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: NYT
July 21, 2008
Senator John McCain was all but a sworn enemy of Senator Trent Lott, the former Republican leader.
Mr. Lott had quashed Mr. McCain’s most cherished legislative goals. And, worse, Mr. McCain believed that in the 2000 Republican primaries, Mr. Lott had spread rumors about his colleague’s mental stability on behalf of his rival for the nomination, George W. Bush.
But when Mr. Bush turned on Mr. Lott in 2002, helping to push him out of the leadership over a racially insensi
Source: Las Vegas Review-Journal
July 21, 2008
Late-night talk show host Jay Leno can make a history teacher flinch with his "Jaywalking" segment.
Random individuals stopped on the street appear stumped when asked who the Americans fought in the Revolutionary War.
They can be wildly off the mark in blaming the North Vietnamese for bombing Pearl Harbor. (It was the Japanese).
Carson City School Board member Joe Enge thinks it's because history education has been dumbed down.
Enge,
Source: HamptonRoads.com
July 21, 2008
Divers on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's new
41-foot catamaran were geared up and waiting to descend to survey the
U-701, the most intact of discovered U-boats sunk off the North Carolina
coast.
Boat captain Chad Smith, NOAA's East Coast vessel coordinator, slowed the
catamaran's motor and circled the position above where the wreck lay
mostly buried on the ocean floor about 22 miles off Avon."All right, guys, start moving toward the stern," dive master Tane
Source: AP
July 20, 2008
Papal apologies have been few in the long history of
the Vatican, though Benedict XVI and his predecessor John Paul II in
recent years have admitted errors by the church. Here are some examples:
Pope Benedict XVI
_ July 19, 2008: Said he was"deeply sorry for the pain and suffering" of
victims of child sex abuse by clergy in Australia.
_ April, 2008: Said he was"deeply ashamed" of the child sex abuse scandal
in the church and that the issue had sometimes been"very badly h
Source: BBC
July 21, 2008
We have just 100 months to act to prevent dangerous climate change, says
Andrew Simms. In this week's Green Room, he outlines plans for a"Green
New Deal" that could sort out the pressing problems we have with climate,
energy and the financial system."Too important to fail" is the message heard repeatedly from governments
stepping in and spending billions to prop up failing financial markets.
But all the time, another system - an atmosphere convivial to human
civilisation, that rea
Source: http://www.abc.net.au
July 21, 2008
Indiana Jones's next adventure may well be in front of a computer if
Hollywood scriptwriters decide to embrace a new approach to archaeological
research in war-torn zones.
David Thomas, a PhD student in La Trobe University's archaeological
program in Melbourne, has used Google Earth to safely uncover historic
sites in a remote part of war-torn Afghanistan.
Using the free internet resource, Thomas found up to 450 possible
archaeological sites in Registan, which borders Helmand
Source: Globe & Mail
July 19, 2008
It's a modern-day treasure hunt using ancient
documents and, to some, the prize is much more valuable than gold or
jewels.
Following an 18th-century English map and the journals of British
Commodore John Byron - the man who led the English conquest against the
Acadians - a Quebec archeologist thinks he might have found the village of
La Petite-Rochelle, the last settlement that Cmdre. Byron burned to the
ground."We're pretty confident that we've located the village that the Acad
Source: AP
July 20, 2008
As a boy, John Brown remembers traveling with
his family to the wooded hills in northwest Rhode Island where his fellow
Narragansett Indians gathered near stone piles they believe were left by
ancient ancestors.
That belief is now at the center of a struggle between the rural town of
North Smithfield and a developer who wants to build a 122-lot subdivision
on the land.
The town suspects the piles are burial mounds, and has filed a lawsuit
asking a judge to declare the land a
Source: New Yorker
July 25, 2008
On the morning of April 15th, a short video entitled “2008 China Stand Up!”
appeared on Sina, a Chinese Web site. The video’s origin was a mystery:
unlike the usual YouTube-style clips, it had no host, no narrator, and no
signature except the initials “CTGZ.”
It was a homespun documentary, and it opened with a Technicolor portrait
of Chairman Mao, sunbeams radiating from his head. Out of silence came an
orchestral piece, thundering with drums, as a black screen flashed, in
both Chines
Source: Time
July 20, 2008
Cambodia and Thailand will begin talks Monday
aimed at resolving a lingering dispute over territory near an World
Heritage Site temple, where more than 4,000 troops from the two sides have
been deployed.
Cambodia's mission at the United Nations has submitted a letter to the
chairman of the Security Council and the chairman of the General Assembly
to"draw their attention to the current situation on the Cambodian-Thai
border," Information Minister Khieu Kanharith said Sunday."Cambodia is no
Source: BBC
July 21, 2008
The village of Madar is perhaps an unlikely setting for a major scientific discovery that has been hailed as a 'new frontier' for the Middle East.
Tucked away in the heart of rural Yemen, Madar now finds itself in the limelight after a series of dinosaur prints were discovered in the village - the first such discovery on the Arabian Peninsula.
The dinosaur tracks have been lying exposed, above ground, for centuries, but scientists only recently stumbled across them followin
Source: Salon
July 21, 2008
Dinko Sakic, the last known living commander of a World War II concentration camp, died overnight in a Croatian hospital while serving a 20-year sentence for war crimes, officials said Monday. He was 87.
Sakic — a former chief of Croatia's infamous Jasenovac camp — died in a hospital in Zagreb, Justice Ministry spokeswoman Vesna Dovranic told The Associated Press.
Sakic had heart problems and had been receiving treatment at a prison hospital, but he was recently transfe
Source: Guardian (UK)
July 21, 2008
More than 600 people paid their respects yesterday to captain David Harold Kouba, an Iowa man whose dangerous life led him from crop-dusting in Mississippi and Australia to flying missions from 1968 to 1975 during the Central Intelligence Agency's "secret war" in Laos.
It was Kouba who flew general Vang Pao, the CIA's top Hmong leader, out of the agency's embattled headquarters at Long Cheng. A program distributed with services explained:
"On May 14, 1975
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 20, 2008
Germany's bitter insecurities about its post-war militarism have been highlighted at a controversial torch-lit ceremony to swear in new soldiers in front of the Reichstag building in Berlin.
The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, made an eleventh hour decision to attend the ceremony, in which 500 new troops were inducted. But her decision was only made after heavy pressure from the German armed forces, which complained of a "shameful lack of interest" from politicians sensi
Source: McGuire Gibson in an email to IraqCrisis
July 18, 2008
[McGuire Gibson is Professor of Mesopotamian Archaeology, Oriental Institute, University of Chicago.]
I have just been comparing a satellite image from February 2003, when the Antiqutities organization was excavating at Umma, with one taken within the past month, June 2008. In the 2003 image, it is quite clear that looting that had been done in the 1990s and earlier was restricted to a very small part of the site, mainly on a part of the mound across from the front entrance of the
Source: WaPo
July 20, 2008
It could be seen as the sincerest form of flattery: Ask some activists on the left the kind of Supreme Court justice they would like to see a President Obama appoint, and the name you hear most is the same justice they most often denounce.
They want their own Antonin Scalia. Or rather, an anti-Scalia, an individual who can easily articulate a liberal interpretation of the Constitution, offer a quick sound bite and be prepared to mix it up with conservative activists beyond the marbl
Source: AP
July 20, 2008
The four dozen men in loincloths stopped repeatedly to toss the new boat into the air as they carried it through their village to shore.
Then they launched it ceremoniously into the Pacific Ocean. It was the first launch of a Tao fishing boat in seven years.
For decades the Tao aborigines of Taiwan's Orchid Island have used colorful canoe-like boats to net flying fish in the warm waters of the Pacific. But now more and more Tao men are migrating to Taiwan's cities to lo
Source: Politico.com
July 20, 2008
In the end, Barack Obama's campaign said “nein” to a speech beside the fabled Brandenburg Gate. Going ahead in the face of opposition from German leaders would have fed the “hubris” narrative.
So after two weeks of public debate, the campaign announced Sunday morning: “On Thursday, July 24, 2008, Sen. Barack Obama will visit Berlin, Germany. Obama will give a major speech on the historic U.S.-German partnership, and the need to strengthen transatlantic relations to meet 21st-century
Source: AP
July 18, 2008
Don't chow, bella! At least not on the steps of Roman monuments.
City Hall is banning all those enjoying a Roman holiday this summer from snacking near the sights in Rome's historical center with fines up to $80.
Officials say they want to preserve artistic treasures and decorum in a city that has millions of visitors every year.
The ordinance also bans the homeless from setting up makeshift beds and cracks down on drunks, litterbugs and nighttime revelers
Source: AP
July 20, 2008
Some pre-negotiation jabbing turned into a potentially damaging diplomatic incident Saturday when Brazil's foreign minister said rich countries' deception in trade talks reminded him of tactics used by Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels.
His comments drew a sharp rebuke from the United States, whose chief trade negotiator, Susan Schwab, is the daughter of Jewish Holocaust survivors. Her spokesman described the reference to Goebbels as "incredibly wrong."
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