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: Telegraph (UK)
Jul 16, 2010
A long lost Hollywood silent film featuring Charlie Chaplin is to be screened for the first time in nearly a century after being discovered at an antiques fair.
The comedy called A Thief Catcher was made in 1914 and was missing for so many years that Chaplin's appearance in it as a buffoon policeman had been forgotten.
The 10-minute movie was discovered by the American cinema historian, Paul Gierucki, who bought a can of old film marked "Keystone" at an antiq
Source: Fox News
Jul 16, 2010
Lynne Stewart, the lawyer sentenced in 2006 to 28 months in prison for aiding convicted terrorist Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, got a new sentence Thursday -- 10 years -- after an appeals court ruled late last year her trial judge went too light on her.
Southern District Judge John Koeltl could've given the 70-year-old Stewart 30 years, but went easy on her considering her age and failing health.
Stewart was found guilty in February 2005 of conveying messages for Rahman fro
Source: AP
Jul 16, 2010
Italian police have recovered hundreds of ancient artifacts in their latest effort to crack down on the looting of art, and have looted art, and they chose a unique setting to display them Friday: the Colosseum.
The 337 pieces displayed in the ancient Roman arena include vases, bronze tools and marble statues of Venus, some dating as far back as the 8th century B.C.
Police said the pieces are worth some euro15 million (about $20 million) overall. They said the pieces we
Source: AP
Jul 16, 2010
After tens of thousands of years under the Siberian frost, a baby woolly mammoth is taking a summer vacation in southeast France.
Baby Khroma, one of the oldest intact mammoths ever found, went on display in a French museum Friday - after it underwent special tests to ensure it was no longer bearing the anthrax believed to have killed it.
Khroma is on display at the Musee Crozatier in Puy-en-Velay in a special cryogenic chamber kept at -18 degrees C (-0.40 Fahrenheit)..
Source: AP
Jul 16, 2010
The enigmatic smile remains a mystery, but French scientists say they have cracked a few secrets of the "Mona Lisa."
French researchers studied seven of the Louvre Museum's Leonardo da Vinci paintings, including the "Mona Lisa," to analyze the master's use of successive ultrathin layers of paint and glaze — a technique that gave his works their dreamy quality.
Specialists from the Center for Research and Restoration of the Museums of France found tha
Source: CNN
Jul 16, 2010
The British government called the freeing of the Lockerbie bomber a "mistake" Friday amid renewed questions over his release.
Britain's ambassador to the United States, Nigel Sheinwald, said the government believes it was wrong to let Abdelbeset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi out of prison in August 2009 and return to his native Libya, but it was a decision taken by the Scottish executive, not the British government.
Scotland has its own government that is responsible
Source: CNN
Jul 16, 2010
...It was on this day 75 years ago that the first parking meter was installed.
And 75 long years later, these coin-gulping contraptions remain as despised as they were when the first 150 of them were put in place in downtown Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, on July 16, 1935.
Concerned that parked cars -- that sometimes never moved for weeks -- were hurting downtown businesses, city officials were eager for a solution, according to the Oklahoma Historical Society.
E
Source: National Association of Scholars
Jul 16, 2010
PRINCETON, NJ (July 16, 2010)—This fall, Arizona voters must choose whether to vote for the Arizona Civil Rights Initiative (AzCRI). The National Association of Scholars (NAS) wants to help them decide. The NAS submitted an official argument in favor of AzCRI.
Sponsored by the American Civil Rights Initiative (ACRI) and its chairman Ward Conn
Source: WaPo
Jul 16, 2010
BP faced a new outcry Thursday about whether the Scottish and British governments sought to smooth BP's oil exploration contract talks with Libya by releasing prisoners, including the man convicted of bombing the Pan Am plane that went down over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988. The bombing killed 270 people, including 189 Americans.
With the approach of the first anniversary of the Lockerbie bomber's release from a Scottish prison, several factors are feeding the new uproar, including
Source: NYT
Jul 15, 2010
In an echo of the debates over the discredited intelligence that helped make the case for the war in Iraq, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday released more than 1,100 pages of previously classified Vietnam-era transcripts that show senators of the time sharply questioning whether they had been deceived by the White House and the Pentagon over the 1964 Gulf of Tonkin incident.
“If this country has been misled, if this committee, this Congress, has been misled by pret
Source: DW World
Jul 15, 2010
The Remembrance, Responsibility and Future Foundation no longer pays out compensation to victims of Nazi forced labor in 2007. But it hasn't stopped working to publicize the former forced workers' suffering.
The Remembrance, Responsibility and Future Foundation (EVZ) began paying compensation to victims of Nazi forced labor in 2000. Funded by the German government and about 6,500 German companies, EVZ paid 4.4 billion euros ($5.7 billion) to 1.7 million former forced workers o
Source: DW World
Jul 15, 2010
Eleven oil paintings that were among a stash that US soldiers are thought to have taken during World War II are on their way home.
The link between the paintings and their origins was discovered by Beth McFadden, whose great uncle, US Army Sergeant Harry Gursky, had been stationed near the town.
"Without the integrity and good will of Beth Ann McFadden, the repatriation of these paintings to the Pirmasens Museum could not have taken place," said a statement fr
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jul 15, 2010
The ONS has released a document, published during the early years of Queen Victoria's reign, which reveals in minute detail the economic and social make up of the country....
Despite the Empire's reputation for being fuelled by afternoon tea, the data indicates that coffee was still the drink of choice in Britain.
In 1840, the year Victoria married Prince Albert, Britain imported 28 million lbs of tea, but we imported more than twice as much coffee at 70 million lbs. By
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jul 15, 2010
Australian scientists have discovered bizarre prehistoric sea life thousands of feet below the Great Barrier Reef, in an unprecedented mission to document species under threat from ocean warming.
Ancient sharks, giant oil fish, swarms of crustaceans and a primitive shell-dwelling squid species called the Nautilus were among the astonishing life captured by remote controlled cameras at Osprey Reef.
Justin Marshall, the lead researcher, said his team had also found seve
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jul 15, 2010
Friday October 31 2003 dawned bitterly cold in Rome after a long Indian summer. Despite the weather, 77-year-old Libero Ricci, a retired interior decorator once employed by the Vatican, had no intention of missing his daily walk. Bundling up against the icy wind, Ricci said goodbye to his wife and son, with whom he lived in the south-western suburb of Magliana, pocketed his wallet and keys, and set off as usual after breakfast at 10am.
Robust and fit for his years, Ricci usually wal
Source: AFP
Jul 15, 2010
Musicologists funded by Abu Dhabi are roaming Islamic countries in search of lullabies and children's songs, one of the first projects of a centre that aims to preserve the musical heritage of the Muslim world.
The Al Ain Centre for Music in the World of Islam seeks to document, digitise and sustain the musical traditions of Muslim countries and Islamic communities anywhere in the world.
It also plans to help preserve the music of non-Islamic minorities in Muslim countr
Source: Newsweek
Jul 15, 2010
Mad Men, AMC’s critically acclaimed drama about the advertising men who ruled Madison Avenue in the 1960s (and the women who worked and lived with them), is coming back for its fourth season on July 25. Apart from making ’60s fashion and décor stylish again, the show offers a fascinating take on how some of the 20th century’s biggest brands became what they are today. In her new book,
Source: CHE
Jul 15, 2010
The University of Texas system's Board of Regents voted unanimously on Thursday to erase a painful reminder of the past by removing the name of a Ku Klux Klan leader and former law professor from a dormitory on the flagship campus here.
President William Powers Jr. recommended last Friday that the regents follow the suggestion of a 21-member review panel and rename Simkins Hall as Creekside Residence Hall.
The new name, which takes effect immediately, refers to the buil
Source: Ynet
Jul 15, 2010
In December 1939, four months after the beginning of World War II, Zionist leader Ze'ev Jabotinsky paid a visit to a retired 61-year-old British colonel.
The colonel, Richard Henry Meinertzhagen, served as an advisor at the War Office in London and knew Jabotinsky from his service in the British army in the Land of Israel after the Ottoman era in 1918.
The colonel documented his conversation with the Zionist leader in his private diary, which was published in London in
Source: AOL News
Jul 15, 2010
Amid a new U.S. furor over trading a terrorist for commercial considerations, BP confirmed today that it had lobbied the British government in late 2007 over a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya prior to the release of Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi.
The London-based petroleum giant said it had voiced concerns that the slow pace of negotiations risked impeding an offshore drilling deal with Moammar Gadhafi's North African country.
The company's statement
