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: Boston.com
Nov 10, 2009
Governor Deval Patrick today assailed the speaking invitation that a group of UMass Amherst faculty extended to a convicted terrorist, even after criticism from state and university leaders scuttled earlier plans for a speech.
"I am more than a little disappointed about this invitation having been extended,'' Patrick said at a State House news conference. I fully get the point, and respect the idea of free speech. But I think it is a reflection of profound insensitivity to cont
Source: The Christian Science Monitor
Nov 10, 2009
Frankfurt, Germany - Yesterday, Marlene Muehlmann saw the Berlin Wall tumble down.
Along with tens of thousands of young people from around the world, she decorated one of 1,000 giant dominoes erected along the strip that once divided East and West Germany and then toppled to commemorate the end of the cold war."I knew everything already, how the border was," says Marlene, a 9th-grader who lives in Berlin's Prenzlauer Berg, not far from where the wall was."The parents in
Source: Boston.com
Nov 10, 2009
Senator John F. Kerry, who came to national prominence when he testified before Congress as a Vietnam war hero turned anti-war activist, is now warning against those pushing for a troop surge in Afghanistan by asserting that the same could have turned the tide in Vietnam.
"Let me be clear: more than 58,000 American troops died because they were sent into battle based on false assumptions, flawed goals, and faulty strategies. Yes, we adopted smarter tactics near the end, but by
Source: The Putnam Standard and Citizen's Newspaper
Nov 10, 2009
The Veterans Administration and the Library of Congress Veterans History Project have a special message for all Americans this Veterans Day - Honor our Veterans. Record their histories!
By recording the oral histories of our Veterans, we preserve the human face of American history for generations to come and honor those men and women who swore to protect and defend the United States.
The Veterans History Project (VHP) collects and preserves the remembrances of American
Source: BBC
Nov 10, 2009
Even though it was not a school day, dozens of them made their way in to Sisowath High School in the centre of Phnom Penh for a presentation ceremony.
School and government officials were formally handing out the new Khmer Rouge history book, a scene that will be repeated across the country in the closing months of this year.
Three decades have passed since the fall of the Khmer Rouge government. Yet only now are Cambodian schoolchildren finally starting to learn abou
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Nov 10, 2009
Thousands of pupils are now getting only two years worth of teaching in the subject at secondary level, instead of the expected three, it was claimed.
Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary, admitted that teachers should have the “flexibility” to cut the amount of time devoted to certain subjects.
But David Laws, the Liberal Democrat children’s spokesman, said the move was a "disgrace".
"Ed Balls is giving the green light to schools to allow pupils
Source: VOA News
Nov 10, 2009
President Barack Obama says he wants to visit the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki sometime during his presidency, but will not have time when he travels to Japan later this week.
In an interview with Japanese broadcaster NHK, Mr. Obama said he would be honored to have the opportunity to visit the two cities that were devastated by U.S. atomic bombs at the end of World War II.
If he does, Mr. Obama will be the first sitting U.S. president to visit Hiroshima and
Source: CNN
Nov 10, 2009
Seoul, South Korea (CNN) -- North and South Korea said their naval forces clashed Tuesday in disputed waters, and each blamed the other for what is the first such violent incident in seven years...
... North and South Korea have been bitterly divided since the 1950-53 war between them ended without a peace treaty.
There was, however, an armistice with the U.N. Command establishing the Northern Limit Line (NLL), a demarcation on the Yellow Sea designed to avert clashes a
Source: Yahoo News
Nov 10, 2009
CAIRO – Egypt's famous Tomb of Tutankhamun will undergo a five-year project to clean and restore the lavish wall paintings in the underground chambers of the boy king whose golden mask and artifacts have long awed the world.
The project to restore the country's most famous tomb is the latest collaboration between Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities and the Los Angeles-based Getty Conservation Institute, which in the past restored nearby tombs and designed airtight cases to displa
Source: The Daily Beast
Nov 10, 2009
With his final appeal rejected by the Supreme Court on Monday, the mastermind behind the D.C. sniper attacks is scheduled to be executed Tuesday, barring a last-minute commutation of his sentence from Virginia Governor Tim Kaine. John Allen Muhammad, working with his young accomplice Lee Boyd Malvo, killed 10 people in the D.C. metro area in 2002 in a series of sniper attacks that terrorized the populace and garnered national interest. The two were captured on October 24 of that year at a Maryla
Source: BBC
Nov 10, 2009
A blackened bottle of beer found in the wreck of the Hindenburg zeppelin is expected to fetch thousands of pounds at auction.
The bottle was found by a fire-fighter cleaning up the American airfield where the German airship exploded in 1932.
The bottle will be the most expensive ever bought if it meets its estimated price of £5,000 ($8,337) on Saturday.
The airship was engulfed by flames as it landed in New Jersey, killing 38 people and injuring 60.
Source: WSJ
Nov 10, 2009
EAST HAMPTON, N.Y. -- Stuart Vorpahl has waged a lonely battle since 1984 against the state of New York over his right to fish. For refusing to obtain a commercial fishing license, he has been arrested at least four times, once on a dock after a police officer seized 490 pounds of fluke and two lobsters from his 40-foot trawler.
Now, others here on Long Island's East End are joining the 69-year-old Mr. Vorpahl's cause. And they are supporting his argument, based on a 313-year-old co
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Nov 10, 2009
East German products have received a new lease of life 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall as Germans bask in nostalgia for the old Democratic Republic.
Years after the last Trabant chugged off the production line, the iconic car it is set to take to the roads again, but this time sporting an ultra-modern electric engine instead of the dirty two-stroke of communist days.
Despite possessing a body made of plastic and cotton matting, and a poor reputation for reli
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Nov 10, 2009
Major Nidal Malik Hasan, the Fort Hood gunman, had been in recent contact with a radical imam said to have been a "spiritual adviser" to two of the September 11 hijackers.
The communications, believed to be emails, between Hasan and Anwar al-Awlaki, who is in Yemen, were sent over the last two years and had been intercepted by US intelligence agencies.
They were investigated but it was decided that they did not require following up. The disclosure will open U
Source: BBC
Nov 10, 2009
A Jacobean manuscript of a play which was to have been performed for James I and was later found in a trunk at a castle has sold at auction for £84,000.
The heavily crossed out draft for The Amazon was discovered in an attic at Powis Castle in Welshpool, Powys.
The hitherto unknown play by Lord Edward Herbert of Chirbury had been valued at £90,000 by Bonhams in London.
It is believed the play was to have been performed before the king and his court in 161
Source: BBC
Nov 10, 2009
Former Liberian President Charles Taylor has said he was duped by Nigeria into being arrested there in 2006.
Speaking at his war crimes trial in The Hague, he said Nigeria's then-leader had reneged on a promise to let him leave the country freely.
He also claimed a plot involving the UK and the US led to his indictment.
Mr Taylor is accused of backing rebels, who committed widespread atrocities throughout the 1990s in Liberia's neighbour Sierra Leone.
Source: BBC
Nov 10, 2009
Three Czech soldiers who served as part of the Nato force in Afghanistan have been suspended for wearing Nazi symbols, Czech defence officials say.
Two are said to have adorned their helmets with symbols of SS divisions while serving in eastern Afghanistan.
Czech Defence Minister Martin Bartak said their behaviour was "unacceptable" and suspended them immediately.
Source: Ceske Noviny (Czeck Republic)
Nov 9, 2009
After examining 40 hectares on land, the experts gathered hundreds of thousands of finds. The most important ones include the four rondel enclosures.
The enclosures, of a circle or oval shape and usually of 50 to 200 metres in diameter, appeared in Europe in the Neolithic period. Their inner space was not inhabited. Experts believe they might have served for cult, military or trade purposes.
Over 100 rondel enclosures have been uncovered in Europe to date, including sev
Source: USA Today
Nov 9, 2009
Scientists have found evidence that cavemen near the U.S.-Mexican border were butchering gomphotheres, elephant-like beasts from the Ice Age that had been believed to be nearly extinct in North America by the time humans appeared there.
Researchers from the University of Arizona and Mexico's anthropology institute say they found the bones of two young gomphotheres — along with blades, a scraping tool and stone chips from making spear tips — at an 11,000-year-old site in Mexico's Son
Source: Times Colonist (Canada)
Nov 9, 2009
Bones found at a Saanich lot where a new home is being built are believed to be the 1,000-year-old remains of an 18-year-old aboriginal person, but police say it is also possible the bones are from several individuals.
The discovery began with a false alarm when on Nov. 3, a dog nosing around at the construction site pulled out a bone from loosened earth where excavators had been working. Construction was stopped at that point and is still on hold. Saanich police took the bone to th
