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: Spiegel Online
May 21, 2009
Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Poland's former prime minister, has seemed lackluster of late. He has only seldom thrown himself into the ongoing campaign ahead of European Parliament elections in two weeks. Instead of delivering his accustomed tirades against the European Union, he has meekly called on his fellow citizens to go to the polls on June 6. It seemed that he was short on issues.
This week, though, Kaczynski has found his old form again -- with the unexpected help of SPIEGEL."The Ger
Source: Deutsche Welle
May 21, 2009
Sifting through reams of old files from the communist state security apparatus in East Germany, two historians, Helmut Mueller-Enbergs and Cornelia Jabs, say they accidently uncovered information that the policeman, Karl-Heinz Kurras, was a so-called unofficial employee of the East German Ministry for State Security (MfS) and a member of the country's Socialist Unity Party (SED).
In reports published separately on Thursday by ZDF public television network and the Frankfurter Allgeme
Source: BBC
May 21, 2009
Mr Obama made a number of references to Republicans who disagree or have disagreed with the former vice-president's approach to national security.
He referred (although not by name) to former Secretary of State Colin Powell and quoted two Republican senators, Lindsey Graham and John McCain.
And he emphasised that this had been a bipartisan rejection, by referring to the nomination by the American people of presidential candidates from both parties who wanted to turn t
Source: Chronicle of Higher Ed
May 21, 2009
The University of Colorado has filed a court brief formally responding to Ward Churchill’s bid for court-ordered reinstatement to the faculty. As university officials had suggested would be the case, their stand on his reinstatement is a very emphatic no.
In the brief, filed yesterday in state court, the university’s lawyers note that the jury that found last month that Mr. Churchill had been fired unjustly, in violation of his free-speech rights, also determined that he was due onl
Source: ABA Journal
May 21, 2009
Justice David H. Souter has in the past avoided the limelight. But in a speech yesterday at Georgetown Law Center decrying Americans’ lack of civic knowledge, the retiring justice demonstrated his speaking prowess.
Souter warned that the republic "can be lost, it is being lost, it is lost, if it is not understood,” the National Law Journal reports. He cited surveys showing about two-thirds of Americans can’t even name the three branches of government, one of the basic lessons h
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 21, 2009
David Miliband has offered a stark appraisal of the Iraq war, saying
the invasion had damaged Britain's standing by causing"bitterness,
distrust and resentment" across the Muslim world.
The Foreign Secretary mentioned the Iraq conflict in the same breath
as the Crusades and 20th century imperialism as he delivered a
strikingly self-critical speech.
Addressing the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, Mr Miliband called
British history"baggage that we have to acknowledge" and acce
Source: CNN
May 21, 2009
Abu Ahmed says he was there: An Iraqi held prisoner at Abu Ghraib by
the American military when inmates were abused.
He says he was kept naked and saw other naked inmates stacked onto a
pile while photos were taken, photos that would become public and
bring shame to the United States.
The pain of the past few years is clearly etched on the man's face and
equally obvious as he talks. It began October 1, 2003, he says, when
U.S. troops came to his home and detained him during a
Source: Telegraph (UK)
May 21, 2009
Rome is to put over 30 historical sites including a gladiators training ground and the aqueduct that feeds the Trevi Fountain on display for the first time.
The sites, part of a vast network of tunnels, caves and catacombs which lie beneath the city, will be open from the end of this month.
Gianni Alemanno, the mayor of Rome, said the aim of the project was to "avoid Rome being known only for its most important monuments."
Source: BBC
May 21, 2009
How many of the paintings displayed at the Vietnamese National Museum of Fine Arts in Hanoi are originals and how many are copies?
It is well known among Vietnamese artists that the museum has been hanging works of art that are in fact copies of very famous Vietnamese paintings as some of the originals were either sold or lost.
The leading art historian and Vietnamese painting expert, Nora Taylor, from Chicago University, believes that about half of the paintings displ
Source: PEW study
May 21, 2009
The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press’ long-term values study project has been tracking a broad range of beliefs and attitudes that shape public opinion and influence voting behavior. The project began in 1987 and has been updated 14 times over the past 22 years.
As the Obama era begins, the survey finds that centrism has emerged as a dominant factor in public opinion. The political values and core attitudes of the American public show little overall ideological movement. Th
Source: Foxnews
May 21, 2009
It's too early to know what surveillance methods were used to arrest four men accused of plotting to bomb two New York synagogues, but national security experts say measures implemented under the Bush administration likely played a critical role.
The FBI launched an elaborate sting operation in June 2008 that culminated Wednesday in the arrest of four men who allegedly conspired to blow up two Bronx, N.Y., synagogues, and to shoot down military planes operating out of Stewart Air F
Source: Secrecy News, written by Steven Aftergood, is published by the Federation of American Scientists
May 21, 2009
“We are launching a review of current policies by all of those agencies responsible for the classification of documents to determine where reforms are possible,” announced President Obama in a speech at the National Archives today.While the President has spoken broadly before of the need for greater transparency, this is the new Administration’s first public approach to reform of the national security classification system. A
Source: Deutsche Welle
May 21, 2009
President Obama will seek to regain control of the Guantanamo Bay discussion Thursday with a major address on national security, just a day after a rare bipartisan defeat for the popular president.
The Senate voted 90-6 to strip the $80 million (58 million euros) Obama requested for the closing of the Guantanamo Bay prison from spending legislation for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
This sharp rebuke puts Obama in a political tight spot at home and abroad and could
Source: BBC
May 21, 2009
Ahmed Ghailani will face charges in a federal court in New York over the 1998 US embassy bombings in East Africa, the justice department announced.
The news comes as the US Senate voted against funding President Obama's plans to close down Guantanamo Bay detention centre and transfer its 240 detainees.
Mr Obama is due to address concerns in a major speech later on Thursday.
Source: BBC
May 21, 2009
Ms Smith told MPs she was "proud to offer this country's welcome to all who have served in the brigade of Gurkhas".
It comes after a high-profile campaign by Joanna Lumley and other supporters of Gurkha rights - and an embarrassing Commons defeat for the government.
Some 36,000 Gurkhas who left before 1997 had been denied UK residency.
Source: AP
May 21, 2009
A bit of Jurassic Park is going on sale with a 150-million-year-old complete skeleton of a dinosaur going on the auction block in New York.
The I.M. Chait Gallery says the fossil of the 9-foot-long dryosaurus dating from the Jurassic era is one of only two of its kind in the world.
The gallery said it could bring up to $500,000 at Saturday's auction.
Gallery operator Josh Chait says the fossil was taken from private land in Wyoming in 1993 and is being sold
Source: NYT
May 20, 2009
Barack Obama has been president only four months, but already his name is cropping up on schools, other buildings and avenues across the country. The most recent example is in St. Paul, where the school board voted Tuesday night to change the name of Webster Magnet Elementary, which had honored Daniel Webster, to Barack and Michelle Obama Service Learning Elementary....
“We have had buildings named after living individuals, but as a rule, they are no longer holding office,” said Ren
Source: AP
May 20, 2009
Italian cultural authorities said Tuesday they had recovered two precious Byzantine-era frescos ripped from a church in southern Italy by looters 27 years ago that ended up at the home of a shipping heiress on a remote Greek island.
The Carabinieri art squad showed off the delicate frescos and other artifacts recovered by Italy as part of its crackdown on illicit antiquities trafficking. In all, police say they recovered more than euro3 million ($4 million) worth of stolen statues,
Source: LiveScience
May 20, 2009
You know science has made it big when the Google homepage logo is changed to celebrate a fossil finding and the mayor of New York shows up at a press conference to unveil it.
A new 47-million year old primate fossil unveiled to the world Tuesday has made waves among scientists and non-scientists. Google responded by working an image of the fossil into the logo of its search page.
The discovery was presented with much fanfare at a press conference at the American Museum
Source: AP
May 20, 2009
The American Civil Liberties Union on Wednesday threatened to sue a San Diego County school that refused to let a student present a report on slain gay rights leader Harvey Milk until her classmates got their parents' permission to hear it.
David Blair-Loy, legal director of the ACLU of San Diego County, said the principal of Mt. Woodson Elementary School in Ramona violated the free speech rights of 6th-grader Natalie Jones, who was the only student in her class prevented from givin
