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: BBC
September 19, 2009
Thousands of Poles fled their homeland, many never to return, when their country was invaded by the Germans and the Russians during World War II. The Polish Armed Forces Memorial being unveiled later aims to commemorate their heroism.
It stands at the end of a broad, grassy avenue, and with every step you take, the giant bronze figures on top of a block of polished granite come more sharply into focus.
They each represent a specific branch of the Polish armed forces. A
Source: Telegraph (UK)
September 18, 2009
India's Gurkhas are preparing to unilaterally declare independence in a separate "Gorkhaland" state in the area around Darjeeling.
They claim they have been forced to take the step by decades of misrule which has siphoned away millions of pounds of government funds earmarked for them.
The Calcutta-based state government granted limited autonomy through the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council in 1988, but today's Gurkha leaders say it has no powers, and cannot even
Source: Telegraph (UK)
September 18, 2009
Angry French farmers dumped millions of litres of fresh milk next to one of France's most famous tourist sites on Friday to denounce the slumping cost of milk and an EU plan to end production quotas, which could further drive prices down.
The Medieval island monastery is one of the most visited sites in France and is next to the Normandy and Brittany regions, which are both big milk producers.
While the European Union strongly subsidises agriculture, milk farmers' grou
Source: Telegraph (UK)
September 19, 2009
Scotland's Lord Advocate Elish Angiolini has fiercely criticised a move by Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Mohmed al-Megrahi to proclaim his innocence.
Hundreds of pages of documents relating to the abandoned appeal by recently-freed Megrahi have been published on a new website.
But Elish Angiolini said she "deplored" his attempt to challenge his conviction though "selective publication of his view of the evidence in the media" after he had abandoned hi
Source: AP
September 18, 2009
A criminal investigation is focused on a 2006 decision by the Interior Department, then under Secretary Gale Norton, to award three oil shale leases on federal land in Colorado to a Shell subsidiary.
The U.S. Justice Department has launched an investigation into whether former Interior Secretary Gale Norton illegally used her position to steer lucrative oil leases to Royal Dutch Shell PLC, the company she now works for, officials with both departments confirmed to The Associated P
Source: AP
September 18, 2009
The only man convicted in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing posted his legal defense to the Web on Friday, saying he hopes it will help convince people he had nothing to do with the terrorist attack that killed 270 people.
Abdel Baset al-Megrahi said the 353 pages of legal arguments are part of an appeal of his conviction that was dropped shortly before he was released from a Scottish jail last month. The documents are particularly aimed at Scots and the families of the bombing's victims,
Source: The Times (UK)
September 19, 2009
The year was 1968 and as revolutionary fervour spread around the world a group of students stormed the president’s office at Columbia University in New York.
Fortunately these were sensible Ivy League radicals and their iconoclasm had its limits. Before things got out of hand they allowed two police officers in to remove the magnificent Rembrandt portrait hanging on the wall.
It disappeared into storage and a few years later was sold privately to a collector who never
Source: AP
September 18, 2009
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Friday lashed out at Israel and the West, questioning whether the Holocaust ever happened and claiming it was a pretext for occupying Palestinian lands, reiterating anti-Israel rhetoric that has brought him international condemnation.
The Iranian president said Israel was formed on a "false and mythical claim" and expressed doubts whether the Holocaust, when the Nazis killed 6 million Jews during World War II, was a "real event
Source: novinite.com (Sohpia News Agency)
September 16, 2009
A team led by Bulgarian archaeologist Prof. Nikolay Ovcharov has uncovered an enormous cult complex at the ancient Thracian city of Perperikon in the Rhodoppe Mountains.
The complex consists of at least 9 altars each 2 meters in diameter located on an area of 12 square km. They are dated back to about 1 500 BC thanks to objects discovered around them, which is about the time of Ancient Egypt and the civilization of Mycenae and Minoan Crete. This is the Late Bronze Age and the Early
Source: artdaily.org
September 18, 2009
JERUSALEM.- A section of a stepped street paved in stone slabs, going south in the direction of the Shiloach Pool was discovered in excavations conducted by the Israel Antiquities Authority in the Shiloach Pool Excavation at the City of David in the Jerusalem Walls National Park. The excavations are conducted in cooperation with the Israel Nature and Parks Authority, funded by the Elad Foundation, under the auspices of Prof. Ronny Reich of Haifa University and Eli Shukron of the Israel Antiquiti
Source: Virginia Gazette
September 16, 2009
JAMES CITY — Local archaeologists have discovered Argall Towne, a short-lived village that was the first suburb of nearby Jamestown.
The village was started in 1617 by Capt. Samuel Argall, then a colorful lieutenant governor of the colony. It thrived for three years, but his impetuous behavior led many of the settlers to move away to Martin’s Hundred near Carter’s Grove Plantation.
Alain Outlaw of Williamsburg-based Archaeological & Cultural Solutions has been sear
Source: Discovery Channel
September 17, 2009
An unprecedented miniature portrait of a young, resolute, sexy Alexander the Great has emerged during excavations in Israel, archaeologist announced this week.
Engraved on a brilliantly red gemstone, the finely carved tiny head portrait is estimated to be 2,300 old, possibly dating to after the Macedonian king's death in 323 B.C.
Less than a half-inch long, the gemstone was found by a University of Washington student in the remains of a large public building from the He
Source: MSNBC
September 17, 2009
MADRID - A Spanish judge on Thursday indicted three alleged ex-Nazi death camp guards who all lived for many years in the United States, charging them with being accessories to genocide and crimes against humanity.
Judge Ismael Moreno of the National Court issued international arrest warrants for Johann Leprich, Anton Tittjung and Josias Kumpf. The 18-page indictment says Kumpf apparently now lives in Austria and the other two are still in the United States...
... He sa
Source: The Daily Beast
September 18, 2009
Days before a visit to New York to address the United Nations, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is doing his best to isolate his country even further. Using a speech on Quds day, an anti-Israel holiday, Ahmadinejad questioned the Holocaust and blamed Zionists for using it as a false pretext for founding Israel as well. "If the Holocaust you claim is correct, why do you reject any research about it?" he said, according to the Los Angeles Times. "The Zionists are behind the ong
Source: The Daily Beast
September 17, 2009
A (relatively) miniature Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton—with the classic outsize jaws, long legs, and teensy arms—has been discovered in China, and is providing scientists insight into the evolutionary line that produced the beast that would someday inspire a million Halloween costumes. This scaled-down Tyrannosaurus ancestor, called Raptorex kriegsteini, was nine feet long and weighed only about as much as a human: 150 lbs. (A whippet compared to its descendant, which was nearly 100 times heavier a
Source: The Wall Street Journal
September 18, 2009
Poland's fears that it is becoming a second-class U.S. ally whose interests come after those of Russia were reinforced by Washington's decision to reorient its missile-defense plans away from Central Europe.
While Polish government officials gave a cautious and generally upbeat assessment of the change in U.S. strategy Thursday, many nonetheless were concerned by what the shift said about the changing focus of the Obama administration.
"I don't like this policy. It
Source: President Lincoln's Cottage (Alison Mitchell)
September 22, 2009
September 22, 2009 (Washington, DC) – Today, on the anniversary of the issuing of the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, President Lincoln’s Cottage launches their award-winning program, “Debating Emancipation,” in an online version. “Lincoln’s Toughest Decisions: Debating Emancipation” is an interactive program that puts students in the role of Lincoln’s closest advisors. Using letters and other historical documents students learn how they would advise the President on this controversial is
Source: NYT
September 18, 2009
Irving Kristol, the political commentator who, as much as anyone, defined modern conservatism and helped revitalize the Republican Party in the late 1960s and early ’70s, setting the stage for the Reagan presidency and years of conservative dominance, died Friday in Arlington, Va. He was 89 and lived in Washington.
His son, William Kristol, the commentator and editor of the conservative magazine The Weekly Standard, said the cause of death was complications of lung cancer.
Source: News9.com (OK)
September 16, 2009
Only one in four Oklahoma public high school students can name the first President of the United States, according to a survey released today.
The survey was commissioned by the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs in observance of Constitution Day on Thursday.
Brandon Dutcher is with the conservative think tank and said the group wanted to find out how much civic knowledge Oklahoma high school students know.
The Oklahoma City-based think tank enlisted nation
Source: Times (UK)
September 18, 2009
More than 100 veterans of the Battle of Arnhem are travelling this weekend to the southern Dutch city to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the heroic and doomed struggle to capture and hold the “bridge too far”. It may be the last such commemoration.
The dwindling number of survivors among the thousands of British and Polish soldiers who parachuted into Arnhem or arrived by glider will be honoured by Dutch officers, children and some of the elderly civilians who sheltered the Alli
