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: Der Spiegel
June 29, 2007
Most of the 30,000 Germans sentenced to death by Nazi Germany's military courts have been rehabilitated. So far, however, soldiers found guilty of treason -- in many cases unjustly, have been excluded. Now, though, Germany's parliament may be prepared to do just that.At the Berlin opening of a travelling exhibit dedicated to victims of Nazi military justice last week, German Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries seemed to indicate that the political will might very well be at ha
Source: NYT
June 28, 2007
In a decision of sweeping importance to educators, parents and schoolchildren across the country, the Supreme Court today sharply limited the ability of school districts to manage the racial makeup of the student bodies in their schools.
The court voted, 5 to 4, to reject diversity plans from Seattle and Louisville, Ky., declaring that the districts had failed to meet “their heavy burden” of justifying “the extreme means they have chosen — discriminating among individual students ba
Source: NYT
June 28, 2007
The White House has dropped the argument that Vice President Dick Cheney’s dual role as president of the Senate meant that he could deny access to national archivists who oversee the handling of classified data in the executive branch.
Mr. Cheney’s office had said that his dual role meant that he was technically not part of the executive branch.
In interviews over the last two days, officials have said that while the vice president does, in fact, have the right of refus
Source: NYT
June 28, 2007
Speculation has been rife in political circles recently that Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, may not survive his wrangle with the chief justice and hold on to power, but a great silence emanates from the one place that may count the most: the barracks and the mess halls of the armed forces, the other great part of Pakistan’s ruling equation....Historians and columnists have been outlining the precedents, recalling how Pakistan’s three previous milita
Source: NYT
June 27, 2007
Citing a harsh report on missteps at the Smithsonian Institution, Senator Dianne Feinstein declared at a hearing on Tuesday that the museum complex should move quickly to replace its ousted top executive rather than take an estimated six months to a year.
“This represents significant jeopardy to the institution,” said Ms. Feinstein, Democrat of California and chairwoman of the Senate Rules and Administration Committee. “I have a hard time understanding why we need this huge search p
Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
June 28, 2007
The caller on the phone did not identify himself, but Augusta historians call him "Deep Throat."
Have a van outside the courthouse at a certain hour, the caller said. Be prepared to load up several garbage bags full of documents.
In fact, the cache of historic records would eventually fill 40 to 50 boxes, and would include pre-Revolutionary War papers, some of them autographed by signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Because someone with co
Source: AP
June 28, 2007
Lady Bird Johnson, the former first lady, was released from the hospital Thursday and was resting comfortably at her home, a family spokesman said.
Johnson, 94, was admitted to Seton Medical Center a week ago and treated for a low-grade fever. She remained at the hospital for observation after the fever subsided.
"After a week of observation and tests, the doctors released Mrs. Johnson to go home," said family spokesman Neal Spelce. "Because of her stroke
Source: Lee White at the website of the National Coalition for History (NCH)
June 28, 2007
On June 28, 2007, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) announced that the legal transfer of the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace from the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace Foundation to the National Archives will take place on July 11, 2007.
Concurrently with the transfer, the new Nixon Library will open approximately 78,000 pages of previously withheld materials.
Source: Lee White at the website of the National Coalition for History (NCH)
June 28, 2007
On June 28, 2007, the House of Representatives approved (240-179) the Financial Services and General Government appropriations bill (H.R. 2829).
The bill includes $10 million for the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC), for grants to states, local governments, universities, local historical societies, and others to help preserve and archive materials of historic significance. The Administration had sought to eliminate the NHPRC. The Committee Report (H. R
Source: Lee White at the website of the National Coalition for History (NCH)
June 28, 2007
On June 28, 2007, the House of Representatives, by a vote of 240-179, approved the Financial Services and General Government appropriations bill (H.R. 2829) . The bill includes $315 million ($2.1 million above the President’s request, and $35.7 million above fiscal year 2007) for operating expenses of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).
The Committee Report (H. Rept. 110-207) accompanying the bill directs that the $2.1 million in additional funding be designated
Source: http://www.rediff.com
June 28, 2007
The Prime Minister's Office in New Delhi has stepped up efforts through official channels to acquire the letters and manuscript written and signed by Mahatma Gandhi [Images] just before his assassination and which are coming up for auction in London [Images] on July 3.
Christie's has fixed the opening bid for the draft at 12,000 pounds (app Rs 9,80,000). The issue came up when Satya Paul, senior member of Servants of the People Society drew the government's attention to the sale.
Source: Chicago Tribune
June 28, 2007
Few people know it's there -- fewer know where it leads.
In the floor behind the bar at the Green Mill Cocktail Lounge, a century-old jazz club in Uptown, lies a door. Beneath it: a musty labyrinth of gangster and Uptown history.
The World Below -- a series of tunnels branching underground from the Green Mill to the bookstore Shake, Rattle & Read a few doors away -- mixes myth and fable, dusty boilers and blood-splattered urinals (more on this in a moment).
Source: http://www.dw-world.de
June 27, 2007
Germany's memorial sites at Nazi concentration camps are in dire economic straits. They are calling for more political responsibility to ensure that they can continue to fulfill their educational task.
The Dachau concentration camp memorial site near Munich receives over 800,000 visitors per year. Internationally, it is among the best-known sites commemorating the memory of the millions who perished in the Holocaust in Europe.
But faced with an acute cash crunch, memori
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 28, 2007
Germany is poised to pardon the very last soldiers who were executed during the Second World War for betraying the Nazi regime.
But the move, which follows a decades-long national debate, has revived bitter differences of opinion over what remains an acutely sensitive subject.
The handful of men were among 30,000 German soldiers who were sentenced to death during the war for a variety of "crimes" from desertion to espionage.
Of those, 16,000 were
Source: ABC News
June 25, 2007
A diamond-adorned sword once owned by Gen. Ulysses S. Grant brought a winning bid of more than $1.6 million in an auction of Civil War items.
The sword given to Grant, who later became the 18th president, was one of the marquee items among the 750 to be auctioned Sunday and Monday by Heritage Auction Galleries of Dallas.
Source: http://www.dailypress.com
June 26, 2007
Jamestown Rediscovery archaeologists picked their way through nearly 1,500 cubic feet of soil this past week, exposing parts of the historic English fort that have not been seen since slaves transformed the site into a Confederate earthwork during the Civil War. The newly uncovered landscape includes evidence of several early fort-period features, including postholes and a possible grave shaft. But far more prominent and still growing is a large, artifact-filled boundary ditch that dates to the
Source: Miami Herald
June 27, 2007
The epic drought gripping Lake Okeechobee has opened a mud-spattered window into Florida's prehistoric past.
Since March, falling water levels have exposed 21 archaeological sites -- for now, the locations a secret to the public. Thousands of artifacts have been unearthed, including pieces of pottery, shell pendants, candleholders, arrowheads and fishing weights.
Human bones, too.
Archaeological teams from the state and Palm Beach County are hunting for still mor
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education
June 28, 2007
The Central Intelligence Agency's release on Tuesday of more than 700 documents detailing some of its most closely guarded secrets was a reminder of some of the agency's most notorious excesses -- including political assassinations and eavesdropping on American journalists. But the document dump also shed a bit more light on the CIA's early interest in student dissenters, in the United States and elsewhere.
The fact that the agency tracked student dissent was previously detailed in
Source: NYT
June 28, 2007
The White House announced today that it was invoking executive privilege to reject subpoenas for internal documents that Congress is seeking in its investigation into the firings of nine federal prosecutors last year.
The White House counsel, Fred F. Fielding, made clear that the Bush administration would not release documents from two senior officials — Harriet E. Miers, the former counsel to the president, and Sara M. Taylor, the director of political affairs — and that it would n
Source: The People's Voice
June 28, 2007
Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger pushed for the 1974 Turkish invasion of Cyprus and allowed arms to be moved to Ankara for an attack on that island in reaction to a coup sponsored by the Greek junta, according to documents and intelligence officers with close knowledge of the event.Nearly 700 pages of highly classified Central Intelligence Agency reports from the 1970's, known collectively as the "Family Jewels," are slated for public release today. Howeve
