Saturday, December 19, 2009

Aerobic Exercise Increases IQ, Reduces Health Issues, Detoxifies

exercise, particularly aerobic exercise, is connected with having a higher IQ

environmental factors, like being physically fit, were a far greater determinant of intelligence than even genetics.
environmental factors ... more than 80 percent of the equation, while genetics was less than 15 percent.

benefits of aerobic exercise ... increased flow of oxygen to the brain.
contributes to having an oxygen-rich internal environment, which is called an alkaline environment.
the more oxygen and oxygen-rich foods we take in regularly, the fewer problems we'll see.

Exercise helps detoxify our bodies
improve circulation which means that environmental and metabolic toxins are less likely to become concentrated in areas of the body.
when toxins flow, they're more apt to be eliminated via the liver and colon.

Exercise benefits our lymphatic system ... to eliminate toxins, especially metabolic toxins, from the body.

Aerobic exercise also increases the movement of the bowels which helps filth leave the body in a more timely manner.

aerobic exercise encourages sweating and sweating is a primary way that toxins leave the body - through the skin.

our bodies should be releasing two pounds of toxins every day - just through the skin. And it generally takes aerobic exercise to make that happen.
+++

Benefit from Aerobic Exercise

Thursday, December 10, 2009 by: Kim Evans, citizen journalist
See all articles by this author
Email this author

http://www.naturalnews.com/027696_aerobic_exercise_health_benefits.html

(NaturalNews) A recent study just found that exercise, particularly aerobic exercise, is connected with having a higher IQ. For the participants that were eighteen, being physically fit was also connected with an increased chance of obtaining a University level education. It was a large study based on over 1.2 million people. Interestingly, over 3,000 of the participants were twins and from the twin data; it was concluded that environmental factors, like being physically fit, were a far greater determinant of intelligence than even genetics. In fact, environmental factors were determined to be more than 80 percent of the equation, while genetics was less than 15 percent.

Study after study confirms the benefits of aerobic exercise and a chief physician at the Sahlgrenska University Hospital attributed the intelligence benefit to having an increased flow of oxygen to the brain. Because aerobic exercise increases the amount of oxygen in the body, it also contributes to having an oxygen-rich internal environment, which is called an alkaline environment. The foods we eat play a large role in determining if we're acidic or alkaline, but so does the amount of oxygen we take in. And within reason, the more oxygen and oxygen-rich foods we take in regularly, the fewer problems we'll see.

There are a couple of other benefits of aerobic exercise that don't get the face time they deserve.

Exercise helps detoxify our bodies - and just as pollutants gather in stagnant water, stagnant blood and lymph also gather toxins. Exercise helps improve circulation which means that environmental and metabolic toxins are less likely to become concentrated in areas of the body.
And when toxins flow, they're more apt to be eliminated via the liver and colon.

Exercise benefits our lymphatic system and one of that system's primary functions is to eliminate toxins, especially metabolic toxins, from the body. But, unlike the blood that has the heart as a subconscious pump, the primary way to stimulate the lymphatic system to do this job is through body movement. When the lymphatic system becomes impure with waste, toxicity throughout the body is the result. Bernard Jensen, Ph.D. tells us, "If the lymph is not kept moving, toxic-laden areas can become sources of infection and inflammation."

Aerobic exercise also increases the movement of the bowels which helps filth leave the body in a more timely manner. Of course, aerobic exercise encourages sweating and sweating is a primary way that toxins leave the body - through the skin. Bernard Jensen also tells us that our bodies should be releasing two pounds of toxins every day - just through the skin. And it generally takes aerobic exercise to make that happen.

There are quite a few benefits to aerobic exercise, but not many realize that helping the body remove stored toxins is one of them. It's well documented that environmental toxins have often extreme and adverse effects on the brain, body and intelligence. So perhaps helping to remove many of these poisons is another reason that people who exercise aerobically regularly are found to have higher IQ's.

More:

Nutritional Handbook Book #1, Bernard Jensen, Ph.D.

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/...
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/art...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/release...

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Friday, December 18, 2009

Nurturing Self Empowerment - Video of the Week: Back On My Feet


Dec 18, 2009

   
Back On My Feet
Imagine driving to work on the first day of your dream job, seeing a few homeless folks on the street, and giving it all up to help them. Anne Mahlum began "Back on My Feet" to encourage the homeless to join her in running through the streets of Philadelphia. By using running as a means to build confidence and self-esteem, combined with job training resources, Mahlum has given many homeless people a chance at a new life. She has helped them see past the reasons for their homelessness, and decide to turn over a new leaf.

Watch This Video


KarmaTube is a repository of inspiring online videos coupled with small, be-the-change actions that everyone can engage in. Our weekly videos reach 28572 active subscribers. about us | more videos



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Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Wendell Berry: A Speech To The Garden Club Of America

Poetry

A Speech to the Garden Club of America

by Wendell Berry September 28, 2009

(With thanks to Wes Jackson and in memory of Sir Albert Howard and Stan Rowe.)

 

Thank you. I’m glad to know we’re friends, of course;

There are so many outcomes that are worse.

But I must add I’m sorry for getting here

By a sustained explosion through the air,

Burning the world in fact to rise much higher

Than we should go. The world may end in fire

As prophesied—our world! We speak of it

As “fuel” while we burn it in our fit

Of temporary progress, digging up

An antique dark-held luster to corrupt

The present light with smokes and smudges, poison

To outlast time and shatter comprehension.

Burning the world to live in it is wrong,

As wrong as to make war to get along

And be at peace, to falsify the land

By sciences of greed, or by demand

For food that’s fast or cheap to falsify

The body’s health and pleasure—don’t ask why.

But why not play it cool? Why not survive

By Nature’s laws that still keep us alive?

Let us enlighten, then, our earthly burdens

By going back to school, this time in gardens

That burn no hotter than the summer day.

By birth and growth, ripeness, death and decay,

By goods that bind us to all living things,

Life of our life, the garden lives and sings.

The Wheel of Life, delight, the fact of wonder,

Contemporary light, work, sweat, and hunger

Bring food to table, food to cellar shelves.

A creature of the surface, like ourselves,

The garden lives by the immortal Wheel

That turns in place, year after year, to heal

It whole. Unlike our economic pyre

That draws from ancient rock a fossil fire,

An anti-life of radiance and fume

That burns as power and remains as doom,

The garden delves no deeper than its roots

And lifts no higher than its leaves and fruits.


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Sunday, December 6, 2009

The Story Of Stuff - Another Movie Under The Radar Watched by 600,000 People So Far

The Story Of Stuff - Another Movie Under The Radar Watched by 600,000 People So Far

Here's the movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLBE5QAYXp8

Here's the website:
http://www.storyofstuff.com/

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Saturday, December 5, 2009

Daily Exercise & Stronger Muscles Lead To Better Brain Function

fitness and health, persistence is more important than intensity.
each day is far better than ... on the weekend

Your body needs daily involvement in physical activity to realize maximum benefits,
so find something you can enjoy daily, then stick to it!
:-)
===


the greater muscle strength a person has, the more likely he or she is to maintain proper cognitive function over time.

less likely to develop progressive cognitive degeneration

link between motor decline and participation in social activities.
significant increase in cognitive degeneration among those who participated the least in social activities.

increased social activity plays an enormous role in prolonging functional motor skills and vice versa.

physical exercise, cognitive activity, and social participation all contribute to healthy brain function.

necessary nutrients
Alpha lipoic acid (ALA)
Acetyl L-carnitine (ALC)
promote a strong memory and a vibrant nervous system.

Phosphatidylserine (PS)
protects the integrity of cell membranes
proven in published research to improve cognitive neural function and memory.

+++

NaturalNews Tip of the day (from Mike):

When it comes to fitness and health, persistence is more important than intensity. Walking 20 minutes each day is far better than sprinting one hour on the weekend, in other words. Your body needs daily involvement in physical activity to realize maximum benefits, so find something you can enjoy daily, then stick to it! :-)

Study Reveals Stronger Muscles Lead to Better Brain Function

Saturday, December 05, 2009 by: Ethan Huff, citizen journalist
http://www.naturalnews.com/027663_muscles_brain_function.html

A recent study published in the November 2009 issue of Archives of Neurology revealed that the greater muscle strength a person has, the more likely he or she is to maintain proper cognitive function over time. The study examined 970 men and women and found that those individuals who ranked in the top ten percent for muscle strength were 61 percent less likely to develop progressive cognitive degeneration when compared to those in the bottom ten percent.

Dr. Patricia Boyle, the author of the study, and her research colleagues from Rush University Medical Center in Chicago examined men and women between the ages of 54 and 100, testing their strength in nine different muscle categories. The study patients were followed for a period of four years in which their cognitive capabilities were examined along the way. The stronger patients were found to have maintained the best brain function.

The research team performed a similar study back in June that investigated the link between motor decline and participation in social activities. The report revealed a significant increase in cognitive degeneration among those who participated the least in social activities.

According to Aron S. Buchman, MD, from the Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center and department of neurological sciences at Rush University Medical Center, each point of decrease on the social activity scale used in the study was the equivalent of a person being five years older at the study's baseline. In other words, increased social activity plays an enormous role in prolonging functional motor skills and vice versa.

Among all the studies performed on the subject, researchers have clearly found that physical exercise, cognitive activity, and social participation all contribute to healthy brain function. Rather than rely on medication, Dr. Buchman recommends a multidisciplinary approach to help aging people retain strong mental health.

Improved brain function can also be achieved by ensuring the body receives the necessary nutrients for such a task. Alpha lipoic acid (ALA), sometimes referred to as the "universal antioxidant", is a necessary compound that converts energy from food and mitochondria for use throughout the body. Acetyl L-carnitine (ALC) works to transport fat through cell membranes into cell mitochondria where it produces cellular energy through oxidation. Together, these nutrients work wonders to promote a strong memory and a vibrant nervous system.

Phosphatidylserine (PS) is another valuable nutrient that fortifies and protects the integrity of cell membranes by defending them against age-associated degeneration. It has been proven in published research to improve cognitive neural function and memory.

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Daily Exercise & Stronger Muscles Lead To Better Brain Function

fitness and health, persistence is more important than intensity.
each day is far better than ... on the weekend

Your body needs daily involvement in physical activity to realize maximum benefits,
so find something you can enjoy daily, then stick to it!
:-)
===


the greater muscle strength a person has, the more likely he or she is to maintain proper cognitive function over time.

less likely to develop progressive cognitive degeneration

link between motor decline and participation in social activities.
significant increase in cognitive degeneration among those who participated the least in social activities.

increased social activity plays an enormous role in prolonging functional motor skills and vice versa.

physical exercise, cognitive activity, and social participation all contribute to healthy brain function.

necessary nutrients
Alpha lipoic acid (ALA)
Acetyl L-carnitine (ALC)
promote a strong memory and a vibrant nervous system.

Phosphatidylserine (PS)
protects the integrity of cell membranes
proven in published research to improve cognitive neural function and memory.

+++

NaturalNews Tip of the day (from Mike):

When it comes to fitness and health, persistence is more important than intensity. Walking 20 minutes each day is far better than sprinting one hour on the weekend, in other words. Your body needs daily involvement in physical activity to realize maximum benefits, so find something you can enjoy daily, then stick to it! :-)

Study Reveals Stronger Muscles Lead to Better Brain Function

Saturday, December 05, 2009 by: Ethan Huff, citizen journalist
http://www.naturalnews.com/027663_muscles_brain_function.html

A recent study published in the November 2009 issue of Archives of Neurology revealed that the greater muscle strength a person has, the more likely he or she is to maintain proper cognitive function over time. The study examined 970 men and women and found that those individuals who ranked in the top ten percent for muscle strength were 61 percent less likely to develop progressive cognitive degeneration when compared to those in the bottom ten percent.

Dr. Patricia Boyle, the author of the study, and her research colleagues from Rush University Medical Center in Chicago examined men and women between the ages of 54 and 100, testing their strength in nine different muscle categories. The study patients were followed for a period of four years in which their cognitive capabilities were examined along the way. The stronger patients were found to have maintained the best brain function.

The research team performed a similar study back in June that investigated the link between motor decline and participation in social activities. The report revealed a significant increase in cognitive degeneration among those who participated the least in social activities.

According to Aron S. Buchman, MD, from the Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center and department of neurological sciences at Rush University Medical Center, each point of decrease on the social activity scale used in the study was the equivalent of a person being five years older at the study's baseline. In other words, increased social activity plays an enormous role in prolonging functional motor skills and vice versa.

Among all the studies performed on the subject, researchers have clearly found that physical exercise, cognitive activity, and social participation all contribute to healthy brain function. Rather than rely on medication, Dr. Buchman recommends a multidisciplinary approach to help aging people retain strong mental health.

Improved brain function can also be achieved by ensuring the body receives the necessary nutrients for such a task. Alpha lipoic acid (ALA), sometimes referred to as the "universal antioxidant", is a necessary compound that converts energy from food and mitochondria for use throughout the body. Acetyl L-carnitine (ALC) works to transport fat through cell membranes into cell mitochondria where it produces cellular energy through oxidation. Together, these nutrients work wonders to promote a strong memory and a vibrant nervous system.

Phosphatidylserine (PS) is another valuable nutrient that fortifies and protects the integrity of cell membranes by defending them against age-associated degeneration. It has been proven in published research to improve cognitive neural function and memory.

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Sunday, November 29, 2009

Another Corporate Change Of Heart - United Students Against Sweatshops Enlightens Them

1,200 workers in Honduras who were fired by their American corporate factory owner because they unionized. Then, something remarkable happened. They got their jobs back.

In January, Russell shuttered one of eight apparel factories it owns in Honduras. It was the only plant with a union.

the University of Miami (which was the first to sever ties)

agreement with the workers' union that reopens the factory, puts all the fired employees back to work, compensates them for lost wages and, in a startling reversal, promises the union access to its other apparel manufacturing plants in Honduras.

But the happy ending did come. Russell did repent and reform its ways. And that good fortune may just spread. Russell is the largest private employer in Honduras, and its watershed agreement may influence other workplaces in Central America.

in the late 1990s, chapters of United Students Against Sweatshops started forming on college campuses with a mission to help empower working people around the world. Today, thanks to that activism, about 175 American colleges and universities have adopted manufacturing codes of conduct demanding that workers in factories that produce their apparel are treated fairly and decently.
===

Corporate Scrooge Has Change of Heart

by Robyn Blumner

When we think of heartwarming tales, they tend to be of the sort like "Miracle on 34th Street," where little Susan Walker gets the house she wanted for Christmas after all, or "It's a Wonderful Life," where George Bailey's neighbors and customers put self-interest aside to save his bank. Those are yummy treats of magical doings and brotherly compassion that the season inspires. But in real life happy endings don't often come so easily or tidily.

I'm about to share one of the most cockle-warming stories of the year, even though its happy conclusion was a long, tough slog and about a decade in the making.

This is a story about 1,200 workers in Honduras who were fired by their American corporate factory owner because they unionized. Then, something remarkable happened. They got their jobs back.

The Scrooge in this modern-day "A Christmas Carol" is Russell Athletic, a leading sportswear company, owned by Fruit of the Loom. The visiting spirits who made Russell change its shriveled corporate heart are college students around the country, members of United Students Against Sweatshops.

In January, Russell shuttered one of eight apparel factories it owns in Honduras. It was the only plant with a union. Since then, USAS students have convinced nearly 100 colleges and universities to end or suspend their licensing agreements with Russell.

This blow to the bottom line was not inconsequential. The agreements allow Russell to put university names on T-shirts, and other apparel that college students buy as wardrobe staples, and some of them were reportedly worth more than a $1 million in sales.

But those dollars flew out the corporate headquarters' window when the University of Miami (which was the first to sever ties), Harvard, New York University, North Carolina, Duke, the entire University of California system and dozens of other major schools told Russell to either correct the injustice and respect the rights of its workers to organize, or go away.

Lo and behold, Russell woke up one morning a changed entity, full of the milk of human kindness. Earlier this month it struck an agreement with the workers' union that reopens the factory, puts all the fired employees back to work, compensates them for lost wages and, in a startling reversal, promises the union access to its other apparel manufacturing plants in Honduras.

This is the same Russell that allowed its management and supervisors to regularly threaten workers that the plant would likely be closed if they brought in a union.

In one incident among many documented in a report by the Worker Rights Consortium, a group funded by universities to watchdog the behavior of their collegiate apparel makers, a Russell supervisor said in a factory cafeteria that "The workers will starve because they got involved with a union." He said, "The owners will never accept a union," and, "these people from the union are going to be left eating (expletive deleted)."

This is the same Russell that offered the union as its final offer during 2008 contract negotiations a raise for workers of four cents a day in 2009 and five cents a day in 2010. If that doesn't describe a classic miserly, exploitative Scrooge, what does?

But the happy ending did come. Russell did repent and reform its ways. And that good fortune may just spread. Russell is the largest private employer in Honduras, and its watershed agreement may influence other workplaces in Central America.

So how did all this happen? How did nearly 100 universities agree to boycott Russell within such a short period of time?

Back in the late 1990s, chapters of United Students Against Sweatshops started forming on college campuses with a mission to help empower working people around the world. Today, thanks to that activism, about 175 American colleges and universities have adopted manufacturing codes of conduct demanding that workers in factories that produce their apparel are treated fairly and decently.

When an investigation by the Worker Rights Consortium found that Russell had clearly breached this code, the universities had little choice but to say "adios."

And so ends our tale of little-guy triumph and noble do-gooders persevering. If only all businesses felt such pressure to treat their people well. What glad tidings those would be.



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Friday, November 27, 2009

PLUNDER - When The Rule Of Law Is Illegal - Ugo Mattei & Laura Nader

A new book worth reading:
PLUNDER - When The Rule Of Law Is Illegal
Ugo Mattei and Laura Nader
Amazon Link


[what is needed is] world culture and of global political realism.

a need of social justice and solidarity
empowered by a political soul
justice
respect

empowering its bright side and fully exposing the dark aspects of the rule of law can transform it into a tool for taking control of a runaway world, fueled by an economic dynamic called neo-liberalism.

a new form of international scholar and citizen activism.
resist the empire of lawlessness

We need ... a philosophy for our own time."

law in action is about politics and power
a rule of law of the people
fundamental restructuring of the political field.

People have to be free to build their own economies.
+++



'The only truly political action . . . is threat which severs the nexus between violence and law'.

the incremental use of law as a mechanism for constructing and legitimizing plunder.

patterns of global plunder, ... continued by nations, in particular the USA, and multinational corporate entities independent of explicit political or military colonialism.

a need of social justice and solidarity


the rule of law has a bright and a dark side

empowered by a political soul
justice
respect

empowering its bright side and fully exposing the dark aspets of the rule of law can transform it into a tool for taking control of a runaway world, fueled by an economic dynamic called neo-liberalism.

a clear rejection of an ideology of inherent superiority of Western culture that does not recognize that the West is itself part of something much larger.

... the problems we are facing are systemic to a several-hundred-year-old system of Euro-American expansion and domination based on extraction and plunder, a system that is now adopted by India and China.

plunder as the rule rather than the exception allows the reader to get outraged.
organize radical alternatives to its destructive models of development?

a new form of international scholar and citizen activism.

differentiate between the light and dark sides of the rule of law

plunder may become the target of public opinion and legal challenges.

Lifting plunder from below the radar screen is a potential mobilizing force
persistence, networking, imagination

resist the empire of lawlessness
develop tools that expose the variety of Western colonial strategies used to deny history
develop a critique of ethnocentrism both conscious and unconscious.

We need ... a philosophy for our own time."

law in action is about politics and power
a rule of law of the people
fundamental restructuring of the political field.

demystify many taboos ... [including the] rule of law.
tell the historical truth,
 to the people, to prove that truth is always revolutionary and might, if politically organized, pierce the thick veil of lies that shelters Western plunder and historical brutality.

Western spectacular and imperialist ideas of democracy and of the rule of law should be rejected.

On this planet, resources are scarce but, if the rich were legally forced to respect the limits of decency, there would be more than sufficient resources for all to live well.

admiring the rich and the powerful and the instruments used to secure such an unfair arrangement seems indeed paradoxical.

People have to be free to build their own economies.


There is nothing inevitable about the present arrangements and their dominant and taken-for-granted certainties.

[what is needed is] world culture and of global political realism.

+++


PLUNDER - When The Rule Of Law Is Illegal
Ugo Mattei and Laura Nader
Amazon Link

From the introduction:

'The only truly political action . . . is threat which severs the nexus between violence and law'. - Giorgio Agamben

... While theoreticians of Euro-American imperialism profess to recognize the rule of law as keystones of the 'civilizing process,' its dark side has been neglected. Law has been used to justify, administer, and sanction Western conquest and plunder, resulting in massive global disparities. Thus, we argue, imperial uses - past and present - of the rule of law are behind the current less-than-ideal practices of distributive justice.
...
Our story is about the incremental use of law as a mechanism for constructing and legitimizing plunder. Our intent is to examine the extent of the law's dark side and to explain the mechanics of such imperial uses of it.
...
What is of interest to us in this book are the mechanisms through which the transnational rule of law, as a deeply Western idea, has led incrementally to patterns of global plunder, a process initiated by the expansion of Euro-American society worldwide, and now continued by nations, in particular the USA, and multinational corporate entities independent of explicit political or military colonialism.
...
The transformation of the rule of law ideal into an imperial ideology has accompanied the move from a need of social justice and solidarity towards the capitalist requirements of efficiency and competition.
...
We argue that the rule of law has a bright and a dark side, with the latter progressively conquering new terrain whenever the former is not empowered by a political soul. In the absence of such political life, the rule of law becomes a cold technology, and the dark side can cover the whole picture as law yields to embrace brute violence.
...
A public shift from justice to profit, from respect to thefts, followed within an atmosphere of silenced political debate, overwhelmed by self-congratulatory rhetoric, such as the end of history, through the 1990s.
...
Perhaps empowering its bright side and fully exposing the dark aspets of the rule of law can transform it into a tool for taking control of a runaway world, fueled by an economic dynamic called neo-liberalism.
...
A reconfiguration would mean, first and foremost, a clear rejection of an ideology of inherent superiority of Western culture that does not recognize that eh West is itself part of something much larger.
... the problems we are facing are systemic to a several-hundred-year-old system of Euro-American expansion and domination based on extraction and plunder, a system that is now adopted by India and China.

Perhaps plunder as the rule rather than the exception allows the reader to get outraged. The Enron scandal, the mutual fund scandal, and other examples portrayed as exceptions ... in fact are the rule of corporate capitalist development; workers are victimized; people lose their savings; innocents are killed; peasants are starved. The distinction between what is legal and what is illegal blurs in a world in which the rule of law is reduced to a dull rhetoric or to Orwellian double-speak. How much more suffering do we need to realize that similar tragedies are the rule and not the exception? How much more time do we need to recognize the civilizing failure of corporate capitalism and the need to organize radical alternatives to its destructive models of development?

From Chapter 1
... In this book we are not moved by the desire to argue against the rule of law. We only wish to gain a better understanding of this powerful political weapon, to question its almost sacred status, by analyzing it as a Western cultural artifact, closely connect with the diffusion of Western political domination. We will try to disenatangle its connection with the ideal of democracy, and on the contrary recognize its close association with another notion, that of 'plunder.'

Let us clarify, before we continue, what we mean by the term 'plunder.' The American Heritage Dictionary defines 'plunder' as  'to rob of goods by force, esp. in times of war; pillage," and 'Plunder' (the noun) as 'property stolen by fraud or force.' It is the latter definition that especially brings to mind the dark side of the rule of law. We address both looting by force and looting by fraud, both wrapped in the rule of law by illustrious legal practitioners and scholars. We trace the development of the critical supporting role that the rule of law has played in plunder.

... the birth of the rule of law ... had nothing to do with notions of democracy, unless we wish to assert that the English Parliament of the time was a democratic institution! As widely recognized by contemporary historians, the birth of the rule of law was actually the triumph of medieval social structure over modernization. ... the false notion that progress and civilization were protected by the alliance between Parliament (democracy!) and the common law courts (the rule of law).


From the end of the last chapter
...
The preceding examples point to a new form of international scholar and citizen activism. The additive effect might in the long run cause people to be able to differentiate between the light and dark sides of the rule of law, between the seedlings that start with local law traditions and then grow and spread, as was exhibited with global outrage at the US's unilateral attack on Iraq. If more widely recognized for what it is, plunder may become the target of public opinion and legal challenges. Lifting plunder from below the radar screen is a potential mobilizing force, although there is no guarantee without persistence, networking, imagination, and recognition of the difficulties inherent in deconstructing the imperial rule of law, in some places still considered to be a social good.

...
If, however, you are a victim of land plunder, polluted drinking water, or loss of state oil revenues, if you have lost a job or savings, or are the poor target of a fishing expedition aimed at filling up privatized jails - that is where the spectacular hits the ground and the user of law grasps the difference between the light and dark sides of the rule of law. Can we resist the empire of lawlessness with a one-day protest or with a well-articulated suit in a US court of law? It seems unlikely.

The strategy is to develop tools that expose the variety of Western colonial strategies used to deny history, and to develop a critique of ethnocentrism both conscious and unconscious. Did Cicero not remind us: "Freedom is participation in power"? A vision that capitalizes on historical experience offers ideas based on whatever deserves to be saved in the name of justice, wherever it comes from in time and space. Realized Western capitalism and realized European socialism must be compared on an equal footing. Neither, with only few exceptions, have been success stories over time. We need, as Margaret Meed noted shortly before her death, "a philosophy for our own time."

In discussing the continuities between colonialism and neo-liberalism we have offered abundant evidence that capitalism has enough strength and its actors the capacity to deploy an impressive aggregate of effective strategies to overcome difficult moments created by temporary triumphs of legality. Given the fact that, ultimately, the law in action is about politics and power, possibly more than about efficiency or justice, we need to acknowledge the impossibility of significantly transforming the imperial rule of law into a rule of law of the people outside of a fundamental restructuring of the political field. Such an attempt, however, needs to demystify many taboos, one being the per se desirability of the historical experience hitherto known as rule of law. There is a renewed need to tell the historical truth, not only to powerful institutions but also to the people, to prove that truth is always revolutionary and might, if politically organized, pierce the thick veil of lies that shelters Western plunder and historical brutality. Western spectacular and imperialist ideas of democracy and of the rule of law should be rejected. What over time should emerge is a very simple notion, today hidden in plain sight over time should emerge is a very simple notion, by a centuries-old dominant ideological tale: in a world of scarce resources there is a limit to private accumulation to be respected, and the rich (countries, corporations, or, ultimately, individuals) cannot be rich beyond that limit without being responsible for the poor being poor. Trespassing over that substantive limit amounts to plunder, regardless of whether the rule of law, by protecting the bottom line and all externalized costs, enforces such disparities. On this planet, resources are scarce but, if the rich were legally forced to respect the limits of decency, there would be more than sufficient resources for all to live well. Nobody would admire and respect someone who at a lunch buffet for seven, obscenely ate 90 percent of the food, leaving he other guests to share an amount insufficient for one. In a world history of capitalism in which the rule of law has reproduced taht arrangement on the large scale, admiring the rich and the powerful and the instruments used to secure such an unfair arrangement seems indeed paradoxical. People have to be free to build their own economies.

There is nothing inevitable about the present arrangements and their dominant and taken-for-granted certainties. Indeed, it may be that the present legal and political hegemonies suffer from lack: the lack of world culture and of global political realism.



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Monday, November 23, 2009

Establish War Tax On High Income Americans To Fund Afghan War Surge

Any troop increase for Afghanistan should come with a "war surtax" on high income Americans

"If we have to pay for the healthcare bill, we should pay for the war as well,"

"graduated" tax on income that would help offset the roughly $40 billion in new costs needed to send 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan,

an "additional income tax" on incomes over $200,000 or $250,000 to finance any troop surge.

+++

Obey Wants 'War Surtax' to Fund Afghan Effort

by Michael O'Brien

WASHINGTON, DC - Any troop increase for Afghanistan should come with a "war surtax" on high income Americans, a top House chairman said Monday.

Rep. David Obey (D-Wisc.), the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, warned that if President Barack Obama decides to send additional troops to Afghanistan, it should be funded with the new tax.

"If we have to pay for the healthcare bill, we should pay for the war as well," Obey told ABC News in an interview, "by having a war surtax."

Obey said his proposed tax would be a "graduated" tax on income that would help offset the roughly $40 billion in new costs needed to send 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan, a cost estimated by Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Peter Orszag.

"I want the president and every American to think ahead of time about what it means if you do add to our involvement in Afghanistan," Obey told ABC, pointing to the war costs that affected the presidencies and domestic agendas of Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson. 

The call for a new tax mirrors a similar demand over the weekend from Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, on funding the war effort in Afghanistan. Levin told Bloomberg News that he favored an "additional income tax" on incomes over $200,000 or $250,000 to finance any troop surge.

"If we don't pay for it, then the cost of the Afghan war will wipe out every other initiative that we have to try to rebuild our own economy," he said. "I'm going to be fighting to get whatever they do paid for."

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Mammograms Harm Women - Cancer Industry Abandons Science To Keep Pushing Them

Cancer industry abandons science to keep pushing mammograms that harm women

Monday, November 23, 2009
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com (See all articles...)

(NaturalNews) The cancer industry has blatantly abandoned science these past two weeks by insisting women under 50 should receive annual mammograms even though the industry's own scientific task force concluded that such screenings result in too many false positives. Essentially, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force took a good, hard look at the science and concluded that mammograms harm far more women than they help (for women under 50, anyway). But when they announced the new recommendations that women under 50 should avoid mammograms -- and women over 50 should only get them every other year -- the cancer industry cried foul.

Radiologists, oncologists, Big Pharma pill-pushers and cancer industry non-profits all banded together to declare, "We are abandoning the science! We want more mammograms for more women, science be damned!"

Of course, they all still claim to be "scientific," but what they really do is selectively cherry-pick which bits and pieces of the scientific evidence they choose to adhere to. And when it comes to these new mammogram recommendations, they've decided to simply abandon the science and keep pushing more radiation imaging tests for women (mammography).

The cancer industry is a complete failure

What you are witnessing here, folks, is the desperate last gasps of a failed industry. Their technologies do not save lives, their drugs do not cure cancer, and their "science" doesn't add up. The cancer industry is a fraud, and now its fraudulent nature is finally becoming apparent to everyone. It even has the mainstream media (USA Today) describing the failures of mammography in articles like the one you'll see here: http://www.usatoday.com/news/health...

Here's something else you need to know: The cancer industry hasn't merely abandoned science in terms of mammography; it has also abandoned all science with the pushing of chemotherapy. Did you know there has never been a randomized, placebo-controlled study proving that chemotherapy saves the lives of breast cancer patients?

That evidence doesn't exist. The whole "treatment" scam is based entirely on fiction. Chemotherapy only works at all against three rare types of cancer, and breast cancer isn't one of them.

In defending the new mammography guidelines, Dr. Timothy Wilt, a member of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, said that the task force recommendations "were based on the most rigorous peer review of up-to-date, accurate information about the evidence about the harms and benefits of treatment."

He repeated that women under 50 should never receive mammograms, and women 50 or over should only receive a mammogram every two years.

The American Cancer Society, quite predictably, has a real problem with that recommendation. Its entire success (and power) depends on more people getting cancer, and one of the best ways to make sure that happens is to keep pushing for more mammograms. In opposing the new mammography recommendations, the ACS has now abandoned science, too.

Chemotherapy: The chemical holocaust

When cancer doctors tell you that "chemotherapy will save your life," they are lying to you. And they lie thousands of times a day, deceptively recruiting women into modern medicine's version of a chemical holocaust.

The cancer industry offers no cures. A cure for cancer would destroy the industry. It would wipe out billions of dollars in profits that drug companies, radiologists and oncologists are counting on right now. This is precisely why the cancer industry dares not tell women the truth about vitamin D, for example, which prevents 77% of all cancers, including breast cancer.

If every woman in America were given vitamin D supplements, cancer rates would plummet by up to 77% in a single year, and the cancer industry would virtually collapse. That cannot be allowed to happen, of course, which is precisely why the industry has a complete blackout on vitamin D information while pushing hard for annual mammograms that continue to cause cancer (and generate repeat business).

The U.S. government has abandoned science, too

Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services, has told women to ignore the new mammography advice by the U.S. government task force. But she has zero scientific evidence to back up her advice. She, like everyone else pushing mammograms, is engaged in pure quackery.

I find this particularly fascinating, given that the cancer industry claims people who are offering cancer cures are "quacks." Such cures aren't based on rock-solid science, they claim! But when the rock-solid science says mammograms are dangerous for women, the cancer industry abandons the science! That's why they are the new quacks.

Here's a simple prediction: In twenty years, mammograms will have been long since abandoned. Doctors of that era will look back at 2009 and wonder how this so-called "modern" medical industry could have been so deeply invested in such a dangerous, cancer-causing technology called mammography. They will scratch their heads and ask, "Why didn't they heed the science that said mammography is dangerous?" They'll write about "how medically illiterate the people were in 2009" because they voluntarily inserted their body parts into irradiation machines.

The fact is that people of every era are suckers for apparent medical authority. Patients tend to believe doctors because they mistakenly think doctors know what they're talking about. But conventional doctors are technicians, not healers. They understand the detailed of how to administer poisons, but they have no clue how to activate the body's innate healing potential.

Doctors tend to be very intelligent individuals, but even they cannot understand things they've never been taught, and medical school is focused almost entirely on a drugs-and-surgery approach to medicine (slash and burn).

To expect a conventional doctor to be good at healing is like expecting your accountant to be good at ballet.

Doctors may be smart, but they're ignorant about healing. And for the most part, they're nutritionally illiterate, which is why cancer doctors still don't recommend vitamin D. (Astonishing, but true.)

So why, then, would patients who are interested in healing their bodies go see medical professionals who are experts in the administration of poison? It makes no sense. But that's what insurance covers, so they keep doing it. And they keep dying of cancer, an almost entirely preventable disease with cures that exist right now but will never be publicized because too much profit depends on keeping people sick.

Mammograms are the insurance of the cancer industry. As long as mammogram machines keep running, there will always be more cancer to diagnose -- because the machines are making cancer!

Sources for this story include:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3404027...
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health...

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Thursday, November 19, 2009

Too Big to Fail is Too Big to Exist - 2 Page Bank Bill In Senate

BREAK 'EM UP

http://sanders.senate.gov/petition/?uid=c53f1aca-5881-403e-928b-a25980cb4e0c

A bill to make the Treasury secretary identify too-big-to-fail financial giants and break them up picked up support. 

"When it comes to understanding the real economy and the struggles of ordinary Americans, Bernie Sanders always seems to be ahead of the curve,"

The Nation said.  Bernie's bill "makes a lot of sense" to Rachel Maddow.  To read more from the editor of The Nation, click here.  To watch Rachel, click here.  To sign the petition, click here.

The Petition:

Petition to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner

Too Big to Fail is Too Big to Exist

Financial institutions that are “too big to fail” played a major role in undermining the American economy and driving our country into a severe recession.

Financial institutions that are “too big to fail” put taxpayers on the hook for a $700 billion bailout and more than $2 trillion from the Federal Reserve in virtually zero interest loans.

Huge financial institutions have become so big that the four largest banks in America (JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and Citigroup) now issue one out of every two mortgages; two out of three credit cards; and hold $4 out of every $10 in bank deposits in the country.  

Just five banks in America (JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley) own a staggering 95% of the $290 trillion in derivatives held at commercial banks. Derivatives are risky side bets made by Wall Street gamblers that led to the $182 billion bailout of AIG, the $29 billion bailout that allowed JP Morgan Chase to acquire Bear Stearns, and the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

The concentration of ownership in the financial services industry has resulted in higher bank fees and interest rates that consumers are forced to pay for credit cards, mortgages and other financial products.

No single financial institution should be so large that its failure would cause catastrophic risk to millions of American jobs or to our nation’s economic well-being.

No single financial institution should have holdings so extensive that its failure could send the world economy into crisis.

We believe it is time to break up the banks and insurance companies which are too big to fail.

We believe that passage of The Too Big to Fail, Too Big to Exist Act is essential for a strong American economy and a secure future for ourselves, our children, and our grandchildren.

We urge the immediate enactment of the Too Big to Fail, Too Big to Exist Act, which directs the treasury secretary to compile a list of those financial institutions that are too big to fail in the next 90 days, and to break up these banks and insurance companies a year after the legislation is signed into law.







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Sunday, November 15, 2009

Live Map Of Increasing Unemployment Rates by County Jan 07 - Sep 09

Watch how unemployment increased from Jan 2007 to Sep 2009.
There are now more than 31 million people currently unemployed
-- that's including those involuntarily working part time and those
who want a job, but have given up on trying to find one.

The worst economic upheaval since the Great Depression.

http://at7b.com/imagesTG/unemp0107.png


http://at7b.com/imagesTG/d2266a62d072629d6922acc2df3f9d08.png


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Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Charter Of Compassion - Nov 12

When Karen Armstrong, who has authored over 20 books on the role of religion in the modern world, won the 2008 TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) Prize, she wished for the creation, launch, and propagation of a Charter for Compassion, to help unite religious and secular people worldwide around a common belief in compassion.

Nurturing a global community of peace and harmony.

See video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCG4qryy1Dg&feature=player_embedded#

Submissions and comments came from more than 150,000 people from 100 countries; a Council of Conscience, made up of 18 diverse religious leaders, is distilling their input into a Charter for Compassion.

On November 12, Armstrong's wish will become fully realized with the launch of the charter.


The Charter Of Compassion unveiling.

There is an urgent need for a new focus on compassion.

Bringing together voices from all cultures and religions, the Charter seeks to remind the world we already share the core principles of compassion.

On November 12, thousands of people across the globe will listen together. More on November 12 »
See second video here:
http://charterforcompassion.org/

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Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Set Up State Banks & Put People To Work & Return Interest To Public Purse

the private credit system has failed.

public credit could put them back to work
returning the interest to the public purse.

Why should you continue to pay the banks for services and interest on loans when you can receive that interest for the benefit of the state
of California? Wouldn't it be better if you could fund your own infrastructure projects without having to get the approval of independent banks or investment bankers? Additionally, you set the interest rate on your own projects.

set up publicly-owned banks that create credit using the same banking principles that are accepted as standard and usual in the trade by bankers themselves.

Bank On It: How Cash-Starved States Can Create Their Own Credit

by Ellen Brown

"He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils; for time is the greatest innovator." - Francis Bacon
On February 19, 2009, California narrowly escaped bankruptcy, when Governor Arnold Schwarzenneger put on his Terminator hat and held the state senate in lockdown mode until they signed a very controversial budget. 1 If the vote had failed, the state was going to be reduced to paying its employees in I.O.U.s. California avoided bankruptcy for the time being, but 46 of 50 states are insolvent and could be filing Chapter 9 bankruptcy proceedings in the next two years. 2

One of the four states that is not insolvent is an unlikely candidate for the distinction-North Dakota. As Michigan management consultant Charles Fleetham observed last month in an article distributed to his local media:

"North Dakota is a sparsely populated state of less than 700,000, known for cold weather, isolated farmers and a hit movie-Fargo. Yet, for some reason it defies the real estate cliché of location, location, location. Since 2000, the state's GNP has grown 56%, personal income has grown 43%, and wages have grown 34%. This year the state has a budget surplus of $1.2 billion!"

What does the State of North Dakota have that other states don't? The answer seems to be: its own bank. In fact, North Dakota has the only state-owned bank in the nation. The state legislature established the Bank of North Dakota in 1919. Fleetham writes that the bank was set up to free farmers and small businessmen from the clutches of out-of-state bankers and railroad men. By law, the state must deposit all its funds in the bank, and the state guarantees its deposits. Three elected officials oversee the bank: the governor, the attorney general, and the commissioner of agriculture. The bank's stated mission is to deliver sound financial services that promote agriculture, commerce and industry in North Dakota. The bank operates as a bankers' bank, partnering with private banks to loan money to farmers, real estate developers, schools and small businesses. It loans money to students (over 184,000 outstanding loans), and it purchases municipal bonds from public institutions.

Still, you may ask, how does that solve the solvency problem? Isn't the state still limited to spending only the money it has? The answer is no. Certified, card-carrying bankers are allowed to do something nobody else can do: they can create "credit" with accounting entries on their books.

A License to Create Money

Under the "fractional reserve" lending system, banks are allowed to extend credit (create money as loans) in a sum equal to many times their deposit base. Congressman Jerry Voorhis, writing in 1973, explained it like this:

"[F]or every $1 or $1.50 which people-or the government-deposit in a bank, the banking system can create out of thin air and by the stroke of a pen some $10 of checkbook money or demand deposits. It can lend all that $10 into circulation at interest just so long as it has the $1 or a little more in reserve to back it up." 3

That banks actually create money with accounting entries was confirmed in a revealing booklet published by the Chicago Federal Reserve titled Modern Money Mechanics. 2 The booklet was periodically revised until 1992, when it had reached 50 pages long. On page 49 of the 1992 edition, it states:

"With a uniform 10 percent reserve requirement, a $1 increase in reserves would support $10 of additional transaction accounts [loans created as deposits in borrowers' accounts]." 4

The 10 percent reserve requirement is now largely obsolete, in part because banks have figured out how to get around it with such devices as "overnight sweeps." What chiefly limits bank lending today is the 8 percent capital requirement imposed by the Bank for International Settlements, the head of the private global central banking system in Basel, Switzerland. With an 8 percent capital requirement, a state with its own bank could fan its revenues into 12.5 times their face value in loans (100 ÷ 8 = 12.5). And since the state would actually own the bank, it would not have to worry about shareholders or profits. It could lend to creditworthy borrowers at very low interest, perhaps limited only to a service charge covering its costs; and it could lend to itself or to its municipal governments at as low as zero percent interest. If these loans were rolled over indefinitely, the effect would be the same as creating new, debt-free money.

Dangerously inflationary? Not if the money were used to create new goods and services. Price inflation results only when "demand" (money) exceeds "supply" (goods and services). When they increase together, prices remain stable.

Today we are in a dangerous deflationary spiral, as lending has dried up and asset values have plummeted. The monopoly on the creation of money and credit by a private banking fraternity has resulted in a malfunctioning credit system and monetary collapse. Credit markets have been frozen by the wildly speculative derivatives gambles of a few big Wall Street banks, bets that not only destroyed those banks' balance sheets but are infecting the whole private banking system with toxic debris. To get out of this deflationary debt trap requires an injection of new, debt-free money into the economy, something that can best be done through a system of public banks dedicated to serving the public interest, administering credit as a public utility.

Some experts insist that we must tighten our belts and start saving again, in order to rebuild the "capital" necessary for functioning markets; but our markets actually functioned quite well so long as the credit system was working. We have the same real assets (raw materials, oil, technical knowledge, productive capacity, labor force, etc.) that we had before the crisis began. Our workers and factories are sitting idle because the private credit system has failed. A system of public credit could put them back to work again. The notion that "money" is something that has to be "saved" before it can be "borrowed" misconstrues the nature of money and credit. Credit is merely a legal agreement, a "monetization" of future proceeds, a promise to pay later from the fruits of the advance. Banks have created credit on their books for hundreds of years, and this system would have worked quite well had it not been for the enormous tribute siphoned off to private coffers in the form of interest. A public banking system could overcome that problem by returning the interest to the public purse. This is the sort of banking system that was pioneered in the colony of Pennsylvania, where it worked brilliantly well.

Restoring Michigan to Solvency Among other advantages to a state of owning its own bank are the substantial sums it could save in interest. As Fleetham notes of his own ailing state of Michigan:

"According to recent financial reports (available online), the State of Michigan, the City of Detroit, the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, the Wayne County Airport, the Detroit Public Schools, the University of Michigan, and Michigan State University pay over $800 million a year in interest on long term debt. If you add interest paid by Michigan cities, school districts, and public utilities, the cost to our taxpayers easily tops a billion a year. What does Wall Street do with our billion plus dollars? They decorate their offices like kings."

Interestingly, the projected state budget deficit for 2009 is also $1 billion. If Michigan did not have to pay over a billion dollars in interest to Wall Street, the budget could be balanced and the state could be restored to solvency. A state-owned bank could not only provide interest-free credit for the state but could actually generate revenues for it. Fleetham notes that in 2007, the Bank of North Dakota earned a net profit of $51 million on a loan volume of $2 billion. He comments:

"Last year, Michigan citizens paid over $5 billion dollars in personal income tax. With a state bank like North Dakota's we could reduce this burden, fund new businesses, and restore our crumbling water and sewer systems. And we don't have to feel sorry about Wall Street losing our business. They didn't ‘earn' the money they lent us. They created it in computers and charged us interest to boot. Let's follow North Dakota's lead and get free from Wall Street's web."

Taking the Initiative in California

California could do this as well. Robert Ellis is a Tucson talk show host who once worked on Wall Street and has been involved in setting up several banks and financial institutions. In January of this year, he proposed in a letter to Governor Schwarzenegger that California could resolve its financial woes by setting up a bank on the model of the Bank of North Dakota. Ellis wrote to the governor:

"I admire your tenacity in dealing with California's financial problems. Your idea of using IOU's was ingenious but there is a better way. The State of California can charter its own bank and issue its own checks to all state employees... . It can also pay all its vendors, contracts and contractors through the bank... . Additionally, once the bank is operational, you can fund your own state projects and you determine the interest rate paid as opposed to being at the mercy of the banks you currently deal with or the interest rates the investment bankers make you pay to issue bonds. By doing this, you will put the state in control of its own destiny and make it the benefactor of its own money.

"... What I am proposing is not new. It has been done by one other state in the nation [North Dakota]. Why should you continue to pay the banks for services and interest on loans when you can receive that interest for the benefit of the state of California? Wouldn't it be better if you could fund your own infrastructure projects without having to get the approval of independent banks or investment bankers? Additionally, you set the interest rate on your own projects. You can even set it at zero if you deem the project worthy enough."

Ellis offered his services in setting up the bank, which he thought could be chartered in a few short months. The Governor has not replied, but some pressure from constituents might encourage a response.

Failing that, there is the initiative and referendum process pioneered in California. It allows state laws to be proposed directly by the public, and the state's Constitution to be amended either by public petition (the "initiative") or by the legislature submitting a proposed constitutional amendment to the electorate (the "referendum"). The initiative is done by writing a proposed constitutional amendment or statute as a petition, which is submitted to the California Attorney General along with a submission fee, which was a modest $200 in 2004. The petition must be signed by registered voters amounting to 8% (for a constitutional amendment) or 5% (for a statute) of the number of people who voted in the most recent election for governor. 5

As Gandhi said, "When the people lead, the leaders will follow." We the people can beat the Wall Street bankers at their own game, by moving our legislators to set up publicly-owned banks that create credit using the same banking principles that are accepted as standard and usual in the trade by bankers themselves.

Ellen Brown, J.D., wrote this article in March, 2009, for Path to a New Economy, a collection of online articles for YES! Magazine, on economic and financial solutions. Ellen developed her research skills as an attorney practicing civil litigation in Los Angeles. In Web of Debt, her latest book, she turns those skills to an analysis of the Federal Reserve and “the money trust.” She shows how this private cartel has usurped the power to create money from the people themselves, and how we the people can get it back. Her eleven books include the bestselling Nature’s Pharmacy, co-authored with Dr. Lynne Walker, and Forbidden Medicine. Her websites are www.webofdebt.com and www.ellenbrown.com.


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Sunday, November 8, 2009

When the Dollar Rallies, the Market will Crash

Bernanke's success in reflating sagging asset prices has depended entirely on interest rate manipulation and liquidity injections. There's been no effort to patch household balance sheets, increase production, or strengthen overall demand. It's a clever trick by a master illusionist, but it has its costs. When the dollar rallies, markets will crash. And Bernanke will be responsible.
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When the Dollar Rallies, the Market will Crash


Interest rates. The Fed does not need slinky women in plunging necklines to peddle money. All it needs is low interest rates. When rates are pushed lower than the rate of inflation, the Fed provides a subsidy for borrowing. This is not as hard to grasp as it sounds. If I offered to give you $1.00 for very 90 cents you gave me in return, you would buy as many dollars from me as you could. The Fed operates the same way. It generates market activity by creating incentives for borrowing. Borrowing leads to speculation, and speculation leads to steadily rising asset prices. This is how the game is played. The Fed is not an unbiased observer of free market activity. The Fed drives the market. It fuels speculation and controls behavior by fixing interest rates.

When Lehman Bros flopped last year, markets went into freefall. A sharp correction turned into a full-blown panic. The bubble burst and trillions of dollars in credit vanished in a flash. Trading in exotic debt-instruments stopped overnight. A global sell-off ensued. Markets crashed. For a while, it looked like the whole system might collapse.

The Fed's emergency intervention pulled the system back from the brink, but the economy is still wracked with deflation. Billions in toxic waste now clog the Fed's balance sheet. The dollar has fallen like a stone.

When the financial system blows up and credit is sucked down a capital-hole, the economy goes into a downward spiral. Businesses slash inventory and lay off workers, workers have to cut back on spending and credit. That creates less demand for products, which leads to more lay offs. This is the vicious circle policymakers try to avoid. That's why Fed chair Ben Bernanke wheeled out the heavy artillery and launched the most aggressive central bank intervention in history.

The Fed dropped rates to zero, but its Quantitative Easing (QE) program (which monetizes the debt) actually pushes rates even lower to roughly negative 2 percent.

Bernanke has underwritten every sector of the financial system with government guarantees. He has provided full-value loans for dodgy collateral which is worth only a fraction of its original value. The market can no longer operate without the Fed. The Fed IS the market, which is why it is foolish to talk about a "recovery". The idea of recovery implies a free-standing system based on supply and demand. But, for now, the government provides the demand, which is why there is no market and no recovery. Analysts at Goldman Sachs sum it up like this:


"How much of the rebound in real GDP was due to the fiscal stimulus, and where do we stand in terms of the effects of stimulus thus far? Although precise answers are impossible at this juncture, several aspects of the report are consistent with our estimates that the fiscal package enacted in mid-February as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) would have accounted for virtually all of the growth reported for the third quarter." (http://www.zerohedge.com/article/hedging-their-bets)

Positive growth is an illusion created by government spending. The economy is still flat on its back. Consumer spending and credit are in sharp decline. Unemployment is steadily rising (although at a slower pace) and wages are flatlining with a chance of falling for the first time in 30 years. Deflationary pressures are building. The talk of a "jobless recovery" is intentionally misleading. Jobs ARE recovery; therefore a jobless recovery merely points to asset-inflation brought on by erratic monetary policy. Surging stocks shouldn't be confused with a genuine recovery.

The Fed faces stiff headwinds ahead. Low interest rates can have unintended consequences. The "cheapness" of the greenback has made the dollar the funding currency for the carry trade. Investors are borrowing low cost dollars and using them to purchase higher interest assets elsewhere. The process, which is rapidly escalating, is fraught with peril as economist Nouriel Roubini points out in an article in the Financial Times:

     "Since March there has been a massive rally in all sorts of risky assets... and an even bigger rally in emerging market asset classes (their stocks, bonds and currencies). At the same time, the dollar has weakened sharply, while government bond yields have gently increased but stayed low and stable...

But while the US and global economy have begun a modest recovery, asset prices have gone through the roof since March in a major and synchronized rally... Risky asset prices have risen too much, too soon and too fast compared with macroeconomic fundamentals.

So what is behind this massive rally? Certainly it has been helped by a wave of liquidity from near-zero interest rates and quantitative easing. But a more important factor fueling this asset bubble is the weakness of the US dollar, driven by the mother of all carry trades. The US dollar has become the major funding currency of carry trades as the Fed has kept interest rates on hold and is expected to do so for a long time. Investors who are shorting the US dollar to buy on a highly leveraged basis higher-yielding assets and other global assets are not just borrowing at zero interest rates in dollar terms; they are borrowing at very negative interest rates...

Every investor who plays this risky game looks like a genius – even if they are just riding a huge bubble financed by a large negative cost of borrowing...

...This policy feeds the global asset bubble it is also feeding a new US asset bubble...
The reckless US policy that is feeding these carry trades is forcing other countries to follow its easy monetary policy... This is keeping short-term rates lower than is desirable... So the perfectly correlated bubble across all global asset classes gets bigger by the day.


But one day this bubble will burst, leading to the biggest co-ordinated asset bust ever: if factors lead the dollar to reverse and suddenly appreciate... the leveraged carry trade will have to be suddenly closed as investors cover their dollar shorts. A stampede will occur as closing long leveraged risky asset positions across all asset classes funded by dollar shorts triggers a co-ordinated collapse of all those risky assets – equities, commodities, emerging market asset classes and credit instruments." ("The Mother of all Carry Trades Faces an Inevitable Bust", Nouriel Roubini, Financial Times)

Everyone who watches the market has noticed the inverse correlation of stocks to the dollar. When the dollar fades, stocks soar. And when the dollar strengthens, stocks plunge. Eventually, the dollar will reverse-course and stage a comeback, probably when Bernanke stops his printing operations. That will trigger the next severe correction which will burst bubbles across all asset classes.

Bernanke's success in reflating sagging asset prices has depended entirely on interest rate manipulation and liquidity injections. There's been no effort to patch household balance sheets, increase production, or strengthen overall demand. It's a clever trick by a master illusionist, but it has its costs. When the dollar rallies, markets will crash. And Bernanke will be responsible.

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Kucinich - Work For Real Health Care - Not For Profit At The Expense Of Health

recognize the broad social and economic benefits of a not-for-profit, single-payer health care system, which is good for the American people and good for America's businesses

Dennis Kucinich - www.Kucinich.us

Congressman Kucinich addresses vote on H.R. 3962

While the political process in Washington suffers through its grotesque pantomime on health care, let us prepare our neighborhoods, our communities, our states for the eventual triumph of single payer health care.



Download, print and circulate the petition among friends and neighbors.
(November 7, 2009)

Congressman Dennis Kucinich after voting against H.R. 3962 addresses why he voted NO, stating:

"We have been led to believe that we must make our health care choices only within the current structure of a predatory, for-profit insurance system which makes money not providing health care. We cannot fault the insurance companies for being what they are. But we can fault legislation in which the government incentivizes the perpetuation, indeed the strengthening, of the for-profit health insurance industry, the very source of the problem. When health insurance companies deny care or raise premiums, co-pays and deductibles they are simply trying to make a profit. That is our system."

"Clearly, the insurance companies are the problem, not the solution. They are driving up the cost of health care. Because their massive bureaucracy avoids paying bills so effectively, they force hospitals and doctors to hire their own bureaucracy to fight the insurance companies to avoid getting stuck with an unfair share of the bills. The result is that since 1970, the number of physicians has increased by less than 200% while the number of administrators has increased by 3000%. It is no wonder that 31 cents of every health care dollar goes to administrative costs, not toward providing care. Even those with insurance are at risk. The single biggest cause of bankruptcies in the U.S. is health insurance policies that do not cover you when you get sick."

"But instead of working toward the elimination of for-profit insurance, H.R. 3962 would put the government in the role of accelerating the privatization of health care. In H.R. 3962, the government is requiring at least 21 million Americans to buy private health insurance from the very industry that causes costs to be so high, which will result in at least $70 billion in new annual revenue, much of which is coming from taxpayers. This inevitably will lead to even more costs, more subsidies, and higher profits for insurance companies - a bailout under a blue cross."

"By incurring only a new requirement to cover pre-existing conditions, a weakened public option, and a few other important but limited concessions, the health insurance companies are getting quite a deal. The Center for American Progress' blog, Think Progress, states, 'since the President signaled that he is backing away from the public option, health insurance stocks have been on the rise.' Similarly, healthcare stocks rallied when Senator Max Baucus introduced a bill without a public option. Bloomberg reports that Curtis Lane, a prominent health industry investor, predicted a few weeks ago that 'money will start flowing in again' to health insurance stocks after passage of the legislation. Investors.com last month reported that pharmacy benefit managers share prices are hitting all-time highs, with the only industry worry that the Administration would reverse its decision not to negotiate Medicare Part D drug prices, leaving in place a Bush Administration policy."

"During the debate, when the interests of insurance companies would have been effectively challenged, that challenge was turned back. The 'robust public option' which would have offered a modicum of competition to a monopolistic industry was whittled down from an initial potential enrollment of 129 million Americans to 6 million. An amendment which would have protected the rights of states to pursue single-payer health care was stripped from the bill at the request of the Administration. Looking ahead, we cringe at the prospect of even greater favors for insurance companies."

"Recent rises in unemployment indicate a widening separation between the finance economy and the real economy. The finance economy considers the health of Wall Street, rising corporate profits, and banks' hoarding of cash, much of it from taxpayers, as sign of an economic recovery. However in the real economy - in which most Americans live - the recession is not over. Rising unemployment, business failures, bankruptcies and foreclosures are still hammering Main Street."

"This health care bill continues the redistribution of wealth to Wall Street at the expense of America's manufacturing and service economies which suffer from costs other countries do not have to bear, especially the cost of health care. America continues to stand out among all industrialized nations for its privatized health care system. As a result, we are less competitive in steel, automotive, aerospace and shipping while other countries subsidize their exports in these areas through socializing the cost of health care."

"Notwithstanding the fate of H.R. 3962, America will someday come to recognize the broad social and economic benefits of a not-for-profit, single-payer health care system, which is good for the American people and good for America's businesses, with of course the notable exceptions being insurance and pharmaceuticals."

Please know the struggle for real health care reform will continue. Contribute, we can make a difference.

Thank you.

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Global Tax On Financial Transactions Backed By UK, Sweden, Possibly Europe and Japan

President Obama knows he needs to do something about the unfair bargain between Wall Street and the US taxpayer.

the taxpayer should no longer foot the bill for banking crises and also suffer their fallout
Global financial markets must be brought into closer alignment with the values held by the mainstream majority

a tax on financial transactions, a contemporary version of the famous Tobin tax.
to be globally implemented and not to distort the operation of the financial markets.
a financial transactions tax is that everyone does
is the economic and moral relationship between Big Finance and taxpayers symmetrical and fair? The answer is obvious.

given US proposals for central exchanges for many forms of financial trading, a transactions tax would be simple and easy to administer.
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Gordon Brown backs radical plan to transform global banking system

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/nov/08/gordon-brown-tobin-tax-plan

A long-time supporter of a financial transactions tax says the prime minister has finally realised that the taxpayer should no longer foot the bill for banking crises and also suffer their fallout

Campaigners for a global tax on financial transactions to reduce the size and volatility of Big Finance, and to encourage development in the world's poorer countries, are today blinking in disbelief. Over the years, they have been mocked for their impracticality, ridiculed for their intellectual inadequacy and attacked because they would damage the financial markets. And now they have woken up this morning to find that the radical proposal that could transform the global financial world is on the table – put there by Gordon Brown. His speech to the G20 finance ministers in St Andrews yesterday was a refreshing surprise, and potentially game-changing – though his bolder suggestions faced immediate flak.

His declaration that "it cannot be acceptable that the benefits of success in this sector are reaped by the few but the costs of its failure are borne by all of us" is what everyone outside the City of London and the British Bankers' Association now thinks.

It is a far cry from Brown's speeches only 18 months ago, extolling the virtues of innovative finance – but a credit crunch and the near-collapse of the British banking system have evidently concentrated the mind. He now sings from a completely different hymn sheet.

"Global financial markets must be brought into closer alignment with the values held by the mainstream majority," he continued. "Hard work, responsibility, integrity and fairness."

And then to the heart of his speech. "There must be a better economic and social contract between financial institutions and the public, based on trust and a just distribution of risks and rewards."

Amen to that. In plain English, Brown is saying that global banking cannot go back to business as usual, backed by global government guarantees that they will be rescued in the event of a crisis, and leaving taxpayers to pick up the bill. It is only fair that bankers must contribute in some way to reducing risk and building up a bailout fund.

There could be an insurance fee to reflect risk, he said. Or banks should pay into a resolution fund which would be used in case an institution does collapse. Or – most radical and surprising of all – there could be a tax on financial transactions, a contemporary version of the famous Tobin tax.

Part of the proceeds, presumably, could be diverted to a fund run by, say, the IMF to support bank bailouts in future. Part of the funds could be diverted to assist growth in developing countries. And part could be used by national governments to reduce their deficits. The IMF is to conduct a study on what could be done – respecting the need for any proposal to be globally implemented and not to distort the operation of the financial markets.

Brown is, of course, completely right – but it was only this August that the Treasury cordially rubbished Lord Turner, chair of the Financial Services Authority, for floating the very same idea. Taxation, he was frostily informed, was the preserve of the Treasury. Sources let it be known that the idea of a financial transactions tax was cuckoo – impractical and an improper assault on one of Britain's prime industries, the City of London. Turner should stick to regulating, they said.

After all, only months earlier the chancellor had co-chaired an inquiry with Win Bischoff, now chair of Lloyds, saying how important it would be to constrain any new regulations in response to the crisis that might damage the City's international competitiveness and how vital it was not to raise taxation.

This was one of the commonest criticisms of Turner in the summer; Boris Johnson, mayor of London, said that the regulator was "crackers" to talk of taxing the City, and instead should be promoting its competitiveness. But, as Turner and others have repeatedly stressed, the only condition for introducing a financial transactions tax is that everyone does it, so there would be no loss of competitiveness. This again was stressed by Brown; Britain would move only if the rest of the world moved too.

The competitiveness argument is the refuge of the refusenik. The big question is as Brown posed: is the economic and moral relationship between Big Finance and taxpayers symmetrical and fair? The answer is obvious.

The other attacks on proponents of the Tobin tax – and I have long been a supporter – is that it is impractical and will damage the financial system's liquidity. In fact, given US proposals for central exchanges for many forms of financial trading, a transactions tax would be simple and easy to administer.

The last objection is that it will reduce the volume of the financial system's transactions, and therefore make it inefficient.

This is the last redoubt of Big Finance, and again it is wrong. For a start, the volume of transactions is now more than 10 times world GDP, having increased more than tenfold in three decades.

The size of the financial system has exploded, populated by super-banks who can borrow trillions – and who, if they get hit by a loss of confidence, can bring the whole system down. It is efficient for individual bankers, who have the chance to make fortunes – but inefficient for the rest of us.

Many of the financial instruments allegedly used to avoid risk are merely forms of gambling. When it all goes wrong, the taxpayer picks up the bill, the bankers walk off with the bonuses, while ordinary people lose their jobs.

Turner took a lot of flak when he dared to say that a lot of banking was socially useless and the sector had got dangerously large. His intellectual bravery has proved a trigger moment. Now Brown is being similarly brave, and similarly radical. And, as with Turner, some of the first reactions to his plan have been very negative. But some Europeans will almost certainly support him, and probably the Japanese.

The swing country is the US. The response yesterday from the US treasury secretary and other key players at the G20 summit was not encouraging. But President Obama knows he needs to do something about the unfair bargain between Wall Street and the US taxpayer.

Could the world be about to adopt a Tobin tax – or its first cousin, a global financial insurance fee? It can't be ruled out. I never thought to live to see the day. I am blinking in disbelief, too.



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Friday, November 6, 2009

Too Big to Fail - Too Big to Exist


Issue November 06, 2009 - http://sanders.senate.gov

Too Big to Fail - Too Big to Exist

More than a year has gone by since Congress passed the $700 billion bailout of Wall Street. The Federal Reserve has committed trillions of additional dollars in virtually zero-interest loans and other assistance to large financial institutions resulting in the largest taxpayer bailout in the history of the world. Today, most of the huge financial institutions still standing have become even bigger -- so big that the four largest banks in America (JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and Citigroup) now issue one out of every two mortgages; two out of three credit cards; and hold $4 out of every $10 in bank deposits in the entire country. 

If any of these financial institutions were to get into major trouble again, taxpayers would be on the hook for another massive bailout. We cannot let that happen. That is why I introduced legislation that would give the secretary of the Treasury 90 days to identify every single financial institution and insurance company in this country that is too big to fail and to break them up within one year.

If it’s too big to fail, it’s too big to exist!



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One Day - I want my music, to have meaning, to touch people, to inspire



Nov 06, 2009

   
One Day
Musician Matisyahu is the personification of harmony. He is a Hasidic Jewish musician from New York City known for blending traditional Jewish themes with reggae, rock, and hip-hop sounds. He pushes musical boundaries by incorporating a variety of genres to create unique sounds with deep messages that aim to unite and uplift. Matisyahu once said, "All of my songs are influenced and inspired by the teachings that inspire me. I want my music to have meaning, to be able to touch people and make them think. Chasidism teaches that music is 'the quill of the soul.' Music taps into a very deep place and speaks to us in a way that regular words can't." Listen to one of his latest songs 'One Day', which he created as an anthem for hope and a source of inspiration for people struggling to open their hearts and stay positive.

Watch This Video


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Friday, October 30, 2009

Did You Know? The Speed Of Information Technology - China To Be Largest English Speaking Country ...

Oct 30, 2009

   
Did You Know?
In this fascinating video about the progression of information technology, we find the research of Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod and Jeff Bronman remixed with some upbeat music -- all of which makes you go hmmmm. Top 10 in-demands job of 2010 did not exist in 2004. In the US alone, 1 out of 8 couples married last year met online. Bermuda is the #1 ranked country in Broadband Internet pentration; US is ranked 19th and Japan is 22nd. Today we Google 31 billion times every month; in 2006, that was 2.7 billion for the whole year. First commercial text message was sent in December of 1992; today, the number of text message sent and received everyday exceeds the total population of the planet. Did you know?

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Thursday, October 29, 2009

Car-Free Cities: An Idea with Legs

Car-Free Cities: An Idea with Legs

Car-free neighbourhoods are no unrealistic utopia – they exist all over Europe

by Steve Melia

A quarter of households in Britain – more in the larger cities, and a majority in some inner cities – live without a car. Imagine how quality of life would improve for cyclists and everyone else if traffic were removed from areas where people could practically choose to live without cars. Does this sound unrealistic, utopian? Did you know many European cities are already doing it?

['Not anti-car, just pro-choice' ... a cyclist in Vauban, Germany. (Photograph: Sipa Press/Rex Features)]'Not anti-car, just pro-choice' ... a cyclist in Vauban, Germany. (Photograph: Sipa Press/Rex Features)
Vauban in Germany is one of the largest car-free neighbourhoods in Europe, home to more than 5,000 people. If you live in the district, you are required to confirm once a year that you do not own a car – or, if you do own one, you must buy a space in a multi-storey car park on the edge of the district. One space was initially provided for every two households, but car ownership has fallen over time, and many of these spaces are now empty.

Vehicles are allowed down the residential streets at walking pace to pick up and deliver, but not to park. In practice, vehicles are rarely seen moving here. It has been taken over by kids as young as four or five, playing, skating and unicycling without direct supervision. The adults, too, tend to socialise outdoors far more than they would on conventional streets open to traffic (behaviour that's echoed in the UK, too).

Most of the European car-free areas are smaller and "purer" than Vauban: vehicles are physically prevented from entering the streets where people live. Exceptions are made for emergency vehicles and removals vans but not for normal deliveries, which are made on foot, trolley or cycle trailer. A few peripheral parking spaces are available to buy (usually around one space for every five homes) and a few are reserved for car club vehicles. In all the examples I have studied, cycling is a vital means of transport.

Car-free areas of this kind, with anything from a couple of hundred to more than a thousand residents, exist in Amsterdam, Vienna, Cologne, Hamburg and Nuremberg, among others. There is even a small one in Edinburgh.

There is another form of car-free development, so familiar we have until recently overlooked its potential. Most pedestrianised city or neighbourhood centres in Britain are almost entirely commercial. But a few farsighted councils, such as Exeter, have brought back housing and residents, without cars or allocated parking, into city centres that would otherwise be deserted after 6pm.

Groningen, the Netherlands' capital of cycling, has the largest car-free centre in Europe: half-pedestrianised, entirely closed to through traffic, with 16,500 residents, three-quarters of whom have no car in the household. Forty percent of all journeys within the city are made by bicycle.

Carfree UK, which I coordinate, was set up to promote European-style car-free development in this country. We are not anti-car, we are pro-choice. We have recently run public meetings in London to set up a new car-free association for London, which is beginning to look at areas of the city from which traffic could be removed. We know considerable potential demand exists for traffic-free housing in London, and probably in a number of other major cities. Where else do you think might be suitable?

• Steve Melia is coordinator of Carfree UK and a researcher at the University of the West of England



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Giving Candy to Kids may Lead to Violent Crimes

The Bitter Side of a Sweet Treat: Giving Candy to Kids may Lead to Violent Crimes

Thursday, October 29, 2009 by: Elizabeth Walling, citizen journalist
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Key concepts: Candy, Sugar and Health
View on NaturalPedia: Candy, Sugar and Health

(NaturalNews) Most parents are aware that too much refined sugar isn't good for their kids. Now a new study indicates that children who are given sweets on a daily basis are more likely to end up as violent adults. The Welsh study, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, examined data on more than 17,000 children born in April of 1970. The data was derived from the British Cohort Study, which provided detailed information about the participants at points throughout their childhood and adulthood.

When questioned at age 34, there were 35 participants who reported being convicted of a violent crime. Out of these, 69 percent reported eating candy daily as a child, while 42 participants without a history of violence reported consuming daily sweets as children. These statistics occur after accounting for factors such as gender, education, family income and parenting styles.

Researchers, however, are not entirely sure how to interpret the results of this preliminary study. Study author Simon Moore, a senior lecturer in the Violence and Society Research Group at Cardiff University in Wales, says sugar is not entirely to blame. Children who receive sugary treats every day may not learn to delay gratification and could develop poor impulse control. These traits are linked to delinquency later in life.

"We think that it is more to do with the way that sweets are given to children rather than the sweets themselves. Using sweets to quiet noisy children might just reinforce problems for later in life," adds Moore.

Experts like Melinda Johnson, a spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association, agree that the study doesn't prove sugar is the true cause behind violence in adulthood. She says the children in the study may have experienced violence at home, and suggests the possibility that children who receive candy on a daily basis may suffer from poor overall nutrition.

In fact, Simon Moore discovered the link between childhood nutrition and adult behavior before he participated in this study. "Kids with the worst problems tend to be impulsive risk takers, and these kids had terrible diets - breakfast was a Coke and a bag of chips."

We know that sugar weakens the immune system in children and also prevents some nutrients from being properly utilized, which means limiting refined sugar is a definite part of providing children with a nutritious diet. But in response to the results of this study, Moore is quoted saying, "It's not fair to blame it on the candy."

Not fair to whom? Since its doubtful candy itself will suffer hurt feelings, perhaps this means it would be unfair to the commercialized food industry if suddenly parents stopped buying sodas, fruit drinks, sugary cereals, cookies and candy to pacify their children in an effort to prevent violent behavior. The effect would likely be profound, as you could imagine.

Would it solve all violence issues? Of course not. We know that sugar is not to blame for all of our problems, but

if the use of refined sugar was greatly reduced in our society we would notice two things:
first, a broad improvement in behavior and health in both children and adults.

And secondly, commercial food companies would notice their fat wallets slimming down considerably. Neither the food or pharmaceutical industries are quite ready for an outcome such as this, so the real effects of refined sugar on children continues to be played down by experts of the industry.

Admittedly, the study in question is far from extensive and can't be considered a clear conviction against sugar. What we can infer from this study is that when parents take a more conscientious approach toward their children when it comes to food, it can have a positive effect on the lives and future of their children.

Nutrition is not the only important aspect of raising children, but good nutrition is a solid foundation which parents can build upon to help their children grow into productive, mindful adults.

For More Information:

http://www.time.com/time/health/art...

http://health.usnews.com/articles/h...

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap...


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Monday, October 26, 2009

GREEN ENERGIES 100% RENEWABLES BY 2050

GREEN ENERGIES 100% RENEWABLES BY 2050 RECOMMENDATIONS  1. An explicit national target should be set for 100 per cent green, renewable energy sources by 2050  2. Nuclear power, carbon capture and storage, and large scale biofuel or biochar plantations should be excluded   3. There should be no carbon trading to offset greenhouse gas emissions in developing countries  4. The developed nations must take responsibility for reducing their own emissions at home, while providing genuine financial and technological assistance to developing nations that have to cope with the worst effects of climate change  5. Public investment should be targeted at education, research and development of the appropriate green energy technologies present and future, including those mentioned in this report  6. Grants and subsidies should be targeted to encourage decentralised distributed small scale to micro-generation of green renewable energies, and to promote green initiatives from local communities  7. Feed-in tariffs should be introduced for all new renewable energies  8. Existing nuclear power stations should be decommissioned at the end of their designated life times. Uranium mining should cease and clean-up should begin. At the same time, weapons grade uranium should be consumed in existing reactors in accordance with nuclear disarmament  9. Major public investment should be directed towards making safe toxic and radioactive nuclear wastes by low energy nuclear transmutation   The Institute of Science in Society Science Society Sustainability http://www.i-sis.org.uk  This article can be found on the I-SIS website at http://www.i-sis.org.uk/  ======================================================== ISIS Press Release 26/10/09  ISIS/TWN Report Green Energies, 100% Renewables by 2050 By Mae-Wan Ho, Brett Cherry, Sam Burcher & Peter Saunders  “This is a road map for survival…it could be the ‘get out of jail’ card that Britain and many other countries will need to play in avoiding the drift into climate chaos.” Alan Simpson MP, Special Advisor to UK Secretary of State for Energy and Climate on Renewable Energy and Feed-in- Tariffs  “Inspiring and realistic…just what world governments need to renew their commitment to the UN Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen this December” Chee Yokeling, Director, Third World Network  Stunning artworks (see the PDF preview) http://www.i-sis.org.uk/GreenEnergiesPreview.pdf  Pre-order at discount here http://www.i-sis.org.uk/onlinestore/books.php#282  Launch Conferernce 25 November 2009  Alan Simpson MP, Michael Meacher MP, Lord David Steel & others  Further details of the report and launch conference at http://www.i-sis.org.uk/  ======================================================== This article can be found on the I-SIS website at http://www.i-sis.org.uk/  All new articles are also announced on our RSS feed http://www.i-sis.org.uk/feed.xml  If you like this original article from the Institute of Science in Society, and would like to continue receiving articles of this calibre, please consider making a donation or purchase on our website  http://www.i-sis.org.uk/ISISappeal.php  ISIS is an independent, not-for-profit organisation dedicated to providing critical public information on cutting edge science, and to promoting social accountability and ecological sustainability in science.  If you would like to be removed from our mailing list unsubscribe at http://www.i-sis.org.uk/unsubscribe 


GREEN ENERGIES 100% RENEWABLES BY 2050
Institute of Science in Society Third World Network
1
FOREWORD BY ALAN SIMPSON
Alan Simpson MP, Special Advisor to the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change Ed Miliband, on Renewable Energy and Feed-in-Tariffs
Let no one be in any doubt about the importance of this report. Take it seriously and this could be the ‘get out of jail’ card that Britain, and many other countries, will need to play in avoiding the drift into climate chaos.
The time for transformation is astonishingly short. There is no point in having 2050 targets without a programme that races into this transformation now. Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the International Panel on Climate Change, gives us three years in which to make dramatic switches in the whole way in which we think about energy systems.
Global leaders gathering in Copenhagen will haggle about a 2050 plan that can keep atmospheric carbon dioxide levels within a maximum of 450ppm. They hope it is not a bridge too far for the world’s politicians. The difference between the politics and the science is that the real survival threshold is around 350ppm. We are already beyond this level. Tomorrow’s agenda is not about the slowing down of carbon emissions, it is about how we row back form where we are now.
Many of the renewable energy choices set out in this report are already with us. Some require little more than a hop, skip and a jump to reach them. The trouble is that this leap has to be in a different direction from where we are currently heading. It involves some fundamental breaks from ‘big energy’, big pollution and the waste making society. Treading more lightly on the planet involves a shift into holistic economics which puts back as much - if not more - than we take out.
The report is a road map for survival. It sets out the science, the technology and the choices for a different future. All it requires is the political will... and that’s where we’re stuck. It invites changes that are as much about power as energy. Most of the choices touched on in the report work best where there is local and public ownership to ensure that the energy system supports sustainable communities rather than global shareholders.
It is not just about empowering the scientists to spell out what can be done. It is about empowering the public to become the drivers of change we can all live with. If we have the sense to act on this report may be we will.
4
FOREWORD BY CHEE YOKE LING
Chee Yoke Ling Director Third World Network
This report is an explosion of hope in a world caught in the morass of false and exorbitant solutions to the energy and climate crisis promoted by corporate interests.
The latest science alerts us that 350 ppm atmospheric CO2 is the maximum limit that we must target in order to avoid “irreversible catastrophic effects”. Developing countries with 80 percent of the world population - the vast majority struggling to rise above poverty - are already hard hit by more frequent and intense climate disasters, and any false solution foisted upon them will certainly stress them beyond the breaking point.
Fortunately, tremendous human capacity and technologies for real solutions to the crisis already exist, with more innovation emerging and further possibilities on the horizon, as Green Energies so clearly documents.
The challenge before us is to rapidly adopt renewable energies solutions across communities and nations. Green Energies is extremely timely as governments gather in Copenhagen in December 2009 to renew their commitment to fully and effectively implement the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) forged in 1992. It is our only legally binding global treaty on climate change, and nations small and large stated in the Preamble that they are “Determined to protect the climate system for present and future generations.”
Equity is a pillar of the necessary transformation towards climate stabilization and sustainable development is enshrined in the UNFCCC. It was agreed that “the largest share of historical and current global emissions of greenhouse gases has originated in developed countries, that per capita emissions in developing countries are still relatively low and that the share of global emissions originating in developing countries will grow to meet their social and development needs.”
Thus it was acknowledged that “the global nature of climate change calls for the widest possible cooperation by all countries and their participation in an effective and appropriate international response, in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities”.
Green Energies clearly states: “For the human species, it is the capacity to use natural resources responsibly and equitably, to meet the needs of all in the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
It challenges governments to take a bold step in setting a national target for 100 percent green, renewable energy sources by 2050 that the report shows is possible with the right policies and global cooperation in place. The report is inspiring and realistic. We can do it, and cannot not do it. Climate and our survival are non-negotiable.
5
PREFACE
350 PPM THE NEW TARGET
Global warming is happening much faster than the IPPC (Intergovernment Panel on Climate Change) predicted in its latest 2007 report. For one thing, Its climate models failed to account for the rapid summer melting of the polar ice caps that’s been making headlines several years in a row.
The IPCC helped set the 450 ppm maximum of atmospheric CO2 that is supposed to limit the global temperature rise to below 2  ̊C, and prevent “dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.”
But top climate scientists Jim Hansen and colleagues, using more realistic climate models and key data from the remote history of the earth, showed that 450 ppm is beyond the danger zone, and we must even reduce atmospheric CO2 down from its 385 ppm to 350 ppm, or else face “irreversible catastrophic effects” [1]. The head of IPCC Rajendra Pachauri now agrees [2].
The good news is that we can still do it. It is not too late. All it takes is to stop burning fossil fuels to bring atmospheric CO2 back down to 350 ppm within the next decades. But we must act now, because 385 ppm is already within the danger zone, and we cannot afford to let it remain there for too long, or we push the planet past the point of no return.
That is why we need to commit ourselves to truly green energies as a matter of urgency
WHAT’S TRULY GREEN?
‘Green’ is environmentally friendly, healthy, safe, non- polluting, renewable, and sustainable.
Renewable energy, as defined by British Petroleum (BP) [3], is derived from natural processes that do not involve the consumption of exhaustible resources such as fossil fuels and uranium. But it could include industrial scale biomass, biofuels, or hydroelectric from large dams, none of which is sustainable.
‘Sustainable’ is the key to being truly green. But the word ‘sustainable’ has been hi-jacked so often to mean just the opposite that it needs to be redefined.
To be sustainable is to endure like a natural biodiverse ecosystem for hundreds if not thousands of years, thanks to a circular economy of cooperation and reciprocity that regenerates and renews the whole [3]. For the human species, it is the capacity to use natural resources responsibly and equitably, to meet the needs of all in the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. We have updated the usual Bruntland definition of sustainability [4] to incorporate the overriding lesson from nature that cooperation and reciprocity between the biodiverse inhabitants of the ecosystem are necessary for the survival of the whole; and this applies all the more so to ecosystem Earth.
Unfortunately, our policy-makers are by and large still engaged in confrontational politics, being misled by the Darwinian myth of competition and the survival of the fittest that will surely take us beyond the point of no return. History has taught us why civilisations collapse in the past when faced with ecological crises [5], simply through the failure to take the political decisions necessary for survival. Are we going to repeat history in the present global ecological crisis that has the survival of the entire human species at stake? Or will our political
leaders in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change learn to cooperate and adopt the most appropriate green energy policies for us to meet the 350 ppm target.
As Germany has demonstrated so well within the past decade, the appropriate policies can trigger a dramatic growth in new renewable energies, with industry offering a variety of distributed, decentralized options that also give people autonomy and independence from big centralised power stations. The global shift to renewable energies is happening, and many politicians and energy experts see no difficulty in achieving a 100 percent of our energy from renewable sources by 2050, which is what Germany intends to achieve [6], as the world’s first major renewable economy.
Green Energies is a follow up on Which Energy?, the first in the series of ISIS’ Sustainable World Initiative reports, and an elaboration of the theme of local food and energy systems presented in Food Futures Now, Organic, Sustainable, Fossil Fuel Free, the second report in the series.
Green Energies provides the public and policy-makers with the evidence for making the right decisions that will enable us to meet the 350 ppm target and 100 percent renewable energies by 2050. Time is running out, as are remaining resources. That’s why it is important at the outset to recognize and reject options that are not renewable or sustainable and dangerous, notably nuclear, carbon capture and storage, and biochar. Our capacity for truly sustainable and renewable energies is growing every day. It is neither necessary nor acceptable to export the burden of cutting carbon emissions to poor developing countries via carbon trading schemes. The developed nations must take responsibility for reducing their own emissions at home, while providing genuine financial and technological assistance to poor nations that have to cope with the worst effects of climate change.
Renewable energy is inexhaustible energy. Wind energy alone can supply 40 times the world’s electricity use or its total energy consumption five times over. An enormous potential also exists for solar energy, and electricity from locally installed solar panels is already as cheap as electricity from the grid. People everywhere are innovating and switching to renewables to save on fuel bills and saving communities as they are saving the planet. In 2008, for the first time, more renewable energies capacity has been added than conventional energies and the trend continues. Local small scale and micro-generation are booming in the developed countries wherever feed-in tariffs have been introduced, giving people independence and autonomy, plus the flexibilities for upgrading as technologies improve.
At the same time, appropriate science at the frontiers has opened up new possibilities for recycling waste heat as electricity, harvesting and storing sunlight by artificial photosynthesis, and solving our nuclear waste problem by low temperature transmutation after we give up nuclear energy for good. These are exciting times. All we need to save the planet is for our leaders follow the way of nature and the will and wisdom of the people.
Mae-Wan Ho and Peter Saunders October 2009


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Guess Who Is Small Enough To Fail - Most Everyone Except A Hand Full Of Fail Safe Giant Banks

Market Musings & Data Deciphering
Breakfast with Dave
http://links.ems.gluskinsheff.net/a/v.x?Token=pkfaephbbggnaohabmmefjgdpekcngccjkcecfdibophiljmfhccclhofoofpomm

...

• The financials sagged 1.6% on Friday and have done squat now for 5½ weeks.

• Just as the economists are taking their housing numbers higher, in classic “sell the fact” mode, the S&P Homebuilding index just closed down 18% from the mid-September high. That almost classifies, dare we say, as a … bear market!

• Oh yes — this is surely a sign that the credit crunch is behind us. Regulators closed seven more regional banks last Friday, bringing the tally for the year to 106. There have been more bank failures this year than in the past 15 years combined,

and the only reason why the big boys never followed suit was
because the government guaranteed all their debt
and then
allowed them to hide their losses by switching to mark-to-model accounting from mark-to-market.


Believe us when we tell you that even the most renowned experts could not tell you what is really sitting on the balance sheets of these large U.S. banks
— but there is limited downside risk because Uncle Sam has deemed them all to be ‘too big to fail’.

Those who were investors in American United Bank, well, we are sorry to have to tell you that
you were involved in an institution that was small enough to close down.


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Friday, October 23, 2009

Bood Review: The Invention Of The Jewish People - International Best Seller

"[t]he national project [creation of Israel] was ... a fully conscious one ... It was a simultaneous process of imagination, invention, and actual self-creation" (45).

the destruction by the Romans of the Second Temple in 70 AD
at that time there were already Jewish communities numbering up to four million persons in Persia, Egypt, Asia Minor and elsewhere (145). Palestine's status as the unique "ancestral homeland" of the Jews collapses together with the myth of David and Solomon's imposing kingdom.

conversion was calculated to save them from absorption into either the Roman or the Islamic empires.
engendered those Askhenazi Jews of central and eastern Europe who would later invent the myths of Zionism to justify their colonization of Palestine, a land to which they had no "ethnic" connection and where they remain the dominant elite.

the exile was a myth -- fomented, ... by the Christian church as an image of divine punishment ("The Wandering Jew")
the indigenous Jews ... converted to Islam and survive as today's disinherited Palestinians.

Today's Israel is not a democracy but a "liberal ethnocracy"
the ideal solution would be the creation of a democratic binational state.

To what extent is Jewish Israeli society willing to discard the ... image of the 'chosen people,' and to cease ... excluding the 'other' from its midst?"
+++


Book review: Shlomo Sand's "The Invention of the Jewish People"

Raymond Deane, The Electronic Intifada, 22 October 2009
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10848.shtml

In 1967 the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish published his poem "A Soldier Dreaming of White Lilies," only to be accused of "collaboration with the Zionist enemy" for his sympathetic depiction of an Israeli soldier's remorse of conscience. Forty years later that soldier has identified himself as the historian Shlomo Sand. He has translated his remorse into a book that has become a bestseller in Israel and France, where the award of the Prix Aujourd'hui has made the author something of a TV star.

Indeed, few recent books have aroused more interest and been more frequently reviewed in the US and Europe prior to the appearance of an English version. Translator Yael Lotan has chosen to follow the example of her French predecessors by telescoping the interrogative Hebrew title (When and How Was the Jewish People Invented?), which here becomes The Invention of the Jewish People, thus misleadingly and (deliberately?) provocatively implying that such inventiveness was unique to the Jews. However, Sand clarifies that worldwide in the 19th century "[t]he national project was ... a fully conscious one ... It was a simultaneous process of imagination, invention, and actual self-creation" (45).

Sand traces how Zionist ideology drove the project of Jewish nationalism by turning Judaism "into something hermetic, like the German Volk ..." (255). He argues that history and biology were enlisted "to bind together the frangible secular Jewish identity." Together, these engendered an "ethnonationalist historiography" which was typified by the mid-19th century German Jewish historian Heinricht Graetz and his friend Moses Hess, who "needed a good deal of racial theory to dream up the Jewish people" (256).

According to Sand, the destruction by the Romans of the Second Temple in 70 AD left the indigenous Jewish population of Judea and Samaria in place. "[T]he Romans never deported entire peoples. It did not pay to uproot the people of the land, the cultivators of produce, the taxpayers" (130). Furthermore, at that time there were already Jewish communities numbering up to four million persons in Persia, Egypt, Asia Minor and elsewhere (145). Palestine's status as the unique "ancestral homeland" of the Jews collapses together with the myth of David and Solomon's imposing kingdom.

Against the ethno-biological concept of a Jewish people -- a "race" -- whose linear descendants returned from exile to (re)found today's Israel, Sand posits a religious community proliferating throughout and beyond the Mediterranean region by means of proselytism and conversion. He offers a detailed rebuttal of the conventional wisdom whereby "Judaism was never a proselytizing religion," a view disseminated by historian Martin Goodman and others (150, note 42).

Most importantly, he concentrates attention on Khazaria, that "Strange Empire" that flourished in the Caspian region between the seventh and tenth centuries AD. By the eighth century the Khazars had adopted Hebrew as their sacred and written tongue, and "[a]t some stage between the mid-eighth and mid-ninth centuries, the[y] ... adopted Jewish monotheism" (221). Sand speculates that this conversion was calculated to save them from absorption into either the Roman or the Islamic empires. The Khazars, he contends, engendered those Askhenazi Jews of central and eastern Europe who would later invent the myths of Zionism to justify their colonization of Palestine, a land to which they had no "ethnic" connection and where they remain the dominant elite.

So if the exile was a myth -- fomented, Sand writes, by the Christian church as an image of divine punishment ("The Wandering Jew") -- what happened to the indigenous Jews? Sand's answer: they converted to Islam and survive as today's disinherited Palestinians. This seemingly radical thesis was once shared by, among others, David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first prime minister who in 1918 still believed that (in Sand's words) "the ancient Judean peasants converted to Islam ... for material reasons ... Indeed, by clinging to their soil they remained loyal to their homeland" (186).

Ultimately, the case against the Jewish state cannot be based on an unseemly tussle for genetic primacy, but on a discourse of fundamental political and human rights. Sand turns toward such a discussion in the final chapter, describing it as the raison d'etre of The Invention of the Jewish People, which he admits essentially contains nothing not already found in the work of other historians and archaeologists.

Today's Israel is not a democracy but a "liberal ethnocracy" (307) that assumes its "growing and strengthening" Arab minority "will always accept its exclusion from the political and cultural heart" (309). Ultimately we may see "an uprising in the Arab Galilee, followed by iron-fisted repression," which would constitute "a turning-point for the existence of Israel" in the region. Hence, Sand states that the ideal solution would be the creation of a democratic binational state.

Sadly, Sand hastily dismisses this "ideal project." In terms all too drearily reminiscent of Zionist apologetics he states that to "ask the Jewish Israeli people, after such a long and bloody conflict, and in view of the tragedy experienced by many of its immigrant founders in the twentieth century, to become overnight a minority in its own state may not be the smartest thing to do" (311-312). Instead, he falls back on a sequence of rhetorical questions: "[h]ow many Jews would be willing to forgo the privileges they enjoy in the Zionist state? ... will anyone dare to repeal the Law of Return ... ? To what extent is Jewish Israeli society willing to discard the ... image of the 'chosen people,' and to cease ... excluding the 'other' from its midst?"

What is behind this sorry post-Zionist anti-climax to a book that seemed to presage a heady anti-Zionist conclusion? In an interview Sand admitted that he "waited until [he] was a full professor" before publishing the book, adding that there "is a price to be paid in Israeli academia for expressing views of this sort." In providing the premises for radical conclusions without either drawing or excluding those conclusions, Sand has the best of both worlds with few if any consequences.

Ultimately, Shlomo Sand is a little like Moses, unable to cross the Jordan into the Promised Land. The journey so far, however, is instructive, and very stylishly accomplished; one hopes that the "soldier dreaming of white lilies" may eventually be emboldened to complete it.

Raymond Deane is a composer and political activist (www.raymonddeane.com).


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Thursday, October 22, 2009

Regenerative Grassroots Solution - Organic Food, Farming, & Ranching

a powerful and regenerative grassroots solution: organic food, farming, and ranching.

Millions of organic farmers, ranchers, conservationists, and backyard gardeners (supported by millions of organic consumers) are demonstrating that we can build a healthy alternative to industrial agriculture and Food Inc.

feed the world with healthy food, but also reverse global warming

transitioning from chemical, water, and energy-intensive industrial agriculture practices to organic farming and ranching on the world's 3.5 billion acres of farmland and 8.2 billion acres of pasture or rangeland

We need to drastically reduce meat overproduction

the burning question is how do we move organics in the U.S. from being the 4% alternative in the marketplace to being the norm

stop buying chemical, GMO, globally sourced and so-called "natural" food
switch to organic and more locally and regionally produced products

a political movement and change public policy
move to an ethical and scientifically grounded policy and practice that promotes health, conservation,
+++


The Organic Revolution: How We Can Stop Global Warming

by Ronnie Cummins

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/10/22-11

"Let us not talk falsely now, for the hour is getting late."

Bob Dylan, "All Along the Watchtower"

*  *   *

Beyond the gloom and doom of the climate crisis, there lies a powerful and regenerative grassroots solution: organic food, farming, and ranching. Even as politicians and the powerful fossil fuel lobby drag their heels and refuse to acknowledge that we have about ten years left of "business as usual" before we irreversibly destroy the climate and ourselves, there is a powerful, though largely unrecognized, life-force spreading its roots underground.

Millions of organic farmers, ranchers, conservationists, and backyard gardeners (supported by millions of organic consumers) are demonstrating that we can build a healthy alternative to industrial agriculture and Food Inc. Our growing organic movement is proving that we can not only feed the world with healthy food, but also reverse global warming, by capturing and sequestering billions of tons of climate-destabilizing greenhouse gases in the soil, through plant photosynthesis, composting, cover crops, rotational grazing, wetlands preservation, and reforestation.

The heretofore unpublicized "good news" on climate change, according to the Rodale Institute and other soil scientists, is that transitioning from chemical, water, and energy-intensive industrial agriculture practices to organic farming and ranching on the world's 3.5 billion acres of farmland and 8.2 billion acres of pasture or rangeland can sequester 7,000 pounds per acre of climate-destabilizing CO2 every year, while nurturing healthy soils, plants, grasses, and trees that are resistant to drought, heavy rain, pests, and disease. And of course organic farms and ranches can provide us with food that is much more nutritious than industrial farms and ranches-food filled with vitamins, anti-oxidants, and essential trace minerals, free from Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), pesticides, antibiotics, and sewage sludge.

In 2006, U.S. carbon dioxide pollution from fossil fuels (approximately 25% of the world's total) was estimated at nearly 6.5 billion tons. If a 7,000 lb/CO2/ac/year sequestration rate were achieved on all 434 million acres of cropland in the United States, nearly 1.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide would be sequestered per year, mitigating close to one quarter of the country's total fossil fuel emissions. If pastures and rangelands were similarly converted to organic practices, we would literally be well on our way to reversing global warming.

But we need an organic revolution in ranching and livestock production, as well as farming and forestry. We need to drastically reduce meat overproduction (77% of all U.S. agriculture resources are devoted to raising animals or animal feed), and over-consumption (a leading cause of obesity, heart disease and cancer) and ban methane-belching factory farms. As the Rodale Institute points out, organic livestock raising practices, including rotational grazing, manure management, methane capture for biogas production, and improved feeds and feed additives, can drastically reduce livestock-related emissions and, because of the massive acreage currently devoted to livestock production (nearly 2.5 times greater than croplands), can safely sequester approximately 60% of the total greenhouse gases that humans, animals, cars, and industry are pumping out every year.

This Organic Revolution, or "Great Sequestering," made possible by a global grassroots movement with the power to transform the marketplace and public policy, is perhaps the only short-term strategy or solution at hand that can buy us the precious time we need to radically reduce energy use and greenhouse pollution and build a green economy. Although politicians and the coal and utilities industry claim that sequestration of massive carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants is on the horizon, there is little or no scientific evidence to back this up. Sequestration of CO2 in the soils of organic farms and ranches, on the other hand, is a proven fact.

Before carbon sequestering forests and grasslands were ravaged by chemical-intensive industrial agriculture (and industrial forestry), soil organic matter generally composed 6-10% of the soil volume, three to six times the 1-3% levels typical of today's industrial agriculture soils. In other words, taxpayer subsidized, chemical-based industrial agriculture, factory farms, and unrestricted grazing (along with industrial forestry) have turned the earth's soil (which still contains three times as much carbon as the entire amount of CO2 in the atmosphere) from being a climate-stabilizing carbon sink into a massive and dangerous source of global warming. 

Given our escalating climate emergency, the burning question is how do we move organics in the U.S. from being the 4% alternative in the marketplace to being the norm, and organic acreage from being 1% of total cultivated land to the majority of farmland, pasture, and rangeland? The answer of course is that we must sound the alert, offer up our practical solutions and rapidly transform public consciousness and policy. But the Via Organica, the road to get there, will be long and arduous. The majority of Americans must not only stop buying chemical, GMO, globally sourced and so-called "natural" food, and switch to organic and more locally and regionally produced products, but we must also rise up as a political movement and change public policy. We must literally force the politicians and the corporations to put a halt to our "business as usual" destruction of the climate and public health, and instead move to an ethical and scientifically grounded policy and practice that promotes health, conservation, greenhouse gas reduction, and organic sequestration. Please join and support the Organic Consumers Association and the climate change movement http://www.350.org as we carry out this life or death campaign.

Ronnie Cummins is co-founder and director of the Organic Consumers Association.



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Bolivia's Massive Public Health Campaign - Washing Hands - Significantly Reduces Common Disease

Bolivia ... massive campaign by the country's public-health officials ... millions of other Bolivian schoolchildren have been washing their hands a lot more than usual — after recess, before meals and every time the animated dancing hands pop up in public-service announcements on TV.

increase in hand-washing ... reduce ... spread of other common diseases in Bolivia.

10% to 15% drop in the rate of incidence of acute diarrheal diseases

prevention and educational campaigns."

promoting hand-washing on billboards, at soccer games, in classrooms and on TV.

Diligent washing, especially at critical times (like after going to the bathroom and before meals, for example), helps reduce the rate of diarrheal disease by more than 40%.

led to a sharp reduction of pinkeye cases in Korea
+++



H1N1: Swine Flu's Collateral Health Benefits in Bolivia

If any good has come of the global H1N1 flu pandemic, it may have started with a child like Nayeli Quispe, 7, a second-grader from the impoverished hillsides of La Paz, Bolivia. Prompted by a massive campaign by the country's public-health officials to contain the spread of the new flu virus, Nayeli and millions of other Bolivian schoolchildren have been washing their hands a lot more than usual — after recess, before meals and every time the animated dancing hands pop up in public-service announcements on TV. "First you wet them really well, then you rub the soap all around and then you dry them with a clean towel," says Nayeli.

Public-health experts now say the increase in hand-washing across the country may have had some collateral benefits, not only in helping to reduce H1N1 infections, but also the spread of other common diseases in Bolivia. "We see a steady 10% to 15% drop in the rate of incidence of acute diarrheal diseases in all age groups, compared with last year's numbers at this time," says Dr. René Lenis, Bolivia's director of epidemiology, referring to data collected on the number of weekly cases of diarrheal disease reported in medical centers nationwide in 2008 and 2009. (See how not to get the H1N1 flu.)

Although the new statistics, and the apparent link between hand-washing practices and disease reduction, need further investigation, "this certainly raises our attention," says Lenis. Diarrheal diseases are the biggest killer of children under age 5 worldwide; in Bolivia, 30,000 children die each year from such illnesses. Swine flu, as H1N1 is still referred to there, has hit Bolivia hard as well, with more than 2,000 infections and 55 deaths in a country of 9 million, most having occurred during the southern hemisphere's winter (June through August). (Read "Child-Care Centers and Parents Brace for Flu Season.")

When the virus first appeared, say government officials, the country reacted the only way it could. "You can combat these outbreaks in two ways — medically and nonmedically," says Lenis. "Bolivia doesn't have the medical resources that other countries do, so we rely on prevention and educational campaigns."

Starting in April, sudsy cartoon hands were everywhere, promoting hand-washing on billboards, at soccer games, in classrooms and on TV. "[Nayeli] was taught at school, and then would remind us to do it at home," says Claudia Quispe, Nayeli's mom. It's not that she and her family didn't wash their hands before, explains Quispe, an indigenous Aymara shop owner, but they didn't do it as much or as thoroughly as they should have. Within her family, Quispe thinks the public-health campaign has been a success: "Normally both Nayeli and my 3-year-old son have constant stomachaches or diarrhea. But in the last few months, they just haven't had those issues," she says.

That's exactly how the program is supposed to work, says Therese Doley, a senior adviser for UNICEF's Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) project. "Kids are the key because they are great at carrying messages," Doley tells TIME. For years, WASH has been trying to educate people, particularly in developing countries, about the benefits of a simple action like washing hands with soap. Diligent washing, especially at critical times (like after going to the bathroom and before meals, for example), helps reduce the rate of diarrheal disease by more than 40%.

Often, though, the problem is not just about good habits or bad ones but about access to clean water or the ability to afford soap. In Bolivia, 25% of the country still doesn't have access to water in the home. Health officials recognize that every citizen must have a sink to wash their hands in before they can expect significant reduction in disease. But when more than half the population is already living with some sort of bacterial or parasitic stomach infection, it's crucial to encourage those who can wash their hands to do so.

Lenis and Doley are still wary of the short-term data on Bolivia's descending rates of diarrheal disease; it remains to be seen whether the trend will hold up. But the findings "make a lot of sense, because behavior change like increased hand-washing happens quicker when there is a perceived threat," says Doley. She says she has not seen similar data regarding a drop in rates of diarrheal or other diseases on an H1N1 timeline from other countries (though at least one news report suggests that increased hand-washing due to H1N1 has led to a sharp reduction of pinkeye cases in Korea). They may trickle in, however, if other countries are also looking for these correlations, says Doley.

Bolivia's challenge now is to maintain the good numbers. The last time Bolivia witnessed a plummet in diarrheal-disease rates was during the cholera outbreak of 1992 and 1993, when better personal-hygiene habits led to a reduction in the spread of infection. But as the threat of the disease died down, so too did people's standards of cleanliness. Lenis says that the Bolivian government is committed to continuing its media campaigns and that ongoing potable-water and sewage-system expansion projects will help make Bolivians healthier. Most important, however, is keeping up the education, says Lenis. "Adults forget or think [hand-washing is] not necessary anymore, but kids get into it as an activity," he says, adding that he's lobbying to make hand-washing education part of the basic public-school curriculum. It may thus be up to little Nayeli and all her friends to keep their country on track.



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The Pharmaceutical Industrial Complex: A Deadly Fairy Tale

Some excerpts:
Merck’s ... Gardasil vaccine for HPV, now being widely administered to pre-teens, was found to be linked
to
... Lou Gehrig’s disease;
$1.4 
billion fine ... deceptive correspondence ... Eli Lilly gaming the system again
AstraZeneca was
fined $160 million for scamming the Medicaid system in Kentucky after being fined $215 million for ripping off
Alabama
;
Glaxo
l... failing to warn doctors and pregnant women of the dangers of its antidepressant drug Paxil related to birth defects;
Pfizer scored a record- breaking fine of $2.3 billion for illegally marketing several drugs over the years


Merck is steeped in a well-documented record of criminality.

The pharmaceutical complex has also infiltrated the majority of American medical
schools and medical research departments.

Mylan Labs settled a case for $100 million.Mylan conspired with the main manufacturer of the
active, indispensible ingredient to have an exclusive agreement
.
The FDA’s under-regulation and erroneous oversight encourages this type of corruption. 

demand legal accountability
+++

The Pharmaceutical Industrial Complex: A Deadly Fairy Tale 
 
Doug Henderson and Gary Null
Progressive Radio Network, October 20, 2009
PDF Version

It has been a particularly bad month for the pharmaceutical industrial complex in its
ongoing litigations in American courts. Among the main pharmaceutical headlines, Merck’s
Gardasil vaccine for HPV
, now being widely administered to pre-teens, was found to be linked
to
amyltrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease; following a $1.4
billion fine in promoting one of its blockbuster drugs Zyprexa off-label, deceptive
correspondence
was uncovered by Eli Lilly gaming the system again by promoting another one
of its drugs, Cymbalta, off-label for fibromyalgia; AstraZeneca was fined $160 million for
scamming the Medicaid system
in Kentucky after being fined $215 million for ripping off
Alabama
; Glaxo lost a Pennsylvania trial for failing to warn doctors and pregnant women of the
dangers of its antidepressant drug Paxil related to birth defects
; and Pfizer scored a record-
breaking fine of $2.3 billion for illegally marketing several drugs over the years
: Bextra, Zyvox,
Geodon and Lyrica. These kinds of charges, among the many others, have become a habit for
drug makers for the past dozen years.

When we speak of the pharmaceutical industry complex, it does not refer solely to private
drug manufacturers. The complex, like a Matrix that holds captive the health of the nation in
medical slavery by its own design and manipulation, is a consortium, a spiders’ web woven with
financial attachments throughout the medical profession. In addition to the pharmaceutical and
medical device firms, this complex includes every government health agency—the Food and
Drug Administration (FDA), the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the National Institutes of
Health (NIH), and or course the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)—as well as
drug lobbying firms now employing a large number of former Congresspersons, insurance and
HMO companies, all of the leading professional medical associations such as the American
Medical Association (AMA) and the American Psychiatric Association (APA), the majority of
medical schools and their research departments who are heavily funded by drug money, many of

 
the most prestigious medical journals, and ultimately all of this filtering downward to the
physicians who diagnose our illnesses and prescribe our medications and treatments. 

America is rightly regarded as having led much of the world in many qualitative
innovations in all fields. That reputation is duly deserved. However, there is a new dynamic at
work that is causing this reputation to be challenged. We are a nation that prides itself in our
humanity, our sense of fairness, but today there is a growing concern that we are now being
monikered as a country held hostage to a national security complex, which includes the largest
military complex in the world, an obscenely expensive healthcare system and self-serving
bureaucracies and private industries that serve their own financial ends. So it is not surprising
that after spending this year $2.6 trillion on healthcare, we have such little health to show for it.
There are second world countries where people live longer and healthier lives. And we have the
worst healthcare among developed nations. So what have we received for our $2.6 trillion.

As the current healthcare debate continues to rage over in sundries—the $200 billion net
profit health insurance industry—the entire deliberation over disease prevention and treatment
has been overshadowed. And amidst this partisan and ideological anarchy, perpetuated by our
elected officials, the media, and fueled by the pharmaceutical complex, two other areas America
excels as a leader above all other developed nations is in being the premier breeding ground for
the pharmaceutical industrial complex’s greatest profits and, second, as the world’s exemplar in
medical fraud and corruption. The fairy tale of America’s health as being best served by drugs is
a creation of this complex, a lullaby that brings ill citizens repeatedly to their doctors and
hospitals for diagnosis and treatment, or simply to deny healthcare altogether to the uninsured.
The country is pacified by a blind belief that the drugs being prescribed to them have been
proven safe because our government health agencies have our physical health and well-being in
their best intentions.  This is a lie, an extraordinarily deadly lie. Iatrogenesis, medically induced
injury and death, is the number one cause of death in American medicine annually, since only a
small percentage of these deaths are actually reported. Each year more Americans die from
preventable deaths due to our medical system than all military causalities in the two world wars
combined. This is tantamount to medical genocide. One of the major causes of these deaths is the
overmedication of Americans in all ages. The constant need for profits has created an
environment that allows the pharmaceutical industrial complex to use their enormous financial

 
and political clout to literally make normal life experiences into new diseases, such as social
anxiety disorder, in order to sell its drugs. The pharmaceutical industry has been given the
authority to pathologize life, with the drugging of our children, seniors, etc. For example, the
leading cause of AIDS deaths today is a result of liver failure. This is not a condition of HIV
infection, but a direct result of the anti-HIV drug AZT. Is it little wonder then that we are being
intimidated and frightened into believing that mandatory vaccination is being touted even though
the science of efficacy and safety, even the need, for these new swine flu vaccines is patently
unproven. It is perhaps one of the largest falsehoods ever perpetuated on humanity that dwarfs
the sleaze on Wall Street. 

If any one of us committed manslaughter, we would be behind bars instead of walking a
crimson carpet into the offices of our elected officials in the Congress and Senate or past the
gates guarded by the nation’s Cerberus, Rahm Emmanuel, to lobby the White House. Yet if we
are a pharmaceutical executive, or a lobbyist representing a drug company who has collected a
litany of charges including medical fraud, criminal salesmanship, gaming the insurance
industries, repeated lying to federal officials, and manipulation of data regarding life-threatening
adverse effects of drugs that have killed so many people, we can walk away with a fine, a surge
in the stock market after a settlement, a financial bonus, and the personal satisfaction in not
having to apologize so we can continue business as usual. This is the power the pharmaceutical
industrial complex possesses and its usurped right to distain every noble principle in the
Hippocratic Oath that every physician dedicates her or himself to live by, “That  I will exercise
my art solely for the cure of my patients, and will give no drug and perform no operation for a
criminal purpose.” 

Every American who is prescribed a drug by a physician has the belief that that pill has
undergone rigorous trials to scrutinize its safety. And when there are known potential adverse
effects, we blindly assume these are known to the attending physician. However, this is a myth
perpetuated not only by drug makers, but by our own federal health agencies.  A 2003
investigation published in The Independent in the UK reported that “under pressure from the
pharmaceutical industry, the FDA routinely conceals information it considers commercially
sensitive, leaving medical specialists unable to assess the true risks [of approved drugs].” One
case involved a very popular over-the-counter drug, the painkiller ibuprofen. The investigators’

 
search uncovered concealed data showing that ibuprofen increased heart attack risks by 25
percent. Even Freedom of Information (FOI) filings to the FDA do not produce all the
information being requested. For example, a group of Swiss investigators filed an FOI to procure
trial data about the musculoskeletal pain drug Celecoxib and received back only 16 of the 27
trials conducted on it. A separate FOI concerning a similar drug, Valdecoxib, had pages and
paragraphs deleted because sections of the document were marked as “trade secrets.” An even
worse case involving a leaked report concerning internal memos and secret FDA reports
provided detailed evidence that the FDA approved 9 different antidepressants, representing a
total of 22 studies enrolling 4,250 children, while knowing full well that the risk of “suicide-
related events” was twice as high as children taking a placebo.  These are just several examples
among numerous others. 

The pharmaceutical industrial complex is perhaps the largest, most influential cartel in
the world. This becomes evident after considering the billions of dollars and other currencies
drug companies have been forced to pay for a wide variety of corruption charges. Our analysis of
724 legal settlements from a random sampling among the over one hundred thousand by
pharmaceutical corporations totally $87 billion is just a small indication about how pervasive Big
Pharma’s criminality since the vast majority of settlements are concluded outside of court and
remain confidential.

It is extremely difficult to comprehend why the United States principle federal health
agencies, particularly the FDA and National Institutes of Health (NIH), with the specific
mandate to provide oversight on all pre-approved drug applications and delegated with the task
to assure drugs are safe or at least specify clearly their known dangers, are so reprehensible and
inept. There is only one rational answer and that is the pharmaceutical industry is the FDA’s
largest client, and this relationship goes much deeper than the FDA functioning as an objective
regulator investigating pharmaceutical products before being released upon the American
population. It is not to far afield to suggest that as it stands now the US regulatory agencies are
an extension of corporate America. 

As serial offenders of product safety cover-ups for over a decade, drugs have injured and
killed millions. In the case Merck’s Vioxx,  this one drug has killed 44,000 people and injured

 
120,000 others. Only in America could you kill 44,000 and not go to jail and get a raise. Should
we assume, therefore, that the pharmaceutical complex should be trusted without challenge? We
have also been asked to believe that the manufacturers were guided by a sense of public service.
But when examining the top ten drugs sold, the facts reveal otherwise. In one example,
manufacturers marked up a drug an astounding 500,000% over its equivalent generic version. 
Six other drugs were marked up 2000%. Pharmaceutical companies make profits higher than oil
companies.     

Big Pharma’s impact is felt almost everywhere. But nowhere is it felt more than in the
legal system. In a recently concluded, short-term study, we found 724 cases involving Big
Pharma in which either the case ended in a verdict against the pharmaceutical company or the
company settled. The number of cases is staggering, as are the dollar amounts. These cases cover
practically every type of civil and criminal case. From products that kill, harm and maim, to false
claims, to not paying taxes, to patent infringements, to bribery, to publishing false scientific
journals. Yet, in spite of the tens of thousands of lawsuits won against Big Pharma, it still
conducts business as usual. 

Eli Lilly flooded state Medicaid programs with Zyprexa: its superstar, antipsychotic drug.
In 2003, worldwide sales of Zyprexa grossed $4.28 billion, amounting to almost one third of
Lilly’s total sales. In the United States, during the same year, Zyprexa grossed $2.63 billion. A
whopping 70 percent of these sales were directly related to government agencies—principally
Medicaid.  Fast-forward six years to 2009, Eli Lilly pleaded guilty for having illegally marketed
Zyprexa for an unapproved use to treat dementia, and will pay $1.42 billion to settle civil suits
and end the criminal investigation. Lilly agreed to pay $800 million to settle civil suits. It will
pay $615 million to resolve the criminal probe, and plead guilty to a misdemeanor in violation of
the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act for promoting Zyprexa as a dementia treatment.

 Did Lilly also know of the possibility that Zyprexa could cause diabetes, which was also
kept concealed under the protection of the FDA? They most certainly did, which makes their
behavior all the more reprehensible. In 2002, British and Japanese regulatory agencies issued a
warning that Zyprexa may cause diabetes. In addition, even after the FDA issued a similar
warning in 2003, Lilly did not pull Zyprexa from the market. This becomes all the more

 
understandable after it is taken into consideration that Lilly is also the largest maker of diabetes
medications.

An article by Mike Adams, the Natural News editor, states that Merck employees had a
“hit list” of doctors they sought to “neutralize.” This allegation was confirmed when documents
that had been secret were revealed during a Vioxx court case. The Australian revealed that the
documents surfaced in the Federal Court in Melbourne and exposed the criminal intent
of Merck employees who admitted they were going to “stop funding to institutions” and
“interfere with academic appointments.”   One Merck employee testified (about the doctors on
the hit list), “We may need to seek them out and destroy them where they live.” Merck
threatened or intimidated at least eight clinical investigators, testimony in court revealed. There
are other, similar stories in which Merck deals with dissent by attempting to destroy the lives
and careers of academics who don’t  review their drugs favorably.  

Merck is steeped in a well-documented record of criminality. Such actions include, but
are not limited to, intentionally hiding the liver-damaging effects of its cholesterol drug,
intentionally withholding the release of clinical data that revealed the failures of another
cholesterol drug; it has dumped vaccine waste and manufacturing chemicals into water supplies;
it opened up offshore banking accounts to avoid paying billions of dollars in U.S. taxes, and it
was caught in a huge scheme of scientific fraud when it was discovered that the company used
in-house writers to secretly write so-called “independent” studies that were published in peer-
reviewed medical journals.

Under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which the U.S. Department of Justice and the
SEC enforce, it is illegal to bribe a foreign government official in order to obtain or retain
business. Apparently, Bristol-Myers and Schering Plough were unaware of this law. According
to the Associated Press, both drug makers were engaged in influencing government officials in
Germany and Poland respectively.  

 Earlier this year, an article in the Boston Business Journal reported that a former drug
company sales executive pleaded guilty in Boston federal court to telling the roughly 100
representatives she supervised that they should promote a pain drug for uses she knew had been
rejected by the FDA. Bextra was the drug she pleaded guilty to inappropriately selling. Pfizer has

 
since pulled it from the market. According to a press release from U.S. Attorney Michael
Sullivan's office, “Holloway was aware of the FDA's safety concerns, but...she nonetheless had
her sales staff of approximately 100 employees sells Bextra for precisely the uses that the FDA
refused to approve.” 

 The pharmaceutical complex has also infiltrated the majority of American medical
schools and medical research departments.
A recent survey in the Journal of the American
Medical Association discovered that 60% of academic department chairs have personal ties to
industry (as consultants, board members, or paid speakers), while 66% of the academic
departments had institutional ties to industry. Researchers who receive funding from drug and
medical-device manufacturers are up to 3.5 times as likely to state their study drug or medical
device works than are researchers without such funding. 

In America, one can hardly turn on the television or pick up a newspaper without reading
about the hot button issue of health care reform. Why such emotion?  Why are, seemingly,
rational people so intransigent and unwilling to budge from their positions? Could lobbyists have
anything to do with this? According to OpenSecrets.org, there are 3093 lobbyists in the health
field and Big Pharma now spends approximately $1.2 million daily to persuade Congress to act
according to their script. An investigation conducted by Medical Verdicts & Law Weekly found
that 30 key lawmakers are involved in health legislation totaling $11 million in health
investments.  Three of every four major health firms have at least one lobbyist who worked for a
congressman. Startlingly, nine lobbyists employed by Big Pharma are former congressional
staffers who are still well-connected to Capitol Hill. The conflicts of interest are everywhere.
Judd Gregg (R-NH), the Obama nominee for Commerce Secretary, who withdrew because of
opposition to the Administration's agenda, is a senior member of the Health Committee. He
revealed that he has $254,000-$560,000 in health stocks." 

In 2000, Mylan Labs settled a case for $100 million. What the numbers don’t tell you is
the story behind the numbers. In 1998, Mylan raised the wholesale price of clorazepate, a generic
tranquilizer, to $377.00 (for 500 tablets) from $11.36 in one year. This represents a 3000%
increase on a generic drug. 

 
It was subsequently revealed that Mylan conspired with the main manufacturer of the
active, indispensible ingredient to have an exclusive agreement
. The agreement prevented any
other manufacturers from producing the drug, for without the active ingredient, the drug could
not be made. Mylan’s deception was uncovered and it had to pay $100 million to settle an FTC
antitrust case. But Mylan represents only an infinitesimal percentage of such examples. In all
likelihood, the vast majority of similar cases remain undetected.  The FDA’s under-regulation
and erroneous oversight encourages this type of corruption. 


Another case included in our study states, “TAP [Taketa-Abbott Pharmaceutical]
Pharmaceutical Products Inc. -- $875,000,000 under the False Claims Act.” TAP agreed to pay
$875 million to resolve criminal charges and civil liabilities in connection with its fraudulent
drug pricing and marketing conduct regarding the drug Lupron, according to a press release from
the Department of Justice. Lupron is used by male cancer patients to suppress the production of
testosterone. Another drug worked as well, so to make Lupron the drug of choice for this
condition, TAP played dirty by giving kickbacks to physicians prescribing the drug, thus
ensuring its ridiculously high price would be maintained. Even though criminal indictments were
filed against TAP Pharmaceutical officials, Lupron’s price remains overly inflated. 

Ever wonder why Big Pharma would engage in all manner of illegal activity? In light of
the steady stream of articles detailing how the elderly are oftentimes forced to choose between
purchasing their medication and buying food, a good place to begin is to examine what it costs to
make a drug and what Big Pharma sells it for. Life Extension magazine conducted an original
investigative report in which it compared the actual price of a popular drug and how much the
generic version of its active ingredients costs. Examine these figures:

WHAT DRUGS REALLY COST
BRAND NAME CONSUMER
PRICE 
(For 100
tabs/caps)
COST OF
GENERIC
ACTIVE
INGREDIENT
(For 100
tabs/caps) 
PERCENT MARKUP

 
 
Celebrex 100 mg $130.27 $0.60 21,712%
Claritin 10 mg $215.17 $0.71 30,306%
Keflex 250 mg $157.39 $1.88 8,372%
Lipitor 20 mg $272.37 $5.80 4,696%
Norvasc 10 mg $188.29 $0.14 134,493%
Paxil 20 mg $220.27 $7.60 2,898%
Prevacid 30 mg $344.77 $1.01 34,136%
Prilosec 20 mg $360.97 $0.52 69,417%
Prozac 20 mg $247.47 $0.11 224,973%
Tenormin 50 mg $104.47 $0.13 80,362%
Vasotec 10 mg $102.37 $0.20 51,185%
Xanax 1mg $136.79 $0.024 569,958%
Zestril 20 mg $89.89 $3.20 2,809%
Zithromax 600mg $1,482.19 $18.78 7,892%
Zocor 40mg $350.27 $8.63 4,059%
Zoloft 50mg $206.87 $1.75 11,821%   
 

 
In order to understand how we can spend 2.6 trillion this year on healthcare, but not
reduce the incidence of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, obesity, mental conditions, arthritis, etc.,
we must realize this is a game. With each piece of the puzzle, feeding into a single picture of a
massively corrupt, unethical, and frequently illegal system controlled by relatively few
corporations within the pharmaceutical complex and the health insurance industry, are the ring
leaders. They in turn influence thousands of lobbyists, paid-off scientists and academicians, and
policymakers, especially those who rule on important health oversight committees. Health
officials and legislators in turn solicit expert witnesses, preselected by the cartels, to position
their drug agendas in the most favorable manner. The pharmaceutical cartel also has direct
connections with its supporting scientific advisory boards and key foundations. These
foundations, supported by policy think tanks who supply the so-called independent experts, then
lobby the upper echelon within the FDA, NIH, CDC, NIMH, HHS. Ideally they hire former
health commissioners and legislators previously players in the game to assist those same federal
agencies to see their drugs guided through the regulatory process. Public relations and
advertizing firms are contracted to give the public impression that these drugs are effective and
safe for the sole reason they have received official licensing. In addition, the cartel creates front
organizations with consumer-friendly titles whose representatives appear at national conferences
and seminars beholden to special drug interests. Finally, the drug corporations set money aside to
be paid out in settlements. With the exception of class action suits, the majority of cases for
injury and death are accompanied by confidentiality clauses to prevent public disclosure of data
the companies wish to remain secret. 

This is how the medical system is rigged and it is why we can watch 60 Minutes or read
the New York Times serving as pharmaceutical shills to encourage vaccination, yet refusing to
air or print the dissenting voices who have the scientific evidence to show it is a massive fraud.
Therefore, the public is misled every step of the way.  Victims of injury, such as the tens of
thousands of children, now at 1 in 91 children, with autism spectrum disorder, are forced to fend
for themselves. Parents know far better than the FDA and CDC, when their perfectly normal
child after a vaccination or a series of vaccines shortly thereafter is lost, withdrawn into the dark
corners of autism. And yet the pediatrician and psychologist will say the child must have had a
genetic defect. The CDC, FDA and NIH, with an orchestrated voice, say it is not the vaccine.
Everyone within the pharmaceutical industrial complex denies the truth.  Only now, during the
10 
 
11 
 
healthcare debate, are we seeing clearly the rampant politics of the pharmaceutical and insurance
industries. The veils are finally being removed. If it were not for the healthcare debacle, we
might still not know how the game is rigged and why our politicians and health officials will not
tolerate any real reform and accountability at any level. 

If we want to clean up American medicine, the corporate shield must be removed and
politicians, health officials and pharmaceutical executives must be held accountable. If they are
threatened with jail time for manslaughter by pushing dangerous drugs, then we will see less life-
threatening drugs go to market. 

We are in a perfect storm without a life raft. We much take back our freedoms of choice
and demand legal accountability or nothing will change. 

Doug Henderson, JD is a legal mediator specializing in civil rights and Director of Gary
Null and Associates in New York City. Dr. Gary Null is the host of the nation’s longest
running public radio program on nutrition and natural health and a multi-award-winning
director of progressive documentary films, including Vaccine Nation and Autism:
Made in the USA. Dr. Null is also the plaintiff on a law suit against the FDA to prevent
the launch of the swine flu vaccine until safety studies have been thoroughly conducted.

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Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Keeping the Body Alkaline for Optimum Health

Keep the Body Alkaline for Optimum Health

Tuesday, October 20, 2009 by: Alex Howard, citizen journalist
See all articles by this author
Email this author

http://www.naturalnews.com/027280_alkaline_food_blood.html

Key concepts: Alkaline, Food and Blood

(NaturalNews) The term pH stands for potential hydrogen. It is the degree of concentration of hydrogen ions in a substance such as water, blood and food. pH is measured on a scale from 0 to 14. The lower the pH reading - the more acidic a substance is. The higher the pH reading, the more alkaline the body is. A pH of 7 is neutral. Ph balance is the balance of acid and alkaline in all fluids and cells throughout your body. Our bodies are alkaline by design and acid by function. This means that our bodies function more efficiently when slightly alkaline, but bodily functions, such as digestion, are acid producing. So what can we do to ensure that our bodies remain more alkaline and balanced?

The human body's metabolic process is naturally acid producing. However, this waste needs to be neutralized or "balanced" so it can be safely eliminated from the body without damaging tissues and organs that are responsible for detoxifying the body. Alkalinity is needed to neutralize and balance acidity. The presence of alkalinity in the body's acid producing environment is counteractive to the onset of illness and disease and also prevents decomposition.

"Acidosis" refers to an acid pH. It is an imbalanced acidic condition of all bodily fluids. Almost all cellular functions in the body are sensitive to the pH of their fluids. If the pH falls too far to the acidic side the cells become poisoned in their own toxic wastes and will die. All chemical processes have an ideal pH.

Your blood should have a pH of 7.35 - 7.45. Many studies show that people with a correct blood pH enjoy good health; whereas, people with a low, or acidic, pH are more likely to be ill. The slightest imbalance can cause serious illness and disease.

The body will do whatever it must to maintain the blood pH balance, and will continually steal acidneutralizing minerals from wherever necessary, such as calcium from bones and teeth. The blood will dump the acid into other body organs in an effort to detoxify itself. The organs then dump the acid back into the blood, creating a vicious cycle of trying to rid itself of acidity. This cycle can be ended with a properly balance pH.

Symptoms of mild cases of acidosis include headache, lack of energy, sleepiness, fast and shallow breathing, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, dehydration and loss of appetite. Acidosis can result in rheumatoid arthritis, diabetes, lupus, tuberculosis, osteoporoses, high blood pressure and most cancers.

Metabolic acidosis occurs when the body has more acidity then alkalinity in it. Eating a diet of excessive meats, grains and breads, dairy products, sugar, overcooked, refined and processed foods and fast foods, can lead to an acidic pH balance. Other factors can include overload from pollutants and chemicals, emotional stress and negative thinking. Even excessive exercising (past the point of exhaustion) causes acidity.

The most important way to stay alkaline is to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

- Increase the amounts of vegetables and fruit (alkaline foods) that you eat while decreasing the amount of acid-forming foods, such as grains, dairy products, pasta and breads.

Juicing vegetables can be an excellent way to increase your alkaline food intake.

Just because a fruit or vegetable may be acid, that doesn't mean it will be acid when it is digested. When foods are digested, they turn into "ash". This ash is what determines if a food is acid or alkaline.

- It is important to remember that the method of cooking will also have either an acidic or alkaline reaction. For example, a potato that is baked or boiled in its jacket is alkaline food, whereas a fried potato is acid-forming.

- Make sure you drink at least 2 liters of good water per day. Normal tap water falls short of being good for you. Most city water has additives such as chlorine and fluoride, which are acid forming. Distilled water, water treated by reverse-osmosis or alkaline waters are best.

- Stress - Joy helps to alkalize the body. Take time to relax, have fun and laugh!

- Exercise will tend to make the body more alkaline, but exercising excessively will become acid-forming.

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Soy foods may curb hip fracture risk in older women

Soy foods may curb hip fracture risk in older women

Fri Oct 16, 2009 10:16pm EDT

By Joene Hendry

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Postmenopausal women may lessen their chances of fracturing a hip by adding soy-based foods to their diet, a study from Singapore hints.

Women in the study were 21 to 36 percent less likely to fracture a hip when they reported eating a moderate amount of soy, Dr. Woon-Puay Koh, at the National University of Singapore, and colleagues found.

In their study, daily moderate soy intake was at least 2.7 grams of soy protein, 5.8 milligrams of soy isoflavones per 1000 calories, or the equivalent of 49.4 grams of tofu.

This level of soy is consistently "higher than the low levels of consumption in the West," Koh told Reuters Health in an email.

Koh's team assessed dietary soy intake of more than 63,000 Chinese men and women who were 45 to 74 years old when, between 1993 and 1998, they enrolled in the Singapore Chinese Health Study.

Follow-up through the end of 2006 showed 276 men and 692 women had fractured a hip.

The men were about 71 years old and the women about 73 years old, on average, when they suffered the fracture, the investigators report in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

As mentioned, moderate soy intake was associated with a reduced risk of hip fracture among women, but not among men.

The current findings are consistent with those of a previous investigation in postmenopausal Chinese women in Shanghai who showed a 30 percent reduced risk for hip fracture among those consuming higher amounts of soy.

Koh and colleagues surmise that the bone-protective effects of soy isoflavones may play a critical role in the bone health of postmenopausal women.

They call for further investigations to confirm and clarify this association.

SOURCE: American Journal of Epidemiology, October 1, 2009



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Saturday, October 17, 2009

Swine Flu Vaccine Mandate Halted By NY Judge's Restraining Order

people realize the vaccine may be far more dangerous than the flu it claims to prevent.

vitamin D is better than the vaccine at halting influenza.
+++


Swine Flu Vaccine Mandate for NY Health Care Workers Halted by Judge's Restraining Order

Friday, October 16, 2009 by: Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Key concepts: Health, Flu vaccine and Vaccines
View on NaturalPedia: Health, Flu vaccine and Vaccines

(NaturalNews) Amid growing discontent among New York health care workers who are being forced to receive swine flu vaccine injections, the Public Employees Federation sued in state court to halt the mandate. Friday, a state Supreme Court judge issued a restraining order granting a temporary halt to the mandate until a subsequent hearing can be completed.

The lawsuit was brought by the Public Employees Federation, New York State United Teachers and four Albany nurses. Until today, these workers were required to be vaccinated by November 30th or many were told they would be fired from their jobs. Others were told pay increases would be suspended. Across the board, there was a campaign of intimidation against NY health care workers to force them into receiving the swine flu vaccine injections.

With this court order, mandatory vaccines are temporarily suspended pending a follow-up court hearing on October 30.

New York sets the tone for the H1N1 vaccine debate nationwide

New York has been an epicenter of health choice protests and demonstrations by concerned health care workers. Over 500,000 workers are affected by the H1N1 vaccine mandate, and a majority of those workers simply don't wish to be vaccinated against their will -- or, perhaps, vaccinated at all.

If New York health authorities thought they could just bully half a million health care workers into being injected with a virtually untested, unproven vaccine, they were gravely mistaken. Resistance to the vaccine mandate continues to build as more and more

 people realize the vaccine may be far more dangerous than the flu it claims to prevent.

In fact, attempts at forcing the swine flu vaccine onto health care workers appear to have backfired for the vaccine industry, causing many people to question the evidence behind all seasonal flu vaccines. As published here on NaturalNews, this increased scrutiny on flu vaccines is resulting in the emergence of some rather revealing information that seems to indicate seasonal flu vaccines have zero efficacy (i.e. they just don't work). See details here: http://www.naturalnews.com/027239_v...

What began as the vaccine industry's attempt to force its medicines on virtually everyone has caused intelligent people across the country and around the world to start asking some tough questions about vaccines. Today, NaturalNews posted ten questions about vaccines that the vaccine industry (and the health authorities pushing vaccines) so far refuse to answer: http://www.naturalnews.com/027258_v...

A recent poll conducted by Harvard University indicates that only 40 percent of adults plan to take the swine flu vaccine. Public support for the vaccine is rapidly evaporating as the real motivations behind the vaccine agenda become increasingly apparent (http://www.naturalnews.com/027222_s...). More and more people are concluding there's really no good reason to take the vaccine given the extremely low fatality rates of the pandemic. At the same time, more people are learning the truth about vitamin D and realizing that

vitamin D is better than the vaccine at halting influenza.
(http://www.naturalnews.com/027231_V...)

Meanwhile, a lawsuit filed in Washington D.C. by health freedom attorney Jim Turner accuses the FDA of violating federal law in approving the swine flu vaccines without conducting proper testing for either safety or efficacy (http://www.naturalnews.com/027205_v...).

Public support is clearly mounting against not just the swine flu vaccine (and the pandemic "fear factor" marketing push behind it), but seasonal flu vaccines as well.

None of this, of course, means the vaccine mandate in New York won't be reinstated on October 30th. The NY State Department of Health has predictably vowed to fight the decision and reinstate the mandate. But between now and then, it seems quite likely that we'll see a surge in public protests and perhaps even more legal actions filed by NY health care workers to stop what they see as a Big Brother chemical intervention into their own personal health.


Sources for this story include:
http://wcbstv.com/breakingnewsalert...

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2... Buzz up!

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Friday, October 16, 2009

BWN - Health - Learn v2

http://www.karmatube.org/videos.php?id=1761

Oct 16, 2009

   
The Fun Theory: Piano Stairs
If stairs played musical notes when you walked on them, would you be more likely to take them? Volkswagen has launched a popular new campaign called "The Fun Theory" which is "dedicated to the thought that something as simple as fun is the easiest way to change people's behavior for the better." It turns out that 66% more commuters opted for stairs over the escalators! Take a look at this utterly clever (and fun!) idea.

Watch This Video





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Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Good Nutrition & No Vaccination Best Way To Fight H1N1 Swine Flu & Seasonal Flu (video)

Boosting your immune system protects you from diseases.
eat the right foods.

In 1976 when we had an outbreak of Swine Flu in the US more people died from the vaccine than did from the disease.

watch the Ron Paul video and the David Icke video.

May we awaken to the power of love over the fear spread by those who would keep us divided and conquered so that they can fuel their greed.

+++

Good nutrition & no vaccination the best way to fight H1N1 Swine Flu & Seasonal Flu (video)

October 12, 3:34 PMCultural Trends ExaminerL. Steven Sieden

Although the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention no longer counts the number of H1N1 virus incidents in this country, the American Medical Association says many of its members are starting to see more cases of the illness. That’s called normal for this time of year. So we’re all wondering what is the best way to protect our families and ourselves?

Many health experts (especially those financed by the drug industry) will tell you the most effective way to fight the flu, including the H1N1 virus, is to get vaccinated, which causes your own body to make antibodies that target specific illnesses. However, there are other ways to boost your immune system to ward off being sick during the winter.

Boosting your immune system protects you from diseases. It's designed to defend the body against millions of toxins, parasites, bacteria and microbes that would love to invade the body and make it their home, but in order to protect you, your immune system has to be healthy. The best way to have a healthy immune system is with good nutrition. We all need to eat the right foods.

Also, consider the following before getting you or your family vaccinated.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that certain “high risk” groups get the H1N1 Swine Flu vaccine because they are more likely to have serious complications if they develop swine flu. These groups include: pregnant women; caregivers and household contacts of children younger than 6 months; everyone between the ages of 6 months and 24 years and people ages 25 to 64 with existing health problems.

Thus, the CDC want lots of us to get the potentially dangerous vaccine.  In 1976 when we had an outbreak of Swine Flu in the US more people died from the vaccine than did from the disease.

So, if you are in one of the “high risk” groups and are feeling pressured to get the vaccine, at least research the entire situation and view the videos below.

Hospitals all over the country are stocking up on face masks and other swine flu prevention stuff.  They want us to believe that it's coming to get us.  Our medical establishment is now preparing "we the people" to choose fear over love, the swine flu vaccine over the potential of getting flu or perhaps being one of the tiny minority to die from the disease.

If you do nothing else for your health, watch the Ron Paul video and the David Icke video.  Then, forward this on to every person you want to be healthy and allow each one to decide for themselves.

May we awaken to the power of love over the fear spread by those who would keep us divided and conquered so that they can fuel their greed.

May all people be healthy and free from the fear that causes suffering.



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Vitamin D May Save Your Life From Swine Flue - And Is Key In Preventing Breast Cancer

Vitamin D is the "miracle nutrient" that activates your immune system to defend you against invading microorganisms -- including seasonal flu and swine flu.

Sunlight triggers the formation of vitamin D in the skin, which can be activated in the liver and kidneys into a hormone with great activity.
+++


Sixty million years of evolution says vitamin D may save your life from swine flu

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 by: Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Key concepts: Vitamin D, Immune system and Vaccines
View on NaturalPedia: Vitamin D, Immune system and Vaccines

(NaturalNews) People still don't get it: Vitamin D is the "miracle nutrient" that activates your immune system to defend you against invading microorganisms -- including seasonal flu and swine flu. Two months ago, an important study was published by researchers at Oregon State University. This study reveals something startling: Vitamin D is so crucial to the functioning of your immune system that the ability of vitamin D to boost immune function and destroy invading microorganisms has been conserved in the genome for over 60 million years of evolution.

As this press release from Oregon State University (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_relea...) explains:

The fact that this vitamin-D mediated immune response has been retained through millions of years of evolutionary selection, and is still found in species ranging from squirrel monkeys to baboons and humans, suggests that it must be critical to their survival, researchers say.

"The existence and importance of this part of our immune response makes it clear that humans and other primates need to maintain sufficient levels of vitamin D," said Adrian Gombart, an associate professor of biochemistry and a principal investigator with the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University.

The announcement goes on to explain:

In primates, this action of "turning on" an optimal response to microbial attack only works properly in the presence of adequate vitamin D, which is actually a type of hormone that circulates in the blood and signals to cells through a receptor. Vitamin D is produced in large amounts as a result of sun exposure, and is available in much smaller amounts from dietary sources.

Vitamin D prevents the "adaptive" immune response from over-reacting and reduces inflammation, and appears to suppress the immune response. However, the function of the new genetic element this research explored allows vitamin D to boost the innate immune response by turning on an antimicrobial protein. The overall effect may help to prevent the immune system from overreacting.


Without vitamin D, you're a sitting duck

What this study reveals is that without sufficient levels of vitamin D circulating in your blood, you're a ripe, juicy target for influenza (H1N1 or otherwise). If you lack vitamin D, your immune system can't "activate" to do its job. That's why people who are deficient in vitamin D so frequently get winter colds.

But people who are high in vitamin D have the nutritional power to activate their immune system so that it can respond to invading pathogens. Crucially, vitamin D also manages to balance immune response and prevent inflammation -- the leading cause of death in the 1918 influenza pandemic.

So not only does vitamin D protect you from the initial infection; it also prevents your body from over-reacting and killing you with inflammation (which typically gets expressed as bacterial pneumonia, an infection of the lungs).

Smart people today are doing two things:

1) Saying NO to vaccines.
2) Saying YES to vitamin D.

If you take vitamin D, you don't need a vaccine!

Sources for vitamin D

Where can you get vitamin D? There's some vitamin D naturally present in fish oils and marine omega-3 oils, but the two most abundant sources are:

1) Sunlight
2) Vitamin D supplements

You can get sunlight for free by exposing your skin to the sun. You can get vitamin D supplements at www.Vitacost.com or just about any vitamin retailer (local or online).

Vitamin D is easy to get. Your body actually manufactures it when you're exposed to the sun.

Why no vitamin D advice?

The research supporting vitamin D's ability to halt influenza is overwhelming. And yet the vaccine industry (and the doctors who push vaccines) don't want you to know about vitamin D. Why is that?

It's because if people knew the truth about vitamin D, the vaccine industry would collapse. Who needs a vaccine if you're got a powered-up immune system to do the job automatically? Plus, your immune system is natural, while vaccines are completely unnatural injections of toxic chemicals that are increasingly being linked to not just autism, but seizures, brain damage and death.

Why risk a vaccine when vitamin D is so remarkably safe?

You'll need at least 4000 IU a day just to prevent deficiency, according to many nutrition experts. Some people I know take 8000 IU a day. I personally don't take any vitamin D but I get at least 30 minutes of sunlight every day near the equator (which is a unique geographical situation, I understand, that not everybody can replicate).

Our national "health" officials (if you can call them that) are making a crucial mistake with the swine flu. Instead of ordering more vaccines, they should be recommending vitamin D supplements to the population. For less than the cost of the vaccines, we could provide vitamin D supplementation to every man, woman and child in America. We would not only end the swine flu pandemic, we would also see cancer rates plummet!

Perhaps that's why our health authorities don't dare recommend vitamin D -- the financial impact on the cancer industry would just be too great. The vaccine makers would lose billions, and the cancer industry could lose tens of billions. Diabetes rates would fall, depression would fade away in many people, kidney function would improve and a long list of other diseases would be prevented or reversed following adequate vitamin D intake.

Vitamin D is the answer to our national health care problems. Just one nutrient, if distributed freely to everyone, could probably slash our national health care costs by one-third within five years, I believe.

And yet they dare not mention it. "It's not approved by the FDA," they say. So the CDC won't mention it. The WHO won't recommend it. The FDA pretends it doesn't exist, and the doctors aren't allowed to prescribe it.

Here it is -- vitamin D -- the great CURE for influenza. It's here right now. It's cheap, it's safe, and it's available. Yet it's being utterly ignored.

Let me go on the record to state the obvious: There is an agenda under way to keep the American people deficient in vitamin D and ignorant about its healing properties. This is a conscious, planned scheme that seeks to keep the people disinformed while pumping them full of vaccines, chemotherapy and prescription drugs instead of teaching them the simple nutritional cures that exist right now.

Mark my words: With the swine flu or any future pandemic, the populations suffering the highest death rates will be those with the highest rates of vitamin D deficiency. And the vaccine? It offers no protection compared to the power of the vitamin D.

The laws of biochemistry cannot be suspended by FDA bureaucrats

To any doctor or health authority who scoffs at the notion of vitamin D being far more useful than vaccines, ask them this question: If vitamin D has no purpose in human health, then why have the immune system genes that are specifically activated by vitamin D persisted in the genome (which is now the human genome) for more than sixty million years?

Why is the human immune system programmed to use vitamin D to activate itself?

Why does human skin generate vitamin D in response to sun exposure?

To hear mind-numbed doctors answer it, this is all just coincidence! There is no specific reason that vitamin D genes exist at all!

But it gets even more bizarre: According to the FDA, vitamin D has no beneficial biological effects in the human body! It's true: The FDA says that any substance that has a beneficial (therapeutic) effect in the human body must be a DRUG, not a nutrient. And vitamin D has never been approved as a drug. Therefore, it is inert.

Do you follow that? Vitamin D has no benefit to the human body because the FDA says so. How's that for bureaucratic arrogance? It's like saying gravity doesn't apply in our world because we haven't yet "approved" the laws of physics. But one step off a high ledge reveals, indeed, that the laws of gravity are still in effect, and so are the laws of biochemistry.

You need vitamin D, not a vaccine

Your body doesn't need a vaccine to combat the swine flu (or seasonal flu, for that matter). What it needs is vitamin D, restful sleep, adequate hydration with clean water, and good nutrition. These things make the vaccine obsolete.

They're safe, affordable, natural and readily available. You don't have to wait in line to get vitamin D, and you don't need a doctor's prescription. There's no needle involved, and there's no risk of you suffering a seizure or permanent brain damage, either.

With sufficient levels of vitamin D in your blood, your immune system will do its job to protect you from swine flu, bird flu, human flu or even the pandemic infectious nonsense being spread around by the CDC, FDA and WHO. Your immune system has all the technology it needs right now to keep you alive from almost any widely-circulating microorganism... as long as it has the biochemical tools (like vitamin D) to "activate" its adaptive response.

Do you realize that without a functioning immune system, you would have been killed by microorganisms a thousand times over by now? Your immune system saves your life every day, quietly, behind the scenes. It is the reason you're breathing right now as you read this article. Receiving a vaccine injection is the ultimate insult to your own body because it admits that you have no faith in the very same immune system that has already saved your life countless times.

Don't put your faith in chemical injections. Believe in your immune system -- and give it the nutritional tools it needs to keep on saving your life.

Additional resources for this story include:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_relea...

About the author: Mike Adams is a consumer health advocate with a passion for sharing empowering information to help improve personal and planetary health He is a prolific writer and has published thousands of articles, interviews, reports and consumer guides, reaching millions of readers with information that is saving lives and improving personal health around the world. Adams is an honest, independent journalist and accepts no money or commissions on the third-party products he writes about or the companies he promotes. In 2007, Adams launched EcoLEDs, a maker of energy efficient LED lights that greatly reduce CO2 emissions. He also founded an environmentally-friendly online retailer called BetterLifeGoods.com that uses retail profits to help support consumer advocacy programs. He's also a noted pioneer in the email marketing software industry, having been the first to launch an HTML email newsletter technology that has grown to become a standard in the industry. Adams is currently the executive director of the Consumer Wellness Center, a 501(c)3 non-profit, and practices nature photography, Capoeira, Pilates and organic gardening. Known by his callsign, the 'Health Ranger,' Adams posts his missions statements, health statistics and health photos at www.HealthRanger.org
===

Vitamin D is nutritional key for prevention of breast cancer

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 by: Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Key concepts: Cancer, Vitamin D and Breast cancer
View on NaturalPedia: Cancer, Vitamin D and Breast cancer

(NaturalNews) You've heard the good news about vitamin D for years: It's a "miracle" medicine that reduces cancer rates by 77% according to previous research (http://www.naturalnews.com/021892_c...). It also happens to be a powerful anti-cancer medicine that can both prevent and help reverse breast cancer.

Yet, bewilderingly, the cancer industry still refuses to teach women about vitamin D. Ever wonder why?

Today, we bring you a compilation of expert quotations on vitamin D and breast cancer, cited from some of the most authoritative books and authors in the world. Feel free to share what you learn here with others who may also be suffering from breast cancer.

Vitamin D and breast cancer

Sunlight triggers the formation of vitamin D in the skin, which can be activated in the liver and kidneys into a hormone with great activity. This activated form of vitamin D causes "cellular differentiation" - essentially the opposite of cancer. The following evidence indicates that vitamin D might have a protective role against breast cancer: Synthetic vitamin D-like molecules have prevented the equivalent of breast cancer in animals.
- The Natural Pharmacy: Complete A-Z Reference to Natural Treatments for Common Health Conditions by Alan R. Gaby, M.D., Jonathan V. Wright, M.D., Forrest Batz, Pharm.D. Rick Chester, RPh., N.D., DipLAc. George Constantine, R.Ph., Ph.D. Linnea D. Thompson, Pharm.D., N.D.

Two equally effective sources of vitamin D in humans are derived from plant ergosterol, which is converted to ergocalciferol (vitamin D2) and cholecalciferol (vitamin D3) by the action of sunlight on the skin. The body uses vitamin D3 for normal immune system function, to control cellular growth, and to absorb calcium from the digestive tract. Vitamin D3 can inhibit the growth of malignant melanoma, breast cancer, leukemia, and mammary tumors in laboratory animals. Vitamin D3 can also inhibit angiogenesis, the growth of new blood vessels that permit the spread of cancer cells through the body.
- Permanent Remissions by Robert Hass, M.S.

There's surprising new evidence that older women who skimp on foods rich in vitamin D are more likely to develop breast cancer, according to Frank Garland, Ph.D., of the Department of Community and Family Medicine at the University of California at San Diego. This may also help explain fish's anticancer protection, because fatty fish is packed with vitamin D. Specifically, Dr. Garland finds that dietary vitamin D wards off postmenopausal breast cancer in women over fifty, but not in women who get cancer at younger ages.
- Food Your Miracle Medicine by Jean Carper

In animals fed a high fat diet, which normally would produce a higher incidence of colon cancer, supplements of calcium and vitamin D blocked this carcinogenic effect of the diet. Vitamin D inhibits the growth of breast cancer in culture, and also seems to subdue human breast cancer. Cells from human prostate cancer were put into a "...permanent nonproliferative state", or shut down the cancer process, by the addition of vitamin D. Human cancer cells have been shown to have receptor sites, or stereo specific "parking spaces" for vitamin D.
- Beating Cancer with Nutrition by Patrick Quillin

Even though vitamin D is one of the most powerful healing chemicals in your body, your body makes it absolutely free. No prescription required. Diseases and conditions caused by vitamin D deficiency: Osteoporosis is commonly caused by a lack of vitamin D, which impairs calcium absorption. Sufficient vitamin D prevents prostate cancer, breast cancer, ovarian cancer, depression, colon cancer, and schizophrenia. "Rickets" is the name of a bone-wasting disease caused by vitamin D deficiency.
- Natural Health Solutions by Mike Adams

George's Hospital Medical School in London finds local production of vitamin D in breast tissue reduces the risk for breast cancer. For women with low breast tissue levels of vitamin D the risk for breast cancer rose by 354%! This study suggests women sunbathe with breast tissue exposed to the sun to enhance local vitamin D production. The provision of 400 IU of vitamin D per day has been found to reduce the risk of pancreatic cancer by 43%.
- You Don't Have to be Afraid of Cancer Anymore by Bill Sardi

Taken together, these facts suggest that vitamin D and its derivatives may play a role in regulating the expression of genes and protein products that prevent and inhibit breast cancer. The cancer-stopping power of vitamin D has been documented in osteosarcoma (bone cancer), melanoma, colon cancer, and breast cancer. These cancer cells contain vitamin-D receptors that make them susceptible to the anticancer effects of this vitamin-hormone made by the skin when it is exposed to sunlight. Vitamin D-rich foods include salmon, tuna, fish oils, and vitamin D-fortified milk and breakfast cereals.
- Permanent Remissions by Robert Hass, M.S.

Low levels of vitamin D may also increase the proliferation of white blood cells and may accelerate the arthritic process in rheumatoid arthritis. Vitamin D supplements are likely to be useful in retarding these adverse effects of alterations in metabolism. Low levels of vitamin D have been linked to several cancers including those of the colon, prostate and breast. Laboratory experiments show that vitamin D can inhibit the growth of human prostate cancer and breast cancer cells. Lung cancer and pancreatic cancer cells may also be susceptible to the effects of vitamin D.
- The New Encyclopedia of Vitamins, Minerals, Supplements and Herbs by Nicola Reavley

Laboratory experiments show that vitamin D can inhibit the growth of human prostate cancer and breast cancer cells. Lung cancer and pancreatic cancer cells may also be susceptible to the effects of vitamin D. Sunlight also seems to be protective against several types of cancer including ovarian, breast and prostate cancers; and this effect may be mediated by vitamin D levels. Synthetic vitamin D-type compounds are being investigated for their potential as anticancer drugs.
- The New Encyclopedia of Vitamins, Minerals, Supplements and Herbs by Nicola Reavley

If mutations aren't corrected or if a cell has already undergone malignant transformation, activated vitamin D can team up with other proteins to stimulate programmed death of abnormal cells. This evidence, along with animal studies, suggest that a girl who lacks adequate vitamin D during puberty years will have abnormal breast development. This, in turn, may increase a woman's susceptibility to risk factors such as alcohol for breast cancer development. In other words, the window of greatest opportunity for vitamin D to reduce breast cancer risk may be during childhood and puberty.
- The Vitamin D Cure by James Dowd and Diane Stafford

A key development for vitamin D was the appearance of increasing evidence that experts had detected a strong relationship between vitamin D and breast cancer risk. The important Nurses Health Study found a 30 percent lower risk of breast cancer in pre-menopausal women when comparing the highest to the lowest intakes of vitamin D, calcium, and low-fat dairy, especially skim milk.
- The Vitamin D Cure by James Dowd and Diane Stafford

Out of every 100 women who might get breast cancer, 50 of them can avoid breast cancer by simply getting adequate levels of vitamin D in their body, and that's available free of charge through sensible exposure to natural sunlight, which produces vitamin D. This vitamin, all by itself, reduces relative cancer risk by 50 percent, which is better than any prescription drug that has ever been invented by any drug company in the world. Combine that with green tea, and your prevention of breast cancer gets even stronger.
- Natural Health Solutions by Mike Adams

There's so much more to vitamin D than enhancing calcium absorption; its anticancer benefit is just one other possibility. Most of 63 recently reviewed studies found a protective effect between vitamin D status and cancer risk. A study presented at the 2006 American Association for Cancer Research meeting suggested that an increase in vitamin D lowered the risk of developing breast cancer by up to 50 percent. How might vitamin D help?
- Food Synergy: Unleash Hundreds of Powerful Healing Food Combinations to Fight Disease and Live Well by Elaine Magee

Place sunshine or vitamin D pills on your list of preventive or therapeutic measures. A daily intake of 2,600 units of vitamin D (65 mcg) is recommended to attain blood concentrations that will optimally protect against disease. There is no way the diet can provide this much vitamin D. Sun-starved females are at great risk for breast cancer, particularly women living in northern latitudes where wintertime sun exposure produces little vitamin D because of a decline in UV radiation in solar light.
- You Don't Have to be Afraid of Cancer Anymore by Bill Sardi

Sunlight produces vitamin D in humans. A deficiency of vitamin D is linked with breast cancer. Was the increase in male breast cancer caused by magnetic fields or by lack of vitamin D? These are the types of questions that make it difficult to ascertain if there is a link between EMF exposure and cancer. To make matters worse, a cell biologist doing work on EMFs for the Department of Energy, faked data linking cancer to electromagnetic fields in order to gain $3.3 million worth of grants for scientific research.
- You Don't Have to be Afraid of Cancer Anymore by Bill Sardi

The dosage of vitamin D required to inhibit the growth of prostate cancer may be much higher than the recommended daily allowance (RDA) of 400 international units per day. Since vitamin D can be toxic in doses that greatly exceed this value, researchers have developed synthetic analogues of vitamin D that retain the ability to inhibit cancer cell growth without the toxicity associated with high doses. These analogs have been successfully used in animal models of leukemia and breast cancer. Vitamin D may be related to other cancers.
- Permanent Remissions by Robert Hass, M.S.

Sunlight exposure, which leads to an increased level of vitamin D, correlates with a reduced risk of breast cancer. I usually recommend small amounts of vitamin D (400 to 1,000 IU) for those people without sunlight exposure, especially during the winter. I also occasionally recommend cod liver oil during the winter months as a source of vitamin D and omega-3 fatty acids. Vitamin D deficiency is very common in the elderly and in people who live in parts of the world with little sunlight; it is also one of the major contributing factors to osteoporosis.
- Herbal Medicine, Healing and Cancer: A Comprehensive Program for Prevention and Treatment by Donald R. Yance, j r.,C.N., M.H., A.H.G., with Arlene Valentine

But how does vitamin D actually work? For many years that was a mystery. The "revolution of information" on vitamin D began in 1968, when J.W. Blunt and colleagues discovered the form of vitamin D that actually circulates in the blood (25-OH-D3). This hormonal form of the vitamin, created in the kidneys, is ultimately responsible for the classical action of the vitamin. At the molecular level, some cancer cells appear to have receptors on their surfaces that are capable of receiving the vitamin D molecule. Scientists studied cancer cells from 136 patients with breast cancer.
- Cancer Therapy: The Independent Consumer's Guide To Non-Toxic Treatment & Prevention by Ralph W. Moss, Ph.D.

Symptoms of vitamin D toxicity include anorexia, disorientation, dehydration, fatigue, weight loss, weakness, and vomiting. New analogues of vitamin D3 allow cancer victims to take high doses of the vitamin without fear of elevating calcium in the blood to dangerous levels. These new forms of vitamin D have very high potency in controlling cell proliferation and differentiation. One of these, calci-potriol, can be used topically to treat psoriasis and inhibit the growth of metastatic breast cancer in patients with whose tumors have vitamin D receptors.
- Permanent Remissions by Robert Hass, M.S.

In an investigation into the relationship of breast density as measured by mammography to serum-vitamin D levels, it was found that there was a strong inverse correlation; the higher the density, the lower the vitamin D levels. Does the blood level of vitamin D at the time of diagnosis of breast cancer make a difference in a woman's time of survival? Yes, it does.
- The Clinician's Handbook of Natural Healing by Gary Null, Ph.D.

Although not part of the study, outdoor exercise where you are getting some (but not too much) sun exposure also raises vitamin D levels. Low levels of vitamin D have been associated with a greater risk of cancer. Relaxation techniques such as writing, meditation, yoga, or massage therapy can aid in battling breast cancer. There is a clear link between alcohol consumption and an increased risk of breast cancer. A study reported in The New England journal of Medicine has stated that consuming as few as three alcoholic drinks a week increases the potential for breast cancer by 50 percent.
- Prescription for Nutritional Healing, 4th Edition: A Practical A-to-Z Reference to Drug-Free Remedies Using Vitamins, Minerals, Herbs & Food Supplements by Phyllis A. Balch, CNC


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The 2009 Right Livelihood Awards - Alternative Nobel Peace Prize

The Right Livelihood Award

The 2009 Right Livelihood Awards
http://www.rightlivelihood.org/

2009 Right Livelihood Awards: Wake-up calls to secure our common future

The Right Livelihood Award Jury gave the following motivation for its choice of laureates:

"Despite the scientific warnings about the imminent threat and disastrous impacts of climate change and despite our knowledge about solutions, the global response to this crisis is still painfully slow and largely inadequate. At the same time, the threat from nuclear weapons has by no means diminished, and the treatable diseases of poverty shame our common humanity."

"The 2009 Right Livelihood Award Recipients demonstrate concretely what has to be done in order to tackle climate change, rid the world of nuclear weapons, and provide crucial medical treatment to the poor and marginalised."

The 2009 Right Livelihood Awards go to four recipients:

David Suzuki Picture: Al Harvey, Right Livelihood Award 2009
David Suzuki
Picture: Al Harvey

David Suzuki (Honorary Award, Canada) "for his lifetime advocacy of the socially responsible use of science, and for his massive contribution to raising awareness about the perils of climate change and building public support for policies to address it".

Read more

Three recipients receive cash awards of EUR 50,000 each:

René Ngongo; Picture courtesy Greenpeace
René Ngongo

René Ngongo (Democratic Republic of Congo) is honoured "for his courage in confronting the forces that are destroying the Congo's rainforests and building political support for their conservation and sustainable use".

Alyn Ware, Right Livelihood Award 2009
Alyn Ware

Alyn Ware (New Zealand) is recognised "for his effective and creative advocacy and initiatives over two decades to further peace education and to rid the world of nuclear weapons".

Read more 

Catherine Hamlin, Right Livelihood Award 2009
Catherine Hamlin

Catherine Hamlin (Ethiopia) is awarded "for her fifty years dedicated to treating obstetric fistula patients, thereby restoring the health, hope and dignity of thousands of Africa's poorest women".

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Saturday, October 10, 2009

The Right Livelihood Award - An Alternative To The Nobel Peace Prize - Tuesday October 13

Our recipients inspire hope and offer solutions how we can still avoid the approaching points-of-no-return threatening our common future."
---

Also below - Howard Zinn's comments on some American war monger who have won the Nobel prize.
+++

The Right Livelihood Award

Coming up: Announcement of the 2009 Awards
http://www.rightlivelihood.org/
Logo of the Right Livelihood Award
Logo of the Right Livelihood Award

2009 Right Livelihood Award Laureates to be announced soon

The announcement of the 2009 Right Livelihood Award Recipients will take place on October 13th, 10.00 Stockholm time.

82 candidates from 46 countries were proposed for the Right Livelihood Awards this year, whereof 36 come from industrialized and 46 from "developing" countries.

It is the 30th announcement of the Awards.

Jakob von Uexkull, Founder and Chairman of the Award, said:

"In 1980, it was not clear that this award would reach its 30th birthday. I am delighted that it has! Since then, the RLA has grown and so has its impact. But the global challenges we are facing have grown ever faster, so that this prize is today more needed than ever. Our recipients inspire hope and offer solutions how we can still avoid the approaching points-of-no-return threatening our common future."
+++

War and Peace Prizes

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/10/10-3
  Published on Saturday, October 10, 2009 by The Guardian/UK

by Howard Zinn

I was dismayed when I heard Barack Obama was given the Nobel peace prize. A shock, really, to think that a president carrying on two wars would be given a peace prize. Until I recalled that Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Henry Kissinger had all received Nobel peace prizes. The Nobel committee is famous for its superficial estimates, won over by rhetoric and by empty gestures, and ignoring blatant violations of world peace.

Yes, Wilson gets credit for the League of Nations – that ineffectual body which did nothing to prevent war. But he had bombarded the Mexican coast, sent troops to occupy Haiti and the Dominican Republic and brought the US into the slaughterhouse of Europe in the first World War, surely among stupid and deadly wars at the top of the list.

Sure, Theodore Roosevelt brokered a peace between Japan and Russia. But he was a lover of war, who participated in the US conquest of Cuba, pretending to liberate it from Spain while fastening US chains on that tiny island. And as president he presided over the bloody war to subjugate the Filipinos, even congratulating a US general who had just massacred 600 helpless villagers in the Phillipines.

The Committee did not give the Nobel prize to Mark Twain, who denounced Roosevelt and criticised the war, nor to William James, leader of the anti-imperialist league.

Oh yes, the committee saw fit to give a peace prize to Henry Kissinger, because he signed the final peace agreement ending the war in Vietnam, of which he had been one of the architects. Kissinger, who obsequiously went along with Nixon's expansion of the war, with the bombing of peasant villages in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Kissinger, who matches the definition of a war criminal very accurately, is given a peace prize!

People should be given a peace prize not on the basis of promises they have made – as with Obama, an eloquent maker of promises – but on the basis of actual accomplishments towards ending war, and Obama has continued deadly, inhuman military action in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The Nobel peace committee should retire, and turn over its huge funds to some international peace organization which is not awed by stardom and rhetoric, and which has some understanding of history.


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Bill Moyers: The 4 Big Banks Take Over Congress & Presidency & Refuse To Show Up In Ohio

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/10092009/watch.html

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Stopping Mandated Vaccines

Stopping Mandated Vaccines

Rally to stop New York state legislation mandating swine flu vaccinations.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZaAOu8Hr8A&feature=sdig&et=1255228881.27

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Friday, October 9, 2009

Let There Be Free, Green Light, Electricity, Refrigeration For Poorest Communities In Palestine & The World

lights, refrigeration and other amenities thanks to solar panels and wind turbines
empower the poorest communities
the entire village of 300 people has access to power that is reliable, free and green.
use renewable energy to empower ... communities

used to depend on diesel generators which were costly and polluted the air.
+++


Let There Be Light For Everyone

Long living in unelectrified caves and tents - despite Israeli power lines overhead - residents of the West Bank village of Susya now have lights, refrigeration and other amenities thanks to solar panels and wind turbines installed by Comet-ME, a group of Israeli-Palestinian activists and scientists. Working with locals, Community, Energy and Technology in the Middle East seeks to empower the poorest communities in the occupied territories through green energy that can churn butter, charge cell phones, maybe even build bridges. Great photos and more on their web site here.
===

The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.     The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.

The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.    The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.


The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.     The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.



Bringing green power to West Bank village

SUSYA, West Bank — Residents of a West Bank village with no electricity have been helped out of the darkness by unlikely benefactors — a group of Israelis who installed solar panels and wind turbines to illuminate the Palestinians' makeshift homes.

The villagers of Susya live in tents and caves with power lines darting right above their dwellings, connecting a nearby Jewish settlement to the power grid while bypassing them entirely.

It was this lack of basic services that drew the physicists from Comet-ME, a group of pro-peace Israeli scientists and activists, to this dusty, desolate area. Now the entire village of 300 people has access to power that is reliable, free and green.

At night, rudimentary streetlights dot the otherwise pitch-black village and each home is lit by an energy-saving bulb. Villagers have no access to phone lines, but the power allows them to charge their cell phones.

"Life is easier now," said Susya villagers Widad Nawaja, standing below the solar panel that powers her home. "We have light. Children can do their homework at night if they couldn't finish it during the day."

The residents also hope the new amenities will help them make more money: an electric butter churner means they can produce butter faster than by hand, and two green-powered refrigerators can preserve their produce until it can be sold.

"The communities here are in deep poverty. The project is targeted to help them make more revenue from their own work," said Noam Dotan, an activist and physicist with Comet-ME.

Comet-ME says it seeks to use renewable energy to empower Palestinian communities like this one, which is among the poorest in the West Bank.

The West Bank, home to some 2.5 million Palestinians, is controlled by the Israeli military, with the Western-backed Palestinian Authority governing some areas. Some 300,000 Israeli settlers also live in the territory. The Palestinians want to make the West Bank part of their future state.

Israel provides power to Jewish settlements and military facilities in the West Bank, as well as to most Palestinian cities and towns.

But Comet-ME says some 500 Palestinian families in communities not officially recognized by the Israeli military authorities in this part of the southern West Bank are forced to live off the grid. The Israeli military said it never received a request for power from the community and if it did, the army would study it "in accordance with the relevant laws."

Susya villagers used to depend on diesel generators which were costly and polluted the air.

The community has faced a series of evictions by the military and has clashed with Jewish settlers in the past. But the villagers and the activists say the work to set up the new power system — done by both Israelis and Palestinians — helped temper mistrust.

"This is an example of the coexistence between Arabs and Jews, and this is a very important thing," said Mohammad Ahmed Nasser Nawaja, wearing a traditional Arab robe and carrying the cell phone he charged thanks to the new power system.

Meanwhile, word has spread to other villages lacking electricity. Comet-ME hopes to power up the remaining off-grid families in this area over the next four years.



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Let There Be Free, Green Light, Electricity, Refrigeration For Poorest Communities In Palestine & The World

lights, refrigeration and other amenities thanks to solar panels and wind turbines
empower the poorest communities
the entire village of 300 people has access to power that is reliable, free and green.
use renewable energy to empower ... communities

used to depend on diesel generators which were costly and polluted the air.
+++


Let There Be Light

Long living in unelectrified caves and tents - despite Israeli power lines overhead - residents of the West Bank village of Susya now have lights, refrigeration and other amenities thanks to solar panels and wind turbines installed by Comet-ME, a group of Israeli-Palestinian activists and scientists. Working with locals, Community, Energy and Technology in the Middle East seeks to empower the poorest communities in the occupied territories through green energy that can churn butter, charge cell phones, maybe even build bridges. Great photos and more on their web site here.
===

The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.     The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.

The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.    The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.


The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.    The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.


The installation of 20 renewable energy systems. South Hebron hills.  



Bringing green power to West Bank village

SUSYA, West Bank — Residents of a West Bank village with no electricity have been helped out of the darkness by unlikely benefactors — a group of Israelis who installed solar panels and wind turbines to illuminate the Palestinians' makeshift homes.

The villagers of Susya live in tents and caves with power lines darting right above their dwellings, connecting a nearby Jewish settlement to the power grid while bypassing them entirely.

It was this lack of basic services that drew the physicists from Comet-ME, a group of pro-peace Israeli scientists and activists, to this dusty, desolate area. Now the entire village of 300 people has access to power that is reliable, free and green.

At night, rudimentary streetlights dot the otherwise pitch-black village and each home is lit by an energy-saving bulb. Villagers have no access to phone lines, but the power allows them to charge their cell phones.

"Life is easier now," said Susya villagers Widad Nawaja, standing below the solar panel that powers her home. "We have light. Children can do their homework at night if they couldn't finish it during the day."

The residents also hope the new amenities will help them make more money: an electric butter churner means they can produce butter faster than by hand, and two green-powered refrigerators can preserve their produce until it can be sold.

"The communities here are in deep poverty. The project is targeted to help them make more revenue from their own work," said Noam Dotan, an activist and physicist with Comet-ME.

Comet-ME says it seeks to use renewable energy to empower Palestinian communities like this one, which is among the poorest in the West Bank.

The West Bank, home to some 2.5 million Palestinians, is controlled by the Israeli military, with the Western-backed Palestinian Authority governing some areas. Some 300,000 Israeli settlers also live in the territory. The Palestinians want to make the West Bank part of their future state.

Israel provides power to Jewish settlements and military facilities in the West Bank, as well as to most Palestinian cities and towns.

But Comet-ME says some 500 Palestinian families in communities not officially recognized by the Israeli military authorities in this part of the southern West Bank are forced to live off the grid. The Israeli military said it never received a request for power from the community and if it did, the army would study it "in accordance with the relevant laws."

Susya villagers used to depend on diesel generators which were costly and polluted the air.

The community has faced a series of evictions by the military and has clashed with Jewish settlers in the past. But the villagers and the activists say the work to set up the new power system — done by both Israelis and Palestinians — helped temper mistrust.

"This is an example of the coexistence between Arabs and Jews, and this is a very important thing," said Mohammad Ahmed Nasser Nawaja, wearing a traditional Arab robe and carrying the cell phone he charged thanks to the new power system.

Meanwhile, word has spread to other villages lacking electricity. Comet-ME hopes to power up the remaining off-grid families in this area over the next four years.



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Thursday, October 8, 2009

Gamed Stock Market & More Set To Collapse - The Biggest Sucker Rally Since The Great Depression

the bear strikes hardest when least expected. Pierre Corneille hit the nail on the head when he said that 'danger breeds best on too much confidence.'

Black Monday's or Thursday's wouldn't be called 'black' if they were expected. Market tops are always marked by extreme levels of optimism.

In January 2009, with the Dow Jones slightly above 9,000, the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter noticed elevated levels of optimism and warned of a severe decline with a target of Dow 6,700. Today, sentiment readings are even more extreme than they were in January. The implications are obvious.

If there is just one time you want to take a lesson from history, it is RIGHT NOW.

The parallels between today and the Great Depression are numerous and strikingly similar. This 5-minute history lesson might be the best investment you'll ever make.

This counter trend rally is likely to be the biggest one of the bear market which started two years ago. While we've seen the biggest rally of this bear, we have yet to experience the biggest decline. This decline may delay for another few days or weeks but it is certain to come.

Just when you thought it wasn't possible

The Dow Jones measured in ... Gold ... has already declined over 80%.

Japan's Nikkei has lost as much as 80% since its 1990 all-time high.

current dividend yields and P/E ratios shows that U.S. stocks are grossly overvalued.
+++



Allow Me to Introduce: The Biggest Sucker Rally Since The Great Depression

  • On 12:22 pm EDT, Wednesday October 7, 2009

It's been said (and perhaps you are getting tired of hearing it) that those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. If the parallels of the Great Depression continue to hold up as they have (and according to historical indicators they will), history doesn't have to repeat itself to severely hurt investors. A mere rhyme to the Great Depression would be enough to wipe out tons of portfolios.

But who cares about history when the market is up and the forecasts call for better days ahead. The Dow Jones (DJI: ^DJI) and S&P 500 (SNP: ^GSPC) have rallied over 55% while the Nasdaq (Nasdaq: ^IXIC) has soared nearly 70%. Wall Street is anxiously expecting another earnings season, which is expected to be predominantly good.

Reuters reports that 'earnings optimism lift Wall Street' while Credit Suisse encourages their clients to buy bullish Alcoa options in advance of Alcoa's profit reports.

If there is one thing we should have learned from history, it's that the bear strikes hardest when least expected. Pierre Corneille hit the nail on the head when he said that 'danger breeds best on too much confidence.'

Black Monday's or Thursday's wouldn't be called 'black' if they were expected. Market tops are always marked by extreme levels of optimism.

In January 2009, with the Dow Jones slightly above 9,000, the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter noticed elevated levels of optimism and warned of a severe decline with a target of Dow 6,700. Today, sentiment readings are even more extreme than they were in January. The implications are obvious.

If there is just one time you want to take a lesson from history, it is RIGHT NOW. The parallels between today and the Great Depression are numerous and strikingly similar. This 5-minute history lesson might be the best investment you'll ever make.

Parallels between the 1929 and 2007 market tops

Even though a major storm was brewing, prior to the 2007 market top, Wall Street saw no 'cloud in the sky.' In its Global Economics Report, released in the summer of 2007, Merrill Lynch's analysts published the following outlook: 'The Merrill Lynch global economics team believes that the economy will continue to grow in 2007 - with no sign of a significant cyclical slowdown.'

From 2007 to 2009, the major indexes declined some 50%.

On December 4, 1928, President Coolidge sent the following message on the state of the Union to the reconvening Congress: No Congress of the United States ever assembled, on surveying the state of the Union, has met with a more pleasing prospect than that which appears at the present time. You may regard the present with satisfaction and anticipate the future with optimism.'

A few days before leaving office in 1929, the parting President cheerfully observed that the economy was absolutely sound and that stocks were cheap at current prices.

Following the 1929 highs, the Dow Jones (NYSEArca: DIA - News) declined 48%.

Parallels between the 1930 and 2009 major bear market rallies

Following the initial 48% decline in 1929, the Dow Jones rallied 48% within a period of six months. This rally was powerful and retraced 52% of the Dow points lost in the initial decline. Even though the market was far from its previous highs, investors had once again gotten excited about owning stocks and felt confident that the market would continue to move higher.

On March 25, 1930, just a few weeks before the waterfall decline resumed, the New York Times reported that 'Wall Street was in a cheerful frame of mind as a result of numerous vague reports of improvement in business and industry.'

Once the bear market resumed, it erased another 86% of the Dow's value.

Following the 54% 2007 - 2009 decline, the Dow Jones rallied 54%. So far, the Dow has retraced 45% of the points lost in the initial decline. The 50% mark, a Fibonacci retracement level, often exercises a magical pull and provides an upper target for bear market rallies. The chart below compares the first six months of the two rallies, up to 8-15-09.

Similar to the 'vague reports of improvements' reported in 1930, today's 'good news' reports are merely an adaption to lower expectations; many consider it the new normal. Just like in 1930, vague reports of improvements (in 2009 they've become known as 'green shoots') are enough to propel stocks. For savvy investors, the parallels between the two declines and subsequent rallies are certainly too close for comfort.

The instigator - real estate

Did you know that the Great Depression was preceded by a great real estate boom centered in Florida? The Florida real estate bubble burst in 1926, three years before equities. Just as we've seen recently, investors took their leftovers from the real estate bust and poured it into stocks. Talk about jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire.

The Great Depression's Warren Buffett

Yes, the Great Depression had its own Warren Buffett - John D. Rockefeller. In his first public statement in decades, Mr. Rockefeller expressed his conviction 'that fundamental c