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
Mar 21, 2009
The questions flew hard and fast at President Obama last week as he stood on the White House South Lawn, preparing to escape for California’s gentler climes. How, Mr. Obama was asked, would he quell public anger over $165 million in bonuses for employees of the bailed-out insurance giant, A.I.G.?...
Mr. Obama is hardly the first American president to grapple with a distraction, a diversion — an outright red herring, some might call it — that grew bigger than itself. Ronald Reagan h
Source: NYT
Mar 21, 2009
A wrongful termination lawsuit filed by a former professor against the University of Colorado has been unfolding in exciting fashion in a courtroom here.
The professor, Ward L. Churchill, was dismissed by the university in July 2007 on grounds that he plagiarized and falsified parts of his research on Native Americans. But Mr. Churchill contends that he was fired in retaliation for an essay in which he described office workers killed in the World Trade Center attacks as “little Eic
Source: NYT
Mar 21, 2009
For many, the excitement of the 2008 presidential election was about witnessing a moment that people would one day read about in history books.
Well, the first draft of history has a release date: this fall.
On Page 1,126 of the newest edition of “United States History,” a Pearson textbook for high schoolers that is due in classrooms this fall, a picture of Barack Obama at his election night rally in Chicago appears next to the red-lettered headline “An Historic Moment.
Source: NYT
Mar 21, 2009
Setting aside specific problems now facing the economy — like the credit crisis and the continuing troubles in the housing and financial sectors — the math of recovering from downturns of this magnitude is hard to overcome quickly. James B. Stack, editor of the InvesTech Market Analyst, a newsletter in Whitefish, Mont., studied bear market recoveries since 1929; he found that after the most significant downturns — like this one — it has taken more than seven years for stocks to fully recoup loss
Source: IHT
Mar 21, 2009
Every time Radovan Karadzic, the onetime Bosnian Serb leader, appears in court on war crimes charges he has hammered on one recurring claim: a senior American official pledged that he would never be standing there.
The official, Richard Holbrooke, now a special envoy on Afghanistan and Pakistan for the Obama administration, has repeatedly denied promising Mr. Karadzic immunity from prosecution in exchange for abandoning power after the Bosnian war.
But the rumor persist
Source: AP
Mar 21, 2009
A 350-year-old statue of a saint and former pope, taken from an Italian church nearly two decades ago, has been found in the home of a North Carolina couple who had no idea it was stolen, authorities said.
The intricately carved bust of St. Innocent will be returned to the church in Naples, Italy, U.S. Immigration and Customs and Enforcement agents said.
The statue was one of 17 similar busts and two oil paintings taken from the church in November 1990. Authorities told
Source: Santa Barbara’s American Presidency Project
Mar 20, 2009
Friday March 20 marked the end of the second month of the Obama Presidency. Obama still maintains his lead in unilateral actions (Executive Orders, Proclamations, and Memoranda; see chart below). Recently the president has begun to define a distinctive mode and method for communicating with the public.
Source: CNN
Mar 20, 2009
America faces an economic calamity. Trouble brews in faraway lands.
Sound familiar?
More than 70 years ago, the very first superheroes debuted in the dire times of the Great Depression and the early years of World War II. Their names became legend -- Superman, Batman (or, as he was then known, the Bat-Man), Wonder Woman, Captain America -- and they're still with us today.
A new exhibit at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles celebrates these icons
Source: Reuters
Mar 20, 2009
BERLIN -– Berliners plan to topple a two kilometer-long chain of giant "dominoes" along the path of the wall that once separated communist east from the west, to mark the 20th anniversary of its fall.
"We want to knock over the wall once again," said Klaus Wowereit, mayor of Berlin. Assembly of more than 1,000 styrofoam slabs, each 2.5 meters (eight feet) high and one meter (three feet) wide, is beginning this week.
At a ceremony on November 9, the d
Source: NPR
Mar 20, 2009
Iraq is suffering one of the worst droughts in decades.
While this is bad news for farmers, it is good news for archaeologists in the country.
The receding waters of the Euphrates River have revealed ancient archaeological sites, some of which
were unknown until now.
For Ratib Ali al-Kubaisi, the director of Anbar province's Antiquities Department, the drought has
opened up a whole new land of opportunity.
He explains that civilization began in Anbar, next to the Euphrat
Source: Christian Science Monitor
Mar 20, 2009
SKOPJE, MACEDONIA - As part of a stunning new homegrown ideology of history and identity based on Alexander the Great, this capital city's main square may soon boast a huge new statue of the ancient conqueror.
Two years ago, the national airport was renamed after Alexander, infuriating Greece.
In January, despite a recent Greek nixing of Macedonia's NATO bid over the airport name, the ruling nationalists here changed the name of its main roadway to Alexander of Macedon
Source: International Herald Tribune
Mar 20, 2009
American flags were set on fire Friday to chants of "no, no for occupation" as followers of an anti-U.S. Shiite cleric marked the sixth anniversary of the Iraq war.
In Baghdad and five other Iraqi cities, supporters of Moktada al-Sadr either marched or stood in protest after prayers to demand the release of their allies detained at Iraqi and U.S.-run prisons.
The protests came as a suicide bomber in Fallujah killed an Iraqi police officer and five other people
Source: BBC
Mar 20, 2009
Badu Bonsu II, leader of the Ashanti tribe, is believed to have been decapitated in retaliation for the killing of two Dutch emissaries.
The Leiden museum, which has been storing the head, said it hoped it could now have a dignified burial.
Ghana had said the king would not be at rest if the head remained where it was.
King Bonsu is thought to have been executed after the two officials were killed during a rebellion against European rule in the country,
Source: NYT
Mar 20, 2009
“Dokdo Island is Korean territory,” the ad [printed on the plastic dry cleaning bag] declared. “The Japanese government must acknowledge this fact.”
To understand the message on the bag is to go back more than a century, to the beginning of an emotional land dispute between Japan and Korea.
The conflict is over a cluster of barely inhabitable islets and reefs in the sea between the countries — called Dokdo in South Korea and Takeshima in Japan — and much more, especiall
Source: AP
Mar 20, 2009
Chinese security forces have detained a former soldier who publicly expressed regret over his role in the 1989 military crackdown on pro-democracy protests near Tiananmen Square, a human rights group said Friday.
The former soldier, Zhang Shijun, 40, published an open letter to Hu Jintao, the Communist Party leader, on the Internet in which he called on the party and government to reconsider its condemnation of the student-led protests.
He said he hoped his example woul
Source: BBC
Mar 20, 2009
A veterans' association has rejected an offer of Lottery funding for a trip to mark the 65th anniversary this summer of the D-Day landings in France.
The Normandy Veterans Association said it would not accept the money at this late stage.
It said it had almost raised enough with the help of a national newspaper.
The government has said it will provide support for those wishing to travel, but has not clarified exactly what help will be available.
Source: BBC
Mar 20, 2009
A former SS man alleged to have taken part in the extermination of 8,000 Jews in one day has been freed by Austria, a day after being extradited from the US.
The Austrian justice ministry said the former guard, 83-year-old Josias Kumpf, could not be put on trial because the statute of limitations had expired.
The US says he acted in the killing and burial in pits of Jewish interns at the Trawniki camp in Nazi-occupied Poland.
Austrian justice ministry sp
Source: AP
Mar 20, 2009
The severed head of King Badu Bonsu II is going home to Ghana, around 170 years after it was hacked off in retaliation for the slayings of two Dutch emissaries whose skulls were hung from the tribal leader's throne.
Bonsu's head was discovered last year in a jar of formaldehyde at the Leiden University Medical Center's anatomical collection by a Dutch author.
Ghana immediately asked for it to be returned and the Dutch government asked the hospital to cooperate.
Source: TPM (Liberal blog)
Mar 20, 2009
As we delve into the back-story behind the collapse of AIG, we thought it might be useful to lay out some key factual information about the firm's Financial Products unit, known as AIGFP, whose disastrous credit default swaps brought the company to its knees. How and when did AIG Financial Products get started? Who ran it, and from where? How did it get into credit default swaps, and what exactly are they, anyway? And how did this group of derivatives traders eventually wind up bringing down one
Source: AP
Mar 20, 2009
Barack Obama's optimistic campaign rhetoric has crashed headlong into the stark reality of governing.
In office two months, he has backpedaled on an array of issues, gingerly shifting positions as circumstances dictate while ducking for political cover to avoid undercutting his credibility and authority. That's happened on the Iraq troop withdrawal timeline, on lobbyists in his administration and on money for lawmakers' pet projects.
It's the same delicate dance each of his predecessors fa
