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: WaPo
Aug 17, 2010
Social activists and civil rights leaders, among them the Rev. Al Sharpton, are planning marches and demonstrations -- including the unveiling of a nearly four-story-tall original sculpture on the Mall -- on Aug. 28 to coincide with a rally organized by Fox News personality Glenn Beck.
Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally, with former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin among the scheduled speakers, will take place on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, 47 years to the day a
Source: Religion News Service
Aug 17, 2010
The scenario might have seemed unlikely: prominent Muslims and Jews from the United States, trekking across the Atlantic in mournful, spiritual solidarity to visit two Nazi concentration camps. Together.
The trip to Dachau and Auschwitz was meant to combat the rise in Holocaust denial that has popped up in various Muslim and non-Muslim circles around the world--and online--in recent years.
"The best way to convince someone about the truth of something is to let the
Source: BBC
Aug 17, 2010
The Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin is showing paintings by the Ulster artist, Sir John Lavery, which include portraits of nearly all the senior British and Irish politicians from the period of Irish independence. BBC NI's Dublin correspondent Shane Harrison has been to have a look.
The Hugh Lane gallery, a centre for modern art in Dublin, is not far from the city's main tree-lined thoroughfare, O'Connell Street.
The gallery is now showing an exhibition that can only be des
Source: TampaBay.com
Aug 17, 2010
Wake up and good morning. You don't usually see a reference to Adolf Hitler in a blog about Florida business, so this is an unusual posting. It seems a Tampa company called World Holdings LLC that says it owns a "significant number" of $208 million in bonds sold to U.S. purchasers following World War I. The company was rebuffed when it sought repayment by the German government, so in a lawsuit originally filed in Miami, World Holdings seeks "hundreds of millions of dollars."
Source: AP
Aug 17, 2010
For 193 years the Ohio Clock has stood watch over the U.S. Senate, a subject of rumor, curiosity and misinformation.
Was it made in Ohio? Did senators stash whiskey inside it?
Now the elegant clock is making its first journey beyond the Capitol. That may not answer the questions, but it will give the clock a long-needed renovation, inside and out, Senate officials say.
The 11-foot-tall piece is a Capitol landmark. Countless press conferences are held there
Source: Guardian (UK)
Aug 17, 2010
Excavations near the antique city of Vindunum (now Le Mans) have revealed a vast religious site dating from the first to the third centuries AD with remarkably well-preserved offerings.
Sometimes archaeology requires imagination. And you need it to conjure up the vast complex of temples that stood nearly 2,000 years ago on this flat two-hectare strip of land, in what is now Neuville-sur-Sarthe, 4km to the north of Le Mans.
"I have been an archaeologist for 30 years
Source: AFP
Aug 17, 2010
South Korean archaeologists said Tuesday they have unearthed a rare neolithic period wooden boat oar, believed to date back about 7,000 years but still in good condition.
The oar was discovered in mud land in Changnyeong, 240 kilometres (140 miles) southeast of Seoul, the Gimhae National Museum said.
One of the oldest boats or related artefacts was found in China's Zhejiang province in 2005 and was believed to date back about 8,000 years....
Source: Reuters
Aug 17, 2010
Archaeologists in Afghanistan, where Taliban Islamists are fighting the Western-backed government, have uncovered Buddhist-era remains in an area south of Kabul, an official said on Tuesday.
The excavation site extends over 12 km (7.5 miles) in the Aynak region of Logar province just south of Kabul, where China is mining copper ore as part of its multi-billion dollar investments in the Central Asian country.
Rasouli said the mining work had not harmed the sites -- which
Source: Newsweek
Aug 17, 2010
With Republicans already viewing controversy over the proposed Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero in New York as an opportunity to mobilize discontented voters, Democrats are fighting back with their own accusations: namely, that the GOP is exploiting the September 11 attacks by politicizing the mosque debate.
Unfortunately, disagreement over the mosque (or whatever it’s being called) isn’t the first occasion that campaigners have used to kick around the 9/11 political footba
Source: Guardian (UK)
Aug 17, 2010
Enormous religious site in French countryside may have been devoted to worshipping many gods.
Excavations near the antique city of Vindunum (now Le Mans) have revealed a vast religious site dating from the first to the third centuries AD with remarkably well-preserved offerings.
Sometimes archaeology requires imagination. And you need it to conjure up the vast complex of temples that stood nearly 2,000 years ago on this flat two-hectare strip of land, in what is now Neu
Source: BBC News
Aug 17, 2010
Former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has been found guilty of lying to agents.
A federal jury in Chicago found him guilty of making false statements but was unable to reach a unanimous verdict on 23 other corruption charges.
The judge said he intended to declare a mistrial on the remaining counts.
Blagojevich, 53, was accused of trying to use his office for personal gain - including a bid to sell President Barack Obama's vacant Senate seat.
Source: CNN
Aug 17, 2010
With his head bowed and a barely detectable quiver in his voice, the baseball player known as the "Iron Horse" devastated the crowd at Yankee Stadium, not by hitting a home run, but by announcing that he was dying.
It was July 4, 1939, and Lou Gehrig, a first baseman for the New York Yankees, had reached the end of a storied career.
"Fans, for the past two weeks you have been reading about a bad break I got," said Gehrig, who during his career played 2,130
Source: AP
Aug 17, 2010
A three-year-old federal law that makes it a crime to falsely claim to have received a medal from the U.S. military is unconstitutional, an appeals court panel in California ruled Tuesday.
The decision involves the case of Xavier Alvarez of Pomona, Calif., a water district board member who said at a public meeting in 2007 that he was a retired Marine who received the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military decoration.
Alvarez was indicted in 2007. He pleaded guil
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Aug 17, 2010
At first glance it is hard to imagine anyone objecting to plans to demolish a street of dilapidated Victorian two-up-two downs in a neglected part of Liverpool.
But when Beatles fans realised the plans included the destruction of drummer Ringo Starr's birthplace, they accused the council of cultural vandalism bordering on the criminal.
Devotees of the Fab Four have said proposals to demolish 9 Madryn Street in the Dingle district of Liverpool, where Starr, whose real name is
Source: BBC News
Aug 17, 2010
Francesco Cossiga, a former Italian president and an enduring presence in Italy's post-war politics, has died at the age of 82.
He had been taken to hospital in Rome last week with respiratory and heart problems.
Cossiga served as interior minister in the 1970s, resigning after he failed to save the life of kidnapped Prime Minister Aldo Moro in 1978.
He was president from 1985-1992, before becoming an outspoken lifetime senator.
Cossiga was bor
Source: BBC News
Aug 17, 2010
The war crimes trial of former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, on its return from a summer break, has heard about the siege of Sarajevo.
A UN observer said the bombardment of the Bosnian capital in late 1992 was so intense that the UN ran out of space to record the attacks on its forms.
Mr Karadzic, who is defending himself, attended the session at the international court in The Hague.
He denies 11 charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against hu
Source: BBC News
Aug 17, 2010
Australia should become a republic when Queen Elizabeth II dies, Prime Minister Julia Gillard has said just days ahead of a general election.
Welsh-born Ms Gillard said the Queen's death would be an "appropriate point" for Australia to move away from having a British monarch as head of state.
Australians voted against becoming a republic in a 1999 referendum, but the issue continues to be divisive.
Ms Gillard's main opponent, Tony Abbott, is a sta
Source: Kansas City Star
Aug 16, 2010
irst, ballplayers plant a large square of broomstick stakes, instead of a diamond of bases, around a field.
Then, they divide randomly into halves. One team with an antique bat heads out for its first bout at bat.
“Huzzah, good strike,” screams Synthia Somerhalder, as striker Logan Nickels knocks a cotton-filled leather ball left and runs from broomstick to broomstick.
Two at-bats later, a ball skims the infield near another “stake-runner” who can’t avoid a
Source: AP
Aug 16, 2010
A trial date has been set on a bid to block a Walmart Supercenter near an endangered Civil War battlefield in northern Virginia....
Source: BBC
Aug 16, 2010
Humans helped drive a species of giant turtle to extinction almost 3,000 years ago, according to a study in PNAS.
It is one of the first cases that clearly shows that humans played a role in the demise of the giant, extinct animals known as "megafauna".
An Australian research team discovered turtle leg bones - but not shells or skulls - on an island of Vanuatu.
The bones date to just 200 years after humans' arrival, suggesting they were hunted to
