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: AFP
Sep 25, 2010
SYDNEY — The late nun who is soon to become Australia's first Catholic saint was briefly excommunicated by the church in part because she exposed a paedophile priest, a new documentary claims.
Mary MacKillop, who will be canonised by Pope Benedict XVI next month, is known as a tireless educator and founder of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of the Sacred Heart order of nuns which ventured into remote outback areas.
But a documentary to be screened on national broadcaster AB
Source: Daily Express (UK)
Sep 25, 2010
SEVENTY years ago famed aviator Charles Lindbergh, America’s most popular man, urged his country to back the Fuhrer’s evil regime – and he almost achieved his twisted goal.
THE voice coming out of radios across America during that autumn 70 years ago was calm and unhurried.
Millions, from farmers in the wheat-swaying Mid West to slick operators in New York, tuned in to listen – for the speaker was the nation’s golden boy.
He was Charles Lindbergh, the count
Source: NYT
Sep 25, 2010
...Despite President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s celebrated World War II record, voters didn’t “like Ike” enough to keep his fellow Republicans from losing 48 House seats amid the 1958 recession. For all his talents, Mr. Clinton watched his party lose control of both the House and Senate in the 1994 midterm election, in which economic weakness was one of many factors. “We have a controlled experiment,” observed Stan Greenberg, one of Mr. Clinton’s pollsters, downplaying the significance of Mr. Obama’
Source: NYT
Sep 25, 2010
The photographs of Ernest C. Withers — of the Little Rock integration battle, of the Emmett Till murder trial, of the aftermath of the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — are among the most powerful records of the civil rights movement. They have lived on in dozens of books and museum collections.
But would these images be seen differently if the captions noted that Mr. Withers was known in some circles not by his name but by an Orwellian cipher, ME 338-R — the co
Source: NYT
Sep 25, 2010
On Sept. 21, 1970, readers who turned to the last inside page of The Times's main section found something new. The obituaries that normally appeared in that space had been moved, replaced by something called Op-Ed. The vision of John Oakes, the editorial page editor, and Harrison Salisbury, the eminent foreign correspondent, Op-Ed was meant to open the paper to outside voices. It was to be a venue for writers with no institutional affiliation with the paper, people from all walks of life whose v
Source: NYT
Sep 25, 2010
[Gail Collins is a columnist for the NYT.]
Congress is staggering toward recess. I’m going to go way out on a limb and guess that they’re not going to accomplish anything major before they leave. But as long as they’re still in town, taking up space, the least they could do is approve the National Women’s History Museum bill.
Honestly, I would not be making this plea if everybody was knee-deep in the budget or reforming the tax structure. But they can barely summon the
Source: NewsInEnglish.no
Sep 24, 2010
Archaeologists think they have found two more Viking ships buried in Vestfold County south of Oslo. The biggest may be 25 metres long, larger than any found so far.
Road construction near the old Viking trading center at Kaupang has led to the discovery of two large ship silhouettes on ground radar pictures. The pictures have been made possible through a venture involving the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research (Norsk institutt for kulturminneforskning, NIKU) and the
Source: Yahoo News
Sep 24, 2010
VIENNA (Reuters) – Roman Catholic and Orthodox theologians reported promising progress Friday in talks on overcoming their Great Schism of 1054 and bringing the two largest denominations in Christianity back to full communion.
Experts meeting in Vienna this week agreed the two could eventually become "sister churches" that recognize the Roman pope as their titular head but retain many church structures, liturgy and customs that developed over the past millennium.
Source: AOL News
Sep 24, 2010
In England, researchers are using some unusual tools to learn how to adapt to change: pressed flowers collected during the Victorian era. Flowers bloom largely based on spring temperatures, Anthony Davy, a professor of the University of East Anglia who co-authored a study on pressed flowers, explained to Reuters. If researchers know the exact day that flowers were picked, they can use that to put together a picture about global temperatures long before accurate recording existed.
By
Source: Yahoo News
Sep 24, 2010
When Cherie Rosenstein penned her essay about being a 5-year-old orphan fleeing war-torn Europe for a new life in America, she probably couldn't have imagined that the story would reunite her with the woman whose passport secured her entry into the United States 62 years ago. But that's exactly what happened.
In 2007, Rosenstein, whose parents both perished in a Nazi concentration camp, wrote about her childhood experiences for the Dayton Jewish Observer. Her name as a child was Ma
Source: AFP
Sep 24, 2010
BAGHDAD (AFP) – It was one of the most impressive collections of historical artefacts in the world. But in the seven years since Saddam Hussein was ousted, Baghdad's National Museum has struggled to recover not just its pillaged treasures, but also its lost lustre.
Officially reopened with great fanfare in February 2009, a cloud now hangs over the imposing brick structure in the centre of the Iraqi capital, once again closed to the public, this time for renovation.
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Source: WalesOnline (UK)
Sep 24, 2010
A RARE Norman site is being irreparably damaged and is in danger of being destroyed, according to a respected archaeologist.
Stephen Clarke, the head of a professional archaeological unit and chairman of Monmouth Archaeological Society, insisted the remains of a defensive ditch which once lined the ancient town of Clawdd Du in Monmouthshire could soon be lost forever.
Mr Clarke, who was made an MBE for services to archaeology, claims Monmouthshire council had “ignorantl
Source: Richmond Times-Dispatch
Sep 24, 2010
The University of Richmond is crafting a digital map tracing the landscape of emancipation during the Civil War.
The project, which has been awarded a $48,155 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, will create a computerized illustration of data documenting where, when and how slaves became free.
One goal is to show how the institution of slavery changed during the course of the Civil War, said Scott Nesbit, associate director of UR's Digital Scholarship
Source: BBC
Sep 24, 2010
Workers restoring a 300-year-old ruined cottage in Snowdonia have dug up a mystery under its fireplace.
Almost 100 single shoes were discovered at Gelli Iago, a home which has been uninhabited for more than 50 years.
The National Trust, which acquired the property after 1998's Save Snowdon campaign, is appealing to the public for an answer to the mystery.
The discovery was made by contractors working to save the cottage's external walls and chimney stack.
Source: BBC
Sep 24, 2010
One of Northern Ireland's smallest World War II heroes has been honoured.
Paddy, a messenger pigeon who served with the RAF during the Normandy operations in June 1944, was remembered in his home town of Larne on Friday.
PDSA, Britain's biggest veterinary charity, awarded Paddy the Dickin Medal, dubbed the animals' "Victoria Cross", 65 years ago this month.
He received it for being the first pigeon to reach England with a coded message from the ba
Source: BBC
Sep 24, 2010
A small but revealing group of letters written by the playwright Oscar Wilde have been sold at auction in Derby.
The five letters, sold as separate lots, reached a total of £33,900 and were all bought by one bidder.
Auctioneers, Bamfords of Derby, said the letters appear to reveal Wilde propositioning a magazine editor at a time when homosexuality was illegal.
They were written to Alsager Vian, during the Society Magazine era, and were sold off by his desce
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Sep 24, 2010
The controversial historian, David Irving, branded his critics as "little Nazis who Hitler would be proud of" as he announced that his controversial tour of wartime sights in Poland would now include a string of the Third Reich's death camps.
The plan to visit Sobibor, Majdanek and Belzec, not mentioned in the original schedule of a £1,500-a-head tour led by the 72-year-old, comes despite fierce criticism of his presence in Poland from the country's Jewish community.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Sep 24, 2010
It is regarded as one of the greatest baseball games ever played, but one that was lost to history.
The decider of the 1960 World Series between the Pittsburgh Pirates and the New York Yankees ended with Bill Mazeroski's electrifying home run which won the game 10-9 and clinched the series for the Pirates.
It was believed that a grainy 40-second clip was all that survived of the match as television networks erased the tape, as was routine up until the 1970s.
Source: AP
Sep 24, 2010
The African Union asked the U.N. Security Council in a letter circulated on Friday to delay for a year the prosecution of Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir on charges of genocide and other alleged crimes.
In a letter to the council circulated Friday, the continent-wide organization said it wants the delay because a trial of al-Bashir would interfere with efforts to end the seven-year conflict in western Darfur.
His letter was made public hours before a high-level meeting
Source: AP
Sep 24, 2010
Abdul Ruzibiza, a former captain of a Tutsi rebel group and key witness in a French judge's investigation into a 1994 attack that triggered the Rwandan genocide, has died, Norwegian police said Friday. He was 40.
Ruzibiza died in a Norwegian hospital Wednesday after a long illness, said Reidun Brekke, who was Ruzibiza's supervisor at staffing company Adecco Norway.
A former captain of the Rwandan Patriotic Front, Ruzibiza released a book in 2005, saying the group was be
