Inside the horrific Caylee Anthony Case. President Bush dodges footwear. And how an Internet Explorer security flaw scared Microsoft silly. These are the top stories making news right now.
Think of a news section — politics, crime, sports, Web — and Citizen Journalists were quick to cover the important stories of the day on DigitalJournal.com. Readers were treated to reports on President Bush dodging a flying shoe, suspicious fires engulfing Sarah Palin’s church, a serious security hole in Internet Explorer and the curious case of a kid named Adolf Hitler.
A special congrats goes to Carol Forsloff, a passionate writer who gave us a glimpse into her corner of the world: Natchitoches, Louisiana. A revealing interview with the town’s mayor provided insight into why some communities attract senior citizens to its environs. The article was nicely complemented with great photos courtesy of the Citizen Journalist, and we appreciate this peek into a slice of American life.
Many other fascinating stories are making news right now, including:
• The Blago Scandal Should Finish Obama: Like a bad virus you can’t shake, the scandal involving Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich is still sidling behind Barack Obama, haunting his inauguration. The Citizen Journalist believes someone from Obama’s team should face recrimination, but the Blago saga will most likely go the way of the Rev. Wright and William Ayers stories — here today, a footnote tomorrow.
• Suspicious fire damages Sarah Palin’s church: As soon as the news hit the press, Citizen Journalist Cynthia Trowbridge informed us about a fire blazing through Wasilla Bible Church, Gov. Palin’s home church. The damage is estimated at $1 million, and commenter John Rickman said, “It is a shame that someone would do something like this.”
• One Arab Throws Shoe at Bush, Another Tests American Culture For Same Behavior: It was one the most bizarre stories of the week: an Arab journalist flung his shoes at President Bush during a press conference, testing the president’s reaction time (pretty impressive) and earning himself a quick trip to worldwide notoriety. This article also dropped some light humour, adding Bush’s quote, “This was a size 10 shoe he threw at me you may want to know.”
• Witnesses for the Prosecution: Crime Experts Cautious On Caylee Anthony Case: Once again, Carol Forsloff was busy penning popular articles, this time about the tragic Caylee Anthony case, where forensic experts pore over a discovered body to see if belongs to Caylee Anthony. In a follow-up article, she reported the results: the remains have indeed been identified as belong to the little girl.
• Drew Peterson Engagement Raises Question; What’s the Attraction to Risky Men?: In other crime news, readers got some education on why some women are attracted to dangerous men, guys with a violent streak. It’s a contentious issue and the seductive ways of bad boys will continue to be on the minds of anyone following the Drew Peterson case or other similar stories.
• Justin Levens of the UFC and his Wife Found Shot to Death in their California Home: Upsetting news struck the world of Ultimate Fighting Championship — fighter Justin Levens and his wife were found shot dead in their California home, and an investigation revealed there were no signs of struggle between the two. Should we expect to see a video tribute at the next UFC event?
• Microsoft Releases Patch For Critical Internet Explorer Security Flaw: Sorry, Microsoft, you’re still buggy. A flaw in Internet Explorer sent the tech giant scrambling to inform users about a necessary patch. As Citizen Journalist Chris V. Thangham advised, “You should download this patch as soon as possible. Even if you don’t use IE, it is still recommended you download this patch because some programs force you to use that browser.” Or you could switch to Firefox.
• Family angry with supermarket for refusing to put son’s name ‘Adolf Hitler’ on cake: Another candidate for the WTF? Department, the parents of a child they named Adolf Hitler are complaining about a supermarket that refused to inscribe the kids’ controversial name on a birthday cake. The article is weird enough to warrant a few head scratches, but definitely check out the comments to get a wide array of opinions on who’s to blame.
• Female Robot That Cleans And Doesn’t Talk Back: Inventor’s Ideal?: When science meets beauty, engineers come up with wonderful creations. Case in point is a female robot called Aiko, the brainchild (brainbot?) of Canadian Le Trung. He fashioned a lady robot with delicate doll-like features who can speak 13,000 different phrases in Japanese and English. Very impressive. And she also can clean the house and advise Trung on what he should drink with his dinner. Supposedly, she doesn’t talk back. Ladies, DO NOT tell your husbands about this bot anytime soon.
• Goans explore Europe through Portuguese citizenship: A solid travel piece informed and entertained readers at DigitalJournal.com on residents of Indian colonies settling in Europe after acquiring Portugese citizenship. After all, these Indians come from Portugese colonies, and reporter armstrong vaz was able to interview some of these individuals to get a deeper perspective on this story. And who knew that Portugal has the largest number of people of Indian origin?
• Notre Dame’s Fumble – Defying the spirit of (Touchdown) Jesus: Who knew our political expert Sadiq Green held such intimate knowledge of college football? He dissected Notre Dame’s recent progress (or lack thereof), opining about the logic behind retaining the current head coach. Out of the woodwork came several Notre Dame fans who offered their own insight into the problems plaguing the Fightin’ Irish. Entertaining stuff.
TopFinds Awards
The honourees of this week’s TopFinds Awards attracted impressive attention and widest readership. Digital Journal thanks the following Citizen Journalists with Awards for their passion for covering the top issues of the day: David Zublick, Cynthia Trowbridge, Nikki Weingartner, Chris V. Thangham, M Dee Dubroff, armstrong vaz, Sadiq Green, and Carol Forsloff.
The Top Blog Post of the Week is awarded to B. Thomas Cooper for his report titled Another Black Eye for the Bush Administration. The headline had his tongue firmly planted in cheek because the post related the story of White House Press Secretary Dana Perino receiving a black eye from a toppled microphone. He jabbed sharply with his line, “It is the black eye to her own legacy with which she should be most concerned.” Oh, snap! Definitely a good read for anyone wanting to know about this odd mishap and Cooper’s opinion on the Bush tenure.
Finally, DigitalJournal.com is offering yet another useful feature for its readers: we have partnered with text-to-speech tech company VoiceCorp to provide a tool that makes every article “talk.” At the top of each article you can now click the Listen button to hear a woman’s voice read each article. Or, save it as an MP3 for the on-the-go experience by clicking the button below Listen. The tool ReadSpeaker will dictate the article to you while you surf, providing a radio experience that frees up your eyes.
