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: Nicholas Wade in the NYT
February 9, 2009
Darwin’s theory of evolution has become the bedrock of modern biology. But for most of the theory’s existence since 1859, even biologists have ignored or vigorously opposed it, in whole or in part.
It is a testament to Darwin’s extraordinary insight that it took almost a century for biologists to understand the essential correctness of his views.
Biologists quickly accepted the idea of evolution, but for decades they rejected natural selection, the mechanism Darwin prop
Source: IHT
February 8, 2009
It's well known that Charles Darwin's groundbreaking theory of evolution made many people furious because it contradicted the Biblical view of creation. But few know that it also created problems for Darwin at home with his deeply religious wife, Emma.
Darwin held back the book to avoid offending his wife, said Ruth Padel, the naturalist's great-great-granddaughter. "She said he seemed to be putting God further and further off," Padel said in her north London home. "B
Source: NYT
February 7, 2009
WHEN the world entered the digital age, a great majority of human historical records did not immediately make the trip.
Literature, film, scientific journals, newspapers, court records, corporate documents and other material, accumulated over centuries, needed to be adapted for computer databases. Once there, it had to be arranged — along with newer, born-digital material — in a way that would let people find what they needed and keep finding it well into the future.
Th
Source: Times (UK)
February 10, 2009
As millions of Iranians prepared for revolution, and tension mounted on the streets of Tehran, the British Ambassador had a more urgent matter in mind: Margaret Thatcher’s hair.
Secret correspondence from 1978 released by the National Archives shows that Sir Anthony Parsons was desperate to reassure the British Government that its interests would be safe under the weakening rule of the Shah.
He was distracted, however, by Mrs Thatcher, the Leader of the Opposition, wh
Source: BBC
February 10, 2009
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said he would welcome talks with the US as long as they were based on "mutual respect".
Speaking on the 30th anniversary of the Islamic revolution in Iran, he said Iran would welcome change from the US as long as it was "fundamental".
Mr Ahmadinejad has previously said the US must apologise for past "crimes" against Iran.
The two nations cut ties in 1979 after the US-backed Shah was
Source: BBC
February 10, 2009
A court in Belgium is to decide whether to proceed with the prosecution of two Rwandan generals in a case which has sparked a diplomatic row.
The two are accused of involvement in shooting down the plane carrying the Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana, which triggered the 1994 genocide.
Rwanda has set up its own commission of inquiry into its charges that France backed the militias who slaughtered some 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
Rwanda
Source: BBC
February 10, 2009
European Union peacekeepers in Bosnia have been searching houses belonging to relatives of the former Bosnian Serb military leader, Ratko Mladic.
He is wanted by the UN to face war crimes charges in connection with the Bosnian conflict of the 1990s.
Local police and Nato troops joined the latest search, raiding homes belonging to the former general's sister and sister-in-law near Sarajevo.
The BBC correspondent in Belgrade, Helen Fawkes, says a number of
Source: BBC
February 10, 2009
A South African TV station erroneously broadcast that former US President George Bush had died during one of its news bulletins.
For three seconds ETV News ran a moving banner headline across the screen saying "George Bush is dead".
The "misbroadcast" happened when a technician pressed the "broadcast live for transmission" button instead of the one for a test-run.
The mistake happened when a senior staff member wanted to see
Source: Telegraph (UK)
February 10, 2009
The Telegraph correspondent who covered the Iranian Revolution remembers the momentous events of February 1979.
They danced on the rooftops and they danced in the streets when back in 1979 national radio announced that the Shah of Iran had left the country. Even though it was ostensibly only for a holiday, no one believed he would be back.
He was the 78-year-old Ayatollah, Ruhollah Khomeini, who was credited with leading a "cassette revolution" by which his v
Source: CNN
February 10, 2009
The White House may be the official residence of the U.S. president, but it's only a temporary address. The former homes and libraries of presidents offer an inside look into the lives of the select few who served as the nation's leader.
As we witness a new leader take office and celebrate past commanders-in-chief on President's Day this month, CNN asked William Clotworthy, author of "Homes and Libraries of the Presidents," to recommend five places for travelers to see a v
Source: IHT
February 9, 2009
GREENHILLS, Ohio | When people talk about green architecture as though it were a new movement, Greg Strupe, a 47-year-old factory worker, just laughs. Strupe lives with his family in one of the first green towns in the United States, built during the Great Depression by unemployed men and women and championed by Franklin D. and Eleanor Roosevelt.
This 1938 village, along with Greenbelt, Maryland, and Greendale, Wisconsin, was created to move struggling families out of nearby cities
Source: Spiegel Online
February 9, 2009
Bishop Richard Williamson's denial of the Holocaust has done serious damage to the Catholic Church. In an e-mail and fax exchange with SPIEGEL, the ultra-conservative bishop says that he is willing to "review the historical evidence."
SPIEGEL: The Vatican is demanding that you retract your denial of the Holocaust, and it is threatening to not allow you to resume your activities as a bishop. How will you react?
Williamson: Throughout my life, I have always soug
Source: Spiegel Online
February 10, 2009
The Egyptian Museum in Berlin is concerned that it may face fresh demands from Egypt that it return the world-famous bust of Queen Nefertiti following the emergence of new information on how Germany got the priceless ancient artwork.
SPIEGEL has seen the contents of a document written in 1924 in which the secretary of the German Oriental Company (DOG) gave an account of a meeting on Jan. 20, 1913 between a senior Egyptian official and German archaeologist Ludwig Borchardt, who found
Source: AP
February 8, 2009
WASHINGTON — The small, red Bible used to swear in Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Barack Obama will go on rare public display to mark the 200th anniversary of the 16th president's birth.
Beginning Thursday, the national Lincoln Bicentennial exhibit at the Library of Congress, "With Malice Toward None," will showcase the Bible, along with the first draft of the Emancipation Proclamation, what may be the original Gettysburg Address and even the grammar book Lincoln used to m
Source: AFP
February 9, 2009
Among the wealth of exhibitions being rolled out for the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth on Thursday, the Library of Congress has taken center stage.
To honor the 16th US president -- emancipator of the slaves, savior of the Union and victor of the Civil War -- the library is showcasing a collection of his letters, speeches and other miscellaneous items.
Kicking off the exhibit is an audiovisual history of Lincoln's legacy, concluding with images of the nat
Source: Politico.com
February 8, 2009
Thomas E. Ricks, the nation’s best-known defense correspondent, writes in a book out this week that many Iraq veterans believe the U.S. is likely to have “soldiers in combat in Iraq until at least 2015 – which would put us now at about the midpoint of the conflict.”
That would mean American forces would remain in danger past President Obama’s terms, into his second term if he wins reelection or the 45th presidency if he doesn’t.
Ricks, author of the bestselling “Fiasco,
Source: Time Magazine
February 4, 2009
February marks the bicentennial of Lincoln's birth. Bookstore shelves are sagging under the weight of new Lincoln tomes. Museums, galleries and lecture halls across the country and around the world have scheduled Lincoln programs. New pennies are being minted, old controversies revisited. And this already keen interest has been further stoked by what Lincoln Bicentennial Commission executive director Eileen Mackevich calls an "Obama wind." The new President, another slender fellow from
Source: AP
February 9, 2009
More than 50 years after her refusal to surrender her bus seat to a white woman set the stage for a similar act of defiance by Rosa Parks, Claudette Colvin is finally getting her due as a civil rights pioneer.
On March 2, 1955, the 15-year-old schoolgirl from Montgomery, Ala., was dragged off the bus by police, handcuffed and jailed. But her bold act drew little support from classmates — many of whom shunned her — or from the city's black leadership.
She went to court
Source: NYT
February 9, 2009
America’s new president has collided with this old reality: Washington likes some kinds of change more than others.
Consider the institution that is Representative John D. Dingell, a Democrat who has represented Detroit since 1955 and who this week becomes the longest-serving House member in history.
Mr. Dingell applauds President Obama’s drive to expand health care coverage, a cause that he and his congressman father before him have championed since Franklin D. Rooseve
Source: The Sunday times (Sri Lanka)
February 8, 2009
Carbonated drinks recovered from a vessel sunk off the coast of Sri Lanka have been confirmed to be 168 years old, say Ocean Archaeology officers conducting research on items found in the wreck of what has been dubbed the “Bottle Ship”.
The vessel - 23 metres long and six metres wide - was discovered two months ago. It is located 26 km off Kirinda, and lies at a depth of six metres. Iron, brass and brick props have been used to support the vessel, whose woodwork has deteriorated ov
