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
November 18, 2007
In the fall of 2005, Charles Hack, a New Yorker who has made a fortune in real estate and spent a lot of it on old master paintings and Renaissance sculpture, noticed a newspaper advertisement for an auction of a rare stamp.
The 24-cent airmail stamp issued in 1918, popularly known to collectors as the Inverted Jenny, became famous — and valuable — because of an error: the airplane in the center of the design, a Curtiss JN-4, is printed upside-down. Only 100 of the misprints are kno
Source: ABC
November 16, 2007
When Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast two years ago, the storm devastated 320 million trees.
Now the United States is suffering the worst forest catastrophe in its history, according to a new analysis by the journal Science.
Using satellite images, scientists found that more than 5 million acres of trees were destroyed across Mississippi and Alabama. Experts said it would take decades for the plant life to recover, and some areas may be permanently damaged.
Source: http://www.24dash.com
November 20, 2007
A royal Anglo-Saxon burial ground and some of the finest gold jewellery ever unearthed in the country has been discovered by a freelance archaeologist.
The 109-grave cemetery is arranged in a rectangular pattern and dates from the middle of the 7th Century.
The cemetery, bed burial and high status objects are considered to all indicate the people buried must have connections with Anglo-Saxon royalty.
Traditionally, Anglo Saxon royalty were always buried in
Source: Scotsman
November 20, 2007
PEOPLE wanting to spend £25,000 on an antique Bible usually head to a top auction house, where they are given a glossy catalogue and fed canapés to nibble while they study it.
But now eBay, the no-frills internet auction site, has just such a rarity up for grabs.
Any would-be buyer surfing the net from their bedroom can bid for a leather-bound Bible carried by Sir Patrick Hume in the 17th century.
Bidding started at £12,000, and a bid of £25,000 will secure
Source: NYT
November 17, 2007
Three organizations representing coin collectors and dealers have filed a lawsuit against the State Department demanding greater disclosure of how the government makes decisions on the import of ancient artifacts from abroad.
The suit, filed jointly on Thursday by the three groups in Federal District Court in Washington, asserts that the State Department violated the Freedom of Information Act when it failed to release documents that the coin collectors had sought concerning recent
Source: NYT
November 17, 2007
An Australian coroner concluded Friday that the Indonesian Army killed five Australia-based journalists at the beginning of its 1975 invasion of East Timor to prevent news of an Indonesian attack from reaching the outside world.
The inquiry found that the five journalists — Greg Shackleton and Tony Stewart of Australia, Brian Peters and Malcolm Rennie of Britain, and Gary Cunningham of New Zealand — were killed by Indonesian forces in the village of Balibo, nearly two months before
Source: EdWeek.org
November 20, 2007
National tests in several core subjects could be eliminated or scaled back over the next five years without more federal funding, the officials who set policy for the National Assessment of Educational Progress said last week.
Scheduled exams in economics, foreign language, geography, and world history could be canceled if funding remains flat, as is projected.
Moreover, some grade levels would not be tested in civics, U.S. history, and writing, and the next administrat
Source: NYT
November 20, 2007
The Supreme Court agreed today to consider an issue that has divided politicians, constitutional scholars and ordinary citizens for decades: whether the Second Amendment to the Constitution protects an individual right to “keep and bear arms.”
The justices agreed to hear an appeal from the District of Columbia, whose gun-control law — one of the strictest in the nation — was struck down by the lower federal courts earlier this year. The case will probably be argued in the spring.
Source: Washington Times
November 20, 2007
Is America ready for a first spouse? Voters will decide next year, but the U.S. Mint isn't taking any chances.
The Mint yesterday, with help from first lady Laura Bush, released the fourth coin in its new First Spouses series.
Mrs. Bush referred to the coin collection as the "First Lady" series in her prepared remarks. But the U.S. Mint named the series the "First Spouse" collection when it was announced last year.
Could the gender-neutr
Source: AP
November 20, 2007
Archaeologists on Tuesday unveiled an underground grotto believed to have been revered by ancient Romans as the place where a wolf nursed the city's legendary founder Romulus and his twin brother Remus.
Decorated with seashells and colored marble, the vaulted sanctuary is buried 52 feet inside the Palatine hill, the palatial center of power in imperial Rome, the archaeologists said at a news conference.
In the past two years, experts have been probing the space with end
Source: BBC
November 17, 2007
On 17 November 1678 as he prepared to leave for mass from a local blacksmith, officials from the government arrested David Lewis who had items needed to carry out mass in his possession.
Just under a year later, on 27 August at Usk, he was executed after being condemned as a Roman Catholic priest who said mass.
He was one of 40 martyrs of the time and his sacrifice has never been forgotten by those at the abbey.
A plaque marking the spot is to be unveiled i
Source: BBC
November 19, 2007
The Canadian city of Quebec wants to get hold of part of the wreckage of a wooden sailing ship submerged off the north Wales coast for 101 years.
The vessel, the City of Ottawa, has been laid up on a sandbar in Rhyl's Foryd harbour since 1906, where it was taken to be broken up.
Built in Quebec in 1860, one of the city's councillors, Rainer Bloess, wants a beam or relic from the ship.
Denbighshire Council said it was happy to work with the Canadian authorit
Source: NYT
November 20, 2007
The Smithsonian Institution’s Board of Regents voted Monday to undertake a major capital campaign to help raise the $2.5 billion needed to improve and repair its buildings. It is the first large-scale private fund-raising effort in the organization’s history.
Because the Smithsonian gets 70 percent of its $1 billion operating budget from the federal government, raising money from private sources will be a significant departure for the institution.
The plan also promises
Source: http://www.missoulian.com
November 18, 2007
The oversized cartridge was lying on ground left black by last summer's Jocko Lakes wildfire.
When Anya Minetz spotted it last month, she could see it was something special.
“Come look at this one,” she called to C. Milo McLeod, who was sifting through the detritus of a modern-day hunter's camp west of Seeley Lake. He came, saw and performed a double-take.
“That's from a Spencer rifle,” McLeod said.
He knew because he owns one of the 1860s-vint
Source: AP
November 19, 2007
Cambodia's U.N.-backed genocide tribunal arrested the former Khmer Rouge head of state and charged him Monday with crimes against humanity and war crimes, a spokesman said.
Khieu Samphan was the last of five senior officials of the brutal regime to be taken in custody ahead of a long-delayed genocide trial.
Police arrested Khieu Samphan, 76, at a Phnom Penh hospital where he had been undergoing treatment since Nov. 14 after a stroke. Officers held his arms to support h
Source: AP
November 15, 2007
Unlike their visit a few months ago, Sandra Churchwell and Debra Wallace weren’t alone Wednesday as they gazed up at the massive Confederate monument on the grounds of the Alabama Capitol.
That’s because someone hopped over the wrought iron fence surrounding the monument during the weekend and painted the statues’ faces and hands black.
“It’s really a shame because this is such a nice monument, it’s so old,” Wallace said of the memorial, which was built on a cornerstone
Source: AP
November 19, 2007
Twenty years after her accusations of a racially charged rape became a national flash point and made the Rev. Al Sharpton a national figure, Tawana Brawley's mother and stepfather want to reopen the case, a newspaper reported yesterday.
Glenda Brawley and Ralph King want to press New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer and state Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo to re-examine the reported November 1987 incident, which a state grand jury concluded was a hoax, according to the Daily News.
Source: http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland
November 16, 2007
Ireland's historic experience of famine has inspired the country to help tackle global poverty, U2 frontman Bono said today.
The rock legend is part of the Government's Hunger Task Force, which was set up last year and met for the second time this afternoon in University College Cork (UCC).
It was established to examine how Ireland can help combat world hunger, particularly in Africa.
The singer, who has become as famous for his aid work as his music, said
Source: NYT
November 19, 2007
At Berkeley Plantation [where the president went today to celebrate Thanksgiving], Bush got a little history lesson.
The site claims America's first official Thanksgiving in 1619, when a group of British settlers knelt in prayer of thanks for a healthy arrival across the Atlantic. Their proclamation of thanks is carved into the ''Thanksgiving Shrine'' that Bush visited.
Of course, Plymouth, Mass., is best known as the home of Thanksgiving, as the place where Pilgrims an
Source: Telegraph (UK)
November 19, 2007
The flood associated with the story of Noah's Ark led to the spread of agriculture across Europe, researchers have discovered.
Archaeologists have dated the flooding of the Black Sea to around 6,300BC and believe the sudden rise in sea levels in south-east Europe pushed communities west, where they continued to farm and make pottery.
The date at which the Black Sea was connected to the Mediterranean had previously been placed at somewhere between 5,600BC and 7,600 BC, b
