The Etruscans were the first "superpower" of the Western Mediterranean who, alongside the Greeks, developed the earliest true cities in Europe.  They were so successful, in fact, that the most important cities in modern Tuscany (Florence, Pisa, and Siena to name a few) were first established by the Etruscans and have been continuously inhabited since then.  Yet the labels ‘mysterious’ or ‘enigmatic’ are often attached to the Etruscans since none of their own histories or literature survives.  This is particularly ironic as it was the Etruscans who were responsible for teaching the Romans the alphabet and for spreading literacy throughout the Italian peninsula.  Read more and see pictures at https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ancient-art-civilizations/etruscan/a/the-etruscans-an-introduction  See also http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/etruscans.htm

Situated in a dominant position overlooking the river Tiber, Perugia marks the border between the lands of the Etruscans and the Umbrians.  Originally a Villanovian settlement since the 9th century BC, these tribes gathered on the Colle Landone and the Colle del Sole in the 6th century BC, when Perugia became an Etruscan town.  The city was a religious centre, or lucumonia, and part of the Etruscan Dodecapolis league comprising a total of twelve cities.  Between the 6th and 3rd centuries BC Perugia was fortified by massive town walls in travertine blocks that followed the hilly ground around the city and are still largely visible today, particularly to the west and north.  Seven gates, of which six still exist although they were partly modified by the Romans and in the Middle Ages, allowed access into town.  http://www.perugiaonline.com/perugia_arcoetrusco.html

Yellow journalism, or the yellow press, is a type of journalism that presents little or no legitimate well-researched news and instead uses eye-catching headlines to sell more newspapers.  Techniques may include exaggerations of news events, scandal-mongering, or sensationalism.  By extension, the term yellow journalism is used today as a pejorative to decry any journalism that treats news in an unprofessional or unethical fashion.   The term was coined in the mid-1890s to characterize the sensational journalism that used some yellow ink in the circulation war between Joseph Pulitzer's New York World and William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal.  The term was coined by Erwin Wardman, the editor of the New York Press. Wardman was the first to publish the term but there is evidence that expressions such as "yellow journalism" and "school of yellow kid journalism" were already used by newsmen of that time.  Wardman never defined the term exactly.  Wardman had also used the expression "yellow kid journalism" referring to the then-popular comic strip which was published by both Pulitzer and Hearst during a circulation war. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism

Claims of media bias in the United States include claims of liberal bias, conservative bias, mainstream bias, and corporate bias.  To combat this, a variety of watchdog groups that attempt to find the facts behind both biased reporting and unfounded claims of bias  have been founded.  Research about media bias is now a subject of systematic scholarship in a variety of disciplines.  Before the rise of professional journalism in the early 1900s and the conception of media ethics, newspapers reflected the opinions of the publisher.  Frequently, an area would be served by competing newspapers taking differing and often radical views by modern standards.  In 1728, Benjamin Franklin, writing under the pseudonym "Busy-Body," wrote an article for the American Weekly Mercury advocating the printing of more paper money.  He did not mention that his own printing company hoped to get the job of printing the money.  As his biographer Walter Isaacson points out, Franklin was never averse to "doing well by doing good."  In 1798, the Congress of the United States passed the Alien and Sedition Acts, which prohibited the publication of "false, scandalous, or malicious writing" against the government and made it a crime to voice any public opposition to any law or presidential act.  This act was only in effect until 1801.  The strong profit-making incentive of the American media leads them to seek a simplified format and uncontroversial position which will be adequate for the largest possible audience.  The market mechanism only rewards media outlets based on the number of viewers who watch those outlets, not by how informed the viewers are, how good the analysis is, or how impressed the viewers are by that analysis.  According to some, the profit-driven quest for high numbers of viewers, rather than high quality for viewers, has resulted in a slide from serious news and analysis to entertainment, sometimes called infotainment:  Kathleen Hall Jamieson has claimed in her book The Interplay of Influence: News, Advertising, Politics, and the Internet that most television news stories are made to fit into one of five categories:  Appearance versus reality; Little guys versus big guys; Good versus evil; Efficiency versus inefficiency; Unique and bizarre events versus ordinary events.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_bias_in_the_United_States

How Headlines Change the Way We Think by Maria Konnikova  http://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/headlines-change-way-think

Ambiguous Newspaper Headlines  http://www.fun-with-words.com/ambiguous_headlines.html

President Obama designated three new national monuments in the California desert February 11, 2016, expanding federal protection to 1.8 million acres of landscapes that have retained their natural beauty despite decades of heavy mining, cattle ranching and off-roading.  The designation was requested by U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who for a decade has sought to protect land that wasn't included in the 1994 California Desert Protection Act.  That measure covered nearly 7.6 million acres, elevated Death Valley and Joshua Tree to national park status and created the Mojave National Preserve.  Unable to gain momentum on her California Desert Conservation and Recreation Act last year, Feinstein and conservation groups asked Obama to act unilaterally to create the three monuments overlapping biological zones between roughly Palm Springs and the Nevada border.  Louis Sahagun  Read more and see graphics at http://www.latimes.com/science/la-me-monuments-20160212-story.html

New York Times:  “Justice Scalia, whose legal theories, vivid writing and outsize personality made him a conservative leader on the Supreme Court, was found dead in Texas [at the age of 79].

New York Times:  Battle Begins Over Naming Next Justice

Politico:  Obama’s Supreme Court short list – The president has a chance to make a big statement with his pick to replace Scalia.

New York Times:  Highlights From Justice Antonin Scalia’s Opinions

LII – Supreme Court Collection: Opinions by Justice Scalia

From President Obama’s statement:  “I plan to fulfill my constitutional responsibility to nominate a successor in due time,” he said, during a weekend trip to Palm Springs.  Obama, who is in the final year of his presidency, said:  “There will be plenty of time for me to do so and for the Senate to fulfill its responsibility to give that person a fair hearing and a timely vote … These are responsibilities that I take seriously, as should everyone, they are bigger than any one party; they are about our democracy.  They are about the institution to which Justice Scalia dedicated his professional life and making sure it continues to function as the beacon of justice that our founders envisaged.”  http://www.bespacific.com/supreme-court-justice-scalia-dies/

Washington's Birthday was first declared a federal holiday by an 1879 act of Congress.  The Uniform Holidays Act, 1968, shifted the date of the commemoration of Washington's Birthday from February 22 to the third Monday in February (between February 15 and 21, meaning the observed holiday never falls on Washington's actual birthday).  Because of this, combined with the fact that President Lincoln's birthday falls on February 12, many people now refer to this holiday as "Presidents' Day"  and consider it a day honoring all American presidents.  However, neither the Uniform Holidays Act nor any subsequent law changed the name of the holiday from Washington's Birthday to Presidents' Day.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_holidays_in_the_United_States  Because "Presidents' Day" is not the official name of the federal holiday, there is variation in how it is rendered, both in the name of official state holidays and colloquially.  Both "Presidents Day" and "Presidents' Day" are common today, and both are considered correct by dictionaries and usage manuals.  "Presidents' Day" was once the predominant style, and it is still favored by leading authorities, notably, The Chicago Manual of Style, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Webster's Third International Dictionary, and Garner's Modern American Usage.  In recent years, as the use of attributive nouns (nouns acting as modifiers) has become more widespread, the popularity of "Presidents Day" has increased.  This style is favored by the Associated Press Stylebook (followed by most newspapers and some magazines) and the Writer's Digest Grammar Desk Reference.  "President's Day" is a misspelling when used with the intention of celebrating more than one individual.  However, as an alternate rendering of "Washington's Birthday," or for the purpose of commemorating of the presidency as an institution, it is a proper use of a possessive.  Indeed, this latter spelling was considered for the official federal designation by U.S. Rep. Robert McClory (IL) who was tasked with getting the 1968 Uniform Monday Holiday Act through the House Judiciary Committee.  Read much more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington%27s_Birthday

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1426  February 15, 2016  On this date in 1879, President Rutherford B. Hayes signed a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the Supreme Court of the United States.  Quote of the Day:  “No power of government ought to be employed in the endeavor to establish any system or article of belief on the subject of religion.” - Jeremy Bentham (born February 15, 1748)