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Nixon in Canada--Smiles. In US--Glowers.

Historic sign for WTC is being donated

On one street corner in Lower Manhattan, the World Trade Center is still spoken of in the present tense, confusing some passers-by, enlightening many others. “Now, every weekday, 50,000 people come to work in 12 million square feet of office, hotel and commercial space in the seven buildings in this city within a city,” says the seven-foot-high Heritage Trails New York sign at Church and Cortlandt Streets, opposite ground zero. “As many as 10,000 visitors in a single da

Bill Would Remove Doubt on Presidential Eligibility

Senator John McCain said Thursday that he had no concerns about his meeting the constitutional qualifications for the presidency because of his birth in the Panama Canal Zone. A Democratic colleague said she wanted to remove even a trace of doubt. The Democrat, Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri, introduced legislation that would declare that any child born abroad to citizens serving in the United States military would meet the constitutional requirement that anyone serving as pr

The most powerful campaign media bias isn't for a person

It's for a decade -- the 1960s, says William Powers [in the National Journal]. "If the race turns out to be Obama versus McCain, the obsession will only grow. Where Obama represents the RFK/MLK side of '60s culture, McCain, the former Vietnam POW, will become the embodiment of the anti-communist, warrior strain."

WH aide lifted passages for op-ed in Fort Wayne newspaper

Nancy Nall read White House employee Tim Goeglein's essay on education in Thursday's Fort Wayne News-Sentinel, then ran some of his passages through Google. She found that the Fort Wayne native borrowed from Jeffrey Hart's Dartmouth Review essay, "What is a College Education?" Nall writes: "My, my, my. Tim Goeglein, director of the White House office of public liaison, is a plagiarist. Not an accidental or delicate one, either."

Declassified Studies from Cheney Pentagon Show Push for U.S. Military Predominance

The United States should use its power to "prevent the reemergence of a new rival" either on former Soviet territory or elsewhere, declared a controversial February 18, 1992 draft of the Defense Planning Guidance (DPG) prepared by then Secretary of Defense Richard Cheney's Pentagon and leaked to The New York Times in March 1992. Published in declassified form for the first time on the National Security Archive Web site, this draft, along with related working papers, shows how defense o

Guiding your way through Texas's deeply confusing primary process

Up until about 30 years ago, Texas was a strong Democratic state, and presidential caucuses--the preferred system prior to 1976--were little more than local turf wars between the liberal and the conservative wings of the party establishment. According to Dr. Patrick Cox, Associate Director for Congressional and Political History at the University of Texas, prior to the 1970s, the Texas Democrats used the "unit rule," meaning that all delegates--often under the guidance of the governor-

Oldest hominid discovered is 7 million years old: study

French fossil hunters have pinned down the age of Toumai, which they contend is the remains of the earliest human ever found, at between 6.8 and 7.2 million years old. The fossil was discovered in the Chadian desert in 2001 and an intense debate ensued over whether the nearly complete cranium, pieces of jawbone and teeth belonged to one of our earliest ancestors. Critics said that Toumai's cranium was too squashed to be that of a hominid -- it did not have the brain cap

Region to commemorate Brown's raid

HARPERS FERRY — Four states and four counties have begun preparations to commemorate the 2009 sesquicentennial anniversary of abolitionist John Brown’s raid on the arsenal at Harpers Ferry. On the evening of Oct. 16, 1859, Brown led a group of abolitionists on a six-mile march from the Kennedy Farm in Washington County, Md., across the railroad bridge into Harpers Ferry and seized control of the town in order to steal weapons from the old federal armory so they could be used in the

Swedish Viking women dressed more provocatively than believed

Women who lived in the major Viking settlement called Birka in the 9th and 10th centuries dressed more provocatively than previously thought, according to a Swedish archaeologist. Uppsala University archeologist Annika Larsson has suggested that the ancient Vikings enjoyed wearing vivid colors, flowing silk ribbons and glittering bits of mirrors, with the men being especially vain, and the women dressed provocatively. "They combined oriental features with Nordic st

Researcher says Turkey Foot Rock is upside down

For decades Turkey Foot Rock has served as the Ohio Historical Society's monument to the role Native Americans played in the Battle of Fallen Timbers. And perhaps for decades it's been upside down, the result of careless moving around that no one noticed for 60 or so years until an amateur archaeologist from Columbus discovered it last year. Jim Murphy, a retired Ohio State University librarian who has a master of science degree in geology from Case Western Reserve University

One of George Washington's Philadelphia slaves is remembered

Although Oney Judge died 160 years ago, her life as one of George Washington's house servants has not been forgotten. A Philadelphia group helped to make sure of that yesterday outside the Liberty Bell Center, at 6th and Market streets, by honoring Judge in a ceremony that included a City Council citation and a proclamation from Mayor Nutter. A so-called Slave House memorial is planned to be built within a few feet of the Liberty Bell Center. The lead architect, Emmanue

1 in 100 U.S. Adults Behind Bars, New Study Says

For the first time in the nation’s history, more than one in 100 American adults is behind bars, according to a new report. Nationwide, the prison population grew by 25,000 last year, bringing it to almost 1.6 million. Another 723,000 people are in local jails. The number of American adults is about 230 million, meaning that one in every 99.1 adults is behind bars.

Britain's equality chief: Obama will only prolong America's racial divide

Trevor Phillips, Britain's most influential black figure, has warned that the election of Barack Obama as US president would prolong rather than end America's racial divide. The chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission accused Mr Obama of "ruthless cynicism" and said he would not be "the harbinger of a post-racial America" if he becomes the country's first black president. Mr Phillips' surprise attack on the favourite to win the Democrati

Creationists 'peddle lies about fossil record'

A leading scientist accuses creationists of peddling the lie that there is no fossil evidence of evolution. Some Christians claim there is a lack of "missing link" fossils, halfway between two major groups of creatures. They say this proves Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is a fallacy and that God created each living species from nothing. But, in an essay published in the magazine New Scientist today, geologist Donald Prothero claims that rep

Britain's last 'witch' may be pardoned

Campaigners will submit a petition to the Scottish Parliament today calling for the last woman convicted under the Witchcraft Act to be pardoned. Helen Duncan spent nine months in Holloway prison after being convicted at a trial in 1944. Her conviction followed a seance at which the spirit of a dead sailor was said to have disclosed the loss of the battleship HMS Barham with most of her crew. The sinking had been kept secret by the authorities to maintain

Trial Date of Teens in Confederate Monument Vandalism (Alabama)

An April trial date has been set for three teenagers charged in juvenile court with vandalizing a 109-year-old Confederate monument at the state Capitol.... They're accused of jumping over a waist-high fence during the November 11 weekend and painting the hands and faces of four granite soldiers black. The vandals also wrote "N.T. 11 11 31" in black paint on the monument's base. That's thought to be a reference to the date rebellious slave Nat Turner was hange

Fla. legislator proposes 'Confederate Heritage' license plates

A Florida legislator wants to see "Confederate Heritage" license plates on his state's highways. Rep. Donald Brown, a Republican from the Panhandle, introduced HB 1007 last week. It directs state officials to develop and issue tags that "contain an emblem or logo of Florida's historic Confederate flags and facsimiles of the buttons issued to Florida Confederate units." The $25 surcharge for these "Confederate Heritage" tags would fund educa

Local Georgia Group Threatens Lawsuit To Return Confederate Flag

Heritage or hate? That's the controversy that continues to swirl around the confederate flag. And now one Georgia organization is threatening to sue. They want the Ringgold City Council to hang the confederate flag at the historic Ringgold Depot by the middle of next week. Back in 2005 the Ringgold City Council decided to remove the confederate flag from the Depot - now that's where many soldiers departed from to heard to the civil war. But three years after the counc

Guatemala to open war archives

Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom has ordered the release of military archives from the country's brutal civil war in a bid to shed light on human rights abuses during the period.Colom ordered the release on Monday during ceremonies held to mark the conflict, which left around 200,000 people dead or "disappeared" from 1960 to 1996. "We are going to make public all military archives ... so the truth can be known, and so that once and for all we can