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: LA Times
Jun 2, 2010
November 25, 1963. As I slowly climbed the familiar, winding steps to the elevated pulpit in the Cathedral of St. Matthew in Washington, D.C., I felt as numb and emotionally exhausted as every other American struggling to make sense of the stunningly brutal murder of the 43rd president of the United States, John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
My own grieving, however, would have to wait. First lady Jacqueline Kennedy had asked that I deliver the eulogy for her husband -- and my friend. Having
Source: BBC
Jun 2, 2010
A statue of Shaka Zulu has been removed from the new airport in South Africa's port city of Durban after complaints about the warrior king's portrayal.
In it he is unarmed and surrounded by cattle, but some think the king should have a spear, shield and wild animals.
The current Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini has also questioned the statue's airport location, reports say.
Once an agreement has been reached on a new design, the statue will be put back up,
Source: Civil War Interactive
Jun 2, 2010
At a land transfer ceremony this afternoon, the Civil War Preservation Trust (CWPT), the nation’s largest nonprofit battlefield preservation organization, formally donated 54 acres of hallowed ground associated with the October 1862 Battle of Perryville to the Commonwealth of Kentucky for integration into the Perryville Battlefield State Historic Site.
“Today we celebrate a great step forward for one of Kentucky’s outstanding historic sites,” said Tourism, Arts and Heritage Secretar
Source: Der Spiegel (Germany)
Jun 2, 2010
It has long been known that German civilians fell victim to Czech excesses immediately following the Nazi surrender at the end of World War II. But a newly discovered video shows one such massacre in brutal detail. And it has come as a shock to the Czech Republic.
For decades, the images lay forgotten in an aluminum canister -- almost seven minutes of original black and white film, shot with an 8 mm camera on May 10, 1945, in the Prague district of Borislavka during the confusing da
Source: NYT
Jun 2, 2010
It has been five years since a former curator of the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles went on trial in Rome for conspiring to traffic in stolen antiquities. The case has become a cornerstone of Italy’s aggressive campaign to recover ancient treasures from around the United States and has led major American museums to make their peace with the Italian government. As the museums have relinquished dozens of artworks that Italy claims were looted, receiving loans of other objects in exchange, off
Source: AFP
Jun 2, 2010
Pigs ears, smoked udders or veal lungs? French archaeologists this week begin examining the remains of an open-air banquet shovelled underground almost 30 years ago as an art performance.
Supervised by the creme-de-la-creme of French archaeology, a bunch of dusty diggers are unearthing the leftovers from a work now known as "Lunch Under The Grass" -- a meal for 80 in sumptuous gardens south of Paris where the star course was offal.
On April 23, 1983, Swiss art
Source: Guardian
Jun 2, 2010
Comparisons between modern Muslim-Christian tensions and the crusades of 1099 are a 'distortion', announces Tom Asbridge at the Hay festival.
Christian and Muslim attempts to draw parallels between the tensions of today and the crusades of almost 1,000 years ago are a distortion and manipulation of history, according to historian Tom Asbridge.
Speaking at the Guardian Hay festival today, Asbridge, author of two books on the crusades, argued that the modern belief that t
Source: BBC
Jun 2, 2010
A campaign to feature social pioneer Robert Owen on banknotes is being taken to the Scottish parliament.
MSPs will debate a motion by Labour MSP Bill Butler calling for Owen to feature on Scottish notes in time for the United Nations Year of Co-operatives in 2012.
Owen pioneered co-operative values during his time as mill manager at New Lanark from the late 18thCentury. Child labour was abolished and the workers were provided with homes, education and health care.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 2, 2010
Israel's ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, has compared the Gaza flotilla attack with America's fight against Nazi Germany in the Second World War.
In an interview with Fox News, he described the operation, in which nine people died, as "perfectly legal, perfectly humane – and very responsible".
His comments came as Israel began deporting hundreds of activists seized from the flotilla, including more than 120 activists from Muslim countries who
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 2, 2010
The Indian government has demanded the return of the "cursed" Koh i Noor diamond, a symbol of imperial power and the inspiration for the Victorian author Wilkie Collins' The Moonstone.
The diamond has been in British possession since East India Company forces in India defeated the Maharaja of Punjab in 1849 and forced him to hand it over to Queen Victoria as a tribute following the Treaty of Lahore.
It was last worn in public by the late Queen Mother and last
Source: AP
Jun 2, 2010
A potentially record-breaking number of congressional challengers are running this election year.
Discontent with incumbents and anti-Washington anger are boosting the numbers. More than 2,300 people are running for the House and Senate in the midterms, the highest number in at least 35 years. That's according to data provided to The Associated Press from the Federal Election Commission, which began tracking candidates in 1975.
Source: CNN
Jun 2, 2010
He was succeeded in the White House by the most web savvy administration in U.S. history, but that has not stopped former President George W. Bush from joining Facebook.
The office of the 43rd President recently established an official presence on the popular social networking site, CNN has confirmed.
The former president has nearly 30,000 Facebook fans connected to his Facebook page which is located at www.facebook.com/geor
Source: CHE
Jun 2, 2010
Higher-education groups praised a set of a national standards for elementary and secondary education that governors and state education officials announced on Wednesday, saying the guidelines would help improve college preparedness and accessibility.
The National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and the Council of Chief State School Officers collaborated with educators, researchers, and other experts to write the Common Core State Standards, which outline specific exp
Source: AP
Jun 2, 2010
The man was in his 80s and dying. The woman was 73 and held his hand. They each lost a son in the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown and fought for decades to get China to acknowledge the deaths.
But Duan Hongbing wouldn't live to see that day.
"I held his hand and told him that I won't give up," the woman, Zhang Xianling, said she told Duan on a visit to his Beijing hospital bed. She said he squeezed her hand and closed his eyes in response, no longer able to sp
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 2, 2010
The Savoy Hotel billed it as the Monet Suite Experience.
For £720 per person, art lovers could stay in the room from which the artist famously spent six months painting his landscapes of the River Thames in London.
However, a new study has now shown that those prepared to pay for the Monet Suite are not actually experiencing the painter's time at the hotel, but that of his next door neighbour.
Scientists have analysed the French Impressionist's paintings and disc
Source: BBC News
Jun 2, 2010
The Volkswagen camper van celebrates 60 years of production this year - and for its generations of fans, the love affair is far from over.
They lie on their backs in oil, get pulled from side to side by their brakes and greet steep hills with a nervous sigh but when you are truly in love nothing really matters.
The owners of vintage VW camper vans are a dedicated bunch, lavishing care, attention and money on their beloved wheels.
They are the first to admit
Source: BBC News
Jun 2, 2010
One of the largest collections of Sir Winston Churchill memorabilia, including an unsmoked cigar, is expected to fetch £1m at auction later.
The items are being sold by US publishing magnate, Steve Forbes, who amassed them over three decades.
The collection also features the wartime leader's official engagements diary and candid letters to colleagues.
Auctioneer Christie's says the items, being sold in three parts, provide an exceptional insight into the ma
Source: CNN
Jun 2, 2010
The mayor of Gary, Indiana, and Michael Jackson's father, Joe, on Wednesday will announce "a major move forward" to bring a museum and performance arts center bearing the singer's name to the city.
Mayor Rudy Clay has said the project has the potential to bring 500,000 to 750,000 visitors to Gary and an annual income of $100 million to $150 million dollars to the community.
In addition, the Jackson Family Museum and a Michael Jackson Performing Arts Center wil
Source: WaPo
Jun 2, 2010
LOUISVILLE -- The push to integrate Kentucky's private social clubs, whose members clung to old notions of Southern white privilege for decades after the end of Jim Crow, began in the early 1990s with a lone, quiet protest: At lunchtime on days when the weather was nice, a black preacher and civil rights activist named Louis Coleman would put up a folding card table in front of one of the many unofficially restricted clubs here; set it with a tablecloth, china and candles; and dine on buns and l
Source: WaPo
Jun 2, 2010
A Minnesota law professor jailed in Rwanda and charged with genocide denial has long been a sharp critic of the central African nation's president and even helped file a lawsuit accusing the one-time rebel leader of sparking the slaughter that erupted there in 1994.
Peter Erlinder, 62, a professor at the William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul with a history of taking on unpopular causes, was arrested Friday, about a week after going to Rwanda to help with the legal defense of
