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: NYT
Jul 19, 2009
It has been more than a half-century since Sumner Elementary School, now an abandoned shell of a building, had a brief and ignoble moment in the spotlight for what it would not do: allow a black father from the surrounding neighborhood, Oliver L. Brown, to enroll his daughter Linda in the third grade.
Mr. Brown, along with a group of similarly rejected black parents, brought a lawsuit against the school board here that went on to become one of the landmarks of this country’s legal h
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jul 19, 2009
Harry Patch, 111, has become Britain's last survivor of the First World War trenches, following the death of Henry Allingham at 113.
Mr Patch, known as the Last Tommy, is the last living soldier to have fought in the mud-soaked battle of Passchendaele in 1917 in which more than 70,000 British troops died.
Now also the country's oldest man, he lives in a nursing home in Wells. After hearing of the death of Mr Allingham, he said he was "very sad at losing a friend&q
Source: Skymania News
Jul 19, 2009
The world is celebrating the amazing journey that Apollo 11 made to the Moon 40 years ago. But few realise that an early bid to reach the Moon was launched from England, way back in the 17th century. Incredible as it may seem, one of the greatest scientific minds of the time, Dr John Wilkins, a founder of the Royal Society, was planning his own lunar mission four centuries ago around the time of the English Civil War.
It wasn't hot air either. Inspired by the great voyages of discov
Source: AP
Jul 18, 2009
Until a few years ago, the memory of three African American soldiers was buried beneath the sandy, desert in New Mexico, their remains left behind by the military and to the mercy of looters.
With some investigating and modern forensics, government archaeologists excavated the remains and identified them as Army Pvts. Thomas Smith, David Ford and Levi Morris. They were among the famed Buffalo Soldiers, African-American members of the U.S. Army who served at remote outposts on the We
Source: NYT
Jul 18, 2009
Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, and Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, the Democratic chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, are indisputably inside guys. Neither man is exactly overflowing with charisma, but they have used their decades in Congress to learn precisely how to pull the legislative levers, making them formidable powers in the Senate and House.
Both are now at crucial junctures. Mr. McConnell, 67, is the leader of a deplete
Source: NYT
Jul 18, 2009
It has been a remarkably tumultuous year here as Alaska celebrates its 50th anniversary of statehood. Sure, Ms. Palin roared out of sub-Arctic obscurity, but there was more: state lawmakers went to prison for corruption and then, in some cases, got out; a sitting United States senator was found guilty of a felony, at least temporarily; the ultimate measure of government stability here, the price of oil, went into freefall, then rose again.
“Will things return to normal?” said Scott
Source: BBC
Jul 18, 2009
A copy of the Magna Carta, that was on loan to the US, has been returned to Lincoln for a new exhibition.
The document, one of four signed copies of the 1215 charter of rights, has been on display at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California.
It has now gone on show at the prison building in Lincoln Castle.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jul 18, 2009
The crew of a US frigate made history on Saturday by becoming the first foreign ship to take part in the ceremony of the 'Constable's Dues' at the Tower of London.
The ceremony recreates a tradition dating back to the 14th century, where ships docking near the Tower would have to give the Constable part of their cargo as a form of tax.
This has since evolved into a ceremonial handover of what is usually an empty barrel of wine.
Source: Foxnews
Jul 18, 2009
Vice President Dick Cheney has long been a target of Democrats for his role in developing and implementing the Bush White House's anti-terror policies, and Democratic legislators soon may get a chance to hold his feet to the fire over a secret proposal for a CIA hit squad.
Some congressional analysts, however, warn that if Democrats try to put Cheney on the hot seat, they risk blowback because of Americans' apparent ambivalence about Cheney's take-no-prisoners approach to fighting t
Source: BBC
Jul 18, 2009
Mr Allingham served with the Royal Naval Air Service in WWI, later transferring to the Royal Air Force at the time of its creation.
Last month, Mr Allingham, born in 1896, became the world's oldest man.
The Queen said he was "one of the generation who sacrificed so much for us all".
Source: The Times (UK)
Jul 18, 2009
For four decades it has sat in bleak isolation on the lunar surface, unseen to the human eye and gathering dust. Now, in new photographs released by Nasa, the remainder of the spacecraft that carried Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the final leg of their voyage to the Moon can be seen for the first time, right where they left it.
The image is part of a series of photographs shot by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, an unmanned satellite launched from Florida last month as part of
Source: http://worldmeets.us
Jul 17, 2009
Over the past three decades, U.S. authorities have deported 107 former
Nazi war criminals. The latest is Ivan [John] Demjanjuk. The Nazi
collaborator has been charged with being an accomplice in 27,900 cases
of murder. Too bad for him that he landed in Munich rather than Vienna.
The scandal began on April 3 with a phone call to the office of social
assistance in the Austrian province of Vorarlberg. Someone inquired
about welfare for a man by the name of Josias Kumpf who had just
re
Source: Discovery News
Jul 17, 2009
The 57 tattoos sported by Oetzi, the 5300-year-old Tyrolean iceman mummy, were made from fireplace soot that contained glittering, colorful precious stone crystals, according to an upcoming study in the Journal of Archaeological Science.
The determination supports prior research that the tattoos were associated with acupuncture treatments for chronic ailments suffered by the iceman, whose frozen body was found remarkably well preserved in the Similaun Glacier of the Alps in 1991.
Source: Reuters
Jul 17, 2009
The 15th century Vinland Map, the first known map to show part of America before explorer Christopher Columbus landed on the continent, is almost certainly genuine, a Danish expert said Friday.
Controversy has swirled around the map since it came to light in the 1950s, many scholars suspecting it was a hoax meant to prove that Vikings were the first Europeans to land in North America -- a claim confirmed by a 1960 archaeological find.
Doubts about the map lingered even
Source: National Security Archive
Jul 17, 2009
Pentagon classification authorities are treating classified historical documents as if they contain today's secrets, rather than decades-old information that has not been secret for years. Today the National Security Archive posted multiple versions of the same documents--on issues ranging from the 1973 October War to anti-ballistic missiles, strategic arms control, and U.S. policy toward China--that are already declassified and in the public domain. What earlier declassification reviewers relea
Source: NYT
Jul 17, 2009
In the 1990 movie “Green Card,” Gerard Depardieu’s character is deported because he cannot recall, under questioning by immigration agents, the type of skin cream his American-born wife likes. In real life, dread of such encounters has prodded many aspiring immigrants to prep for their interviews with elaborate “study aids,” particularly if they were adopting new identities.
Few of these crib sheets survived. “You were supposed to throw the cheat sheet overboard,” noted Nancy Shader
Source: CBS
Jul 17, 2009
Walter Cronkite, who personified television journalism for more than a generation as anchor and managing editor of the"CBS Evening News," has died Friday night in New York. He was 92.
Known for his steady and straightforward delivery, his trim moustache, and his iconic sign-off line -"That’s the way it is" - Cronkite dominated the television news industry during one of the most volatile periods of American history. He broke the news of the Kennedy assassination, reported extensively on
Source: BBC
Jul 17, 2009
One of the few 20th Century eastern European thinkers to gain international renown, he spent almost half of his life in exile from his native country.
He argued that the cruelties of Stalinism were not an aberration, but the logical conclusion of Marxism.
MPs in Warsaw observed a minute's silence to remember his contribution to a free and democratic Poland.
Source: Foxnews
Jul 17, 2009
Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Tex., chairman of the committee, announced the investigation in a statement Friday, saying the inquiry "will focus on the core issue of how the congressional intelligence committees and Congress are kept fully and currently informed."
The committee will determine whether the CIA violated the National Security Act, which requires, with rare exceptions, that Congress be informed of covert activities.
But the top Republican on the House
Source: AP
Jul 17, 2009
The event is one of only two that will feature the entire Apollo 11 crew -- the other is a lecture at the Smithsonian Institution Sunday night.
The event is one of only two that will feature the entire Apollo 11 crew. The other is a lecture at the Smithsonian Institution Sunday night.
Two of the crew members, Neil Armstrong who took the first step on the moon, and command module pilot Michael Collins, do not make many public appearances. The second man on the moon, Buzz
