the city.
Various evidence of the important buildings in Jerusalem that appear on the map has been uncovered over the years or has survived to this day – for example the Church of the Holy Sepulcher – but the large bustling street from the period when Jerusalem became a Christian city has not been discovered until now. The reason for this is that no archaeological excavations took place in the region due to the inconvenience it would cause in stopping traffic in such a busy central location.
Now, because of the need for a thorough treatment of the infrastructure in the region, the Jerusalem Development Authority has initiated rehabilitation work and is renewing the infrastructure in this area in general, and next to the entrance to David Street (known to tourists as the stepped-street with the shops) in particular. Thus it is possible for both archaeologists and the public to catch a rare glimpse of what is going on beneath the flagstone pavement that is so familiar to us all.
From his knowledge of the Madaba Map, Dr. Ofer Sion, excavation director on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, surmised that the place where the infrastructure will be replaced is where a main road passes that is known from the map. "And indeed, after removing a number of archaeological strata, at a depth of c. 4.5 m below today’s street level, much to our excitement we discovered the large flagstones that paved the street." The flagstones, more than a meter long, were found cracked from the burden of centuries. A foundation built of stone was unearthed alongside the street on which a sidewalk and a row of columns, which have not yet been revealed, were founded. According to Dr. Sion, "It is wonderful to see that David Street, which is teeming with so much life today, actually preserved the route of the noisy street from 1,500 years ago."
During the Middle Ages a very large building that faced the street was constructed on the stone foundation of the Byzantine period. In a later phase, during the Mamluk period (thirteenth-fourteenth centuries CE) elongated rooms were built inside this structure, some of which are vaulted; these were apparently used as shops and storerooms. It turns out that beneath this building – right below the street that runs between David’s Citadel and David Street and leads to the Armenian Quarter – is an enormous cistern, 8 x 12 meters and 5 meters deep, which supplied water to its occupants.
The Madaba Map is an 8 x 16 meter mosaic map that was built in a church in Madaba, Jordan and described the Land of Israel through the intimate knowledge the mosaic’s builder had of the country. The map depicts schematically all of the Land of Israel, with an emphasis on the Christian sites in it. Among other things that appear on the map are many of the churches they began to erect at this time when the city underwent a religious change from paganism to Christianity. The churches can be identified by the red roofs that are portrayed on the map.
The artifacts that were discovered in the excavations include an abundance of pottery vessels and coins and five small square bronze weights that the shopkeepers used for weighing precious metals.
Name of source: Lee White at the National Coalition for History
SOURCE: Lee White at the National Coalition for History (2-2-10)
On February 1, President Obama asked Congress for $161.3 million to fund the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for FY 2011, a $6.2 million cut from the FY 10 appropriated level of $167.5 million.
The President’s request includes $80,250,000 to enable the Endowment to fund grants in the study, preservation, public programming, and teaching of the humanities, including $2.5 million for a special initiative—Bridging Cultures—to enhance Americans’ understanding of their own cultural heritage as well as the cultural complexity of an increasingly interdependent world. An additional $14,050,000 is requested for matching grants, which leverage non-federal support for the humanities....
...President Obama [also] sent to Congress a proposed Fiscal Year 2011 budget request of $460.2 million for the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). The requested amount for NARA is a two percent decrease of $9.6 million from the FY 2010 appropriated funding levels of $469.8 million. The National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) would receive $10 million in grant funding, a $3 million cut from FY 2010.
Name of source: Global Arab Network
SOURCE: Global Arab Network (1-30-10)
Chairman of the Ruins Excavation Section in Aleppo Ruins and Museums Department Youssef Kanjo pointed out that the Syrian-Japanese joint expedition working in Didarieh Cave, northern Aleppo, unearthed lots of stony tools dating back to the Yabroudi civilization.
He added that excavation works included the part returned to the Musterian Civilization, as hundreds of flint and bony tools were used by the Neanderthal Man, to whom the Musterian Civilization belongs.
The Lebanese-Syrian expedition working in al-Nabi Huri, in Ephreen area, discovered the city's fence during the Byzantinean and Islamic eras. Kengo pointed out that the Syrian-Polish expedition working in Tel al-Qaramil, north Aleppo, discovered a circular bridge and number of circular adjoining houses and tombs dating back to the Bronze era.
Name of source: Discovery News
SOURCE: Discovery News (2-9-10)
The discovery of a new "missing link" species of bull dating to a million years ago in Eritrea pushes back the beef steak dinner to the very dawn of humans and cattle.
Although there is no evidence that early humans were actually herding early cattle 2.5 million years ago, the early humans and early cattle certainly shared the same landscape and beef was definitely on the menu all along, say researchers.
The telltale fossil is a skull with enormous horns that belongs to the cattle genus Bos. It has been reassembled from over a hundred shards found at a dig that also contains early human remains, said paleontologist Bienvenido Martinez-Navarro of the Universitat Rovira i Virgili in Tarragona, Spain. Martinez is the lead author of a paper reporting the discovery in the February issue of the journal Quaternary International.
