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.
Acting on the suggestion of her top data crunchers at the department’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius released an enormous data file on May 8 that reveals the list—or “chargemaster”—prices of all hospitals across the country for the 100 most common inpatient treatment services in 2011. It then compares those prices with what Medicare actually paid hospitals for the same treatments—which was typically a fraction of the chargemaster prices. As a result, Americans are a big step closer to being able to compare what hospitals charge them for goods and services with what they actually cost. There are two reasons Sebelius’ release of this newly crunched, massive data file is a great first step toward a new transparency in health care costs. First, it reveals the vast disparity between what hospitals charge for pills, procedures and operations and the real cost of those services, as calculated by Medicare. The second reason the compilation and release of this data is a big deal is that it demonstrates [that] most hospitals’ chargemaster prices are wildly inconsistent and seem to have no rationale. Thus the release of this fire hose of data—which prints out at 17,511 pages—should become a tip sheet for reporters in every American city and town, who can now ask hospitals to explain their pricing. In the through-the-looking-glass world of health care economics, those who are asked to pay chargemaster rates are often under-insured or lack insurance altogether. Moreover, insurers typically negotiate discounts off the grossly inflated chargemaster prices ($77 for a box of gauze pads!), so the chargemaster matters for insured patients too.
Note: For more on corporate corruption, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
In this exclusive excerpt from her autobiography, I Am Malala, young activist Malala Yousafzai recounts the day she was shot by the Taliban. "Tuesday, Oct. 9, 2012, wasn’t the best of days to start with, as it was the middle of exams. We had been getting threats all year. Some were in the newspapers, and some were messages passed on by people. I was more concerned the Taliban would target my father, as he was always speaking out against them. His friend and fellow campaigner Zahid Khan had been shot in the face in August on his way to prayers. When our bus was called, we ran down the school steps. Inside the bus it was hot and sticky. Then we suddenly stopped. A young bearded man had stepped into the road. The man was wearing a peaked cap and had a handkerchief over his nose and mouth. Then he swung himself onto the tailboard and leaned in over us. “Who is Malala?” he demanded. No one said anything, but several of the girls looked at me. I was the only girl with my face uncovered. That’s when he lifted up a black pistol. My friends say he fired three shots. The first went through my left eye socket and out under my left shoulder. I slumped forward, blood coming from my left ear, so the other two bullets hit the girls next to me." Malala has undergone a recovery that is nothing short of miraculous. The bullet narrowly missed her brain [and she] suffered no major permanent neurological damage. The ordeal did, however, solidify her will: “It feels like this life is not my life. It’s a second life. People have prayed to God to spare me and I was spared for a reason—to use my life for helping people.”
Note: Malala was only 11 when she took on the Taliban, demanding that girls be given full access to school. Her campaign led to a blog for the BBC, a New York Times documentary, and a Pakistani peace prize. But all that was only a prelude to even more extraordinary events, the Taliban's assassination attempt and her miraculous recovery. For a treasure trove of great news articles which will inspire you to make a difference, click here.
Seventy-eight-year-old Tona Herndon of Bethany, Okla., was vulnerable in every way. Her husband of 60 years had died just two weeks earlier. Her eyes were so clouded with grief, she never saw it coming. She was mugged as she visited her husband's grave. The mugger got away with her purse and $700, but not for long. Police caught him, and the news put his mug shot on TV. Fifteen-year-old Christian Lunsford says the first time he saw the picture, he ... had no doubt that it was his dad. Christian says his parents divorced when he was two, and his dad has been mostly absent ever since. Last time he heard from him was a few weeks ago. His dad gave him $250 for a band trip Christian really wants to go on. Christian says his dad has been in and out of jail more than half a dozen times. "There's times that you just feel really low, like, 'Is that going to be me?'" he says. "'Am I going to end up like that?'" Which is why, after Christian heard about his dad's latest crime, he reached out to the victim and asked to meet her. Christian says he just had to tell her he was sorry about what happened. And Christian was just getting started. "He gave me $250 for my band trip, but I'm not sure if it was yours or however he got it, but I'd feel bad if I didn't give it to you," he told Tona. "I accepted the money back," Tona says. "And it was mine to do with what I wanted." "I want you to take your band trip," Tona told Christian. She gave it all back to him for his band trip. "I feel more like my life still has a purpose," Tona says. "You're not who your parents are," Christian says. "Even if they do raise you, you can become whatever you want to be."
Note: For a treasure trove of great news articles which will inspire you to make a difference, click here.
Some New Yorkers mark the anniversary of the September 11 attacks by going to a memorial service or observing a moment of silence. For the past 10 years, Jeff Parness has been helping others. Every September, Parness brings hundreds of volunteers from New York to help another disaster-stricken community in the United States. "It was our way of saying, you know, New Yorkers will never forget what people from around the country and the world did for us in our time of need after 9/11," said Parness. "So that's how the mission started. It was just to pay forward the kindness that we experienced." Over the past decade, Parness' nonprofit, New York Says Thank You, has assisted victims of wildfires in San Diego, tornadoes in the Midwest and Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana. Many of those who receive help are so inspired that they travel across the country the next year -- often at their own expense -- to volunteer with Parness' group and help someone else. The result is a unique disaster-response organization. "All of our volunteers are survivors. They survived, whether it was 9/11 or Katrina or tornadoes. So they all share that common bond," said Parness, who quit his job as a venture capitalist to work on his nonprofit full-time. This year, Parness' mission has come full circle. Last weekend, more than 300 volunteers -- at least half of whom were from outside the New York area -- helped rebuild 13 homes damaged by Superstorm Sandy in October. For Parness, a native New Yorker, the work carried extra significance.
Note: For a treasure trove of great news articles which will inspire you to make a difference, click here.
The story of Danny and Annie Perasa — how they met, and how they've stayed in love — inspires many who hear it. Their joy in life, and in one another, was celebrated recently in New York, where a crowd gathered to honor Danny and Annie. The Perasas are a memorable couple. In person, they come off like a pair of favorite grandparents, with thoughtful wisecracks and stories that take unpredictable turns. They say their affinity for one another was always obvious. Their enthusiasm has now been honored in a tangible way. The StoryCorps oral history project has dedicated its booth in Grand Central Terminal to the Perasas. On Friday, Feb. 10, a plaque was unveiled that dedicated the booth to the Perasas. The plaque reads: "This booth is dedicated to Danny and Annie Perasa, who recorded their story here on January 6, 2004. Their humor, heart, eloquence and love will never be forgotten." The couple made the trip to the ceremony despite Danny's illness: suffering from pancreatic cancer, he is currently in hospice care. Their visit was a treat for those present, as the Perasas revisited the conversation they had that day in 2004, and the life they've shared since 1978.
Note: For a very touching six-minute NPR video on this true story of beautiful marriage, click here. For a treasure trove of great news articles which will inspire you to make a difference, click here.
The CIA has been subjecting operatives to monthly polygraph tests in an attempt to suppress details of a reported US arms smuggling operation in Benghazi that was ongoing when its ambassador was killed by a mob in the city last year, according to reports. Up to 35 CIA operatives were working in the city during the attack last September on the US consulate that resulted in the death of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans, according to CNN. The television network said that a CIA team was working in an annex near the consulate on a project to supply missiles from Libyan armouries to Syrian rebels. Sources said that more Americans were hurt in the assault ... than had been previously reported. CIA chiefs were actively working to ensure the real nature of its operations in the city did not get out. So only the losses suffered by the State Department in the city had been reported to Congress. Frank Wolf, a US congressman who represents the district that contains CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, is one of 150 members of Congress for a new investigation into the failures in Benghazi. "I think it is a form of a cover-up, and I think it's an attempt to push it under the rug," he said. "We should have the people who were on the scene come in, testify under oath, do it publicly, and lay it out. And there really isn't any national security issue involved with regards to that."
Note: For more on the hidden realities of intelligence agency operations, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
[Seymour] Hersh, the investigative journalist who has been the nemesis of US presidents since the 1960s and who was once described by the Republican party as "the closest thing American journalism has to a terrorist", ... is angry about the timidity of journalists in America, their failure to challenge the White House and be an unpopular messenger of truth. Don't even get him started on the ... death of Osama bin Laden. "Nothing's been done about that story, it's one big lie, not one word of it is true," he says of the dramatic US Navy Seals raid in 2011. Hersh is writing a book about national security and has devoted a chapter to the bin Laden killing. He says a recent report put out by an "independent" Pakistani commission about life in the Abottabad compound in which Bin Laden was holed up would not stand up to scrutiny. "The Pakistanis put out a report, don't get me going on it. Let's put it this way, it was done with considerable American input. It's a bullshit report," he says hinting of revelations to come in his book. The Obama administration lies systematically, he claims, yet none of the leviathans of American media, the TV networks or big print titles, challenge him. He is certain that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden "changed the whole nature of the debate" about surveillance. "But I don't know if it's going to mean anything in the long [run] because the polls I see in America – the president can still say to voters 'al-Qaida, al-Qaida' and the public will vote two to one for this kind of surveillance, which is so idiotic," he says.
Note: For a powerful analysis by scholar David Ray Griffin of the years-long Osama bin Laden psyop, arguing that bin Laden probably died in December 2001, see his book Osama Bin Laden: Dead or Alive?. For more on media cover-ups of important realities, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
The US National Security Agency spied on civil rights leader Martin Luther King and boxer Muhammad Ali during the height of the Vietnam War protests, declassified documents reveal. The documents show the NSA also tracked journalists from the New York Times and the Washington Post and two senators. Some NSA officials later described the programme as "disreputable if not outright illegal", the documents show. The operation, dubbed "Minaret", was originally exposed in the 1970s. However, the names of those on the phone-tapping "watch list" had been kept secret until now. The secret papers were published after a government panel ruled in favour of researchers at George Washington University. The university's National Security Archive - a research institute that seeks to check government secrecy - described the names on the NSA's watch-list as "eye-popping". The agency eavesdropped on civil rights leaders Martin Luther King and Whitney Young as well as boxing champion Muhammad Ali, New York Times journalist Tom Wicker and Washington Post columnist Art Buchwald. The NSA also monitored the overseas phone calls of two prominent US senators - Democrat Frank Church and Republican Howard Baker. In 1967 the strength of the anti-war campaign led President Lyndon Johnson to ask US intelligence agencies to find out if some protests were being stoked by foreign governments. Many of those targeted were considered to be critics of US involvement in the Vietnam War. The NSA worked with other spy agencies to draw up the "watch lists" of anti-war critics, tapping their phone calls. The programme continued after Richard Nixon entered the White House in 1969.
Note: These names were kept secret until now allegedly for reason of "national security." Note how this term is repeatedly used to cover up illegal government activity solely to protect those who commit these crimes. For more on the hidden realities of intelligence agency operations, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
One of the most overlooked aspects of the NSA reporting in the US has been just how global of a story this has become. Last week it was revealed that Belgium's largest telecom, Belgacom, was the victim of a massive hacking attack which systematically compromised its system for as long as two years. Last week, using documents obtained from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, Laura Poitras and other Der Spiegel journalists reported in that paper that it was the GCHQ, Britain's intelligence agency, that was behind the attack. According to that report, the attack was carried out by targeting individual engineers at the telecom with malware that allowed GCHQ agents to "own" their computer and thus exploit their access to the telecommunications system. As the US and UK run around the world protesting the hacking activities of others and warning of the dangers of cyber-attacks, that duo is one of the most aggressive and malicious, if not the most aggressive and malicious, perpetrators of those attacks of anyone on the planet. Nobody hacks as prolifically and aggressively as the two countries who most vocally warn of the dangers of hacking. A coalition called Stop Watching Us has been formed by privacy and civil liberties groups from across the political spectrum. On October 26, the 12th anniversary of the enactment of the Patriot Act, they will hold an anti-surveillance rally in Washington DC.
Note: For more on the hidden realities of intelligence agency operations, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
An Australian inquiry into church and institutional child abuse began public hearings [on September 9], with warnings that widespread and "shocking" allegations would be heard against places of worship, orphanages, community groups and schools. Justice Peter McClellan opened the hearings in the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, announced by the government last November, saying that thousands of people had so far come forward. "It is now well known that the sexual abuse of children has been widespread in the Australian community, however the full range of institutions in which it has occurred is not generally understood," McClellan said in an address. "Many of the stories we are hearing will shock many people." Some "preliminary themes have already emerged", he said. In residential institutions such as orphanages and boarding schools ... the commission had established that "sexual abuse is almost always accompanied by almost unbelievable levels of physical violence inflicted on the children by the adults who have responsibility for their welfare". The events would often set off a domino effect, with a victim's schoolwork suffering, limiting their future employment prospects, and their ability to trust others and form relationships damaged beyond repair. "The damage to an individual, be it a boy or girl, who was abused at a time when, because of their age, they are unable to resist an abuser or report the abuse to others, may be life-changing," he said, adding that even "low level" abuse could have "catastrophic" consequences.
Note: For powerful information already released on this including names of famous Australians implicated, click here.
Much attention has been turned in recent months to the fact that the agro-chemical/GMO industry -- corporate giants Dow, Pioneer DuPont, Syngenta, Monsanto, BASF -- have been using Hawaii since the 1990s as one of their main testing grounds for experiments engineering new pesticide-crop combos. On the "Garden Island" of Kauai, the industry controls over 15,000 acres of prime agricultural land, which they drench with over 17 tons of restricted-use pesticides each year, and likely at least five times that amount in non-restricted pesticides that may be equally as harmful (such as glyphosate). Pioneer DuPont alone has used 90 pesticide formulations with 63 active ingredients in the past 6 years. They apply these pesticides around 250 days each year, with 10-16 applications per day on average. Pesticides are sprayed next to schools, hospitals, neighborhoods and major waterways, with zero buffer zone and zero public knowledge of what is being sprayed. Preliminary evidence suggests that living in the shadow of these companies may be causing alarming rates of rare birth defects and cancers. Through the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) these same chemical corporations are seeking to lock us in to arrangements that guarantee their profit interests will not be impeded by pesky democratic governments protecting people's health or other common interests. If passed, it will amount to perhaps the biggest corporate power-grab in history, putting the rights of corporations above those of elected governments and sovereign nations.
Note: The TPP is a highly secretive international agreement being negotiated under the pretext of "trade" between twelve Asian and Pacific Rim countries, including the United States. Why is the media keeping this huge agreement largely secret? For more on the environmental and health impacts of GMO crops, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
What happens to the seed affects the web of life. When seed is living, regenerative and diverse, it feeds pollinators, soil organisms and animals - including humans. When seed is non-renewable, bred for chemicals, or genetically engineered with toxic Bt or Roundup Ready genes, diversity disappears. In recent years, beekeepers have been losing 25% of their hives each winter. According to a scientific study in 2008, bees and pollinators contribute more than €153bn annually to agriculture. Chemically-farmed soils, sprayed with herbicides and pesticides kill the beneficial organisms that create soil fertility and protect plants. Organic seeds and organic farming do not just protect human health; they protect the health and wellbeing of all. With industrial seeds and industrial agriculture, the diversity of plants and crops disappears. India had 200,000 rice varieties before the "green revolution" in the 1970s, which relied on pesticides and fertilisers to avert famine in India. This diversity was replaced by monocultures. Today the fastest expanse in acreage is of genetically engineered corn and soya, because they are patented and corporations can collect royalties from farmers. When seed freedom disappears and farmers become dependent on GMO seeds, they in effect become seed slaves. According to the National Bureau of Crime Records, more than 284,000 Indian farmers have committed suicide since seed monopolies were established in India. Gandhi spun cotton for our freedom. Today GMO Bt cotton has enslaved [these] farmers in debt, and pushed them to suicide. And 95% cotton seed is controlled by one company: Monsanto.
Note: Author Vandana Shiva is a biodiversity campaigner and founder of Navdanya, which campaigns for biodiversity and against corporate control of food and seeds. For more on the environmental and health impacts of GMO crops, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
Americans throw away 40 percent of the food they buy, often because of misleading expiration dates that have nothing to do with safety, said a study released [on September 18] by Harvard University Law School and the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group. The report said 90 percent of Americans toss good food into the garbage because they mistakenly think that "sell by," "best before," "use by" or "packed on" dates on food containers indicate safety. One-fifth of consumers, the report said, "always" throw away food based on package dates. In fact, "sell by" dates are used by retailers for inventory control. "Best before" or "use by" dates usually reflect manufacturer estimates of peak quality. While some labels are intended to indicate freshness, none of them reflects edibility or safety, said Ted Labuza, a food science professor at the University of Minnesota who collaborated with the authors. "If food looks rotten and smells bad, throw it away, but just because it reaches a certain date does not mean the food is unsafe," Labuza said. "I don't know of any food poisoning outbreak that came from people eating food that was past its shelf-life date." The report estimated the value of food tossed away at $165 billion a year. Food waste is a big source of greenhouse gases. Wasting food also squanders vast quantities of water, land, fertilizers, petroleum, packaging and other resources that go into producing it. About a quarter of all fresh water used in the United States goes into the making of food that is thrown away, the report said.
Are the colored additives used in Kraft's popular Macaroni & Cheese products dangerous? That's what two food bloggers are alleging in their petition to Kraft Foods to remove Yellow No. 5 and Yellow No. 6 from the blue-boxed pantry staples. Yellow Nos. 5 and 6 are used to color beverages, dessert powders, candy, ice cream, custards and other foods. Vani Hari, from the blog Food Babe, and Lisa Leake, from 100 Days of Real Food, have taken to Change.org to petition Kraft's management to remove the dyes, saying they may potentially cause health problems and are not included in Kraft's Mac & Cheese products sold in the United Kingdom. "Kraft reformulated their product for the UK, but not for their fellow American citizens," they argued. At press time, the petition had nearly 135,000 signatures. The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group, has been petitioning to ban food dyes in the U.S. for years. In a 2010 report called Food Dyes: A Rainbow of Risks, the CSPI says Yellow Nos. 5 and 6 can cause hypersensitivity, or allergic reactions, and contain carcinogens called Benzidine and 4-amino-biphenyl. Some studies reported hyperactivity in children associated with Yellow 5 intake or genotoxicity -- or damage to cellular DNA -- says CSPI. Yellow 5 is the most widely used food dye after Red 40, according to CSPI.
Note: For more on important health issues, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
Ready for some genetically altered algae in your Dove soap or Ben & Jerry's ice cream? South San Francisco biofuel company Solazyme has struck a deal with British conglomerate Unilever to manufacture 3 million gallons of algae-based oil for the multinational whose brands include Dove and Ben & Jerry's. It's a big one for Solazyme, which started out 10 years ago producing jet and automobile fuel from algae and has since expanded into food and cosmetics with its "microalgae" additives. In addition to Dove and Ben & Jerry's, Unilever brands include Pond's, Caress and Noxzema in the personal care category, and Hellmann's, Lipton and Breyers in the food department. The "tailored oils," targeted initially at Unilever's beauty products, are the first to be produced on a commercial scale at Solazyme's sugarcane processing facility in Brazil. The company's own line of algae-infused cosmetics, including an antiaging ingredient called alguronic acid, have been sold in Sephora stores since 2011 under the Algenist label.
It pays to be president, especially after leaving office. 24/7 Wall St. examined the finances of all 43 presidents to identify the richest. The only currently living president who makes the wealthiest list is Bill Clinton, who has an estimated net worth of $55 million. Clinton continues to make millions of dollars in speaking fees. President Obama is not one of the wealthiest presidents of all times. Yet his net worth increased from $5 million in 2010 to an estimated $7 million, primarily from his book sales. The net worth of the presidents varies widely. Washington amassed over half a billion in today's dollars, while other presidents went bankrupt. The first few presidents — from Washington's election to about 75 years later — were large landowners. They generally made money from land, crops and commodity speculation. By 1850, ... most presidents were lawyers who spent years in public service. They rarely amassed large fortunes and their incomes often came almost entirely from their salaries. James Buchanan, Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Johnson, Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes and James A. Garfield had modest net worths when they died. [By] the beginning of the 20th [century] ... corporations in the oil, mining, financial and railroad sectors allowed individuals to amass large fortunes. Indeed, since the early 20th century, the fortunes of many presidents, including Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, George and George W. Bush were driven by inherited wealth.
Note: For more on government corruption, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
The sobbing wife of George Zimmerman called 911 [on September 9] to report that her estranged husband was threatening her with a gun and had punched her father in the nose, but hours later she decided not to press charges against the man acquitted of all charges for fatally shooting Trayvon Martin. Police officers in Lake Mary, Fla., were still investigating the encounter as a domestic dispute. Shellie Zimmerman left the house after being questioned by police. George Zimmerman remained there into the early evening and his attorney denied any wrongdoing by his client. George Zimmerman was not arrested. Shellie Zimmerman, 26, who has filed for divorce, initially told a 911 dispatcher that her husband had his hand on his gun as he sat in his car outside the home she was at with her father. She said she was scared because she wasn't sure what the 29-year-old Zimmerman was capable of doing. Hours later she changed her story and said she never saw a firearm, said Lake Mary Police Chief Steve Bracknell. For the time being, "domestic violence can't be invoked because she has changed her story and says she didn't see a firearm," Bracknell said. "We didn't find a gun," Lake Mary police spokesman Zach Hudson said. "We didn't find anything that indicated he had a gun on his person." Hudson said Zimmerman was released from investigative detention at around 6:30 p.m. and "he just walked back into the house." "Right now he's not a suspect in anything per se, but were still viewing the video and trying to ascertain what new information that may yield," he said, referring to video from home surveillance cameras outside the house.
Note: Isn't it strange that Zimmerman's wife would change her story in such an extreme way after being questioned by the police? Could she have been pressured to do so? There are many strange aspects to the Zimmerman acquittal in the killing of Martin.
Your OnStar-equipped car can share an awful lot about your driving habits -- even if you're no longer an OnStar customer. A senator from New York has asked the Federal Trade Commission to open an investigation into vehicle tracking by General Motors' OnStar division. Two other senators issued calls for the company to explain and reconsider its tracking policies. OnStar, which provides a variety of services including vehicle diagnostics, driving directions and automated 911 calls to owners of mostly GM vehicles, recently announced that it reserves the right to track and sell information about vehicles' location and speed even after the driver has stopped subscribing to the service. OnStar, which has around 6 million subscribers, relies on GPS tracking and other systems built into the car. Senator Charles Schumer, a Democrat from New York,... called the tracking "one of the most brazen invasions of privacy in recent memory." Senators Al Franken and Christopher Coons, both Democrats, sent a letter to OnStar last week saying that the company's actions "appear to violate basic principles of privacy and fairness." OnStar reserves the right to sell "anonymized" information collected from vehicles to outside companies. "Anonymized" data is aggregated on cannot be traced back to any individual vehicle or person. But hackers have been able to tease out individual user information from supposedly anonymized data, Schumer noted in his announcement.
Note: For more on corporate and government privacy invasions, see the deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources available here.
A Dairy Queen manager who came to the aid of a visually impaired customer is receiving Internet and social media praise for his heroic actions. Joey Prusak said on Sept. 10 [that] one of his regular customers came in to order a sundae. While paying, the visually impaired man dropped some of his money on the floor. "Right then and there I knew when he dropped that $20 bill, game's over, he's not going to know," explained Prusak. "He just kept walking and that's when the lady picked it up and I thought, she's going to give it back 'cause she picked it up so quickly." Prusak then watched as the woman her put the money in her purse. Initially he didn't know what to say, but when the woman reached the counter to place her order Prusak confronted her. He says they went back and forth a bit: She claimed the money was hers. "I said, ma'am I'm not going to serve someone as disrespectful as you, so you can either return the $20 bill and I'll serve you, or you can leave," said Prusak. "And she goes, 'Well it's my 20-dollar bill,' and I go, well then you can leave." The woman left, but was clearly not happy. Prusak ultimately gave the customer who dropped the money $20 of his own money. Other customers saw what happened and one of them emailed Dairy Queen. The email was forwarded to the store's owner, who posted it on a board in the shop. A co-worker was impressed by what happened and posted the message on Facebook, where others found it and shared it. "People started sharing it, pretty soon it's on Reddit," Prusak said. "It's one of the top things on Reddit and all of a sudden it's gone viral."
Note: For a treasure trove of great news articles which will inspire you to make a difference, click here.
It’s striking that the most innovative activists aren’t necessarily the ones with the most resources, or the best tools. Maggie Doyne epitomizes this truth, for she began her philanthropic work as an 19-year-old financed by her baby-sitting savings. Yet she has somehow figured out how to run a sophisticated aid project in a remote area of Nepal. She took a “gap year” after high-school graduation and ended up in northern India, working with needy children. “The first little girl I met was Hema,” Doyne remembers. Then 6 or 7 years old (few children know their precise age), Hema spent her time breaking rocks and scavenging garbage and had no chance to go to school. Doyne, who decided to take Hema under her wing and pay for her education: “I knew I couldn’t do anything about a million orphans, but what if I started with this girl?” So she took Hema to school and paid $7 for the girl’s school fees and another $8 for a uniform so that she could enter kindergarten. “It became addictive,” Doyne said. “I said, if I can help one girl, why not 5? Why not 10? And along with scholarships, they needed the most basic things: food, shelter, clothing.” Doyne ... telephoned her parents with a strange and urgent request: Can you wire me the money in my savings account? Doyne returned to New Jersey and began to take odd jobs and proselytize for her shelter. People in her hometown thought that she was nuts, but in a benign way — and they wrote checks. After a few months, when Doyne had raised $25,000, she moved back to Nepal to oversee construction of the shelter, called the Kopila Valley Children’s Home.
Note: For a beautiful slide show of Maggie's work, click here. For a treasure trove of great news articles which will inspire you to make a difference, click here.
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.