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)
December 15, 2009
Jonathan Sumption QC, acting for David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, told the Court of Appeal: “I would go so far as to say their views were irresponsible.”
Mr Sumption said the two High Court judges had “charged in” when they decided that seven paragraphs summarising intelligence provided by the Americans should be published.
The Foreign Secretary is appealing against the decision but Mr Sumption said the material was no longer necessary because the documents were
Source: Azzaman (Iraq)
December 31, 2069
Iraq’s Tall Harmal, site of the old Babylonian city of Shadupum, has been left unguarded since the 2003-U.S. invasion of Iraq.
The site, in the outskirts of Baghdad, was fenced and seen as one of the country’s most important ancient landmarks prior to the invasion.
Only recently the Antiquities Department has remember Harmal, where Iraq’s most renowned archaeologist Taha Baqer had unearthed an ancient library of about 300 cuneiform documents in the late 1940s and early
Source: LA Times
December 31, 2069
The honorary degree UC Berkeley posthumously bestowed on William Fujioka is a precious validation for his family. He left college behind and enlisted to fight in WWII after his family was interned.
For a time, the Fujiokas of Los Angeles lived a life of almost unimaginable abundance for a Japanese immigrant family in the early 20th century. There were white mink stoles and a Steinway grand piano, beachfront property and vacations to Catalina, even enough money to sponsor an Indianap
Source: Inside Higher Ed
December 31, 2069
At the College of Holy Cross this year, language instructors had to scramble to set up a second section of introductory Russian -- for the first time since the Cold War.
Not only are more students enrolling, but different kinds of students. "Our core has always been those with a love of the literature and we are still getting them, but now we are getting students with all sorts of other interaction with Russian culture," said Amy Adams, associate professor of Russian.
Source: Washington Post
December 31, 2069
A huge, rare deep-blue diamond known as the Wittelsbach-Graff Diamond will join the other gems at the National Museum of Natural History for seven months next year.
The diamond, which weighs 31.06 carats, has not been on public display since an exhibition in Brussels in 1958. The museum announced Monday that the current owner, Laurence Graff, chairman of Graff Diamonds International, is lending the brilliant gem not only for exhibition but also research. Graff bought the diamond las
Source: AP
December 31, 2069
The History Channel is planning its first scripted series and will base it on the Kennedys.
The cable network says the eight-hour series is called "The Kennedys" and will be told in a multigenerational manner akin to "The Godfather." The network says the series will depict a manipulative, egocentric father living out his ambitions through his sons.
The personal drama of the clan will be included in the saga as well as the era's major events. Some of
Source: New Scientist
December 10, 2009
Signs of what could be a previously unknown ancient civilisation are emerging from beneath the felled trees of the Amazon. Some 260 giant avenues, ditches and enclosures have been spotted from the air in a region straddling Brazil's border with Bolivia.
The traditional view is that before the arrival of the Spanish and Portuguese in the 15th century there were no complex societies in the Amazon basin – in contrast to the Andes further west where the Incas built their cities. Now def
Source: Live Science
December 14, 2009
Dingoes were semidomesticated village dogs once, in Southeast Asia. Then, about 4,000 years ago, they got loose in Australia, where their behavior reverted to that of their ancestor, the wolf. They howl, live in packs, and fear humans.
But even after so long on the lam they've retained at least one mark of domestication: an ability to read human gestures.
At the tender age of four months, ordinary dogs will spontaneously investigate objects that we point to or even ju
Source: Live Science
December 11, 2009
Ancient Greeks living in Sicily built their sacred temples to face the rising sun, new research suggests.
Almost all of the temples constructed on the island of Sicily during its Greek period over 2,500 years ago are oriented toward the eastern horizon, according to a new study by Alun Salt, an archaeoastronomer with the University of Leicester, in England.
Though many temples on mainland Greece also line up with the sunrise, it is less frequent on the mainland than o
Source: National Geographic News
December 13, 2009
Today's recyclers can now conceivably lay claim to a rich, bloody, brawny heritage, if a new Viking discovery is any indication.
The famed Norse warriors, many of whom settled parts of eastern and northern England in the Middle Ages, recycled as they fought, new excavations in the United Kingdom suggest.
An 11th-century metalworking site recently discovered in the city of York (map) is likely evidence of a makeshift recycling center, where Vikings took weapons for rep
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
December 14, 2009
Even with a measure of gin and a slice of lime, it's likely to leave a bad taste in the mouth.
An ice cube tray has gone on sale in which drinkers can make a replica of the Titanic - complete with four icebergs. The product is called the Gin And Titonic Ice Tray.
The manufacturer says it allows drinkers to 're-create history' by making the two objects collide in the glass, but one critic has branded the idea 'sick and distasteful'.
Source: BBC
December 14, 2009
The chance to spend Christmas Day with up to 30 guests at Warwick Castle enjoying a seven-course banquet has been won in an auction for £27,000.
The castle was put up for private hire on the online auction eBay with a reserve price of £25,000.
It will be the first time in 31 years that Christmas has been celebrated at the castle, which is the only day of the year it is closed to the public.
The Earl of Warwick sold it in 1978 to the Merlin Entertainment g
Source: The Australian
December 14, 2009
THE makers of Rabbit Proof Fence yesterday rejected claims by historian Keith Windschuttle that the film lies about a government policy to "breed out" Aboriginality in the 1930s.
In the third volume of his The Fabrication of Aboriginal History, Windschuttle claims that two of the three girls the subject of the 2002 film were removed in 1931 for their own safety, because of alleged promiscuity with white station workers, not as part of a systematic breeding program.
Source: BBC
December 14, 2009
Tens of thousands of Palestinians have turned out in the Gaza Strip to celebrate the 22nd anniversary of the founding of the Islamist group Hamas.
Hamas leader Ismail Haniya said the organisation would not recognise Israel and would not stop fighting.
Supporters filled the streets, waving banners and portraits of assassinated Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.
The event comes almost year after a deadly three-week conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Source: AP
December 14, 2009
France on Monday handed over to Egyptian officials five fragments of an ancient wall painting at the center of a dispute between Egypt and the Louvre Museum.
President Nicolas Sarkozy showed one of the fragments — a pockmarked slab with sepia and blue tones featuring two figures in profile — to his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak on Monday, after the two men had lunch in Paris.
Egypt's antiquities czar Zahi Hawass cut ties with the Louvre in October, saying the famed
Source: WCVBTV (Boston)
December 14, 2009
A historical marker that commemorated the call to arms at the Battle of Lexington in 1775 was stolen late last week, town officials said.
The bronze plaque marked the location of the Old Belfry that was used to sound the alarm on April 19, 1775, at the beginning of the American Revolution.
The Old Belfry was originally built in 1762 and then moved to the Battle Green in 1768. Its bell was used to summon townspeople to worship or warn them of danger.
Source: New York Times
December 31, 2069
With brand management a focus of the new millennium and celebrity its obsession, could there be a better moment to study the pioneering image-maker of the Western world: Louis XIV?
From the heroic Bernini bust of the young French king in 1665, a noble face framed in tumbling curls; to the florid poseur in his coronation robes, painted by Hyacinthe Rigaud in 1701, Louis XIV was the role model for creating an image and a myth.
It is hard to believe that the palace at Vers
Source: Telegraph, UK
December 31, 2069
The remains of St Nicholas, the man who inspired Father Christmas, are buried at Jerpoint Abbey in County Kilkenny, Ireland, historians believe.
Experts claim that the philanthropist St Nicholas of Myra is entombed at the 12th century abbey after his body was moved there 800 years ago.
The saint, revered for his extraordinary generosity, lived during the 4th century and was Bishop of Lycia in what is now Turkey.
Due to his habit for leaving anonymous gifts
Source: Telegraph (UK)
December 31, 2069
Charles Darwin, who suffered poor health throughout his life, was the victim of a genetic vomiting illness, an academic has claimed.
Darwin often became a virtual recluse during the worst episodes.
Previous theories regarding the cause of his illness have included hypochondria or panic disorders, while others claimed the problems lay with ‘repressed anger towards his father’, nervousness about his relationship with his wife or guilt over conflict with his earlier religi
Source: MyCentralJersey.com
December 12, 2009
When Kim Ciak searched through her grandparents' attic to look for her late mother's Elvis Presley bubblegum cards, she instead, to her great surprise, found photographs -- wrapped in linen, stored inside a hope chest -- of Adolf Hitler and other high-ranking Nazis.
The slide-sized photographs, her grandmother told her, belonged to her late grandfather, Julius Dobrzynski, who served in the U.S. Army during World War II and whose duties included defusing live bombs.
Ciak
