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: AP
July 13, 2009
The way swine flu multiplies in the respiratory system is more severe than ordinary winter flu, a new study in animals finds.
Tests in monkeys, mice and ferrets show that the swine flu thrives in greater numbers all over the respiratory system, including the lungs, and causes lesions, instead of staying in the nose and throat like seasonal flu.
In addition, blood tests show that many people who were born before the 1918 flu pandemic seem to have immunity to the current
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 14, 2009
The overnight steamboat, a majestic feature of the Mississippi since before the days of Mark Twain, has been forced off the river by the current recession after nearly two centuries of continuous service on the river.
This year, there are no river boats offering Mississippi cruises that come with night cabins and last more than a few hours.
It was in 1811 that the New Orleans, the first steamboat in western waters, was piloted down the Mississippi. For nearly two centur
Source: John Noble Wilford in the NYT
July 13, 2009
In memory, after all this time, Apollo resists relegation to the past tense. It is close to midnight, and the summer air is warm and still, no heavier than usual for Florida. We are driving toward a light in the distance. Its preternatural glow suffuses the sky ahead but, strangely, leaves the land where we are in natural darkness.
After the first checkpoint, miles back, where guards inspected our badges and car pass, the source of the light comes into view. The sight is magnetic, d
Source: NYT
July 13, 2009
At the end of the first chapter of John Updike’s “Rabbit Redux,” the title character, a fictional Pennsylvania everyman whose given name is Harry Angstrom, tunes in, like millions of his nonfictional fellow citizens, to watch the Moon landing on television.
Even though the Apollo 11 mission casts a long metaphorical shadow over the book, the second in what would ultimately become a quartet of novels about Rabbit, Rabbit’s experience of the epochal event of July 20, 1969, is curiousl
Source: Salt Lake Trib
July 14, 2009
In yet another twist in the widening crackdown on illegal artifact trafficking, a 44-year-old Blanding man has been charged with threatening to beat up the undercover informant in the case with a baseball bat.
Charles Denton Armstrong, shackled and guided by U.S. marshals, appeared before a federal magistrate Monday on the felony retaliation charge.
Armstrong allegedly told a federal agent that he didn't want to kill the undercover operative, he just "wanted to hur
Source: Canada.com
July 14, 2009
Archeological sites closer to the U.S. border appear more likely to be looted as Americans face stricter penalties for such crimes back home, says an unpublished report for Canadian Heritage.
Researchers with the Snuneymuxw First Nation said last month that they were holding off on going public about artifacts they've uncovered, fearing that thieves would get to the archeological site before work was complete.
The 2001 report Research on Looting of Canada's Archeologica
Source: National Geographic
July 14, 2009
After nearly 30 years in the field, archaeologist Leonardo López Luján may be on the verge of the discovery of a lifetime: the only known tomb of an Aztec king.
An air of excitement has been thickening around Mexico's Templo Mayor (Great Temple) since 2006, when excavations near the temple revealed a stone monolith with a carving of an Aztec goddess.
Recently the anticipation intensified with the discovery of a richly decorated canine skeleton near a sealed entrance.
Source: Ansa
July 14, 2009
The world's largest haul of ancient coins has been restored and will be put on view to the public shortly.
The 108,000 Roman coins were found by chance in Libya in 1981 but were in such poor condition that it has been impossible to adequately restore them until recently.
Now Italy's Institute for Technologies Applied to Cultural Heritage (ITABC) has acquired the means to do it, using instruments such as the DPAA (Deep Proton Activation Analysis), a non-invasive analysin
Source: Littleabout.com
July 14, 2009
A team of experts has discovered a six-kilometer-long lava cave system on Easter Island thought to have been used as a refuge by the islands inhabitants during the 16th century.
According to a report in The Santiago Times, the team confirmed that it is the largest cave on the island and the 11th-largest in the world in terms of area
Source: CNN
July 14, 2009
Ben Steele hated the young man as soon as he saw him.
The man's almond-shaped eyes, dark hair and olive skin -- Steele had seen those Asian facial features before.
He saw that face when he watched Japanese soldiers behead sick men begging for water, run over stumbling prisoners with tanks and split his comrades' skulls with rifle butts.
"Men died like flies," Steele says. "I thought for a while I would never make it."
Steele
Source: Deutsche Welle
July 14, 2009
Horst Koehler Tuesday became the first German president to take part in the annual military parade to mark the Bastille Day celebrations in France. A day earlier, more than 300 cars were set on fire in riots in Paris.
Along with Koehler, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was invited as a special guest for the annual military parade in Paris.
The parade is one of the grand occasions in the French calendar and marks the storming of the Bastille fortress in 1789, tradit
Source: http://www.fox10tv.com
July 13, 2009
It's a day Annie Ruth Owen thought would never come; the day she'd
bury her first husband.
Her husband, Lt. Woodie McVay, has been listed as missing in action
since 1944. The 26 year old Navy fighter pilot was shot down over the
Pacific during World War II."He gave his life willingly. He's a hero, in my book and a lot of
people's," said Owen.
Six decades passed before Lt. McVay's family, many of whom he never
laid eyes on, learned what happened to the young man considered a
Source: Discovery.com
July 10, 2009
Tuscan discovery was found almost intact in a cosmetics case
Italian archaeologists have discovered lotion that is over 2,000 years old, left almost intact in the cosmetic case of an aristocratic Etruscan woman.
The discovery, which occurred four years ago in a necropolis near the Tuscan town of Chiusi, has just been made public, following chemical analysis which identified the original compounds of the ancient ointment. The team reports their findings in the July issue
Source: Times (UK)
July 14, 2009
Screaming obscenities, a British soldier hauls the hooded Iraqi detainee off the floor and forces him to lean, legs bent, against a wall as other captives, sacks over their heads and wrists bound with tape, groan in discomfort.
The damning images, captured on an amateur-style video, were released for the first time yesterday at the opening of a public inquiry into the death of an Iraqi in British military custody in southern Iraq six years ago.
The hearing was also to
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
July 14, 2009
President Obama has ordered an investigation into an alleged massacre in Afghanistan amid claims that the Bush White House tried to cover up the atrocity.
Up to 2,000 Taliban fighters were reportedly killed after they surrendered to the US-backed warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum and his Northern Alliance troops in the early days of the Afghan War in 2001.
Although allegations first surfaced in 2002 that prisoners were deliberately left to suffocate in overcrowded con
Source: BBC
July 14, 2009
He denies 11 counts including terrorism, murder, rape and torture, at the Special Court for Sierra Leone.
The 61-year-old is accused of having armed and directed rebel groups from Liberia in order to seize control of Sierra Leone's diamond riches.
Mr Taylor is the first African leader to be tried by an international court.
"It is very, very, very unfortunate that the prosecution, because of disinformation, misinformation, lies, rumours would associa
Source: BBC
July 13, 2009
Most were interpreters, who say they were not given adequate protection from attack by extremist militias.
They claim they were owed a duty of care, and later this week will begin their legal actions in a bid to gain compensation from the UK.
The government says it has helped hundreds of Iraqis settle in the UK through an assistance scheme.
It also says "many thousands" of Iraqis have worked for British forces since 2003.
Source: History Today
July 13, 2009
The first part of the State Papers Online Project was completed last November when 200 volumes of papers containing a complete collection of the Domestic State Papers from Henry VIII to Elizabeth I became available online. Last Thursday, July 9th, to mark the 500th anniversary of Henry VIII’s accession to the throne, State Papers Online Part II was released online by Gale, part of Cengage Learning, in conjunction with The National Archives. The aim of the State Papers Online project is to create
Source: http://www.adnkronos.com
July 13, 2009
Archeological treasures including a Greek amphitheatre have been unearthed in the ancient city of Laodicea, which is being excavated in western Turkey. Local businesses have been working with regional leaders in the western province of Denizli on the project, the first of its kind in Turkey.
"Something has taken place here that is unseen in the rest of the country," Celal Simsek, head of the excavation team, told the Anatolia news agency.
"The industriali
Source: http://www.iomtoday.co.im
July 13, 2009
A PREHISTORIC dwelling – 3,000 years older than Stonehenge – has been unearthed during construction of the runway extension at Isle of Man Airport.
Dating back an astonishing 8,000 years to the time when the first human settlers returned to the Isle of Man after the end of the Ice Age, it is probably the oldest dwelling ever found in the Island.
Featuring the foundations of a strongly-built shelter, filled and surrounded by thousands of pieces of worked flint, the charred rem
