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: Yahoo News
Nov 7, 2009
BERLIN – Massive colorful dominoes painted by German students were placed Saturday along the former path of the Berlin Wall to mark the 20th anniversary of the opening of the barrier that divided the city for nearly three decades.
Many of the upright 7.5-foot-high (2.3-meter-high) plastic foam dominoes carried messages, including "We are one people." The approximately 1,000 dominoes stretching for 1.5 kilometers (1 mile) will be toppled Monday as part of wider celebrations
Source: The National Security Archive
Nov 7, 2009
The fall of the Berlin Wall 20 years ago generated major anxiety in capitals from Warsaw to Washington, to the point of outright opposition to the possibility of German unification, according to documents from Soviet, American and European secret files posted on the Web today by the National Security Archive.
Solidarity hero Lech Walesa told West German chancellor Helmut Kohl on the very day the Wall would fall that "events in the GDR [East Germany] are developing too quickly&q
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Nov 7, 2009
The rival version of events on November 9 has cast doubt on the official history of one of the most celebrated decisions of the century, as Berliners prepare to mark the 20th anniversary of the breaching of the wall with a "Festival of Freedom" this weekend.
Until recent weeks, Harald Jaeger, a Stasi officer at Bornholmer Strasse in north Berlin, held the undisputed mantle of the man who peacefully breached the Berlin Wall. But now Heinz Schafer, who was a colonel in the
Source: WSJ
Nov 7, 2009
The American railroad produced the nation's original corporate capitalists—the ones we call tycoons, moguls, or robber barons. The first and greatest was "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt, who amassed the New York Central system between New York and Chicago in the 1860s and '70s. This week's purchase of Burlington Northern by Warren Buffett seems to make Mr. Buffett a worthy successor.
"It's an all-in wager on the economic future of the United States," Mr. Buffet
Source: WSJ
Nov 7, 2009
Klaus Rader's rise began when the Wall fell.
He was 26 years old and managing a McDonald's in the sleepy West German town of Hof when the Berlin Wall was toppled 20 years ago on Monday. The next day, East Germans poured into the West. The first stop for many was Mr. Rader's Golden Arches, a siren of capitalism's long-forbidden fruits.
"We were overrun," Mr. Rader recalls. In just hours, all his hamburgers and fries were devoured. What piles of gold awaited the
Source: Live Science
Nov 6, 2009
We are currently the only human species alive, but as recently as 24,000 years ago another one walked the earth — the Neanderthals.
These extinct humans were the closest relatives we had, and tantalizing new hints from researchers suggest that we might have been intimately close indeed. The mystery of whether Neanderthals and us had sex might be solved if the entire Neanderthal genome is reported soon as expected. The matter of why they died and we succeeded, however, remains an ope
Source: Talking Points Memo
Nov 6, 2009
At yesterday's tea party rally on Capitol Hill, at least one protester brandished a large graphic photograph of the victims of the Dachau Nazi concentration camp, comparing health care reform to Nazi policies. Today, Rep. Eric Cantor's (R-VA) spokesman called the photograph "inappropriate."
Rep. Steve Israel (D-NY) has also condemned the poster.
Cantor, in an interview today with Bloomberg, also offered some criticism of radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh's co
Source: NYT
Nov 6, 2009
BERLIN — During his childhood, Lutz Braun could see the Berlin Wall from his home in Blankenfelde, a village south of the city that was part of communist East Germany.
The wall snaked along, cutting through fields, yards and gardens. But Mr. Braun’s family did not talk about the wall. “As children, we did not see borders,” said Mr. Braun, 56. “They played no role.”
When Mr. Braun was conscripted into the East German People’s Army in the mid-1970s, he had no choice but t
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Nov 6, 2009
The green jade seal, belonging to the emperor Qian Long (1736-1795) fetched £3.6 million, six times its estimate, at the auction on Wednesday following frantic bidding by eight competing collectors.
News of the sale was greeted with anger on the Chinese internet, where the country's growing nationalism frequently finds its voice.
"Bandits have seized our treasures and are now selling them off at auction for ridiculous profits. How can we tolerate such behaviour?&qu
Source: Salon
Nov 6, 2009
Unfortunately, it seems that whether it's on the Internet or in real life, Godwin's Law always finds a way to prove itself again. People manage to use Nazi and Holocaust references in the most poorly considered of ways, as if they're unaware of the true horror that was the slaughter of millions of innocent people.
That sort of thing has been happening all too frequently during protests against Democratic healthcare reform plans, and one of the more shocking examples was on display a
Source: Philly.com
Nov 6, 2009
PHILADELPHIA - As the city's transit strike drags into its fourth day, tempers are frayed, commuter trains are packed, streets are clogged and some residents remain virtually stranded at home.
It could be worse.
During World War II, federal troops armed with bayonets and rifles gave striking Philadelphia transit employees an ultimatum: Get back to work or be drafted.
And there wasn't much brotherly love in the city in 1910, when a transportation strike led
Source: New Jersey Real-Time News
Nov 6, 2009
Images of downtown Newark, the Statue of Liberty, the state Capitol in Trenton and the new Giants and Jets football stadium in the Meadowlands sports complex will grace the holiday tree in the Blue Room of the White House this Christmas thanks to the efforts of students at the Chancellor Avenue School in Newark.
The seventh and eighth grade students are creating 10 holiday ornaments for the tree depicting various "noteworthy and inspirational buildings or sites with historical
Source: Boston.com
Nov 6, 2009
Massachusetts’ top historic preservation officer has dealt a setback to the proposed Nantucket Sound wind farm, ruling yesterday that the body of water is eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places because of its cultural significance for two Native American tribes.
In a letter released late in the afternoon, Brona Simon, state historic preservation officer, said she believes that Nantucket Sound is so culturally important to two Wampanoag tribes that it should
Source: CNSNews.com
Nov 6, 2009
As Germany prepares to mark the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, activists in South Korea will hold a series of events this weekend to highlight calls for similarly momentous developments leading to the liberation of North Korea.
Planned events include a mass human rights and democracy demonstration led by North Korean refugee leaders in Seoul on Saturday; an all-day national day of prayer, fasting and repentance on Sunday; and another demonstration on Monday at the
Source: Inside Higher Ed
Nov 6, 2009
What started as a debate over whether brick-and-mortar libraries would survive much further into the 21st century turned into an existential discussion on the definition of libraries, as a gathering of technologists here at the 2009 Educause Conference pondered the evolution of one of higher education’s oldest institutions.
“Let’s face it: the library, as a place, is dead,” said Suzanne E. Thorin, dean of libraries at Syracuse University. “Kaput. Finito. And we need to move on to a
Source: The News-Press
Nov 5, 2009
In the cool, buggy shade of a huge royal poinciana, archaeologist Michael Wylde dragged his trowel 1,200 years into the past.
Wylde, manager of the Randell Research Center at Pineland, was renewing an excavation begun last winter of a Calusa Indian site known as Mound 5 of Brown's Mound Complex...
... "Brown's Mound Complex is a site we know about extensively but not intensively," said Bill Marquardt, curator in archaeology at the Florida Museum of Natural His
Source: Google News
Nov 5, 2009
ATLANTA — An archaeologist says excavations in southern Georgia have turned up beads, metal tools and other artifacts that may pinpoint part of the elusive trail of the 16th-century Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto.
Dennis Blanton of the Fernbank Museum of Natural History in Atlanta was scheduled to present his findings Thursday to the Southeastern Archaeological Conference in Mobile, Ala.
Excavations since 2006 in rural Telfair County uncovered remains of an Indian se
Source: Truthout
Nov 5, 2009
Washington - After an emotional debate over how to keep Americans safe, the Senate Thursday narrowly defeated an effort to prevent civilian trials in U.S. courts for the accused planners of the 9/11 attacks.
The Senate's 54-45 vote to reject the measure by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., opens the door for President Barack Obama to bring Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-professed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, to trial in federal court, rather than the military commissions G
Source: wsoctv9 North Carolina
Nov 5, 2009
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- A controversial history lesson left parents and teachers upset in Union County.
The teachers plan to write letters to leaders at the historic Latta Plantation about their disapproval of a hands-on history lesson during a Rea View Elementary class trip Wednesday.
During a lesson on the Civil War, tour guide Ian Campbell, who is himself black, made black students pretend to be slaves in front of their white classmates.
Campbell said he's be
Source: Rasmussen Reports
Nov 5, 2009
Fifty-two percent (52%) of voters feel that America’s best days are in the past, according to the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. This marks the highest level of voter pessimism in two years and is up 13 points from a year ago when Barack Obama was elected president.
Thirty-five percent (35%) feel the nation's best days are still to come, down 13 points since President Obama’s inauguration in January.
