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
July 25, 2009
Windows have been vandalised at the front of the Shakespeare's Birthplace tourist attraction in Warwickshire.
Brown paint was daubed on several windows and plaster work between Thursday evening and early on Friday, the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust said.
The trust, which looks after the Tudor house on Henley Street, Stratford-upon-Avon, said it had done a "good job" of cleaning it up, but marks remained.
Shakespeare's father owned the house at th
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 25, 2009
The Bush administration considered sending federal troops to arrest a group of terror suspects in Buffalo, New York in 2002.
The proposal, which would have risked falling foul of the US constitution if enforced, called on the president to deploy troops to make arrests on American soil for the first time since the Civil War.
The move was backed by Dick Cheney, the former vice president, who wanted the military to apprehend the men, who were suspected of plotting with a
Source: Agence France-Presse
July 25, 2009
The severed head of Ghanaian King Badu Bonsu II, who was executed by colonialists in the 1880s, was flown back home to a solemn traditional ceremony.
A group of tribal leaders who received the bottled head from Dutch authorities a day earlier, were met at Kotoka international airport by government officials and members of the beheaded king's clan on Friday.
Traditional prayers were said and libation ceremonies staged by tribal leaders to welcome home and invoke the spi
Source: TPM (Liberal blog)
July 23, 2009
On Sunday night, Dr. David McKalip forwarded to fellow members of a Google listserv affiliated with the Tea Party movement the image below. Above it, he wrote:"Funny stuff."Now, Tea Party activists trafficking in racist imagery are
Source: The Daily Beast
July 25, 2009
Was CNN president Jon Klein hoping for an off-screen Face Off with host Lou Dobbs? Klein sent "Lou Dobbs Tonight" staffers an email on Thursday saying that the controversy surrounding the legitimacy of President Obama's birth certificate—one of Dobbs' pet topics of late—is a "dead" story. In the email, Klein elaborated that CNN researchers had determined that Hawaiian officials tossed out paper documents in 2001—thus, Obama's long-form birth certificate no longer exists and a
Source: AP
July 24, 2009
Associates of the late Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa plotted to ambush a group of FBI agents during his 1962 trial in Nashville, newly released transcripts of federal grand jury testimony indicate.
Walter J. Sheridan, a Justice Department official, told the Nashville grand jury in March 1963 that Hoffa's supporters planned to trap the agents in an alley "and have a bunch of business agents waiting for them."
The grand jury testimony came at a time when the Justic
Source: AP
July 24, 2009
Crumbling sidewalks near the Jefferson Memorial are sinking into the Tidal Basin. Reflecting pools are filled with green, smelly water. And millions of visitors have trampled the soil into virtual concrete where grass can't grow.
The National Mall is in danger of becoming a national disgrace.
"It does not deserve the name 'National Mall,'" said Eleanor Holmes Norton, the city's nonvoting member of Congress. "We ought to call it something else until it loo
Source: AP
July 25, 2009
Despite the content of a letter bearing his signature, Gov. Charlie Crist does not want to share an anti-Semitic movie with all Floridians.
Crist's office sent a letter thanking John Ubele for providing the governor with a copy of the film "Jud Suss." The film is recognized as one of history's most incendiary.
The brief thank-you note was dated June 30 and bore the governor's automated signature. It praised Ubele's thoughtfulness and generosity and said Crist
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 24, 2009
The American Jewish Committee said on Friday it was suing the German branch of online retailer Amazon for selling books which it said questioned the Holocaust and "trivialised" the Nazis.
According to AJC research, around 50 works including "Der Auschwitz-Mythos – Legende oder Wirklichkeit ("The Auschwitz Myth – Legend or Reality") by Wilhelm Staglich were on sale on Amazon.de this month.
Some of these books, the AJC said, were classified by th
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 24, 2009
Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi has failed to declare the presence of 30 ancient tombs on his land, according to newly published recordings said to be of him.
The recordings allege Mr Berlusconi told escort Patrizia D'Addario of 30 Phoenician tombs at his Sardinia villa.
The tombs date from 300BC, a man said to be Mr Berlusconi was heard saying.
But officials say there is no record of him reporting any finds - a legal requirement for all Italians - and oppos
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 24, 2009
It was 100 years ago that Frenchman Louis Blériot became the first man to fly across the Channel.
The mustachioed aviation enthusiast and inventor was one of three pilots to respond to a public challenge to become the first man to achieve the feat.
The British newspaper magnate Lord Northcliffe had offered a prize of £1,000 to the first person to make the flight in either direction. But his two competitors – Hubert Lartham, a Franco-British
Source: Times (UK)
July 24, 2009
The Panzers are beginning to roll as Germany mounts its biggest operation in Afghanistan ahead of next month’s presidential elections. Having faced sharp criticism for opting out of major combat missions in the region, Germany is now deploying heavy artillery, Marder tanks and mortar fire to support an Afghan army push around the city of Kunduz. German fighter jets have also been firing missiles at Taliban positions for the first time.
Germans, in short, are in the middle of a shoo
Source: AP
July 25, 2009
The Bush administration in 2002 considered sending U.S. troops into a Buffalo, N.Y., suburb to arrest a group of terror suspects in what would have been a nearly unprecedented use of military power, The New York Times reported.
Vice President Dick Cheney and several other Bush advisers at the time strongly urged that the military be used to apprehend men who were suspected of plotting with al Qaida, who later became known as the Lackawanna Six, the Times reported on its Web site Fri
Source: AP
July 24, 2009
The dispute between Southern Methodist University and condominium owners over land for the George W. Bush presidential library is over.
SMU reached an agreement Friday with Gary Vodicka, who alleged that the university forced him out of his condominium to make way for the project and lied about its intentions. A settlement reached a day earlier with fellow condo owner Robert Tafel also was announced Friday. Terms were not released.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 25, 2009
The move marks the latest step in China's attempts to communicate its values and culture to the outside world.
The Communist Party has budgeted 45 billion yuan (£4 billion) to expand its overseas media, including a United States edition of the China Daily newspaper and several English newspapers and magazines.
The decision to launch an English platform for serious Communist Party thought was reportedly made by Li Changchun, one of the nine members of the Standing Commit
Source: BBC
July 24, 2009
A portrait of ex-serviceman Henry Allingham completed days before his death last weekend is being unveiled.
Artist Dan Llywelyn Hall, said it was an "enormous privilege" to have painted Mr Allingham, who at 113 was the world's oldest man.
His portrait will later be sold to raise funds for the ex-forces care home where Mr Allingham lived.
Source: BBC
July 24, 2009
Fragments of human and animal bones believed to be dating back to the time of the Blitz have been uncovered by children playing in Regent's Park.
The remains, along with burnt bricks, roof tiles and other debris were found in the central London park on 13 May.
Natural History Museum, which analysed the fragments, said the remains dated back to before 1941 and could have been deposited in the park after the Blitz.
Source: BBC
July 24, 2009
Old underground burial chambers in a Devon city could be used to store the bodies of swine flu victims if the outbreak worsens, a council has said.
Exeter City Council has identified the empty catacombs in Bartholomew Street as a potential mortuary.
The 19th century burial chambers are normally a tourist attraction.
Source: AP
July 24, 2009
A Turkish official says restoration workers have uncovered the never-before-seen mosaic face of an angel at Istanbul's Haghia Sophia — a former Byzantine cathedral.
The cathedral's Christian mosaics were covered up in line with Muslim custom shortly after Constantinople — the former name for Istanbul — fell to the Ottomans in 1453 and the cathedral was turned into a mosque.
Some of the mosaics were revealed after it was turned into a museum in 1935, but the angel image
Source: Politico.com
July 24, 2009
President Obama made a surprise appearance in the White House briefing room Friday to address the spiraling controversy over his comments on the Monday arrest of Harvard Prof. Henry Louis Gates by the Cambridge, Mass., Police Department.
Just hours after Cambridge police union officials called on Obama to apologize for saying the officers involved in the incident behaved "stupidly," Obama conceded that he erred in his "choice of words."
Obama said he
