News StoriesExcerpts of Key News Stories in Major Media
Note: This comprehensive list of news stories is usually updated once a week. Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news stories on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.
Of Susan, a parent who suspects that her child has been sexually abused, "Unspeakable Acts" tells us: "Susan said she couldn't rest until she knew the truth. She wouldn't rest afterward, either." Readers of Jan Hollingsworth's account of a widely publicized Florida child-abuse case may feel the same. In its lurid details, its frustrating complexity and in the agony of the children and families who were victimized, this case would seem to be the paradigm of incidents in Minnesota, California and elsewhere that have surfaced in recent years. A startling difference, though, is the outcome: the molester was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. In October 1985, the owner of the Country Walk Babysitting Service, one Frank Fuster, was found guilty of 14 counts of abuse. Mr. Fuster's unspeakable acts were more than just the repeated sexual abuse of children; the victims also testified that he led them in satanic rituals in which both crucifixes and excrement played a part. The author cites the specifics of these revolting rituals to illustrate disturbing similarities in some of the multiple-victim sexual-abuse cases that have recently been discovered in other states. She suggests that such acts are fostered by a nationwide network of pedophiles who swap information and videotapes in a mega-dollar child-pornography business the F.B.I. would do well to target. Certainly, the Florida parents and children are fortunate to have this volume to document and bear witness to their collective nightmare.
Note: For more on this disturbing case, see this Huffington Post article and this blog entry. For solid evidence that rogue elements of government are involved in systematic child abuse, see this excellent essay. Watch a disturbing seven-minute clip from a 1988 show of Geraldo interviewing Satanist Lt. Col. Michael Aquino and Ted Gunderson, former chief of the FBI's Los Angeles division. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing sexual abuse scandal news articles from reliable major media sources.
It’s a mythical number that skeptics never question. And it’s come up again and again in the national press for decades. It’s purportedly the number of victims from the infamous child sexual abuse cases of the 1980s and 1990s. Not child victims, though. The victims are said to be adults who were falsely charged and often convicted of sexual abuse, victims of a witch-hunt. Christina Hoff Sommers used the number just a few weeks ago in a Time column, referring to those cases and writing that “hundreds of innocent adults faced charges of ritual child abuse.” She was echoing a January article in Slate. The list goes back over the years. The number of accused or jailed is always impressive. But the numbers don’t add up. There’s no evidence of hundreds of cases of false convictions of child sexual abuse in this era. In my new book, The Witch-Hunt Narrative, I examine dozens of specific cases from the 1980s and early 90s that are said to be wrongful prosecutions or wrongful convictions. Looking closely at the record revealed substantial evidence of abuse and compelling reasons that jurors voted to convict. While the media publicizes sexual abuse stories about celebrities and cover-ups of abuse in the past, and repeats the mythical numbers from the witch-hunt narrative, they overlook a real number that concerns real victims - the number of children being sexually abused today.
Note: For solid evidence that rogue elements of government are involved in systematic child abuse sometimes with Satanic elements, see this excellent essay. Watch a disturbing seven-minute clip from a 1988 show of Geraldo interviewing Satanist Lt. Col. Michael Aquino and Ted Gunderson, former chief of the FBI's Los Angeles division. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing sexual abuse scandal news articles from reliable major media sources.
The Maine Clean Elections Act, originally passed in 1996 and strengthened in 2015, gives candidates the option to finance campaigns with taxpayer dollars. Candidates who choose to run a publicly financed campaign don’t need to spend time courting wealthy donors - in fact, they’re prohibited from raising private money. Instead, constituents show their support through $5 contributions to the Maine Clean Elections Fund made on behalf of a candidate. But that money doesn’t go to the candidate - instead, it shows support and helps fund the public-financing program. Once candidates have raised the required number of donations, they receive a flat fee from the state, which can vary depending on the office being sought. During [State representative Joyce] McCreight’s first campaign, in 2014, the state gave her nearly $5,000 once she’d collected 60 contributions. She won, and by the end of her first term, she’d helped to write a bill that makes it easy for low-income people without insurance to get reproductive health [services]. The bill passed, and McCreight expects it to save the state $2.5 million a year. McCreight’s story ... was made possible by a network of activists who came together in 1995 to draft and support the Maine Clean Elections Act. The Clean Elections system has given Maine the most economically diverse legislature in the nation. About 14 percent of Maine legislators are working class: waitresses, cashiers, machinists. Only 2 percent of the U.S. Congress comes from similar backgrounds.
Note: Why is the major media not reporting this important and inspiring news? Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.
Until recently, 8-year-old Arkinya Graham had never met her father. While they have grown close talking over the phone for the past six months, her father Johnny "Trey" Williams is serving 23 years in a Michigan prison for second-degree murder. ABC News' "Nightline" was given access to go behind prison walls ... as Arkinya met her dad for the first time. Their special visit is part of a prison ministry program called "One Day with God" that is designed to help children reconcile with their parents behind bars. The two-day program is part family reunion, part intervention. On the first day, the dads get a seminar on the importance of fatherhood. On the second day, they get to ... spend a rare day doing various activities with their kids. "Children are the silent victims," said One Day with God founder Scottie Barnes. "[There is an] importance of these boys and girls having relationships with their mothers and fathers who are incarcerated across America." Barnes says her own father ... spent most of her childhood behind bars. "I never had a hug. I never even been told 'I love you' by my dad," Barnes said. "The little children ... want to be loved. They want to be somebody proud of them." Children of incarcerated parents are six times more likely to end up incarcerated themselves. One Day with God is working to end the cycle of reincarceration. At a time when family programs are being cut in prison systems, this program is operating in seven states, [and] expanding to five other prisons in Michigan alone.
Note: Don't miss the beautiful video of these special father-child reunions. Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.
For a long time, Daniel Au Valencia got the message that she was wrong, wrong, wrong. “There’s a lot of shame around autism,” she says. Last year Valencia heard about an unusual experimental study ... exploring a treatment specifically for social anxiety in autistic adults. Many traditional therapies don’t work for autistic people, says Nick Walker, [a] consultant on the new study, because they reinforce stigma around autism. He sees this new research as a uniquely “culturally appropriate” approach to addressing the “epidemic” of social anxiety in autistic adults. The treatment is MDMA, known more commonly as Ecstacy or Molly. Early studies ... show it can ease or erase symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. In one study, 83 percent of study participants treated with MDMA and psychotherapy were cured of their PTSD. Psychologist Alicia Danforth [is] conducting the social anxiety study at UCLA’s Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute, along with psychiatrist Charles Grob. Valencia is one of just 12 autistic adults participating in the pilot study. It’s impossible to draw a direct line between the treatment and how Valencia is doing right now, but she says she’s doing great. She’s got a steady full-time job, her own apartment, and she just got married. She says her biggest takeaway ... is more about emotions than social anxiety. She says she’s learned that there’s no such thing as good emotions or bad emotions. “All emotions deserve to exist,” she says.
Note: Learn more about the healing potentials of mind-altering drugs now being explored by the scientific community.
Photographer Niki Boon and her husband, Rob, decided to home-school their four children when they moved to a rural region of New Zealand. Instead of following a fixed and rigid curriculum, each child explores his or her curiosities on the family's 10-acre property in Blenheim, surrounded by waters and bushes and hills. Boon began studying photography so she could represent her children's lives better. Her photo series "Wild and Free" is a dreamy black-and-white glimpse into a childhood spent among nature and the environment. The ... decision to raise her children this way actually stems from a form of education named after Rudolf Steiner, an Austrian philosopher. Boon's eldest son, Kurt, is now 13 years old and spent a year at a Rudolf Steiner school. The school did not have computers and encouraged families not to have TVs, Boon says. "We embraced this completely and fully and we loved the idea so much," she said. "We got rid of our TV, and we haven't had one since." Kurt, Rebecca, Anton and Arwen not only don't watch TV, but they don't use any kind of modern electronic devices, either - no computers, no smartphones. Boon ... says her children haven't shown interest in using any kind of technologies yet - but if any of them were to start developing an interest, she and her husband would look into it at that stage. "They live in the minute," Boon said. "They don't want to know what happened yesterday or what happened even that morning. They just want to know what's happening now."
Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.
A former top Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) official has accused Congress of putting pharmaceutical company profits ahead of public health in the battle to combat the US’s prescription opioid epidemic. Joseph Rannazzisi, head of the DEA office responsible for preventing prescription medicine abuse until last year, said drug companies and their lobbyists have a “stranglehold” on Congress to protect a $9bn a year trade in opioid painkillers claiming the lives of nearly 19,000 people a year. Rannazzisi ... said the drug industry engineered recent legislation limiting the DEA’s powers to act against pharmacies endangering lives by dispensing disproportionately large numbers of opioids. He also accused lobbyists ... of whipping up opposition to new guidelines for doctors intended to reduce the prescribing of the painkillers. Charges that Congress is too beholden to pharmaceutical companies have been levelled for years. But ... the influence on opioid policies is particularly disturbing because so many lives are being lost. Industry groups have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in lobbying to stave off measures to reduce prescriptions and therefore sales of opioid painkillers. Among the most influential drug industry groups is the Pain Care Forum, co-founded by a top executive of Purdue Pharma – the manufacturer of the opioid which unleashed the addiction epidemic, OxyContin. It spent $740m lobbying Congress and state legislatures over the past decade.
Note: See also a Washington Post article for more. For more, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and Big Pharma profiteering.
Concerns about the inner workings of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have been mounting in recent months amid disclosures of cozy corporate alliances. Now a group of more than a dozen senior scientists have reportedly lodged an ethics complaint alleging the federal agency is being influenced by corporate and political interests in ways that short-change taxpayers. A group calling itself CDC Scientists Preserving Integrity, Diligence and Ethics in Research, or CDC SPIDER, put a list of complaints in writing in a letter to the CDC Chief of Staff and provided a copy of the letter to [a] public watchdog organization. The members of the group have elected to file the complaint anonymously for fear of retribution. “It appears that our mission is being influenced and shaped by outside parties and rogue interests... and Congressional intent for our agency is being circumvented by some of our leaders. What concerns us most, is that it is becoming the norm and not the rare exception,” the letter states. The complaint cites among other things a “cover up” of the poor performance of a women’s health program called ... WISEWOMAN. The complaint alleges there was a coordinated effort within the CDC to misrepresent data given to Congress. “Definitions were changed and data ‘cooked’ to make the results look better than they were,” the complaint states. And the complaint cites as “troubling” the ties between soft drink giant Coca-Cola Co. ... and two high-ranking CDC officials.
Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health.
Do the committees that oversee the vast U.S. spying apparatus take intelligence community whistleblowers seriously? For the last 20 years, the answer has been a resounding “no.” My own experience in 1995-96 is illustrative. Over a two-year period working with my wife, Robin (who was a CIA detailee to a Senate committee at the time), we discovered that, contrary to the public statements by then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Colin Powell and other senior George H. W. Bush administration officials ... American troops had in fact been exposed to chemical agents during and after the 1991 war with Saddam Hussein. Officials at the Pentagon and CIA were working to bury it. The agency didn’t care about helping to find out why hundreds of thousands of American Desert Storm veterans were ill. Seeing the writing on the wall, I began working on what would become a book about our experience: “Gassed in the Gulf.” The agency tried to block publication of the book and attempted to reclassify hundreds of previously declassified Department of Defense and CIA intelligence reports that helped us make our case. Our story [became] a front-page sensation just days before the 1996 presidential election. Within six months, the CIA was forced to admit that it had indeed been withholding data on such chemical exposures, which were a possible cause of the post-war illnesses that would ultimately affect about one-third of the nearly 700,000 U.S. troops who served in Kuwait and Iraq. None of the CIA or Pentagon officials who perpetrated the cover-up were fired or prosecuted.
Note: The above article was written by whistleblower and former CIA analyst Patrick Eddington. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about intelligence agency corruption and the manipulation of public perception.
Hundreds of activists gathered to block construction of the Dakota Access pipeline on Thursday. Police with tanks and riot gear surrounded them and began making mass arrests. One officer on the loudspeaker warned the demonstrators not to shoot “bows and arrows”. For some Native American activists, the officer’s comment was the latest sign that a highly militarized police force has little understanding of indigenous culture. The notion that the criminal justice system is biased against Native American protesters came into sharp view hours later, when a jury in Portland, Oregon, issued a verdict of not guilty for white militia leaders who staged an armed occupation of federal land to protest government policies. The fact that protesters with guns were acquitted on the same day police arrested 141 “water protectors”, who have often relied on indigenous songs and prayers to convey their message, sparked a firestorm on social media. At the Standing Rock camps in North Dakota, where the fight against the $3.8bn oil pipeline is escalating ... Native Americans said the Oregon verdict was an infuriating and painful reminder that the law treats them differently – and that the odds are stacked against them in their ... battle to save their land. The ultra-conservative activists who seized the Malheur refuge were fighting against environmental restrictions aimed at protecting ... public lands. In North Dakota, the Native American-led movement is grounded in the idea that the land is sacred and must be preserved.
Note: For more on this under-reported movement, see this Los Angeles Times article and this article in the UK's Guardian. For more, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and the erosion of civil liberties.
Protesters at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in Cannon Ball, N.D., rallying against the Dakota Access oil pipeline have been calling for reinforcements since summertime. As of this week, about 800 people had come. But in the course of just a few days, more than 1.5 million people marked themselves present at the pipeline protest using Facebook - even though they weren’t actually there. A recent report by the American Civil Liberties Union revealed that law enforcement agencies across the country use location tracking and social media data to identify activists. Protesters have reported phones turning on on their own, phone calls cutting out and live video streams being interrupted as evidence that they’re being spied on, said Jennifer Cook, the policy director for the ACLU of North Dakota. Law enforcement agencies ... said they are not relying on Facebook’s check-in system to track protesters. Last week, video of violent clashes between lines of police and protesters circulated online, showing demonstrators running from officers as 142 people were arrested. Most of them were charged with rioting and criminal trespassing. About 300 people have been arrested since the protests began over the summer. Tensions have intensified in recent weeks as the pipeline’s construction moves closer to a river crossing that activists view as a critical water source that they fear will be compromised by the oil main, which many Native American tribes have said treads on sacred land.
Note: For more on this under-reported movement, see this Los Angeles Times article and this article in the UK's Guardian. For more, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and the erosion of civil liberties.
One of Hillary Clinton’s closest aides is at the centre of the new FBI investigation into the Democrat candidate's emails after it emerged the evidence was discovered during an investigation into her husband. Anthony Weiner is being investigated over allegations that he sent sexually explicit text messages to a 15-year-old girl. New York prosecutor [Preet Bharara] issued a subpoena for Mr Weiner's mobile phone and other electronic records after the “sexting” came to light in September. It is believed this sparked the reopening of the closed [Clinton] investigation. Mr Weiner [is] the estranged husband of Huma Abedin, 40, Mrs Clinton’s closest aide. Mrs Clinton thought that the issue of her email server – which has been a millstone round her neck since 2012 – was finally settled, with the FBI deciding in July not to charge her with any criminal offence. Mrs Clinton was supposed to have handed over all evidence relating to her use of a private email server – something she instigated in 2009, when she was appointed secretary of state. The Weiner investigation shows she did not. Critics claim there was a security risk if restricted government business was sent over personal email servers. They also say Clinton could skirt around freedom of information requests and have sole control of what information was handed over to interested parties – such as the congressional committee investigating 2012’s attack on the US consulate in Benghazi.
Note: The use of private servers for sending and receiving sensitive official emails is not unprecedented. Between 2003 and 2009, the George W. Bush White House 'Lost' 22 Million emails, which helped cover up its lies about WMDs in Iraq. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about corruption in government and the manipulation of public perception.
I was 29 and mowing the lawn at my mother’s house in Birmingham, Alabama, on a hot day in July 1985 when I looked up and saw two police officers. I asked the detective 50 times why I was being arrested. Eventually, he told me I was being arrested for a robbery. I told him, “You have the wrong man.” He said, “I don’t care whether you did it or not. You will be convicted.” At the station, it became clear I’d been at work when the robbery occurred. The detective verified this with my supervisor, but then told me they were going to charge me with two counts of first-degree murder from two other robberies. When I met my appointed lawyer, I told him I was innocent. He said, “All of y’all always say you didn’t do something.” I might have seen him three times in the two years I waited for trial. The only evidence linking me to the crime was the testimony of a ballistics expert who said the bullets from the murder weapon could be a match to my mother’s gun. They found me guilty. [In] 1986 I went to death row. Eventually, [in] 2015, the State of Alabama dropped all charges. I was released that same day. When you’ve been locked up for nearly 30 years, nothing is the same. It was like walking out on to another planet at the age of 58. Every night, I go outside and look up at the stars and moon, because for years I could not see either. Now, I am determined to go wherever I am asked to help end the death penalty. I am so thankful that I get to travel with Lifelines and [the Equal Justice Initiative], and share my story.
Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about corruption in police departments and in the judicial system.
HIV likely landed in the United States a full decade before the first AIDS reports made headlines, according to a report released Wednesday that also strongly dismisses the long-held myth that a single man, a flight attendant notoriously known as “Patient Zero,” was responsible for the domestic epidemic. The report, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, traces the lineage of HIV from Africa to Haiti to New York and, finally, San Francisco. The virus seems to have arrived in New York around 1971, and in San Francisco five years later. By the time doctors were reporting the first AIDS cases in 1981, the virus would have been deeply embedded in cities all over the country. The fact that HIV predated those first AIDS reports - and that the so-called Patient Zero could not have been responsible for the epidemic - has long been known by AIDS researchers. But the new paper ... provides perhaps the most detailed genetic history of the virus’ geographic movement. The new study, when coupled with previous work, gives a fairly clear picture of HIV’s global travel, said co-author Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona at Tucson. He said studies suggest the virus moved from chimpanzees to humans in the early 20th century, but languished in rural villages for decades before passing into Kinshasa, the capital of Congo. From Kinshasa it may have spread throughout sub-Saharan Africa, and finally moved to the Caribbean, including Haiti, in the mid-1960s.
Note: Watch this astounding 10-minute video where one of the world's leading vaccine experts says that AIDS was imported through "wild viruses" in vaccines. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing health news articles from reliable major media sources.
European and American doctors added new reports today to earlier descriptions of patients with an AIDS-like disease but no detectable evidence of infection with H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS. American health officials appealed to doctors today to report any similar cases to the Federal Centers for Disease Control. Dr. James Curran, an AIDS expert at the [CDC] in Atlanta, said here it was not clear whether the known cases represent a new syndrome or a variety of rare medical problems that pose no threat to the nation's health. The plea resulted from a ... meeting at which Dr. Jeffrey Laurence of Cornell University Medical Center in New York City described five such cases that are due to be reported soon in the Lancet, a British medical journal. At the C.D.C., Dr. Thomas J. Spira has collected reports of six patients over the last 3 years. Dr. Spira saw no pattern among them. The reports from Dr. Laurence and Dr. Curran were greeted by a parade of scientists who reported more than a dozen similar cases. By the time the [meeting] ended, Dr. Curran said he learned of more cases in a few minutes today than he had in the last three years. Reports of additional cases from doctors in Edinburgh and the Hague followed, [along with] criticism at the Centers for Disease Control for not having reported the six cases it knew about and for not issuing an earlier plea to doctors to report additional ones.
Note: Watch a C-SPAN video discussing this matter. For more on this, see this webpage and this one. And more resources can be found on this website. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing health news articles from reliable major media sources.
New York City is an expensive place to live for just about everyone, including prisoners. The city paid $167,731 to feed, house and guard each inmate last year, according to a study the Independent Budget Office released this week. “It is troubling in both human terms and financial terms,” Doug Turetsky, the chief of staff for the budget office, said on Friday. With 12,287 inmates shuffling through city jails last year, he said, “it is a significant cost to the city.” by nearly any measure, New York City spends more than every other state or city. The Vera Institute of Justice released a study in 2012 that found the aggregate cost of prisons in 2010 in the 40 states that participated was $39 billion. The annual average taxpayer cost in these states was $31,286 per inmate. New York State was the most expensive, with an average cost of $60,000 per prison inmate. The cost of incarcerating people in New York City’s jails is nearly three times as much. 83 percent of the expense per prisoner came from wages, benefits for staff and pension costs. Some 76 percent of the inmates in the city were waiting for their cases to be disposed. The wait times have grown even as the number of felonies committed in the city has declined. Since 2002, the time spent waiting for cases to be disposed of has gone to 95 days, from 76 days, [former city correction and probation commissioner Michael] Jacobson said.
Note: This CNN chart shows that most states spend two to three times as much on their prison inmates than they do on students in school. What does that say about our priorities? For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing prison system corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.
In a case that has horrified Americans way beyond the Bible Belt, Louis Lamonica ... and eight members the Hosanna Church are accused of being members of a Satanic paedophile ring who ritually raped up to 25 children, as well as performing animal sacrifices. Police say some of those charged - who include Lamonica's wife and a deputy sheriff - have already admitted devil worship inside the now defunct church. The discovery of badly rubbed-out pentagrams on the floor and eight boxes of hooded black costumes - allegedly used both in the abuse and in "morality tales" performed to prepare the young victims - bear out some of the claims. Lamonica himself astonished police by walking into a neighbouring sheriff's office a few weeks ago and confessing out of the blue that over five years he and other church members had sexually abused boys and girls aged between one and 16 and taught them to have sex with each other, as well as with a dog. Local police say his claims have been confirmed by some of the victims, of whom half a dozen have so far been interviewed, and by some of the fellow abusers, whose names Lamonica freely gave to police. Lamonica ... claimed the abuse began in 1999 and stopped in 2003 when the Hosanna Church closed. But police believe it may have continued in members' homes. Most of the accused have been charged with aggravated rape of a child under 13.
Note: The US military accepts avowed Satanists in their ranks. Watch an excellent segment by Australia's "60-Minutes" team "Spies, Lords and Predators" on a pedophile ring in the UK which leads to the highest levels of government. A second suppressed documentary, "Conspiracy of Silence," goes even deeper into this topic in the US. For more, see concise summaries of deeply revealing sexual abuse scandal news articles from reliable major media sources.
Griffin Furlong is a Florida teenager who knows something about heartaches and joy. The 18-year-old is homeless, but he graduated at the top of his class from Florida Coast High School. Furlong managed to achieve a 4.65 grade point average ... making him the valedictorian. He’ll attend Florida State University in the fall. “Everyone thinks I try to make good grades because I’m smart. Not true,” he told his fellow graduates. “I perform the way that I do in the classroom because I have everything to lose.” Furlong’s mother died of leukemia when he was just 6 years old. Soon afterward, Furlong, his father, and older brother lost their home and ended up in homeless shelters. Furlong said he often went to bed hungry and there were times when he wanted to give up. He sought temporary shelter with his girlfriend’s parents then moved in with an aunt and uncle, who said Furlong had laser-like focus on his school work. “He had nothing else but to study," said his aunt, Nancy Nancarrow. “He didn’t have the things that most children have. He would go to his room when he was home and he studied. That is his entertainment. We’re proud of him.” Now, [Furlong] says he hopes his story inspires other kids who are also facing hardships. “Despite the obstacles I faced, I know that I can actually do something with education.” His only wish, he said, is that his mother could see him deliver his speech. “Don’t dwell on the past, use it as motivation for your future,” he told the graduates. “It’s amazing what you can do with your life when you have motivation, ambition and most importantly, a purpose.”
Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.
She could easily be mistaken for someone 30 years younger but this woman is actually turning 105 tomorrow. And she looks incredible. Eileen Ash, who lives in Norwich, spends her days doing yoga and driving around in her signature yellow Mini car. And there’s no sign of her slowing down anytime soon. Her secret? Eating healthy and two glasses of red wine a day she says. The 104-year-old, who once played Test cricket for England women, told BBC Norfolk: "I’d like to know when I’m going to be old. Do you think it will be when I’m 105?" Eileen made her debut for the ladies team at The Oval in London in 1937. She then went on to play for her country until 1949 and has previously said her proudest moment was scoring a century. When asked if she suffers from aches and pains, she cheekily answered: "Not yet, when I’m older, I will apparently, but what is old?" Age is clearly just a number, Eileen. Keep doing you.
Note: Watch a great, one-minute video of this inspiring woman on this BBC webpage.
In many ways, there has never been a better time to be alive. Fewer among us are poor, fewer are hungry, fewer children are dying, and more men and women can read than ever before. How strange, then, to see such anger and great discontent in some of the world’s richest nations. Why? A small hint comes from interesting research about how people thrive. In one ... experiment, researchers found that senior citizens who didn’t feel useful to others were nearly three times as likely to die prematurely as those who did feel useful. This speaks to a broader human truth: We all need to be needed. Being “needed” does not entail selfish pride or unhealthy attachment to the worldly esteem of others. Rather, it consists of a natural human hunger to serve. As the 13th-century Buddhist sages taught, “If one lights a fire for others, it will also brighten one’s own way.” Americans who prioritize doing good for others are almost twice as likely to say they are very happy about their lives. In Germany, people who seek to serve society are five times likelier to say they are very happy than those who do not view service as important. Selflessness and joy are intertwined. Everyone has something valuable to share. We should start each day by consciously asking ourselves, “What can I do today to appreciate the gifts that others offer me?” We need to make sure that global brotherhood and oneness with others are not just abstract ideas that we profess, but personal commitments that we mindfully put into practice.
Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.
Important Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news stories on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.