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: BBC
July 10, 2007
New software which works out much more realistically how ancient buildings would have looked in their glory by generating accurate plays of light sources has been developed by scientists in England.
The project, developed at Warwick University in the West Midlands, brings ancient architectural features to life through a revolutionary sophisticated modelling of light.
This allows archaeologists to study how buildings and artwork would have really looked at the time, righ
Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
July 9, 2007
Archaeologists sifting the ruins of a small cluster of slave cabins in central Alabama have unearthed an oft-forgotten facet of Southern slavery.
In the South, slavery has been most closely associated with antebellum plantation life. But here, on a hillside just a stone's throw from the massive blast furnaces of the Tannehill Ironworks, the remains of a cluster of simple cabins attest that slaves were also pressed into service in the South's first industrial labor force.
Source: NYT
July 10, 2007
Vice President Dick Cheney’s popularity has hit an all-time low, with recent polling by The New York Times and CBS News suggesting that he has replaced Dan Quayle as the most unpopular vice president in recent history.
Two polls taken in May and June reveal an erosion of Mr. Cheney’s base of support — seen in both his job approval rating and his favorability. Just 28 percent of those polled in June approve of the job Mr. Cheney is doing, while 59 percent disapprove, a reading simila
Source: NYT
July 10, 2007
Under attack for supporting America’s hard-line stance against Saddam Hussein, among other things, former Prime Minister Tony Blair considered announcing in the fall of 2002 that he would not seek a third term, his former spokesman said Monday. But Mr. Blair changed his mind and convinced his wavering cabinet the following spring that the impending invasion of Iraq was justified.
The revelation comes in “The Blair Years: Extracts from the Alastair Campbell Diaries,” a 757-page colle
Source: Inside Higher Ed (Click on SOURCE for embedded links.)
July 10, 2007
As technology makes it easier for students to cheat on exams or plagiarize papers, there has been no shortage of technology meant to deter and catch students who use cell phones, iPods and Google for a little extra help.
Turnitin and SafeAssignment are the two dominant technologies for comparing students’ submissions to databases of millions of student papers, articles and Web sites. But the educational software company Blackboard is today creating a new service, sort of — releasing
Source: Newark Star-Ledger
July 8, 2007
Heading into the summer of 1967, Newark seemed primed for civil unrest.
In previous summers, what journalists started calling "riots" had been increasing in frequency and severity. In 1964, they touched 11 cities, from New York (in Harlem and in Brooklyn) to Cleveland. In 1965, the riots in the Watts section of Los Angeles resulted in the death of 34 people. In 1966, there were 43 civil disturbances of varying intensity across the nation.
Source: CNN
July 9, 2007
There was no mourning at this funeral.
Hundreds of onlookers cheered Monday as the NAACP put to rest a long-standing expression of racism by holding a public burial for the N-word during its annual convention.
The ceremony included a march by delegates from across the country from downtown Detroit's Cobo Center to Hart Plaza. Along the way, two Percheron horses pulled a pine box adorned with a bouquet of fake black roses and a black ribbon printed with a derivation of t
Source: Sydney Morning Herald
July 7, 2007
DOCTORS have frequently been accomplices in politically motivated repression, brutality and genocide, conducting inhumane experiments on victims, participating in torture and directing programs to exterminate the enemy. For no reason other than they had the power to do it at the time, they have beaten, tortured and killed victims.
Political medical murderers reverse the process of patients seeking help from a doctor, instead misusing their skills on vulnerable groups in the name of
Source: WSJ
July 6, 2007
A new manual for Russia's history teachers succinctly distills President Vladimir Putin's drive to rekindle patriotism, retelling events of the past six decades according to the Kremlin's preferred storyline: Russia is a great power that shouldn't be ashamed of its past.
Backed by support from the president himself, the book, which rails against U.S. hegemony, is raising fears among some historians that the Kremlin is -- quite literally -- trying to rewrite history in a way that ris
Source: Reuters
July 5, 2007
A former police chaplain accused of involvement in torture, kidnapping and murder during Argentina's "dirty war" declined to testify on Thursday as he went on trial in the first case linking a clergyman to rights abuses.
Roman Catholic priest Christian Von Wernich tended to the notorious Buenos Aires provincial police force at a time when leftist dissidents of the 1976-1983 military dictatorship were routinely abducted, maimed and killed.
Rights activists accu
Source: Interfax
July 8, 2007
The Federal Security Service has been assisting the United States in investigating crimes against humanity.
"Since 1994, 60,000 pages of documents dealing with Nazi crimes during World War II, kept at the FSB's Central Archives, have been handed over to the United States," Vasily Khristoforov, the head of the FSB's Register and Archives Department, said in an interview with Interfax.
Cooperation between American and Russian law enforcement and judiciary agenci
Source: CNN
July 6, 2007
The new seven wonders of the world were named Saturday following an online vote that generated server-crushing traffic in its final hours.
The final tally produced this list of the world's top human-built wonders:
• The Great Wall of China
• Petra in Jordan
• Brazil's statue of Christ the Redeemer
• Peru's Machu Picchu
• Mexico's Chichen Itza pyramid
• The Colosseum in Rome
• India's Taj Mahal
Source: Email circulating on the Internet from the International Council of Museums
July 7, 2007
The illicit traffic of cultural property is currently one of the most lucrative criminal
activities in the world. Every civilisation's cultural heritage is universal and priceless, and
the harm caused by illicit trafficking has disastrous repercussions, not only on peoples'
understanding of their history, and thus on their cultural identity, but also with regard to the
future of all humankind.
ICOM, UNESCO and INTERPOL are all the more concerned about this plague since illicit tra
Source: BBC
July 7, 2007
Enver Hoxha, the Stalinist communist dictator of Albania until 1985, was proud of Butrint.
At the height of the Cold War in the 1960s he showed Nikita Khrushchev around. But only after the sites in the forest were sprayed with DDT and purged of snakes, wild animals and insects.
Khrushchev was more interested in establishing a secret submarine base in the lake of Butrint - an idea that Hoxha did not follow up.
Source: Australian
July 9, 2007
FORMER US secretary of state Colin Powell has revealed that he spent 2 1/2 hours vainly trying to persuade President George W. Bush not to invade Iraq and believes today's conflict cannot be resolved by US forces. "I tried to avoid this war," Mr Powell said at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado. "I took him through the consequences of going into an Arab country and becoming the occupiers."
Mr Powell has become increasingly outspoken about the level of violence
Source: Breitbart
July 8, 2007
The UN body for culture on Sunday blasted a private initiative that drew nearly 100 million Internet and telephone voters to choose seven "new" wonders of the world.
"This campaign responds to other criteria and objectives than that of UNESCO in the field of heritage," said Sue Williams, the spokeswoman for UNESCO, the UN cultural body that designates world heritage sites.
"We have a much broader vision," she told AFP.
Voters chose t
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 9, 2007
Thousands of Leonardo Da Vinci's drawings and scientific theories will soon be viewable for free on the internet.
Until now the majority of the manuscripts have been seen only by scholars but the National Museum of Leonardo in his hometown of Vinci has promised to scan about 12,000 pages and create an archive.
The European Union is funding the website www.leonardodigitale.com, and 3,000 pages have been scanned so far.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
July 9, 2007
The Great Wall of China was named as one of the new seven wonders of the world over the weekend at a televised ceremony in Lisbon, but no one in China was watching.
The state broadcaster CTV chose not to screen the event, leaving the thousands of tourists who visited the wall yesterday unaware of the monument's new status.
The refusal to celebrate reflects the Chinese public's apathy towards the competition to determine the new seven wonders.
Although almos
Source: http://www.ireland.com
July 6, 2007
Minister for the Environment John Gormley is to review how the State protects its national heritage and landscape following the controversy over the planned construction of the M3 motorway over historic sites near the Hill of Tara.
Mr Gormley said today that Tara and "similar controversies" of recent years raised the "valid question" as to whether the current measures we have to protect our archaeological and natural landscape are adequate. However, he again ins
Source: BBC
July 5, 2007
Plans to build a new road over a 4,000-year-old serpent-shaped feature in Herefordshire have been criticised.
Archaeologists have said the ribbon of stones, known as the Rotherwas Ribbon, is of similar importance to Stonehenge.
Herefordshire council said a protective shield will be built over the site to preserve it for future generations. A relief road will then be built over it.
