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Steven Gaal

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  1. Why Oncologists Don’t Like Baking Soda Cancer Treatment

    Baking-Soda-300x159.jpgDave Mihalovic, Prevent Disease
    Waking Times

    Even the most aggressive cancers which have metastasized have been reversed with baking soda cancer treatments. Although chemotherapy is toxic to all cells, it represents the only measure that oncologists employ in their practice to almost all cancer patients. In fact, 9 out of 10 cancer patients agree to chemotherapy first without investigating other less invasive options.

    Doctors and pharmaceutical companies make money from it. That’s the only reason chemotherapy is still used. Not because it’s effective, decreases morbidity, mortality or diminishes any specific cancer rates. In fact, it does the opposite. Chemotherapy boosts cancer growth and long-term mortality rates and oncologists know it.

    A few years ago, University of Arizona Cancer Center member Dr. Mark Pagel received a $2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study the effectiveness of personalized baking soda cancer treatment for breast cancer. Obviously there are people in the know who have understood that sodium bicarbonate, that same stuff that can save a person’s life in the emergency room in a heartbeat, is a primary cancer treatment option of the safest and most effective kind.

    Studies have shown that dietary measures to boost bicarbonate levels can increase the pH of acidic tumors without upsetting the pH of the blood and healthy tissues. Animal models of human breast cancer show that oral sodium bicarbonate does indeed make tumors more alkaline and inhibit metastasis. Based on these studies, plus the fact that baking soda is safe and well tolerated, world renowned doctors such as Dr. Julian Whitaker have adopted successful cancer treatment protocols as part of an overall nutritional and immune support program for patients who are dealing with the disease. The Whitaker protocol uses 12 g (2 rounded teaspoons) of baking soda mixed in 2 cups water, along with a low-cal sweetener of your choice. (It’s quite salty tasting.) Sip this mixture over the course of an hour or two and repeat for a total of three times a day. One man claims he has found a cure for cancer using baking soda and molasses and actually successfully treated his own disease by using baking soda.

    When taken orally with water, especially water with high magnesium content, and when used transdermally in medicinal baths, sodium bicarbonate becomes a first-line medicinal for the treatment of cancer, and also kidney disease, diabetes, influenza and even the common cold. It is also a powerful buffer against radiation exposure, so everyone should be up to speed on its use. Everybody’s physiology is under heavy nuclear attack from strong radioactive winds that are circling the northern hemisphere.

    Dr. Robert J. Gillies and his colleagues have already demonstrated that pre-treatment of mice with baking soda results in the alkalinization of the area around tumors. The same researchers reported that bicarbonate increases tumor pH and also inhibits spontaneous metastases in mice with breast cancer.

    What is Baking Soda?

    Baking soda is a white crystalline solid that appears as fine powder. It is also called cooking soda, bread soda and bicarbonate of soda. Its chemical name is sodium bicarbonate or sodium hydrogen carbonate.

    Baking soda is different from washing soda (sodium carbonate) although they share the same slightly salty and alkaline taste.

    This widely used soda is commonly dissolved in mineral water and used as a leavening agent in baking. It works as a leavening agent by neutralizing the acidic components of batter. The neutralization releases carbon dioxide and leads to the “raising” or expansion of baked foods.

    Baking soda has also been used to soften vegetable and to tenderize meat.

    As a household chemical, baking soda is used as a cleaning agent. It is included in toothpastes for similar reasons where it serves as an antiseptic, acid-neutralizer, whitening agent and plaque-removing agent as well as a cleaning agent.

    Other common personal hygiene products in which baking soda can be found include deodorants and shampoos.

    Baking Soda and pH Medicine

    The pH of our tissues and body fluids is crucial and central because it affects and mirrors the state of our health or our inner cleanliness. The closer the pH is to 7.35-7.45, the higher our level of health and wellbeing. Staying within this range dramatically increases our ability to resist acute illnesses like colds and flues as well as the onset of cancer and other diseases. Keeping our pH within a healthy range also involves necessary lifestyle and dietary changes that will protect us over the long term while the use of sodium bicarbonate gives us a jump-start toward increased alkalinity.

    The pH scale is like a thermometer showing increases and decreases in the acid and alkaline content of fluids. Deviations above or below a 7.35-7.45 pH range in the tightly conxxxxxed blood can signal potentially serious and dangerous symptoms or states of disease. When the body can no longer effectively neutralize and eliminate the acids, it relocates them within the body’s extra-cellular fluids and connective tissue cells directly compromising cellular integrity. Conversely when the body becomes too alkaline from too much bicarbonate in the blood, metabolic alkalosis occurs, which can lead to severe consequences if not corrected quickly.

    Jon Barron presents a way of looking at pH that opens up one of the major benefits of alkaline water:

    Hydrogen ions tie up oxygen. That means that the more acid a liquid is, the less available the oxygen in it. Every cell in our body requires oxygen for life and to maintain optimum health. Combine that with what we know about hydrogen ions and we see that the more acid the blood (the lower its pH), the less oxygen is available for use by the cells. Without going into a discussion of the chemistry involved, just understand that it’s the same mechanism involved when acid rain “kills” a lake. The fish literally suffocate to death because the acid in the lake “binds up” all of the available oxygen. It’s not that the oxygen has gone anywhere; it’s just no longer available. Conversely, if you raise the pH of the lake (make it more alkaline), oxygen is now available and the lake comes back to life. Incidentally, it’s worth noting that cancer is related to an acid environment (lack of oxygen)–the higher the pH (the more oxygen present in the cells of the body), the harder it is for cancer to thrive.

    Understanding this is important for two reasons: (1) it reveals one of the primary benefits of alkaline water–more “available” oxygen in the system and (2) it explains why alkaline water helps fight cancer.

    How Baking Soda Can Help “Cure” Cancer

    Basically, malignant tumors represent masses of rapidly growing cells. The rapid rate of growth experienced by these cells means that cellular metabolism also proceeds at very high rates.

    Therefore, cancer cells are using a lot more carbohydrates and sugars to generate energy in the form of ATP (adenosine triphosphate).

    However, some of the compounds formed from the energy production include lactic acid and pyruvic acid. Under normal circumstances, these compounds are cleared and utilized as soon as they are produced. But cancer cells are experiencing metabolism at a much faster rate. Therefore, these organic acid accumulate in the immediate environment of the tumor.

    The high level of extracellular acidity around the tumor is one of the chief driving force behind the metastasis of cancer tumors.

    Basically, cancer cells need an acidic environment to grow and spread rapidly.

    Some cancer experts, therefore, believe that by buffering the tumor microenvironment with an alkalizing compound, the pH of tumors can be raised enough to starve them and stop their growth and spread.

    Curiously, this rather simple solution to cancer has been proven right.

    What is even more remarkable is that there is no need to cook up some fancy synthetic drug to lower the acidity in the immediate environment of the tumor. A simple, commonly obtained compound like sodium bicarbonate will do.

    Obviously, it is desirable to deliver the sodium bicarbonate as close to the tumor as possible since its pH-raising effect is needed in the microenvironment of the tumor. Therefore, directly injecting sodium bicarbonate in the tumor site is considered a better solution than oral administration. However, oral sodium bicarbonate is just safer and can be readily used at home.

    A 2009 study published in the journal, Cancer Research, is among the first to confirm that the alkalinizing effect of sodium bicarbonate can indeed stop cancer.

    By injecting sodium bicarbonate into a group of mice, the authors of the study were able to determine how the growth and spread of cancer tumors were effected by raising the pH of the organ affected by the cancer.

    The study results showed that baking soda indeed raised the pH and reduced spontaneous metastases in mice induced with breast cancer.

    The researchers also determined that sodium bicarbonate works by raising the pH outside cells and not within cells. This is an important finding because it suggests that sodium bicarbonate does not interfere with cellular metabolism even as it makes the microenvironment unconducive for tumor growth.

    Other findings from this study show that baking soda:

    • Reduced the involvement of the lymph node on the transport of cancer cells
    • Does not lower the levels of circulating tumor cells
    • Reduced the involvement of the liver and, therefore, the spread of tumor cells to other organs
    • Inhibit the colonization of other organs by circulating tumor cells

    The Baking Soda Formula for Cancer

    To make the baking soda natural cancer remedy at home, you need maple syrup, molasses or honey to go along with the baking soda.

    In Dr. Sircus’ book, he documented how one patient used baking soda and blackstrap molasses to fight the prostate cancer that had metastasized to his bones. On the first day, the patient mixed 1 teaspoon of baking soda with 1 teaspoon of molasses in a cup of water.

    He took this for another 3 days after which his saliva pH read 7.0 and his urine pH read 7.5.

    Encouraged by these results, the patient took the solution 2 times on day 5 instead of once daily. And from day 6 – 10, he took 2 teaspoons each of baking soda and molasses twice daily.

    By the 10th day, the patient’s pH had risen to 8.5 and the only side effects experienced were headaches and night sweat (similar to cesium therapy).

    The next day, the patient had a bone scan and too other medical tests. His results showed that his PSA (prostate-specific antigen, the protein used to determine the severity of prostate enlargement and prostate cancer) level was down from 22.3 at the point of diagnosis to 0.1.

    Another baking soda formula recommends mixing 90 teaspoons of maple syrup with 30 teaspoons of baking soda.

    To do this, the maple syrup must be heated to become less viscous. Then the baking syrup is added and stirred for 5 minutes until it is fully dissolved.

    This preparation should provide about 10-day worth of the baking soda remedy. 5 – 7 teaspoons per day is the recommended dose for cancer patients.

    Care should be taken when using the baking soda remedy to treat cancer. This is because sustaining a high pH level can itself cause metabolic alkalosis and electrolyte imbalance. These can result in edema and also affect the heart and blood pressure.

    One does not have to be a doctor to practice pH medicine. Every practitioner of the healing arts and every mother and father needs to understand how to use sodium bicarbonate. Bicarbonate deficiency is a real problem that deepens with age so it really does pay to understand and appreciate what baking soda is all about.

  2. Terminally ill benefit claimants asked when they expect to die, MP says

    http://unreportedtoday.com/category/middle-east

    Terminally ill welfare claimants are being asked by benefit assessors when precisely they are expected to die, according to evidence seen by Frank Field, the newly elected chairman of the work and pensions select committee.

    Field has written to the work and pensions secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, asking for an explanation. He told the Guardian: “There is absolutely no need for this level of intrusive and painful questioning by DWP officials. If I have had two such cases in my constituency in recent weeks; I dread to think how often this is happening around the country.”

    The Labour MP for Birkenhead said one of the complaints had come to him from a vicar on behalf of his sister.

    The two individuals were claiming for a personal independence payment (PIP) under the “special rules terminally ill” procedure. Both had submitted DS 1500 forms signed by their doctor – forms that need to be signed if the patients is regarded as suffering from a terminal illness.

    The DS 1500 asks for factual information and does not require the doctor to give a prognosis. It should contain details of the diagnosis, including whether the patient is aware of their condition and, if unaware, the name and address of the patient’s representative.

    It should also set out the current and proposed treatment, and brief details of clinical findings. A doctor is expected to believe that the patient is likely to die within six months, but once the form is submitted the Department for Work and…

  3. Insecticides Are Killing the Pollinators: How Bea-Killing Neonicotinoids Work

    Global Research
    Honeybee-cooling__735_350-400x190.jpg

    Want to understand how bee-killing neonicotinoids (a class of insecticide) work in less than two minutes, and why you should care that the EPA does nothing to reverse the damage that these pesticides have done to our pollinating insects? Watch this brief video that explains it all.

    Dr. Keith Tyrell explains how this new class of pesticides, neonicotinoids, which are considered “new” in that they have only been on the market for about 20 years, are taken up by plants as they grow. These ‘neonics’ are not like old pesticides because they become part of the plant itself, making it toxic. (Neonics are taken up by the roots or leaves and taken to all other parts of the plant.)

    see video

    https://youtu.be/pJhTpcpjZww

    Tyrell’s summary is a brief insight into why neonics are ‘bad for everything.’ The European Union has imposed a two-year moratorium on all neonics, but the US still allows them to be sprayed everywhere. In fact, the EPA has decided to allow more of these bee- and butterfly-killing chemicals to enter the environment despite clear dangers.

    In fact, they are the fastest growing class of pesticides in the United States. This, even though imidacloprid and acetamiprid – two types of neonics – could possibly be impairing the developing human nervous system.

    Neonicotinoid-pesticides-find-680-300x14

    Image credit: PakalertPress

    What’s worse – one study conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey found that neonics are widespread contaminants of groundwater which many people use to drink or bathe in. In nine rivers monitored in the Midwest, where neonics are most heavily used, the study found clothianidin in about three-quarters of monitored sites, thiamethoxam in about one-half, and imidacloprid in about one-quarter

    If numerous communities banning neonics due to pollinator-deaths, articles reporting on how the chemicals are killing millions bees, and 100+ organizations urging Obama to take action against the chemicals isn’t enough for the EPA to take action, then I’m not sure what it will take.

    If you haven’t yet taken the time to understand neonics, I urge you to take two minutes and do it now.

    =========================================================

    Follow us: @naturalsociety on Twitter | NaturalSociety on Facebook

    -------------------------------------------

  4. Helms and Tracy Barnes were enemies; Helms had Barnes fired once he became DCI, so I have a hard time believing that the two worked in concert in planning or carrying out the assassination.

    AGREE FOR RCN WAS SPYING ON THE HELMS OP. GAAL

    ++++++++++++++++++++

    • David Ferrie had the phone exchange for Thomas Karamessines
    • Thomas Hercules Karamessines was Helm's number two man.
    • Helms was part of the old guard loyal to Dulles
    • Helms had the power to overrule JJA in having a French Patsy,which IMHO JJA wanted.
    • Though JJA could assassinate ,said Dallas Operation was a "Plans" type of operation.
    • see
    • (RE HELMS /// BARNES) https://groups.googl...jfk/bXvsDBjY4q4 (CLICK THIS AT TOP Sam McClung it's becoming pretty obvious that tracy barnes was abe greenbaum mentioned by richard case nagell in )
    • BELOW ,Reviewed by James DiEugenio CTKA >>>> http://www.ctka.net/...l_review_2.html

    Another possibility is that someone in the know learned about Barnes' efforts and told him to back off.(James DiEugenio )(RE BARNES STOPPING PLOT ,GAAL)

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Who could overrule Barnes ? ANSWER HELMS (GAAL)

  5. Steven Gaal,

    I have no doubt Richard Helms would lie to protect the CIA. Any CIA operative would do that. That's a given. It's baked into the cake.

    Your #467 comment suggests Helms helped organize the JFK murder. That's treason. Helms was not a petulant child. I don't believe he would have committed treason.

    Might Helms have kept to himself what he knew about the assassination? You bet. That's not treason.

    It's one thing to know something. It's quite another to cause something to occur.

    Angleton and Phillips Shuffle off this Mortal Coil

    -

    http://www.ctka.net/2015/JimDMexicoCity/DestinyBetrayed16.html

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    It took fifteen years for Lopez and Hardway to begin to scrape away the bad odor. It took another fifteen years for the public to see that report. By that time, Angleton had passed away. But during the so-called "season of inquiry," that is the investigations of the Church Committee and the HSCA, his name finally became popular with the press in a way it never had been before. As mentioned previously, Angleton always wished to portray the Kennedy murder as the product of the KGB. And this is what he— with the help of David Phillips— had arranged for with the soufflé they had cooked up in Mexico City. But when, after the anesthesia of the Warren Commission finally began to wear off, and questions about the Kennedy assassination began to be asked, Angleton’s extensive but submerged role in all this began to be exposed. The surprising thing is that, even after his role in the case was finally revealed, he still insisted that the Russians had killed Kennedy. But during his all too brief inquisition— at the time of the Church Committee and HSCA— two famous incidents of resonance took place. In 1974 Director William Colby dismissed Angleton because of his zealous insistence that Russian defector Yuri Nosenko was not genuine. Nosenko gravely wounded Angleton’s KGB case since he said the Russians never seriously thought of employing Oswald. The dispute over Nosenko partially paralyzed the CIA. Colby fired not just Angleton, but his trusted assistants Ray Rocca and Scotty Miler. In the midst of the formation of the Church Committee, which would soon question him, and the possibility of a reopening of the Kennedy case, Angleton uttered his now famous and provocative phrase: "A mansion has many rooms … I’m not privy to who struck John."110 Angleton had dabbled in writing poetry for many years, and was a friend of T. S. Eliot. Therefore he knew how to be precise with words. What many thought he was suggesting was the following: Since he was now cut loose from any formal protection by the Agency, if they had any ideas about pinning the assassination on him, he was not going down by himself.

    This suspicion was furthered over the brouhaha over the so-called Hunt memorandum. In 1978, former CIA officer Victor Marchetti wrote an article saying that the Agency had decided on a limited hang out on the JFK murder. They would surrender Howard Hunt to the HSCA. The basis for this was the alleged surfacing of a 1966 internal CIA memo from Angleton to Richard Helms saying that no cover story had been constructed for Howard Hunt’s presence in Dallas on the day Kennedy was killed. No one had seen the memo prior to Marchetti writing his story in 1978. But Angleton did show it to author Joe Trento in that year. As he did, he told Trento, "Did you know that Howard Hunt was in Dallas on the day of the assassination?"111 Although the HSCA never did get this memo, a subsequent trial over Marchetti’s article did show that Hunt indeed had no alibi for where he was on the day Kennedy was killed.112 As Lisa Pease maintains in her two part essay on Angleton, this whole memo issue seems part of Angelton’s attempt to repeat his "Who struck John" warning.113 For Howard Hunt was not a part of Angleton’s unit of over 200 employees. As we have seen, Hunt was associated with Allen Dulles, Tracy Barnes, and later Richard Helms. The memo to Helms— whether real or concocted later— would insinuate Hunt’s covert action group in the assassination. Again, if Angleton was going to take the fall, he was going to bring others with him.

    ##############################################################################################################

    ##############################################################################################################

    http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=3658&p=141147 below

    ]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]

    P. 198-99 - "...(William) Hood could not explain why Oswald received such high-level attention. He told me he was puzzled that 'latest headquarters information' on Oswald had been omitted after such extensive consultation. Was it possible that Karamessines had omitted the latest information on Oswald because someone at headquarters was running an operation involving him?"

    "'Absolutly not,' Hood said. 'There's no reason to. If it was something at Helms's level there would be a reason not to tell somebody in teh field. But not at this level.'"

    "But the October 10 cable had reached the level of Tom Karamessines, who was Helms's most trusted deputy. Hood conceeded that 'the information that is left out is pretty significant.' The ommission os Oswald's encounter with the DRE, he said, was 'an anomaly....It really should have been sent in the cable.'"

    "Thus significant information about a man who would go on to kill the president of the United States six weeks later was deliberately denied to teh CIA's top man in Mexico. Hood could not explain why, save to say, 'I would like to think that 80% [of CIA cables] would be more competent.' But he insisted, 'I don't find anything smelly in it.'"

    P. 233 - "...As Angleton took over as the agency's liaison to the Warren Commission, he made sure its investigators never saw a key piece of paper: John Whitten's November 23 memo on how Tom Karamessines had ordered Win not to seek the arrest of Sylvia Duran so as to preserve 'US freedom to maneuver.' Whitten had noted his objections...."

    ================

    from thread

    http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=3658&p=25947

  6. Ron, do you think Angleton and/or Helms were involved?

    Everything I've read about Angleton only confuses me. What was he doing in Mary Pinchot Meyer's house looking for her diary after her murder? Did he expect to be named in the diary as a JFK assassin, as if Meyer would know? As for Helms, I think he at least must have known who did it (accessory after the fact). He was certainly involved in the cover-up.

    • David Ferrie had the phone exchange for Thomas Karamessines
    • Thomas Hercules Karamessines was Helm's number two man.
    • Helms was part of the old guard loyal to Dulles
    • Helms had the power to overrule JJA in having a French Patsy,which IMHO JJA wanted.
    • Though JJA could assassinate ,said Dallas Operation was a "Plans" type of operation.
    • see
    • (RE HELMS /// BARNES) https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.conspiracy.jfk/bXvsDBjY4q4 (CLICK THIS AT TOP Sam McClung it's becoming pretty obvious that tracy barnes was abe greenbaum mentioned by richard case nagell in )
    • BELOW ,Reviewed by James DiEugenio CTKA >>>> http://www.ctka.net/2009/russell_review_2.html

    Another possibility is that someone in the know learned about Barnes' efforts and told him to back off. (RE BARNES STOPPING PLOT)

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Who could overrule Barnes ? ANSWER HELMS (GAAL)

  7. Cover Up – Mainstream Reporting on Fukushima a Joke

    http://www.activistpost.com/2015/07/cover-up-mainstream-reporting-on.html

    Fukushima-Radiation-2-300x263.pngBy Terrence Newton

    It has been over four years since the 9.0 magnitude Tōhoku earthquake and ensuing catastrophic tsunami leveled the Pacific coast of Japan, setting off a nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant. Radiation has been pouring into the ocean, into the earth below, and into the air for over 1500 days now and there is still zero sense of urgency on the part of the government and world leaders to seriously address this blooming catastrophe. All efforts to stop the meltdown and clean up the radiation have been left in the hands of TEPCO, Japan’s energy company that has been proven time and again to be inept and unprepared to confront a disaster of this sort.

    The mainstream media, for its part, appears to be complicit in a cover-up of the effects that Fukushima radiation is already having on our environment and on human and animal health, and instead insists on omitting most news on the matter, or seriously dumbing down reports of the fallout.

    For example, at CNN.com, a search for ‘Fukushima’ yields only 6 unique related stories for the entire calendar year of 2015 so far. Two of these stories focus on sensationalized footage of underwater robots assisting in the detection of radiation. A third story is ironically about the failure and loss of a first underwater robot. On April 14th, CNN ran a video report with 11 short segments entitled ‘New look inside Fukushima,’ which focused primarily on the lifestyle impact the disaster has had on Japan’s Fukushima prefecture. On February 24th, 2015 CNN ran a very short snippet entitled ‘Highly Radioactive Water Spill Sets Off Alarm at TEPCO Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant,’ which included this quote:

    With discharged water likely to have contained contaminated water, the regulatory body concluded that part of highly radioactive water flew into the plant’s port.
    It has yet to find out the cause of the situation.

    On January 20th, 2015, CNN ran an article about a TEPCO employee who died by falling inside a water storage tank at Fukushima.

    At the home page of FoxNews.com, you might see embarrassing photos of presidential candidates and stories about ISIS, shark attacks, motel shootouts and murder investigations, but very little pressing news about the impacts of Fukushima on public health. A search of their coverage of of Fukushima for 2015 includes a June 30th story about a cool looking new robot called the ‘Scorpion’ that promises to soon get a look at melted fuel inside the reactor. ‘Fukushima’ was tagged and mentioned in a Fox News video report on June 18th, 2015 covering the upcoming robot Olympics, which included the quote, ‘who isn’t excited about Terminator or Genesis?’

    A Fox News story about $1.6 billion in wasted cleanup funds in Japan was featured on March 24th, with a retraction published the following day to correct a misprint about who’s funds were allegedly squandered. On March 9th of this year, Fox News also ran a very concise anniversary piece on the disaster, mostly focusing on the prospect of new earthquakes, tsunamis, or volcanic eruptions that could potentially cause more damage to Japan’s nuclear infrastructure. In this article they did mention the ongoing fallout, as is fully quoted here:

    Radioactivity released as a result of the Fukushima accident continues to be a problem at the site, which the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) is decommissioning.


    A radioactive “puddle” was discovered in early March on the roof of one of the damaged buildings, TEPCO said. In late February, engineers also detected a rise in the radioactivity of drainage water,
    some of which went into the ocean.

    On June 11th and 12th, Fox News ran 2 articles about the proposed 30-40 year ‘roadmap’ to clean up Fukushima, featuring vague guesses as to how some of the major issues at the plant can be resolved.

    As examples, here are a couple of choice quotes:

    The volume of [radioactive] water grows by 300 tons daily. TEPCO runs it through treatment machines to remove most radioactive elements, and then stores it in thousands of tanks on the compound. Water leaks pose environmental concerns and health risks to workers.
    Nuclear experts say conxxxxxed release of the treated water into the ocean would be the ultimate solution.

    ===

    The 1,573 units of [highly radioactive and volatile] fuel rods — mostly used but some of them new — are considered among the highest risks at the plant, because they are uncovered within the reactor building. To remove them, the building roofs must be taken off and replaced with a cover that prevents radioactive dust from flying out. Each building is damaged differently and requires its own cover design and equipment.
    The government and plant operator TEPCO hope to start the process in 2018, three years later than planned.

    On April 13th, Fox News piped in along with CNN in about the loss of the radiation detecting robot. And on January 9th, again in concert with CNN, Fox News also covered the death of the TEPCO employee who fell in the water tank.

    The most recent report on Fukushima to be found at MSNBC.com is over a year old, and covers the 2014 anniversary of Fukushima in a short 186-word (including author bio) piece.

    CBSNews.com featured on article in 2015 about of the impact of radioactive fallout on birds in the vicinity of Fukushima, which is actually the most thorough report on Fukushima’s environmental impact to be found so far in the mainstream media for 2015.

    Even at the ever-popular DrudgeReport.com, 2015 coverage of the Fukushima catastrophe is light and fails to bring attention to the impacts on human and environmental health. A search on their site reveals 10 links (with 2 duplicate links) about Fukushima for 2015, with one link about the arrival of Fukushima contamination on the U.S. Pacific Coast, and another linking to an Independent.UK story about the importation of radioactive Japanese products into Great Britain.

    Behind the Glaring Omissions

    Hiding behind the glaring omissions of the mainstream press regarding Fukushima is the pressing reality that contamination from the event is severe, continual, on the rise, and already affecting North America. Many smaller and bizarre ecological are taking place as we speak, such as massive marine life die-offs on the Pacific Coastline of the U.S. and Canada, and the detection of radioactive material from Fukushima in our food supply, yet there is no connection between these events and Fukushima in the mainstream news.

    Independent Media Runs With the Story

    There is, however, plenty of news coming out about Fukushima and plenty of conversation taking place about the impact on the environment and on human health. It’s just not to be found in the mainstream media, who is unquestionably strongly influenced by the nuclear energy industry and the government, and apparently involved in one of the greatest media cover ups of all time.

    We know that the mainstream media has the power to rally the golden hordes into action, as is evident in their promotion of a race war and sensationalized coverage of ISIS and other government created threats. In fact, recent news events in the US prove just how malleable public outrage is when the elite wish to make a major pubic policy change or cause a major stir in our social fabric. Take for example the media’s efforts to shove non-issues like the Bruce Jenner sex change in our face.

    When it comes to nuclear radiation and the impact it is having on life and our food supply, the dumbing down of events in the mainstream media is exceptional, suggesting that they simply do not wish for the public to know the severity of the crisis, or that they don’t care for us to be forewarned enough to take precautionary measures.

  8. brain-726x400.jpg

    Compassion Alters Brain and Body
    ===
    Posted on

    July 6, 2015

    http://sorendreier.com/compassion-alters-the-brain-and-body/

    Author: Kathy Gilsinan

    =============================

    In 1992, the neuroscientist Richard Davidson got a challenge from the Dalai Lama. By that point, he’d spent his career asking why people respond to, in his words, “life’s slings and arrows” in different ways.

    Why are some people more resilient than others in the face of tragedy? And is resilience something you can gain through practice?

    The Dalai Lama had a different question for Davidson when he visited the Tibetan Buddhist spiritual leader at his residence in Dharamsala, India.

    “He said: ‘You’ve been using the tools of modern neuroscience to study depression, and anxiety, and fear. Why can’t you use those same tools to study kindness and compassion?’ … I did not have a very good answer. I said it was hard.”

    The Dalai Lama was interested in what the tools of modern neuroscience could reveal about the brains of people who spent years, in Davidson’s words, “cultivating well-being … cultivating qualities of the mind which promote a positive outlook.”

    The result was that, not long afterward, Davidson brought a series of Buddhist monks into his lab and strapped electrodes to their heads or treated them to a few hours in an MRI machine.

    “The best way to activate positive-emotion circuits in the brain is through generosity,” Davidson, who founded the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at University of Wisconsin, Madison, said in a talk at the Aspen Ideas Festival.

    “This is really a kind of exciting neuroscientific finding because there are pearls of wisdom in the contemplative tradition—the Dalai Lama frequently talks about this—that the best way for us to be happy is to be generous to others. And in fact the scientific evidence is in many ways bearing this out, and showing that there are systematic changes in the brain that are associated with acts of generosity.”

    Davidson and his colleagues ran a simple experiment on eight “long-term Buddhist practitioners” whose had spent an average of 34,000 hours in mental training. They asked the subjects to alternate between a meditative state and a neutral state in order to observe how the brain changed. One subject described his meditation as generating “a state in which love and compassion permeate the whole mind, with no other consideration, reasoning, or discursive thoughts.”

    Read More: Here

  9. US-Saudi Man-Made Famine Threatens 20 Million Yemenis

    =

    80 percent of people in the Arab world’s poorest country are in danger of starving to death under a US-backed and US-enabled blockade and bombing campaign

    • Have the CNN, BBC, NBC, Fox, Sky, etc told you about that?

    http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/us-saudi-man-made-famine-threatening-20-million-yemenis/ri8502

    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    alalam_635371605284214018_25f_4x3_0.jpg?
    No "We are the children" for the children of Yemen

    Obviously a news that doesn’t directly touch on Russia. However, obviously an enormously important one - this is the biggest humanitarian disaster in the world right now - but it’s getting barely any attention because the US is contributing to it in a mayor way. (The Saudi campaign in Yemen wouldn’t be possible without American diplomatic, intelligence and logistics backing.)

    Another interesting (albeit in the light of 20 million lives in danger far less key) angle is that despite repeatedly causing such tragedies (260,000 people died in 2010-12 Somalia famine after a sustained US-Ethiopian military intervention there made an even greater mess of that country and up to a million who died in the 1990s due to sanctions on Iraq passed after US destroyed chunks of the country’s civilian infrastructure) the US still thinks it can take the moral high ground against Russia.

    Preposterous! Even if Russia actually did everything the US accuses it of (and it doesn’t) it would be far, far cleaner than the US, which is the world’s premier killer today.

    This article originally appeared at Foreign Policy in Focus

    Twenty million people in Yemen, the poorest country in the Arab world, are at risk of dying from hunger or thirst. That’s 80 percent of the country’s population, which according to UN agencies badly needs emergency supplies of food and water, along with fuel and medicine.

    This almost unimaginable crisis sounds like something out of a disaster movie. But the cause isn’t an earthquake or a tsunami.

    The main reason for all this suffering is months of merciless bombardment and blockade led by the richest Arab countries — Saudi Arabia and its neighboring petro-princedoms — and backed by the United States. Washington’s providing the attackers with technical assistance, intelligence, and top-shelf armaments.

    The countries bombing Yemen are targeting a rebel group they claim is a proxy for Iran. The evidence for that is very thin.

    In fact, the conflict in Yemen is rooted in internal disputes. Try to stay with me…

    In 2011, a nationwide uprising akin to those in Tunisia and Egypt deposed the country’s autocratic leader, Ali Abdullah Saleh. There was no democratic election before his successor, the Saudi- and U.S.-backed Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, took over — he ran unopposed. And there was no relief from the terrible poverty, unemployment, and government corruption that brought about the popular revolt.

    So a few months ago, a reformist movement and militia called the Houthis — which had launched a handful of rebellions against Saleh in the past — took advantage of widespread discontent to conquer the capital, Sanaa. Hadi fled into exile, and the Saudis started bombing shortly thereafter.

    Since then, local militias in central and southern Yemen have fiercely resisted the Houthis and army units still loyal to Saleh, who is now allied with his former foes. Meanwhile, a local franchise of al-Qaeda is fighting everybody.

    In short, it’s terribly complicated, and the bombs aren’t helping.

    The Yemenis caught in this crossfire were already thirsty and hungry before the war — unlike their Saudi neighbors, they don’t have a lucrative oil supply. Now, with Yemen’s borders closed, its airports shut down, and Arab navies enforcing an embargo at sea, the situation is breathtaking in its desperation.

    Saudi Arabia and its friends, including the United States, support Hadi. Yet they have no discernible plan for winning beyond reducing Yemen to rubble and besieging civilians in the hope of securing the Houthis’ surrender.

    The Obama administration probably doesn’t believe the Saudis’ nonsense about the Houthis and Iran, but it’s shown no interest in stopping the war.

    In fact, the United States has even announced a full suspension of aid to Yemen for a year, undercutting its occasional murmurs of humanitarian concern. By endorsing this Saudi-led shooting match, Washington may hope to calm the Saudis’ nerves about the ongoing nuclear talks with Iran, which Saudi Arabia opposes.

    Is that what it’s come to, soothing a bully’s nerves just because it pumps a lot of oil?

    Instead, the Obama administration should withdraw its support for the bombing, lift the blockade, and broker a power-sharing agreement between Yemen’s competing factions. For the people of Yemen, it’s beyond urgent.

  10. Man Admits To Plotting To Massacre Muslims, Judge Sets Him Free Anyway

    =

    http://12160.info/page/man-admits-to-plotting-to-massacre-muslims-judge-sets-him-free-an

    Robert-Doggart.jpg

    Robert Rankin Doggart, a former candidate for Congress, admitted in federal court to “plotting the annihilation” of a village in New York that is home to many Muslims. Doggart’s plans included “burning down a school, a mosque and a cafeteria,” according to the criminal complaint.

    “We’re gonna be carrying an M4 with 500 rounds of ammunition, light armor piercing. A pistol with three extra magazines, and a machete. And if it gets down to the machete, we will cut them to shreds,” Doggart allegedly said according to the transcript of a wiretap cited in the complaint. He also allegedly tried to recruit other individuals to participate in his plot through a Facebook group.

    As part of a plea agreement, Doggart pled guilty to “interstate communication of threats” and faces up to five years in prison. He was in jail awaiting final sentencing.

    But a federal judge, Curtis Collier, may not accept the guilty plea. He’s ordered the prosecution and defense to produce briefs proving that Doggart was a “true threat.” Meanwhile, a different federal judge, Magistrate Susan K. Lee, released Doggart from jail “into the custody of two family members.”

    Lee had previously found that Doggart was a “danger to the community.” The government appealed the decision to release Doggart to Judge Collier, who affirmed Lee’s decision.

    Doggart’s release has drawn criticismMan Admits To Plotting To Massacre Muslims, Judge Sets Him Free Anyway

  11. Is Western media balanced on any scale?
    ======================================
    By Joe Emersberger, teleSUR
    ---------------------------------------------------------
    Western media bias against Venezuela is shameless.

    Two years ago, a news article about Venezuela in the Christian Science Monitor reported that “Globovisión, widely considered to be the last standing television station to aggressively criticize the Chávez regime, was sold to a group of businessmen believed to be friendly with the government.” It is only one sentence in one news article, but in a few ways it reveals that the western media has spent well over a decade parroting anything said by the Venezuelan opposition which is funded and staunchly backed by the US government. For one thing, Andrew Rosati, the reporter I quoted, refers to Venezuela’s democratically elected government as a “regime”. That alone indicates that coverage of the Venezuelan government has been almost one hundred percent negative. Would any reporter refer to “the Obama regime”, and would it ever get past an editor? The same applies to US allies. Good luck finding a western reporter who would dare call Israel’s government a “regime” in a news article.

    I’ve already written a piece explaining that Venezuelan opposition leaders appeared on major private broadcasters, Televen and Venevision, to accuse the government of murder, repression and theft while violent anti-government protests raged in February of 2014 – several months after the ownership change at Globovisión. These leaders were given ample time to speak and were treated very respectfully as they ferociously attacked the government. Venevision has the largest audience share for news of any public or private broadcaster in Venezuela. As of 2013, Televen also had a larger share than Globovisión. In other words, possibly without knowing it, Andrew Rosati, like countless other reporters, was spreading an outrageous lie. Globovisión was never the only major broadcaster where Venezuelans could easily find aggressive anti-government views. But what exactly happened to Globovisión since the ownership change in May of 2013?

    Researchers with the American University’s Center for Latin American and Latino Studies (CLALS) in Washington DC just released a study that found that
    Globovisión is not biased towards the Venezuelan government or the opposition since the ownership change. Opposition supporters immediately attacked the study for being commissioned by Globovisión even though the researchers tried to make the findings palatable to the hopelessly biased international media.

    The CLALS study examined coverage of four key events since the ownership change: the 2013 municipal elections, opposition protests in early 2014, internationally mediated talks between the government and opposition in the spring of 2014, and the shortages of goods during the summer of 2014.

    The researchers explained “we identified thirteen news or opinion programs that regularly covered contemporary political topics of interest to this study. Rather than randomly select broadcasts from these thirteen programs, however, we chose to focus on those with the highest viewership,..”.

    They then selected twenty five broadcasts for each period by using the following methodology “researchers listed all broadcasts of the three selected programs in chronologi­cal order over the entire period. Second, researchers used the random number generator function, ‘RAND(),’ which generates a random number between 0 and 1 for each broadcast. Third, research­ers sorted all broadcasts in ascending order based on these random numbers and selected the first twenty-five broadcasts within each critical juncture.”

    Weights were then assigned to the randomly selected broadcasts in an attempt to objectively answer the following questions:

    • Does Globovisión provide regular and fair coverage and airtime of the opposition in Venezuela re: stories, policies and interviews?
    • Does Globovisión provide coverage that presents the government in a negative light or holds it accountable?
    • Is there balance in the airtime afforded to opposition and government coverage?
    The answer to each question was “yes” according to the study, but it is interesting how the researchers decided to sell their findings. In a piece entitled “Globovisión is balanced, but on what scale?” the researchers stated “analysts and sectors of the general public have assumed the channel is now heavily slanted in favor of the government. According to our study of Globovisión’s coverage, this perception needs to be rethought.” It is not clear if they are referring to “analysts” and the “general public” in Venezuela alone or abroad. However, the most important conclusion to be drawn from their study is that international media reporting has been shockingly biased and inaccurate about Venezuelan TV news. The researchers either ignored that conclusion or expressed it with remarkable timidity. When a German broadcaster, for example, said in February that Globovisión had been turned into a “government mouthpiece” it was saying what the western media’s reporting would lead anyone to believe.

    The CLALS researchers also wrote in their piece that “While Globovisión offered coverage of major news stories during these four periods, two important holes in the news coverage need underscoring. The case of Leopoldo López, arguably the most critical individual example for human rights, received comparatively less visibility than it did on two international outlets Globovisión competes with—CNN in Spanish and NTN24. Likewise, Governor Henrique Capriles, the opposition’s 2012 and 2013 Presidential candidate, was not interviewed in-studio during the periods we studied–a notable absence given his still significant political profile.”

    The standard the CLALS researchers use to decide if Leopoldo Lopez gets enough attention is an international media that depicts Globovisión as a government mouthpiece. That’s a risible standard as the researchers must know. And why should any decent person consider Leopoldo López’s imprisonment, even if you accept the extremely dubious assumption that it’s a human rights violation, to be more important than the assassination of Sabino Romero? The trial and sentencing of some of Romero’s killers took place during the period CLALS investigated. He was never mentioned in the study.

    As for Capriles, he did appear in the broadcasts sampled by the researchers but they chose to “underscore” that they didn’t pick up any “in-studio” interviews. During the time period that CLALS investigated, Capriles was a twice-defeated presidential candidate. Anywhere in the world, media coverage of defeated presidential candidates tends to fall quite drastically. The violent protests of 2014 also revealed deep tactical divisions within the opposition that alienated Capriles from a vocal segment of it. Among government opponents, Capriles does not have the stature that Hugo Chávez acquired among government supporters – that of undisputed leader.

    It appears the CLALS researchers want to give western journalists a way to publicize the study without having to “underscore” very damning conclusions about the international media’s coverage of Venezuela. That suggests the researchers either share the bias against Venezuela’s government, or feel strongly obliged to cater to that bias.

    At any rate, reporting about Venezuela has been so terrible that it doesn’t take rigorous study of Globovisión’s content to expose it. Just consider one lengthy interview that opposition legislator Julio Borges gave on Globovisión early this year. Borges used the interview to spread drug smuggling allegations against National Assembly President Diosdado Cabello, the same allegations spread by the Wall Street Journal. Rely on the international press and you’d never believe that interview could take place on any Venezuelan TV network.


    Source URL
  12. Number of young homeless people in Britain is 'more than three times the official figures'

    The true number of young people who are homeless far exceeds government figures, according to a major new study by housing experts at Cambridge University being released on Monday.
    Some 83,000 homeless young people have had to rely on councils and charities for a roof over their heads during the past year – more than three times the 26,852 young people recorded in homeless figures released by the Department for Communities and Local Government. And there are about 35,000 young people in homeless accommodation at any one time across Britain.
    The “worryingly high” levels of young people using homelessness services across Britain is “a minimum estimate and it is likely that in reality more homeless young people access support across the UK”, the research said.
    The study, by Cambridge University’s Centre for Housing and Planning Research, was commissioned by the homeless charity Centrepoint and provides the most comprehensive picture of youth homelessness to date. It draws on official figures in conjunction with examinations of 40 local authorities and a national poll of more than 2,000 16- to 25-year-olds.
    The research looked at homelessness during the course of a year, including rough sleeping, staying in hostels and “sofa-surfing”.
    Government figures do not capture those who do not meet narrow criteria for being homeless which would force councils to help them. Many homeless people do not come into contact with their local authority, and those that do are often considered to be “intentionally homeless” or not in a “priority need” category such as being under 18 or pregnant, the study says.
    More than one in seven young people (17 per cent) have slept rough, including in places such as cars or squats, during the past year, according to a ComRes survey done for the study. “When the poll data was scaled up to reflect the wider population, an estimated 1.3 million young people aged 16 to 24 have slept rough during the past year,” said the research.
    Collecting “coherent national data on youth homelessness” is essential if the true scale of the problem is to be understood and funded accordingly so that young people receive the support they urgently need, the research concluded.
    “Successive governments have been making policy in the dark as they have failed to grasp the sheer scale of youth homelessness in the UK,” said Balbir Chatrik, policy director of Centrepoint. “We’re seeing the consequences of funding decisions based on this lack of knowledge which have placed extreme pressure on charities and local authorities, with the majority of hostels full or oversubscribed.
    “Young people typically find themselves facing homelessness through no fault of their own. As a society, we owe them a national safety net devised from more than just guesswork.”
    Responding to the findings, Campbell Robb, the chief executive of Shelter, said: “This research paints a grim picture of youth homelessness in the UK and demonstrates that the Government’s current plan to cut housing benefit for 18- to 21-year-olds could be nothing short of catastrophic – as it’s this which helps to pay for the hostel beds that keep young people off the streets.
    “If the Government really wants to help young people, its first priority should be to invest in the safe, secure and genuinely affordable homes that are so desperately needed, rather than stripping away the threadbare safety net they have at the moment.”
    This comes amid warnings in recent weeks that Britain is heading for a housing crisis, with the numbers of households in temporary accommodation at almost 65,000 – the highest since 2008.
    Communities Secretary Greg Clark, speaking at the Local Government Association’s annual conference on Friday, admitted that young people are being “exiled” from the places they come from to “find a home that they can afford”.
    In a statement, a government spokesman said: “Since 2010, we have increased spending to prevent homelessness, making over £500m available to local authorities and voluntary sector.”
    Other initiatives to help young homeless people include £14m to support 10,000 vulnerable individuals in privately rented homes, £15m to turn around the lives of 1,600 vulnerable homeless, and £40m shared among projects to support young people to work and study and hostel accommodation to get them off sleeping on the streets.
    Mo Ibrahim, 22, from London, came to Britain five years ago and in 2013 was thrown out of the family home.
    “I used to sleep at the back of my mum’s house in a park on a bench and it was really horrible. I was lucky that it was summer. I would go to the shelter to have something to eat. When I used to sleep over there I’d worry that someone would something to me.
  13. I am sorry to hear that Mr. Piper is dead. I was wondering what had happened to him, as he seemed to fall of the radar some years ago. I spoke with him briefly when I ordered my copy of FJ and my impression at the time was that whatever he was putting forth he sincerely believed, whether or not it was the complete truth.

    FJ has to me both a fascinating and extremely myopic view of the assassination -- in it, all roads lead to Mossad. MCP does make a fairly good case for JJA being the mastermind of the assassination, operating both as CI chief (keeping tabs on LHO, the patsy, for example) and as the head of the Israeli desk for CIA. I do think that idea has merit.

    However, in reading FJ, it can become frustrating to see every chapter return to Mossad. If they had returned to JJA, my thinking might be different. So I find FJ of significant but limited value. The real question to me is 'in what way could Mossad have been involved'?

    In terms of Israeli attitude toward JFK, it seems to me he was balanced in his approach, as have been Jimmie Carter and Prez. Obama, seeking equal rights and housing for the Palestinians as well as the Israeli's. JFK did zero in on Dimona early on, and I have no doubt that did not set well with Israel. We discovered, years later, through the statements of Mordechai Vanunu (whom I am still trying to help get released from Israel) that JFK was on the right track in trying to nail down inspections of Dimona. LBJ was gung-ho Israel and lightened up on them considerably.

    Underneath Israeli concerns about JFK is, of course, the fact that Joe Sr. was a Hitler appeaser. JFK was known to praise Hitler too, as in his "European Diary", written soon after WWII, he says "within a few years Hitler will emerge from the hatred that surrounds him now as one of the most significant figures who ever lived." (Prelude to Leadership, p 74)). ( I put that passage in my SS100X essay for CCC in 2001 and the editor immediately ordered me to delete it, so I knew then it was dynamite.)

    So did Israel/Mossad see JFK as a "Haman" and LBJ as their savior? I don't know, but it might not be out of the question. (Israel Knew LBJ was more on their side, Gaal)

  14. Putin: We don’t expect any change in hostile policies toward Russia
    By Staff Writers. RT
    RT.com
    Saturday, Jul 4, 2015
    putin.si_1.jpg Russian President Vladimir Putin (RIA Novosti / Aleksey Nikolskyi)
    Russia is not expecting a soon change in the hostile policies it’s subject to, President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting of the country’s Security Council, adding that Moscow is not going to “trade its sovereignty.”

    “We cannot expect a change in the hostile policies of some of our geopolitical opponents in the immediate future,” Putin said, without elaborating on the countries he was referring to.

    “The reasons for pressuring Russia are clear: the country is conducting an independent policy and doesn’t trade its sovereignty. This is not to everyone’s liking, but it can’t be any other way,” he said.

    Putin pointed to what he called attempts to split Russian society “to find the weak link,” but maintained that they had not yielded the desired results. Those attempts came from those who introduced and continue to support “restrictive measures” against Russia, the president said.

    Russia should look into all challenges it now faces and define the strategy of the country’s national security, Putin said.

    “It is necessary to quickly analyze the entire spectrum of potential challenges and risks – political, economic and informational, and others, and on this basis to adjust the strategy of the national security.”

    Putin’s statement comes after the Pentagon unveiled its new military strategy where it said that Russia, North Korea and Iran are among its new challenges together with non-state groups – particularly the “violent extremist organizations” such as Islamic State and the Taliban.


    Countries that have introduced sanctions on Russia over the Ukraine crisis:
    EU, US, Australia, Canada, Albania, Iceland, Montenegro, Norway, Ukraine, Switzerland, Japan
    Sanctions include travel bans for individuals and asset freezes for companies considered to be involved in the ongoing crisis in the east of Ukraine and Crimea seceding from the country.
    The document blamed Russia for violating “numerous agreements” with its “military actions.”

    The countries who initiated anti-Russian sanctions have provoked the Ukrainian crisis, Putin said, and now they don’t even try to analyze what is happening.

    “Those who are implementing these restrictive measures toward Russia, sanctions – they are, in fact, the culprits of all the events we are witnessing in the east of Ukraine.”

    Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev declared that the pressure on Russia is aimed at changing the country’s leadership.

    "Sanctions toward Russia are aimed at reducing our economic potential, to influence the policy we have been conducting. Well, in fact, [sanctions aim] to change the leadership in our country, " he said, adding that the country needs to work out a 15-year economic security strategy.


    Source URL
  15. So, Steven Gaal,

    Do you think Piper was correct? That Mossad was instrumental in killing JFK?

    Its very odd that you seem never to have read my posts.

    ----------------------------------------------------------------------

    • CEO OF ASSASSINATION DULLES /// Dulles in contact with Averell Harriman,Bundy,Casey. Has ultra secret personal operatives paid from stolen Japanese gold.
    • HELMS COORDINATES/compartmentalizes: ONI,Collins Radio Dallas Security, Hughes Security, Transnationally Protected Narcotics covert operations* (RUBY),Empire Trust.
    • JCS via Dulles man Taylor has back up hit team (Trade Mart) and military observes in DP and theater.
    • JJA coordinates patsy operation and is overruled in having FRENCH intel patsy.
    • ONI acquiesces into CIA using TSBD (see Spiders Web by William Weston)
    • Empire Trust becomes involved after JFK touches Federal Reserve.
    • JCS/NAVY coordinates unreported pre autopsy covering up right front wound.

    ================================================================================

    (There was also a photographic honey traps covert operation associated with the protected narcotics trade) *

  16. FROM THE kook loon Newsweek

    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    Fluoridation May Not Prevent Cavities, Scientific Review Shows

    By Douglas Main 6/29/15 at 2:57 PM
    Tech & Science
    There is little recent or high-quality evidence that fluoridation reduces tooth decay, according to a review. Shannon Stapleton / REUTERS

    If you’re like two-thirds of Americans, fluoride is added to your tap water for the purpose of reducing cavities. But the scientific rationale for putting it there may be outdated, and no longer as clear-cut as was once thought.

    Water fluoridation, which first began in 1945 in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and expanded nationwide over the years, has always been controversial. Those opposed to the process have argued—and a growing number of studies have suggested—that the chemical may present a number of health risks, for example interfering with the endocrine system and increasing the risk of impaired brain function; two studies in the last few months, for example, have linked fluoridation to ADHD and underactive thyroid. Others argue against water fluoridation on ethical grounds, saying the process forces people to consume a substance they may not know is there—or that they’d rather avoid.

    Despite concerns about safety and ethics, many are content to continue fluoridation because of its purported benefit: that it reduces tooth decay. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Division of Oral Health, the main government body responsible for the process, says it’s “safe and effective.”

    Try Newsweek for only $1.25 per week

    You might think, then, that fluoridated water's efficacy as a cavity preventer would be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. But new research suggests that assumption is dramatically misguided; while using fluoridated toothpaste has been proven to be good for oral health, consuming fluoridated water may have no positive impact.

    The Cochrane Collaboration, a group of doctors and researchers known for their comprehensive reviews—which are widely regarded as the gold standard of scientific rigor in assessing effectiveness of public health policies—recently set out to find out if fluoridation reduces cavities. They reviewed every study done on fluoridation that they could find, and then winnowed down the collection to only the most comprehensive, well-designed and reliable papers. Then they analyzed these studies’ results, and published their conclusion in a review earlier this month.

    The review identified only three studies since 1975—of sufficient quality to be included—that addressed the effectiveness of fluoridation on tooth decay in the population at large. These papers determined that fluoridation does not reduce cavities to a statistically significant degree in permanent teeth, says study co-author Anne-Marie Glenny, a health science researcher at Manchester University in the United Kingdom. The authors found only seven other studies worthy of inclusion dating prior to 1975.

    The authors also found only two studies since 1975 that looked at the effectiveness of reducing cavities in baby teeth, and found fluoridation to have no statistically significant impact here, either.

    The scientists also found “insufficient evidence” that fluoridation reduces tooth decay in adults (children excluded).

    “From the review, we’re unable to determine whether water fluoridation has an impact on caries levels in adults,” Glenny says. (“Tooth decay,” “cavities” and “caries” all mean the same thing: breakdown of enamel by mouth-dwelling microbes.)

    “Frankly, this is pretty shocking,” says Thomas Zoeller, a scientist at UMass-Amherst uninvolved in the work. “This study does not support the use of fluoride in drinking water.” Trevor Sheldon concurred. Sheldon is the dean of the Hull York Medical School in the United Kingdom who led the advisory board that conducted a systematic review of water fluoridation in 2000, that came to similar conclusions as the Cochrane review. The lack of good evidence of effectiveness has shocked him. “I had assumed because of everything I’d heard that water fluoridation reduces cavities but I was completely amazed by the lack of evidence,” he says. “My prior view was completely reversed."

    “There’s really hardly any evidence” the practice works, Sheldon adds. “And if anything there may be some evidence the other way.” One 2001 study covered in the Cochrane review of two neighboring British Columbia communities found that when fluoridation was stopped in one city, cavity prevalence actually went down slightly amongst schoolchildren, while cavity rates in the fluoridated community remained stable.

    Nacho Doce / Reuters

    Overall the review suggests that stopping fluoridation would be unlikely to increase the risk of tooth decay, says Kathleen Thiessen, a senior scientist at the Oak Ridge Center for Risk Analysis, which does human health risk assessments of environmental contaminants.

    “The sad story is that very little has been done in recent years to ensure that fluoridation is still needed [or] to ensure that adverse effects do not happen,” says Dr. Philippe Grandjean, an environmental health researcher and physician at Harvard University.

    The scientists also couldn’t find enough evidence to support the oft-repeated notion that fluoridation reduces dental health disparities among different socioeconomic groups, which the CDC and others use as a rationale for fluoridating water.

    “The fact that there is insufficient information to determine whether fluoridation reduces social inequalities in dental health is troublesome given that this is often cited as a reason for fluoridating water,” say Christine Till and Ashley Malin, researchers at Toronto’s York University.

    Studies that attest to the effectiveness of fluoridation were generally done before the widespread usage of fluoride-containing dental products like rinses and toothpastes in the 1970s and later, according to the recent Cochrane study. So while it may have once made sense to add fluoride to water, it no longer appears to be necessary or useful, Thiessen says.

    It has also become clear in the last 15 years that fluoride primarily acts topically, according to the CDC. It reacts with the surface of the tooth enamel, making it more resistant to acids excreted by bacteria. Thus, there's no good reason to swallow fluoride and subject every tissue of your body to it, Thiessen says.

    Another 2009 review by the Cochrane group clearly shows that fluoride toothpaste prevents cavities, serving as a useful counterpoint to fluoridation’s uncertain benefits. Another study that year which tracked the fluoride consumption of more than 600 schoolchildren in Iowa showed there was no significant link between fluoride ingestion and tooth decay.

    Across all nine studies included in the review looking at caries reductions in children's permanent choppers, there was evidence linking fluoridation to 26 percent decline in the prevalence of decayed, missing or filled permanent teeth. But the researchers say they have serious doubts about the validity of this number. They write: “We have limited confidence in the size of this effect due to the high risk of bias within the studies and the lack of contemporary evidence.” Six of the nine studies were from before 1975, before fluoride toothpaste was widely available.

    The review also found fluoridation was associated with a 14 percent increase in the number of children without any cavities. But more than two-thirds percent of the studies showing this took place more than 40 years ago, and are not of high quality.

    Nearly all these papers were flawed in significant ways. For example, 70 percent of the cavity-reducing studies made no effort to control for important confounding factors such as dietary sources of fluoride other than tap water, diet in general (like how much sugar they consumed) or ethnicity.

    When it comes to fluoridation research, even the best studies are not high quality. Although this was already well-established, it doesn't seem to be well-known.

    “I couldn’t believe the low quality of the research” on fluoridation, Sheldon says.

    The data suggest that toothpaste, besides other preventative measures like dental sealants, flossing and avoiding sugar, are the real drivers in the decline of tooth decay in the past few decades, Thiessen says. Indeed, cavity rates have declined by similar amounts in countries with and without fluoridation.

    water-fluoridation-cavities.JPG?itok=hb- Rates of cavities have declined by similar amounts in countries with and without fluoridation. KK Cheng et al / BMJ

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    Meanwhile, dental health leaves much to be desired in widely fluoridated America: About 60 percent of American teenagers have had cavities, and 15 percent have untreated tooth decay.

    One thing the review definitively concluded: Fluoridation causes fluorosis.

    This condition occurs when fluoride interferes with the cells that produce enamel, creating white flecks on the teeth. On average, about 12 percent of people in fluoridated areas have fluorosis bad enough that it qualifies as an “aesthetic concern,” according to the review. According to Sheldon, that’s a “huge number.” A total of 40 percent of people in fluoridated areas have some level of fluorosis, though the majority of these cases are likely unnoticeable to the average person.

    In a smaller percentage of cases, fluorosis can be severe enough to cause structural damage, brown stains and mottling to the tooth.

    Sheldon says that if fluoridation were to be submitted anew for approval today, “nobody would even think about it” due to the shoddy evidence of effectiveness and obvious downside of fluorosis.

    There is also a definite issue of inequality when it comes to fluorosis. Blacks and Mexican-Americans have higher rates of both moderate and severe forms of the condition. Blacks also have higher levels. As of 2004, 58 percent of African-Americans had fluorosis, compared to 36 percent of whites, and the condition is becoming more common.

    The Cochrane review concerned itself only with oral health. It didn’t address other health problems associated with fluoride, which Grandjean says need to be researched.

    Many of the Cochrane study’s conclusions conflict with statements by the CDC, the American Dental Association and others that maintain fluoridation is safe and effective. The ADA, for example, maintains on its website that “thousands of studies” support fluoridation’s effectiveness—which is directly contradicted by the Cochrane findings. The ADA didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

    The CDC remains undeterred. “Nothing in the Cochrane review” reduces the government’s “confidence in water fluoridation as a valuable tool to prevent tooth decay in children as well as adults,” says Barbara Gooch, a dental researcher with CDC’s Division of Oral Health.

    The CDC and others “are somehow suspending disbelief,” Sheldon says. They are “all in the mindset that this is a really good thing, and just not accepting that they might be wrong.” Sheldon and others suggest pro-fluoridation beliefs are entrenched and will not easily change, despite the poor data quality and lack of evidence from the past 40 years.

    Derek Richards, the editor of the journal Evidence-Based Dentistry (published by the prestigious Nature group) concedes that “we haven’t got any current evidence” that fluoridation reduces cavities, “so we don’t know how much it’s reducing tooth decay at the moment,” he says. “But I have no qualms about that.” Richards reasons that because fluoridation may help reduce cavities in those who don’t use toothpaste or take other preventative measures, including many in lower socioeconomic groups, it’s likely still useful. He also argues that there’s no conclusive evidence of harm from fluoridation (other than fluorosis), so he doesn’t see a large downside.

    But most scientists interviewed for this article don’t necessarily think fluoridation’s uncertain benefits justify its continuation without more stringent evidence, and argue for more research into the matter.

    “When you have a public health intervention that’s applied to everybody, the burden of evidence to know that people are likely to benefit and not to be harmed is much higher, since people can’t choose,” Sheldon says. Everybody drinks water, after all, mostly from the tap. “Public health bodies need to have the courage to look at this review,” says Sheldon, “and be honest enough to say that this needs to be reconsidered.”

  17. Death raises questions

    Man who died in Cd'A motel was a conspiracy theorist

    Posted: Friday, July 3, 2015 12:00 am

    =

    Death raises questions JEFF SELLE and MAUREEN DOLAN/jselle@cdapress.com, mdolan@cdapress.com The Coeur d' Alene Press | 5 comments

    COEUR d'ALENE - A national celebrity journalist among conspiracy theorists, but considered an anti-Semite by some members of the Jewish community, Michael Collins Piper, 54, died alone in a local motel room in late May.

    The news is being quietly debated online, and in the tradition of Piper's life work, conspiracy theories about his death are starting to emerge.

    Piper was found by a housekeeper in room 216 of the Budget Saver Motel on Sherman Avenue on May 30, but had obviously died prior to that date, according to Coeur d'Alene Police reports.

    The manager of the motel told police that Piper checked in on May 14, and was scheduled to check out June 4. The manager told police he last recalled seeing Piper on the morning of May 29.

    When police went into the room to identify the body, Piper had strange blisters on his back that were weeping fluid, so the patrol officers called in detectives and contacted the coroner's office.

    "He had multiple blisters forming on his neck and right elbow," the responding officer wrote in his report. "Also, something appeared to be soaking through his shirt on his back."

    The officer reported that Coeur d'Alene Fire Department was also on the scene and said the blisters and stain on Piper's back looked "very odd."

    As police waited for the detectives to arrive at the scene, the responding officers contacted a guest, Chad Dalton, who had been living in room 217 for about a month. Dalton told police he had only met Piper briefly before his death, but he added that he did hear tapping noises coming from Piper's room around 11 p.m. the night before his body was found.

    When detectives arrived at the scene, they began taking photographs and investigating the room. They found several pieces of mail with the name Michael Collins Piper on them, and one of the detectives thought the name was familiar.

    "He remembered this name being related to a male who was a conspiracy theorist," the detective wrote, adding there didn't appear to be any signs of foul play, and the room was locked from the inside when the body was found.

    When Deputy Coroner Lynn Acevedo arrived she told detectives she thought the blisters were from accelerated decomposition of the body because its was 80-85 degrees in the room, and she said certain medical conditions could speed that process too.

    The detectives and coroner decided at that point to slate the body for an autopsy, but eventually the procedure was canceled.

    While moving the body, police found Piper's wallet, which contained a large amount of cash in $5 bills, and they were able to confirm Piper's identity. He also had a card in his wallet that said he had a heart valve replacement in April 2014.

    One detective looked through Piper's computer tablet and found additional information about him, including the fact that Piper had suffered a heart attack in 2013 and had diabetes.

    The coroner said diabetes would accelerate decomposition, but she would attempt to contact Piper's doctor to better understand his medical issues.

    "Michael appears to have had some medical issues with his heart and is a possible diabetic," the detective concluded in his report. "There was no evidence anyone was involved in a criminal act to cause the death of Michael, and this death appears to be of natural causes."

    After talking with his doctor, Acevedo told detectives that Piper was a non-compliant diabetic along with his heart ailment, and she was going to rule the death as "natural."

    Acevedo wrote in the coroner's report that the cause of death was a "probable Myocardial Infarction, Ischemic Cardiomyopathy and Coronary Artery Disease," and listed diabetes as another significant condition.

    The coroner's report also indicates that toxicology results were consistent with her findings and that no autopsy was conducted.

    "This case is being closed and there is no need for further investigation," the detective wrote in his final report.

    Another detective was able to contact Piper's close friend Mark Glenn, of Careywood, who told him that Piper had been living with him for approximately five months, but a house fire had forced Piper to find a new rental home in Coeur d'Alene on Seventh Street.

    Glenn told police that Piper had moved all his possessions into the house, and was living at the motel until he could get his things unpacked.

    "Glenn also told me Michael was in very bad health," his report said. "Michael was crippled to a point and could barely walk."

    Glenn did not respond to a Press request for an interview. On his blog, theuglytruth.wordpress.com, Glenn wrote that he helped move Piper to Idaho after Piper was terminated from his job at American Free Press. AFP is a weekly digital and print publication often cited as anti-Semitic. Glenn indicated Piper left the publication on bad terms.

    That termination and Piper's death have many of his readers now speculating if there was a conspiracy involved.

    "Did Israel Assassinate Michael Collins Piper," reads the headline in a story published by Veterans Today, a website that describes itself as a journal for the clandestine community.

    "Collins led the war against AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) and the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) and the Kosher mafia when others now considered 'experts' knew nothing at all," wrote Veterans Today senior editor Gordon Duff, in the article published June 3. "News quickly spread about his 'heart condition' and how he died of natural causes. Then again, Abe Foxman is still alive and Netanyahu's attic portrait is oozing hideousity."

    Duff wrote he believes Piper was likely murdered.

    "Moreover, I also believe his heart condition was induced as well," he added.

    The confusion prompted Wikipedia to flag the death information on Piper's page as unfounded and in need of citations. The website posted a link to its "talk page" for people to discuss the details of Piper's life and death.

    Piper's brother, Tom Piper, of Pennsylvania, said he could not tell The Press much about his brother's journalism career because he had moved away and spent most of his life in Washington, D.C.

    "I don't know anything about his career," he said.

  18. Unemployment Numbers Are Rigged

    by IWB · July 2, 2015

    I know you hear that the unemployment rate is a good indicator as a gage for the state of the economy.

    This is false, and here is why.

    Every month, the numbers are calculated. They only take into account those that are currently receiving unemployment compensation.

    They do not count those fired from work, quit due to medical condition or those who have run out of benefits.

    The answer is simple.

    On January 1, 2014, the extended benefits were discontinued, resulting in an overnight 1 million people dropping off the rolls. And, you thought it was because the economy was doing better…. right?

    http://www.workforcesecurity.doleta.gov/unemploy/supp_act.asp

    http://www.ibtimes.com/us-january-jobs-report-2014-unemployment-rate-falls-66-nonfarm-payrolls-rise-113k-1553925

    The numbers are rigged, and the legislation that is not passed to keep those on the rolls for extended periods, will not be passed in an election year, or any other time for that matter, because the powers that be are disconnected from the truth.

    You are lazy to them…

    You freeloader!

    Really, the collusion is thick. We are lied to and when I worked at Amazon a while back, I saw laborers, plenty of them with advanced degrees making a couple bucks over minimum.

    So, what we have is an economy based on a lie, and where under-employed is the norm… F*CK YOU OBAMA!!!

    Read more at http://investmentwatchblog.com/unemployment-numbers-are-rigged/#r1EOjM8P9eQvze2l.99

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    Every Statistic About The US Economy Is Now A Lie

    by IWB · July 1, 2015

    Please – all the growth that the US generates is by fudging inflation data:

    Let’s not forget that US inflation numbers are completely fake – so real US GDP is much, much lower:

    The Chapwood Index for 2014 was 9.7% and official CPI in the land of the free was only 0.8%. So the Nominal GDP of 5.6% for 2014 becomes real GDP of -4.1%.

    The revised real GDP for years 2011 to 2013 worked out to -6.2%, -6.5%, -6.5% respectively.

    What is the Chapwood Index?

    The Chapwood Index reflects the true cost-of-living increase in America. Updated and released twice a year, it reports the unadjusted actual cost and price fluctuation of the top 500 items on which Americans spend their after-tax dollars in the 50 largest cities in the nation.”

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-05-29/inaccurate-statistics-and-threa…

    The 1.26% inflation measure used to deflate first quarter nominal GDP is unrealistic, as Americans who make purchases are aware.

    A reasonable correction to the understated deflator gives a much higher first quarter contraction. The two main causes of inflation’s understatement are the substitution principle introduced during the Clinton regime and the hedonic adjustments ongoing since the 1980s that redefine price rises as quality improvements. Correcting for excessive hedonic adjustments gives a first quarter real GDP contraction of 5%. Correcting for hedonic and substitution adjustments gives a first quarter real GDP contraction of 8.5%.

    Realistic economic analysis is a rarity. The financial press echoes Wall Street, and Wall Street economists are paid to help sell financial instruments. Gloomy analysis is frowned upon. Even negative quarters are given a positive spin.

    http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2014/07/08/deteriorating-economic-outloo…

    Here is you real unemployment:

    Every statistic about the US economy is now a lie as David Stockman looks at 5.5% unemployment:

    At the present time, there are 210 million adult Americans between the ages of 16 and 68—to take a plausible measure of the potential work force. That amounts to 420 billion potential labor hours, if we accept the convention that all adults are at least theoretically capable of holding a full-time job (2,000 hours/year) and pulling their share of society’s need for production and work effort.

    By contrast, during 2014 only 240 billion hours were actually supplied to the US economy, according to the BLS estimates. Technically, therefore, there were 180 billion unemployed labor hours, meaning that the real unemployment rate was 42.9%, not 5.5%!


    Read more at http://investmentwatchblog.com/every-statistic-about-the-us-economy-is-now-a-lie/#ohI6MjGhx39SVpjR.99
  19. Birth control goes high tech, fertility chip comes with remote control

    By Rhodi Lee, Tech Times | July 8, 7:42 AM

    contraceptive.jpg?w=600

    Birth control goes high tech, fertility chip comes with remote control

    By Rhodi Lee, Tech Times | July 8, 7:42 AM

    A Massachusetts-based startup that specializes in long-term implantable drug delivery technology is developing an implantable birth control chip that can be switched on and off using a remote control.


    (Photo : Monik Markus)

    Women in ancient times are known to use acacia leaves, lint and honey to block sperm as a method of birth control but this rudimentary method of preventing pregnancy has gone a long way with the advent of new and more effective means of contraception available today including the use of pills, patches and intrauterine device (IUD).

    Yet it appears that there are still more room for improvement when it comes to contraceptives. A startup based in Lexington, Massachusetts is developing a new method of birth control that is too futuristic when compared with using leaves, lint and honey. The company is developing a contraceptive implant that is made up of a fertility chip that can be conxxxxxed using a remote control.

    MicroCHIPS, which specializes in long-term implantable drug delivery technology, has come up with a birth control chip that is implanted under the skin of the upper arm, abdomen or buttocks, and can be turned on and off using a wireless remote control.

    "Microchips' technology is based on proprietary reservoir arrays that are used to store and protect potent drugs within the body for long periods of time," MicroCHIPs explained its technology on its website. "Individual device reservoirs can be opened on demand or on a predetermined schedule to precisely control drug release or sensor activation."

    The device, which measures, 20 x 20 x 7 millimeters, dispenses 30 micrograms of the hormone levonorgestrel, which is also used in other contraceptive products, per day. The dosage, however, can be adjusted remotely by doctors.

    Unlike with women using other birth control implants such as IUD who need to see their doctor to have the device removed when they feel ready to conceive, women with the implanted fertility chip could simply turn it off using the remote control should they feel ready to have a baby. They can turn it on again if they do not wish to get pregnant.

    MicroCHIPS' fertility chip is also designed for long term use. While there are currently no hormonal birth control that lasts longer than five years, the device is designed to last up to 16 years after which it could be removed.

    Although the high tech contraceptive device is still under development, it is being readied for preclinical testing next year with the objective of making it available for public use by 2018. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation supports the development of the device under its Family Planning program.

  20. Record 93,626,000 Americans Not in Labor Force; Participation Rate Declines to 62.6%

    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    http://cnsnews.com/news/article/ali-meyer/record-93626000-americans-not-labor-force-participation-rate-declines-626

    (CNSNews.com) - A record 93,626,000 Americans 16 or older did not participate in the nation’s labor force in June, as the labor force participation rate dropped to 62.6 percent, a 38-year low, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

    In June, according to BLS, the nation’s civilian noninstitutional population, consisting of all people 16 or older who were not in the military or an institution, hit 250,663,000. Of those, 157,037,000 participated in the labor force by either holding a job or actively seeking one.

    The 157,037,000 who participated in the labor force equaled only 62.6 percent of the 250,663,000 civilian noninstitutional population, the lowest labor force participation rate seen in 38 years. It hasn’t been this low since October 1977 when the participation rate was 62.4 percent.

    Another 93,626,000 did not participate in the labor force. These Americans did not have a job and were not actively trying to find one.

    Of the 157,037,000 who did participate in the labor force, 148,739,000 had a job, and 8,299,000 did not have a job were actively seeking one—making them the nation’s unemployed.

    The 8,299,000 job seekers were 5.3 percent of the 157,037,000 actively participating in the labor force during the month. Thus, the unemployment rate was 5.3 percent which dropped from the 5.5 percent unemployment seen in May.

    The number of employed Americans dropped from 148,795,000 in May to 148,739,000 in June, a decline of 56,000. The number of unemployed Americans also dropped over the month from 8,674,000 in May to 8,299,000 in June, a decline of 375,000.

  21. This is news to me. Can you provide a source for this? Where was the Standard Fruit office Marguerite worked at located? Would love to see anything more you have on this.

    Some of the banking and other stuff you've mentioned is interesting, but falls well short of proof of much, at least in my opinion. Thanks! // HARGROVE

    ==============================

    http://quixoticjoust.blogspot.com/2012/05/colossal-failure-to-research-ekdahl.html

    =

    Following the failure of an attempt at running her own home business, "Oswald's Notion Shop," selling sewing notions and some candy, in the front room of their home for less than a year, Marguerite took what may have been her first job since her marriage to Robert E. Lee Oswald in 1933. Prior to the birth of her first son, John Edward Pic, she had, since before her 17th birthday, a receptionist at the large New Orleans law firm which represented the Standard Fruit Company as one of its clients.

    =========================

    1924: Marguerite finds work as a receptionist at the New Orleans law firm of Defour,

    Rosen, Wolff and Kammer.

    ============================================================

    I didnt put in all the Banking info I have (POSTED OVER YEARS ON THIS SITE) because the post would be called "thorough" sorry no,no , incoherent.Yup incoherent posts that the charge. // GAAL

  22. By WTStaff July 1, 2015

    Roundup’s Lesser-Known Cousin Is Coming to a Farm Near You

    roundup-herbiced-300x170.jpgJason Best, TakePart
    Waking Times

    It’s the next wave in a revolution of GMO crops—and it’s happening right under our noses.

    One of the world’s leading groups of cancer experts has just classified the industrial herbicide 2,4-D as a possible human carcinogen, and that’s got one of the world’s biggest ag-tech companies in an uproar. But why should we care about some corporate kerfuffle?

    Because the U.S. is about to be deluged with 2,4-D—an herbicide similar to Roundup but lacking the comfort of a consumer-facing, trademarked name.

    This week, the International Agency for Research on Cancer, an arm of the World Health Organization, released the results of its evaluation of three agricultural chemicals, including 2,4-D. The agency’s designation of the herbicide as “possibly carcinogenic to humans” is based on a review of the existing scientific evidence, which it deems “inadequate” in humans and “limited” in animal experiments—hence the emphasis on “possibly” carcinogenic. Nevertheless, the agency says, “There is strong evidence that 2,4-D induces oxidative stress, a mechanism that can operate in humans, and moderate evidence that 2,4-D causes immunosuppression, based on in vivo and in vitro studies.”

    No surprise: Ag-tech giant Dow AgroSciences has reacted swiftly, calling the findings hogwash. The company says the IARC’s conclusions are “inconsistent with government findings in nearly 100 countries,” according to the Midland Daily News.

    “No herbicide has been more thoroughly studied, and no national regulatory body in the world considers 2,4-D a carcinogen,”
    a Dow AgroSciences spokesman said in a statement.

    So, Why Should You Care? It’s not as though Dow is an impartial observer in all this. The company has millions of dollars in profit at stake in keeping farmers from worrying too much about dumping countless pounds of 2,4-D on their fields. Dow is in the midst of rolling out the next generation of genetically modified crops—its Enlist Duo patented line of crops—which are engineered to withstand heavy application of 2,4-D as well as the herbicide glyphosate, itself deemed a possible human carcinogen by the IARC a few months ago. It’s all part of a dramatic escalation of the ag-tech industry’s mad-scientist warfare on Mother Nature. In the late 1990s, Monsanto “revolutionized” agriculture with its introduction of Roundup Ready crops, which were genetically modified to tolerate being soaked in glyphosate.

    American consumers appear to be growing ever more wary of GMO crops, with an increasingly vocal number demanding the government step in and require companies to label any food that contains GMO ingredients. But the absence of such labeling thus far has arguably allowed Big Ag to engineer one of the most sweeping overhauls of agricultural production in the nation’s history—right under our noses. From virtually nothing just 20 years ago, today a staggering 90 percent of corn and 93 percent of soybeans grown in the U.S. are genetically modified.

    How has that worked out? As farmers have become more reliant than ever on glyphosate, they’ve unwittingly created a scourge of “superweeds” that have naturally developed their own resistance to the herbicide. Just as the overreliance of the livestock industry on antibiotics has given rise to the threat of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, some areas of the country are now plagued by weeds that glyphosate alone just can’t kill.

    Big Ag’s answer to this crisis (which only seems logical if you’re, well, a company whose profits depend on selling massive amounts of GMO seeds and the chemicals to go with them) has been to ramp up the chemical assault. Hence, Dow’s Enlist Duo, which combines glyphosate with 2,4-D in a bid to combat those resilient monster weeds.

    According to the USDA, the use of Dow’s new crop “system” will result in a tripling of the amount of 2,4-D being sprayed by 2020, and the increase could be as much as sixfold. Agricultural communities in areas where 2,4-D-resistant crops are planted would be exposed to eight times the amount of the “possible human carcinogen they are now. Nevertheless, the EPA in April expanded its approval of the use of Enlist Duo across an additional nine states, from North Dakota to Louisiana, bringing the total number of states where the chemical cocktail is approved to 15.

    That may not sound like mad science to Dow—or to the EPA, for that matter—but it does to plenty of others, including Mary Ellen Kustin, a senior policy analyst for the Environmental Working Group.

    “We have known for decades that 2,4-D is harmful to the environment and human health, especially for the farmers and farmworkers applying these chemicals to crops,”
    Kustin said in a
    .
    “Now that farmers are planting 2,4-D-tolerant GMO crops, this herbicide is slated to explode in use much the way glyphosate did with the first generation of GMO crops. And we know from experience—and basic biology—that weeds will soon grow resistant to these herbicides, making GMO crop growers only more dependent on the next chemical fix.”

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