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: IHT (UK)
Jan 12, 2009
They waxed nostalgic about secret negotiations in Beijing, a Cold War alliance against the former Soviet Union and the first visit to the United States by Deng Xiaoping, the now deceased Chinese leader.
They mentioned some touchy issues, like the ongoing tensions over Taiwan and Tibet.
But in the end, the American and Chinese leaders who gave speech after speech in Beijing on Monday afternoon chose to focus on China's stunning economic growth and its place in the world
Source: IHT (UK)
Jan 12, 2009
President George W. Bush held what he called "the ultimate exit interview" on Monday, using the final news conference of his presidency to deliver a vigorous defense of "the decision I have made to protect the homeland" and a pointed warning to President-elect Barack Obama that, despite the turbulence in the economy, his most urgent priority must be protecting the United States against "an enemy that would like to attack America and Americans again."
Th
Source: Foxnews
Jan 12, 2009
Construction workers in northern Poland have unearthed a World War II-era mass grave containing what are believed to be the bodies of 1,800 German men, women and children who disappeared during the Soviet Army's march to Berlin.
Poles digging at the site of a planned luxury hotel in Malbork — which was called Marienburg and was part of Germany during the war — excavated a bomb crater at the foot of the city's famous 13th century Teutonic Knights fortress, authorities said Monday.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jan 12, 2009
President George W Bush launched a passionate defence of his record in office today claiming America was still admired by ordinary people across the world.
In his last press conference before handing over to President-Elect Barack Obama next week, Mr Bush said the country had retained its standing despite criticism from European elites.
He cited the prevention of another terrorist attack on US soil as the signature achievement of his eight-year presidency and said he
Source: CNN
Jan 12, 2009
James Presley stands amid chopped cotton, the thick Mississippi mud caked on his well-worn boots. A smile spreads across his face when he talks about voting for Barack Obama and what that might mean for generations to come. His voice picks up a notch. He holds his head up a bit higher."There's a heap of pride in voting for a black man," he says.
At 78, Presley is a legend of the past living in the present and now hopeful for the future. A grandson of slaves, he's one of th
Source: BBC
Jan 12, 2009
War crimes judges have begun hearing evidence against a militia commanded by former Democratic Republic of Congo Vice-President Jean-Pierre Bemba.
His Movement for the Liberation of Congo intervened in a power struggle in neighbouring Central African Republic in 2002 and 2003.
The International Criminal Court pre-trial hearings involve claims of murder and rape. Mr Bemba denies all charges.
He says his troops were not under his command once they crossed t
Source: Independent (UK)
Jan 12, 2009
Barack Obama paid a visit to the Lincoln Memorial at the weekend, publicly honouring the man who inspired his career and whose legacy is to provide a major theme for the inauguration in eight days.
The President-elect took his family to the monument on Saturday night, where they admired the statue of the 16th President, before studying the inscriptions of his greatest speeches, including the Gettysburg Address.
It was the latest indication that Mr Obama intends
Source: Tehran Times
Jan 12, 2009
An Iranian-Australian team’s joint efforts in late 2007 led to the discovery of the ruins of an Achaemenid palace at the site, which is believed to be the Achaemenid city of Lidoma that has been named in a collection of ancient tablets previously unearthed at Persepolis.
The prehistoric area of Tol-e Nurabad and the Achaemenid structure at the site will be studied by the team, Iranian director of the team Alireza Asgari told the Persian service of CHN on Sunday.
Tol-e
Source: NYT
Jan 12, 2009
WASHINGTON — It is still a week before he takes office, yet President-elect Barack Obama is everywhere: on the Sunday talk shows, on radio and YouTube, on Capitol Hill, drawing on the techniques he employed during the campaign and lessons from predecessors as he seeks to shape public attitudes about the economic downturn.
His aides said Mr. Obama had studied the way Franklin D. Roosevelt approached the first 100 days of his presidency, and in particular had seized on the notion of R
Source: NYT
Jan 12, 2009
On Christmas Eve, the conservative pundit Monica Crowley argued on Fox News that instead of rescuing America from the Great Depression, Franklin Roosevelt’s spending on public works made it worse. She insisted that this bizarre claim was confirmed by “all kinds of studies and academic work.”
The show’s host backed her up. “Yes,” said Gregg Jarrett, “I think historians pretty much agree on that.” In the same vein, a recent Wall Street Journal opinion piece said F.D.R. helped turn “a
Source: AP
Jan 11, 2009
Yale University says a lawsuit by Peru seeking the return of thousands of Inca artifacts removed from the famed Machu Picchu citadel nearly a century ago should be dismissed because a statue of limitations expired.
Peru rejects the argument, saying Yale never owned the artifacts and that its claim is not subject to a statute of limitations under Peruvian law. Peru also says Yale did not assert ownership of the artifacts until late 2008.
The South American nation filed t
Source: The Boston Globe
Jan 11, 2009
BU archeologist unearths clues about ancient Egypt’s sea trade.
The archeological digs at Egypt’s Wadi Gawasis have yielded neither mummies nor grand monuments.
But Boston University archeologist Kathryn Bard and her colleagues are uncovering the oldest remnants of seagoing ships and other relics linked to exotic trade with a mysterious Red Sea realm called Punt.
Source: The Seattle Times
Jan 11, 2009
For more than a century, the Pacific Ocean has clawed away at Washaway Beach, a 2-mile stretch of eroding coastline just south of Grayland.
With nature claiming so much, it seemed only fair that it offer something in return. Now it has — the buried wreckage of an old vessel revealing more of itself with every outgoing tide.
According to maritime experts and others, the wreckage could be part of the Canadian Exporter, a freighter that broke in two in August 1921 while ca
Source: Philadelphia Inquirer
Jan 11, 2009
One fragment is a poster-size patch of discolored red-and-white cloth, the other little more than threads and fibers. Both pieces come from the same source. And both are more than what they seem.
Both swatches were snipped from a giant U.S. flag that President-elect Abraham Lincoln raised at Independence Hall during the 1861 rail voyage that took him through Philadelphia to Washington for his inauguration. On Saturday, nearly 150 years later, another president-elect from Illinois w
Source: IHT (UK)
Jan 11, 2009
Manmohan Singh leads the largest democracy on Earth. But the Indian prime minister is gentle of manner and speaks in whispers. One struggles to imagine him professing love without shyness to his own wife. And so it meant something when he recently laid the L-word on a little-loved man: George W. Bush.
"The relationship with India is one of the few success stories of the Bush administration's foreign policy," said Teresita Schaffer, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and
Source: IHT(UK)
Jan 11, 2009
A former Macedonian interior minister who spent more than three years in detention while on trial at a United Nations war crimes tribunal has announced that he plans to run for president.
Ljube Boskoski, 48, was the first person to officially announce his candidacy for the elections, which are to be held March 22.
Boskoski was welcomed as a hero in his native Macedonia in July after the UN tribunal in The Hague, acquitted him on several charges for war crimes.
Source: IHT (UK)
Jan 11, 2009
The police put up wanted posters across Serbia on Sunday offering a €1 million reward for the capture of wartime Bosnian Serb Army commander, Ratko Mladic.
Posters carrying photographs of Mladic, the former general charged with genocide, and another war crimes fugitive, Goran Hadzic, were distributed to all police stations in Serbia.
Mladic is charged with genocide by the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague. He is accused of orchestrating the 1995 massacre o
Source: WaPo
Jan 11, 2009
Officials staged a large-scale rehearsal of the upcoming presidential inauguration and parade this morning -- and even practiced the swearing-in at the Capitol with a stand-in for Barack Obama.
The stand-in, Army Staff Sgt. Derrick Brooks, delivered a six-word inaugural address that nonetheless drew a cheer: "My fellow Americans, God bless America!"
The activities began before dawn, with thousands of people deployed later in the morning at the Capitol and alon
Source: AP
Jan 11, 2009
Toshio Tamogami draws a full pension, gives lectures, appears on TV talk shows and is treated with respect.
Not bad for a general who two months ago was fired for writing an essay justifying Japan's entry into World War II.
The case of the ousted air force chief reveals how the idea that Japan's war was justified still lives on in the minds of many Japanese, including powerful ones.
When Japan went to war, the nation was told it was for self-defense, to fre
Source: New York Daily News
Jan 11, 2009
His approval rating is lower than his boss' dismal numbers. The McCain campaign considered Cheney so toxic with moderate and independent voters that he never campaigned with the Republican nominee last fall.
Even a close pal calls him "the most divisive public official in modern political history."
While Bush has been given to some introspection and a few second thoughts in his farewell interviews, Cheney is unrepentant.
However history assesse
