This page features brief excerpts of 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.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
February 1, 2010
Nazi memorabilia collectors are expected to push the price for the diary and letters of the "Angel of Death" responsible for thousands of murders at Auschwitz to at least £40,000.
Infamous as Hitler's "Angel of Death", Mengele experimented on prisoners at the death camp without anaesthetic and became obsessed with twins, hoping to be able to clone perfect specimens of the Aryan race.
His diary's eclectic and often mundane contents include praise for
Source: AP
January 29, 2010
The last young backpackers flew away from Machu Picchu as clouds closed in again Friday, leaving Peru to grapple with flood damage that will close its top tourist site for weeks, or even months.
Torrential rains caused mudslides and swelled the Urubamba River on Sunday, stripping away long sections of the railway that is the only transportation in and out of the area around the Inca citadel. The road to the ruins from this village at the end of the train line also washed away.
Source: National Geographic
January 28, 2010
A thousand-year-old temple complex (including a tomb with human sacrifice victims, shown in a digital illustration) has been found under the windswept dunes of northwestern Peru, archaeologists say.
The discovery of the complex, excavated near the city of Chiclayo (map) between 2006 and late 2009, has injected a dose of reality into the legend of Naylamp, the god who supposedly founded the pre-Inca Lambayeque civilization in the eighth century A.D., following the collapse of the Moc
Source: CNN
February 2, 2010
Defense Secretary Robert Gates is expected to unveil the Pentagon's plan for rolling back the controversial "don't ask, don't tell" policy regarding gay and lesbian service members on Tuesday.
During last week's State of the Union address, President Obama made clear he wanted a change.
"This year, I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are,
Source: BBC News
February 2, 2010
A Polish court has issued a European arrest warrant for a Swede alleged to be behind the theft of the Arbeit Macht Frei sign from Auschwitz.
A court official in the southern city of Krakow said the warrant had been issued 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 European ar
Source: BBC News
February 2, 2010
US airline Continental and five individuals have gone on trial in France over the crash of an Air France Concorde nearly 10 years ago.
The jet took off in flames from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport and crashed minutes later, killing 113 people.
The presiding judge began the proceedings by reading out the names of all those who died.
An official report said Concorde had hit a metal strip from a Continental plane that had taken off earlier.
But
Source: Washington Post
February 1, 2010
Culpeper County public school officials have reversed an earlier decision to stop teaching a version of Anne Frank's diary that contains passages one parent found inappropriate.
School administrators said they would convene a committee this spring to review the book, in accordance with the school's policy of handling complaints about instructional materials. The earlier decision to exclude the book from classroom lessons had not followed the school system's policy.
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Source: MSNBC
February 1, 2010
More than 1,500 years before Christopher Columbus and his crew sailed to the New World, Native Americans had already domesticated turkeys twice: first in south-central Mexico at around 800 B.C. and again in what is now the southwestern U.S. at about 200 B.C., according to a new study.
The two instances of domestication appear to have been separate, based on DNA analysis of ancient turkey remains. However, the different Native American groups could have been in contact with each othe
Source: AP
January 29, 2010
The last young backpackers flew away from Machu Picchu as clouds closed in again Friday, leaving Peru to grapple with flood damage that will close its top tourist site for weeks, or even months.
Torrential rains caused mudslides and swelled the Urubamba River on Sunday, stripping away long sections of the railway that is the only transportation in and out of the area around the Inca citadel. The road to the ruins from this village at the end of the train line also washed away.
Source: CNN
February 1, 2010
Fifty years ago Monday, McCain and three other freshmen at North Carolina A&T University took a stand by sitting at the lunch counter in the national chain's Greensboro, North Carolina, store.
The store had no qualms selling toothpaste or light bulbs to blacks, but a cup of coffee at the lunch counter? Out of the question. The Greensboro Four, as they came to be known, were fed up.
McCain, Joseph McNeil, Ezell Blair Jr. and David Richmond were refused service Februa
Source: AP
February 1, 2010
A team of Polish scientists said Monday they have discovered three Neanderthal teeth in a cave,a find they hope may shed light on how similar to modern humans our ancestors were.
Neanderthal artifacts have been unearthed in Poland before. But the teeth are the first bodily Neanderthal remains found in the country, according to Mikolaj Urbanowski, an archaeologist with Szczecin University and the project's lead researcher.
Urbanowski said the teeth were unearthed in the
Source: Discovery News
February 1, 2010
One of history's greatest mysteries -- the family lineage of the boy pharaoh King Tut -- may soon be solved.
Zahi Hawass, chief of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, has announced on Sunday he would hold a press conference on Feb. 17 to reveal the results of DNA tests on the world's most famous pharaoh.
The long awaited announcement will be "about the secrets of the family and the affiliation of Tutankhamun, based on the results of the scientific examination
Source: BBC
February 1, 2010
Ministers were warned of a "serious risk" the military would not have all the equipment it needed to invade Iraq, the inquiry into the war has heard.
Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, the head of the armed forces, said defence chiefs "simply didn't have enough time" to source everything they wanted.
It would have made a "significant difference" if the military had been given six months, rather than four.
A shortage of body
Source: BBC
January 29, 2010
The first of the remains of 250 World War I soldiers found in France are being reburied with military honours after painstaking efforts to identify them. How do you put the right name on a headstone after so long?
Boots, purses, toothbrushes and other personal artefacts lay amongst the twisted skeletons at Pheasant Wood, offering partial clues about the men's identities.
But it is the unique genetic codes within these remains that offer the best chance of putting names
Source: BBC
February 1, 2010
This week, BBC News is running a series of articles about pioneering British computers and British computer pioneers. The series begins with a look at research into computers developed at GCHQ after the Second World War.
The influence of the 1939-45 war on the development of computers is well known. That conflict spurred the creation of pioneering machines such as Colossus at Bletchley Park and Eniac in the US.
Also, many of the engineers who contributed to wartime in
Source: Telegraph (UK)
January 30, 2010
No one may ever know how valiantly he fought. Nor how fearfully he faced his death on the battlefield.
But on a snow-capped hillside in northern France, a soldier who died in the carnage that was the Western Front during the First World War was finally laid to rest with full military honours.
His body, as yet unidentified, was the first of the 250 remains of soldiers that were found in mass graves at the site of the Battle of Fromelles, one of the most fiercely fought
Source: CNN
January 31, 2010
No decision has been made on whether to change the current plan to hold the September 11 terrorist attack trial in a civilian court in lower Manhattan, White House officials said Sunday.
Last week, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and other politicians expressed concern over the costs and disruption of holding the trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four accomplices at a New York City courthouse.
David Axelrod, the senior adviser to President Obama, and White House Pres
Source: CNS News
February 1, 2010
Next week’s anniversary of Iran’s Islamic revolution is shaping up to be a key indicator of the opposition’s resilience. The regime, in a continuing clampdown, last week executed two of 11 protestors who recently were sentenced to death.
On Saturday another 16 Iranians went on trial. They were arrested during the last round of protests, in late December, when hundreds of people were arrested and at least eight killed.
The semi-official Press TV news channel said that th
Source: CNN
February 1, 2010
The leading Republican in the Senate said Sunday that the previous Republican administration had been mistaken in ever trying alleged terrorists in civilian federal courts.
Instead of giving alleged terrorists civilian trials in federal court, McConnell said the administration should use the system of military commissions set up by Congress “for the specific purpose of trying foreigners captured on the battlefield.”
Asked whether he was ready to deny the White House the
Source: CNN
February 1, 2010
The last surviving U.S. veteran of World War I, former Cpl. Frank Buckles, turns 109 on Monday and is still hoping for a national memorial in Washington for his comrades.
Buckles is expected to deliver remarks during a quiet celebration Monday afternoon at his home in Charles Town, West Virginia.
But the old "Doughboy" -- as World War I American infantry troops were called -- has already been outspoken in recent years, urging congressional lawmakers to give fe
