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: Daily Mail (UK)
Sep 14, 2009
A museum has a deal with a top bookmaker to display the Loch Ness monster - if the beast is ever caught.
The Natural History Museum has thrashed out an agreement with bookmaker William Hill which would see the monster go on public display.
For more than 20 years, William Hill has been paying the museum a retainer to showcase Nessie's remains in return for verifying her existence.
Documents released by the museum, based in South-West London, show a deal bet
Source: BBC
Sep 14, 2009
French journalist Florence Hartmann - the court's spokeswoman for six years - was fined 7,000 euros (£6,100).
She was found guilty of disclosing the existence of confidential documents on Serbian government involvement in the Bosnian war of the 1990s.
The documents were discussed in a book and article published by Ms Hartmann.
The confidential documents in question were only released by Belgrade for the trial of the former Serbian President Slobodan Milo
Source: Fox News
Sep 13, 2009
AMSTERDAM — Attention, countries of the world: Do you know where your moon rocks are?
The discovery of a fake moon rock in the Netherlands' national museum should be a wake-up call for more than 130 countries that received gifts of lunar rubble from both the Apollo 11 flight in 1969 and Apollo 17 three years later.
Nearly 270 rocks scooped up by U.S. astronauts were given to foreign countries by the Nixon administration. But according to experts and research by The Ass
Source: Mail on Sunday (UK)
Sep 13, 2009
Russia's ambassador to Afghanistan has some advice for top NATO commanders fighting the Taliban based on the Soviet Union's bitter experience battling Islamist insurgents here in the 1980s: Don't bring more troops.
'The more troops you bring the more troubles you will have here,' said Zamir Kabulov, a blunt-spoken veteran diplomat.
In 2002, he noted, there were roughly 5,000 U.S. soldiers fighting in Afghanistan and the Taliban controlled just a small corner of the coun
Source: BBC
Sep 13, 2009
A Greater Manchester street has been honoured as the "bravest little street in England" in memory of 161 male residents who fought in World War I.
A blue plaque was awarded to remember the men who joined up from 60 houses in Chapel Street, Altrincham.
King George V first singled out the street's courageous residents after it provided so many volunteers. It was bulldozed in 1960 to build flats. The sign was erected by Trafford Counci
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Sep 13, 2009
The row over the release of the Lockerbie bomber has reignited after he was given a standing ovation during a reception with 150 African politicians.
Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi was treated as a hero by the delegation, in his first public appearance since his return to Libya three weeks ago.
After less than five minutes, the bomber, who is terminally ill with prostate cancer, began to cough and signalled he wanted to leave.
The African MPs said they
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Sep 13, 2009
The Loch Ness monster will go on display at London’s Natural History Museum if it is caught under a deal negotiated with bookmakers William Hill.
The museum has secured the rights to showcase Nessie’s remains should it be captured, in exchange for verifying her existence on behalf of the bookmakers.
Under the deal, formalised in 1987 and revealed in archive documents released by the museum, William Hill pays the museum an annual fee on return for the guarantee its exp
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Sep 13, 2009
Tens of thousands of conservative 'tea party' protesters have staged the biggest demonstration of Barack Obama's presidency, thronging Capitol Hill to denounce runaway government spending.
The protest on Saturday demonstrated the potency of grassroots opposition to Mr Obama despite a landmark speech to Congress last week that attempted to quell opposition to his overhaul of the health-care system.
Saturday's march marked the end of a summer in which angry scenes at &qu
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Sep 13, 2009
The biggest manufacturer of Harris tweed has dropped the word "Scottish" from its marketing campaign in America amid fears of a consumer backlash over the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
Harris Tweed Hebrides said it had to “de-Scottishify” the product after receiving feedback that sales could suffer.
The company, whose chairman, Brian Wilson, a former government minister, believes it was a mistake to release Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, has removed ref
Source: Fox News
Sep 13, 2009
White House senior adviser David Axelrod says that the demonstrations in Washington, D.C., Saturday do not represent the views of the broader public when it comes to health care reform.
Axelrod said that President Obama has made clear he wants to "build on the system that we have," dismissing concerns that the president is proposing a large-scale government intervention and claiming broad support for the president's plan.
The rally, and others like it, have
Source: AP
Sep 13, 2009
A Dallas newspaper reports that the FBI is investigating a "stolen" handwritten condolence note by Jacqueline Kennedy to Ethel Kennedy that was penned shortly after Robert F. Kennedy's 1968 assassination.
The Dallas Morning News reported Sunday that investigators and Kennedy family members suspect the note was taken from Robert and Ethel Kennedy's Virginia home.
The note has changed hands several times and has sold for as much as $25,000.
Source: CNN
Sep 13, 2009
A day after tens of thousands of conservatives gathered in Washington to protest the policies of the Obama administration, a top White House aide said that President Obama doesn’t think the protests and the growing conservative movement against Obama are motivated by racism.
“I don’t think the president believes that people are upset because of the color of his skin,” White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union.
Pointing to the upcom
Source: Taegan Goddard's Political Wire
Sep 13, 2009
Vanity Fair runs a fascinating profile of Henry Paulson, the man who relunctantly became the Treasury Secretary for an upopular, lame duck president during a time of historic crisis. "Paulson spent most of his time at Treasury slogging down the field, facing one crisis after another. History will decide whether Paulson's policy choices were wise or ill-advised. Economists and politicians are already
Source: Science Daily
Sep 12, 2009
Recent studies show that one in three people suffer from stress and the number is on the rise. But stress isn't a new problem.
While the physiological state wasn't properly named until the 1930s, new research from The University of Western Ontario proves stress has plagued humans for hundreds, and perhaps thousands of years.
The first study of its kind, published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, detected the stress hormone cortisol in the hair of ancient Peruvi
Source: BBC News
Sep 12, 2009
Research has revealed details of the catastrophic Zanclean flood that refilled the Mediterranean Sea more than five million years ago.
The flood occurred when Atlantic waters found their way into the cut-off and desiccated Mediterranean basin.
The researchers say that a 200km channel across the Gibraltar strait was carved out by the floodwaters.
Their findings, published in Nature, show that the resulting flood could have filled the basin within two years
Source: AP
Sep 12, 2009
After fighting his way across Europe during World War II, John Pistone was among the U.S. soldiers who entered Adolf Hitler's home nestled in the Bavarian Alps as the war came to a close.
Making his way through the Berghof, Hitler's home near Berchtesgaden, Germany, Pistone noticed a table with shelves underneath. Exhilarated by the certainty of victory over the Nazis, Pistone took an album filled with photographs of paintings as a souvenir.
"It was really a great
Source: BBC News
Sep 12, 2009
A record-breaking auction in London saw two works of art, a Rembrandt and a Raphael, sell for almost £50m.
The drawing by Raphael, Head of a Muse, sold for £29.2m, a world record price for any work on paper to go under the hammer, Christie's said.
It was also a world record price for the artist.
The Rembrandt painting, entitled Portrait of a Man, Half-Length, With His Arms Akimbo, fetched £20.2m, a record price for the artist at auction.
Chri
Source: Times Online
Sep 12, 2009
Harvest time is here again on Germany’s 1.2 million allotments: potatoes have to be hoisted out of the soil and the last of the peas must be plucked.
In the shed, next to the trowel and gloves, there will almost certainly be a well-thumbed copy of the gardeners’ bible written by Alwin Seifert, the country’s organic guru.
Now it emerges that at least some of Seifert’s useful tips in his bestselling book Gärtnern, Ackern-ohne Gift, (Gardening, Working the Soil without Poi
Source: telegraph.co.uk
Sep 12, 2009
Experts warn that parts of the cathedral are "falling down" and that the building as a whole is "in serious jeopardy".
A fifth of the structure's internal marble pillars are currently held together by duct tape.
In July, masonry around the Great South Window fell out, forcing the authorities to fence off the area around the window and south entrance to protect the public.
There are fears that the fourteenth century window, which is 80ft
Source: Politics Daily (Contributor Matthew V. Storin)
Sep 12, 2009
About a week ago, I was handed a copy of the Ted Kennedy memoir in a sealed, padded envelope. As I carried the package, I could feel the familiar outside edges of a hard cover. Strangely, a thought came that now this still-unseen book was all that was left of this man who had been part of my professional life since 1965.
I mention this because "True Compass" (By Edward M. Kennedy, Hachette Book Group, 532 pp. $35.00) seems to be everything Kennedy had wanted to say about h
