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: Telegraph (UK)
November 13, 2010
Mark Twain's autobiography, released on Monday 100 years after his death, has reopened old wounds, as Philip Sherwell reports.
But in the his final life work, a 429-page manuscript that has gone unpublished for a century, Twain claims it was he who was "hypnotised" by Isabel Van Kleek Lyon, his once trusted secretary, personal assistant and confidante.
The diatribe against Miss Lyon, whom he denounced as a "forger, thief, drunkard, traitor and salacious
Source: Telegraph (UK)
November 14, 2010
Georgi Arbatov, who has died aged 87, was for 30 years the Kremlin's chief "Amerikanist"; a man whose knowledge of the West convinced him that Soviet communism was doomed, he remained an enigmatic figure.
As head of the Moscow US and Canada Institute from 1967 to 1995, Arbatov was, during the Cold War, one of the Soviet leadership's most trusted advisers and propagandists. For more than two decades, under Leonid Brezhnev, Yuri Andropov, Konstantin Chernenko and Mikhail Go
Source: Telegraph (UK)
November 14, 2010
The US Secret Service agent who ran to President John F Kennedy’s side when he was shot has described the harrowing seconds after the assassination.
Breaking a silence of nearly half a century, Clint Hill told how he jumped into the president’s car and consoled Jacqueline Kennedy, the First Lady, as she cradled her husband’s head in her lap.
Mr Hill, now in his late 70s, had been assigned to protect Mrs Kennedy as she and the president were driven through Dallas in an
Source: CNN
November 14, 2010
Former President George W. Bush defended his administration's handling of the war in Afghanistan on Sunday, telling CNN that some NATO allies who contributed troops to the conflict "turned out not to be willing to fight."
In an interview with CNN's Candy Crowley, Bush strongly refuted criticism that his administration took its "eye off the ball" in Afghanistan when he ordered troops to invade Iraq. He said he ordered American forces to overthrow Iraqi dictator Sa
Source: NYT
November 11, 2010
AT a glance it looked like any small-town fair, with smoke wafting from the barbecue, families gathering around picnic tables, music percolating over loudspeakers and doting parents trailing after happy toddlers in front of white tents hawking brightly colored T-shirts and knickknacks.
But the Ghjurnate Internaziunale di Corti (the International Days of Corte) were hardly fun and games. It turns out that militant separatists, like baseball owners, car salesmen and trade unionists, a
Source: NYT
November 12, 2010
LONDON — As treasure-in-the-attic stories go, the 18th-century Chinese vase sold at a suburban auction house in outer London on Thursday night will be hard to beat.
The delicate, decorative 16-inch vase started at a not-inconsequential $800,000, but after a half-hour of unexpectedly spirited bidding, the gavel fell at $69.5 million. It was the highest price ever paid at auction for a Chinese antiquity.
Adding in the 20 percent buyer’s premium levied by the auction house
Source: NYT
November 13, 2010
France’s national railway, the S.N.C.F., has issued its first public apology for its involvement in the deportation of tens of thousands of Jews to Nazi death camps during World War II. Guillaume Pepy, the railway’s director, expressed the company’s “profound sorrow and regret for the consequences of its acts” in a statement released last week but first reported Friday.... “
Source: NYT
November 13, 2010
YANGON, Myanmar — Myanmar’s pro-democracy leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, was freed from house arrest on Saturday, setting her on the path to a possible new confrontation with the generals who had kept her out of the public eye for 15 of the past 21 years.
As she stepped to the gate of the lakeside compound where she had been confined, she was greeted by thousands of jubilant supporters, some of them in tears.
Waving and beaming in a long-sleeve pink shirt and a purple sa
Source: NYT
November 13, 2010
A secret history of the United States government’s Nazi-hunting operation concludes that American intelligence officials created a “safe haven” in the United States for Nazis and their collaborators after World War II, and it details decades of clashes, often hidden, with other nations over war criminals here and abroad.
The 600-page report, which the Justice Department has tried to keep secret for four years, provides new evidence about more than two dozen of the most notorious Na
Source: Arkansas Times
November 11, 2010
It's very clear by now that a lot of Arkansans walked into the voting booth Nov. 2 and simply filled in the bubble next to anyone's name that didn't have a "D" beside it. The reasons for that will be worried over well beyond this election season.
But there are Republicans and there is Republican Loy Mauch, elected to represent House District 26 near Hot Springs. A former head of the Sons of the Confederate Veterans post in Hot Springs, Mauch calls the Confederate flag &qu
Source: BBC
February 13, 2010
France's state rail company has for the first time publicly expressed regret for its role in transporting Jews to Nazi death camps in World War II.
Until now, SNCF has said its workers were forced to assist in deportations by the occupying German army.
The change of language is clearly linked to the lucrative market for high-speed rail contracts in the US.
The company has been criticised in the US for failing to apologise for its involvement....
Source: Telegraph (UK)
November 12, 2010
The British government has rejected pleas to grant a royal pardon to Boer War soldier Harry Breaker Morant.
Earlier this year Commander James Unkles, an Australian military lawyer, and Nick Bleszynski, a Scottish-born writer, sent a petition to the Queen, calling for a review of the trials of Lieutenant Morant and his co-accused Peter Handcock and George Witton.
The trio were found guilty of the murder of 12 prisoners of war more than 100 years ago in South Africa. De
Source: Telegraph (UK)
November 13, 2010
George W Bush has gained an unlikely fan after Bill Clinton praised his fellow White House alum's book.
Mr Clinton never ran against the younger Bush, but he is winning so far in a key ex-presidential competition: book sales. According to Random House, Inc., which published "Decision Points" and Mr Clinton's "My Life," Mr Bush's memoir had first-day sales of around 220,000 copies. "My Life," released in 2004, debuted with sales of 400,000 copies....
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
November 12, 2010
A 14th century manuscript containing what is believed to be the oldest surviving account of the legends of King Arthur is to be sold for up to £2 million, it was announced today.
The Rochefoucauld Grail, a colourful, illustrated account of the knights of the round table is said to be one of the finest medieval texts in private hands.
It is due to be sold by auction house Sotheby's in London for a price estimated between £1.5 million and £2 million....
Source: USA Today
November 12, 2010
As communities across the nation prepare to commemorate next year's 150th anniversary of the Civil War, some are struggling with a lack of funding, while a bill that could change that is stuck in a House committee.
The Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission Act, which would establish a national, federally funded committee to help organize commemorative events, was introduced to the House on March 4 by Illinois Democratic Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. and then referred to the House Committee
Source: USA Today
November 11, 2010
PHILADELPHIA — After 34 years in cramped quarters but with big dreams, a new museum opening in the heart of the city's historic district aims to tell for the first time the complete story of the Jewish experience in America.
Plans to expand the National Museum of American Jewish History were a decade in the making. A grand opening weekend kicks off with a Friday night gala featuring Bette Midler and Jerry Seinfeld, and a Sunday dedication with Vice President Joe Biden as keynote spe
Source: Fox News
November 11, 2010
MUNICH – John Demjanjuk's lawyer argued Thursday that transcripts of interrogations by Soviet authorities of former Nazi death camp guards shouldn't be used as evidence because the suspects could have been tortured for their confessions.
The argument appeared aimed at excluding statements by a now-deceased former Sobibor guard who told Soviet interrogators he remembered Demjanjuk from the camp in Nazi-occupied Poland.
Ukrainian-born Demjanjuk, 90, a retired Ohio autowo
Source: Jerusalem Post
November 10, 2010
FRANKFURT - A row over the choice of a guest speaker clouded Tuesday Germany's main event to commemorate ‘Kristallnacht’, the anniversary of the beginning of deadly pogroms against Jews across Nazi Germany.
"Kristallnacht," or Night of Broken Glass on November 9, 1938, was the first openly violent Nazi-sanctioned targeting of Jews, when mobs torched synagogues and destroyed thousands of Jewish shops and private homes around the country....
Key speaker at the m
Source: Novinite
November 10, 2010
Mehmet Ali Agca, who attempted to assassinate Pope John Paul II in 1981, putting the blame afterwards on the Bulgarian secret service, has now alleged that the Vatican government has masterminded the move.
"The Vatican government decided on the Pope's assassination," Agca told Turkey's state-run television in his first interview in his native country since his release.
"They planned and organised it. The order to shoot the Pope was given by Vatican secret
Source: AP
November 10, 2010
DUBLIN (AP) — Ireland's human rights watchdog has appealed to the government to investigate the abuse of women and girls in prison-style Catholic laundries, a long-unresolved issue of Irish abuse scandals in church-run institutions....
