Home closures, inflationary depression accelerating - no recovery in sight

From the National Inflation Association

7 foods that experts won't eat

1. Canned tomatoes

The resin linings of tin cans contain bisphenol-A, a synthetic estrogen that has been linked to ailments ranging from reproductive problems to heart disease, diabetes, and obesity. Unfortunately, acidity (a prominent characteristic of tomatoes) causes BPA to leach into your food. Studies show that the BPA in most people’s body exceeds the amount that suppresses sperm production or causes chromosomal damage to the eggs of animals. “You can get 50 mcg of BPA per liter out of a tomato can, and that’s a level that is going to impact people, particularly the young,” says vom Saal. “I won’t go near canned tomatoes.” Fredrick vom Saal, PhD, endocrinologist

2. Corn - fed beef

Cattle evolved to eat grass, not grains. But farmers today feed their animals corn and soybeans, which fatten up the animals faster for slaughter. More money for cattle farmers (and lower prices at the grocery store) means a lot less nutrition for us. A recent comprehensive study conducted by the USDA and researchers from Clemson University found that compared with corn-fed beef, grass-fed beef is higher in beta-carotene, vitamin E, omega-3s, conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), calcium, magnesium, and potassium; lower in inflammatory omega-6s; and lower in saturated fats that have been linked to heart disease. “We need to respect the fact that cows are herbivores, and that does not mean feeding them corn and chicken manure,” says Salatin. Joel Salatin, expert on sustainable farming

3. Microwave popcorn

Chemicals, including perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), in the lining of the bag, are part of a class of compounds that may be linked to infertility in humans, according to a recent study from UCLA. In animal testing, the chemicals cause liver, testicular, and pancreatic cancer. Studies show that microwaving causes the chemicals to vaporize—and migrate into your popcorn. “They stay in your body for years and accumulate there,” says Naidenko, which is why researchers worry that levels in humans could approach the amounts causing cancers in laboratory animals. DuPont and other manufacturers have promised to phase out PFOA by 2015 under a voluntary EPA plan, but millions of bags of popcorn will be sold between now and then. Olga Naidenko, PhD, Environmental Working Group

4. Non-organic potatoes

Root vegetables absorb herbicides, pesticides, and fungicides that wind up in soil. In the case of potatoes—the nation’s most popular vegetable—they’re treated with fungicides during the growing season, then sprayed with herbicides to kill off the fibrous vines before harvesting. After they’re dug up, the potatoes are treated yet again to prevent them from sprouting. “Try this experiment: Buy a conventional potato in a store, and try to get it to sprout. It won’t,” says Moyer, who is also farm director of the Rodale Institute (also owned by Rodale Inc., the publisher of Prevention). “I’ve talked with potato growers who say point-blank they would never eat the potatoes they sell. They have separate plots where they grow potatoes for themselves without all the chemicals.” Jeffrey Moyer, National Organic Standards

5. Farmed salmon

Nature didn’t intend for salmon to be crammed into pens and fed soy, poultry litter, and hydrolyzed chicken feathers. As a result, farmed salmon is lower in vitamin D and higher in contaminants, including carcinogens, PCBs, brominated flame retardants, and pesticides such as dioxin and DDT. According to Carpenter, the most contaminated fish come from Northern Europe, which can be found on American menus. “You can only safely eat one of these salmon dinners every 5 months without increasing your risk of cancer,” says Carpenter, whose 2004 fish contamination study got broad media attention. “It’s that bad.” Preliminary science has also linked DDT to diabetes and obesity, but some nutritionists believe the benefits of omega-3s outweigh the risks. There is also concern about the high level of antibiotics and pesticides used to treat these fish. When you eat farmed salmon, you get dosed with the same drugs and chemicals. David Carpenter MD

6. Milk produced with artificial hormones

Milk producers treat their dairy cattle with recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH or rBST, as it is also known) to boost milk production. But rBGH also increases udder infections and even pus in the milk. It also leads to higher levels of a hormone called insulin-like growth factor in milk. In people, high levels of IGF-1 may contribute to breast, prostate, and colon cancers. “When the government approved rBGH, it was thought that IGF-1 from milk would be broken down in the human digestive tract,” says North. As it turns out, the casein in milk protects most of it, according to several independent studies. “There’s not 100% proof that this is increasing cancer in humans,” admits North. “However, it’s banned in most industrialized countries.” Nick North Campaign for Safe Food

7. Conventional apples

If fall fruits held a “most doused in pesticides contest,” apples would win. Why? They are individually grafted (descended from a single tree) so that each variety maintains its distinctive flavor. As such, apples don’t develop resistance to pests and are sprayed frequently. The industry maintains that these residues are not harmful. But Kastel counters that it’s just common sense to minimize exposure by avoiding the most doused produce, like apples. “Farm workers have higher rates of many cancers,” he says. And increasing numbers of studies are starting to link a higher body burden of pesticides (from all sources) with Parkinson’s disease. Mark Kastel, Cornucopia Institute

On how to avoid these foods and for the full article, please click here.

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More FDA authority won't improve food safety
Say no to methyl iodide
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Interview with Shiv Chopra
10 organic foods that are worth the money
Teenagers carry 30% more BPA in their bodies than the rest of the population

2011: A brave new dystopia

By Chris Hedges

The two greatest visions of a future dystopia were George Orwell’s “1984” and Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World.” The debate, between those who watched our descent towards corporate totalitarianism, was who was right. Would we be, as Orwell wrote, dominated by a repressive surveillance and security state that used crude and violent forms of control? Or would we be, as Huxley envisioned, entranced by entertainment and spectacle, captivated by technology and seduced by profligate consumption to embrace our own oppression? It turns out Orwell and Huxley were both right. Huxley saw the first stage of our enslavement. Orwell saw the second.

We have been gradually disempowered by a corporate state that, as Huxley foresaw, seduced and manipulated us through sensual gratification, cheap mass-produced goods, boundless credit, political theater and amusement. While we were entertained, the regulations that once kept predatory corporate power in check were dismantled, the laws that once protected us were rewritten and we were impoverished. Now that credit is drying up, good jobs for the working class are gone forever and mass-produced goods are unaffordable, we find ourselves transported from “Brave New World” to “1984.” The state, crippled by massive deficits, endless war and corporate malfeasance, is sliding toward bankruptcy. It is time for Big Brother to take over from Huxley’s feelies, the orgy-porgy and the centrifugal bumble-puppy. We are moving from a society where we are skillfully manipulated by lies and illusions to one where we are overtly controlled.

Orwell warned of a world where books were banned. Huxley warned of a world where no one wanted to read books. Orwell warned of a state of permanent war and fear. Huxley warned of a culture diverted by mindless pleasure. Orwell warned of a state where every conversation and thought was monitored and dissent was brutally punished. Huxley warned of a state where a population, preoccupied by trivia and gossip, no longer cared about truth or information. Orwell saw us frightened into submission. Huxley saw us seduced into submission. But Huxley, we are discovering, was merely the prelude to Orwell. Huxley understood the process by which we would be complicit in our own enslavement. Orwell understood the enslavement. Now that the corporate coup is over, we stand naked and defenseless. We are beginning to understand, as Karl Marx knew, that unfettered and unregulated capitalism is a brutal and revolutionary force that exploits human beings and the natural world until exhaustion or collapse.

The corporate state does not find its expression in a demagogue or charismatic leader. It is defined by the anonymity and facelessness of the corporation. Corporations, who hire attractive spokespeople like Barack Obama, control the uses of science, technology, education and mass communication. They control the messages in movies and television. And, as in “Brave New World,” they use these tools of communication to bolster tyranny. Our systems of mass communication, as Wolin writes, “block out, eliminate whatever might introduce qualification, ambiguity, or dialogue, anything that might weaken or complicate the holistic force of their creation, to its total impression.”

The psychological torture of Pvt. Bradley Manning—who has now been imprisoned for seven months without being convicted of any crime—mirrors the breaking of the dissident Winston Smith at the end of “1984.” Manning is being held as a “maximum custody detainee” in the brig at Marine Corps Base Quantico, in Virginia. He spends 23 of every 24 hours alone. He is denied exercise. He cannot have a pillow or sheets for his bed. Army doctors have been plying him with antidepressants. The cruder forms of torture of the Gestapo have been replaced with refined Orwellian techniques, largely developed by government psychologists, to turn dissidents like Manning into vegetables. We break souls as well as bodies. It is more effective. Now we can all be taken to Orwell’s dreaded Room 101 to become compliant and harmless. These “special administrative measures” are regularly imposed on our dissidents, including Syed Fahad Hashmi, who was imprisoned under similar conditions for three years before going to trial. The techniques have psychologically maimed thousands of detainees in our black sites around the globe. They are the staple form of control in our maximum security prisons where the corporate state makes war on our most politically astute underclass—African-Americans. It all presages the shift from Huxley to Orwell.

“Never again will you be capable of ordinary human feeling,” Winston Smith’s torturer tells him in “1984.” “Everything will be dead inside you. Never again will you be capable of love, or friendship, or joy of living, or laughter, or curiosity, or courage, or integrity. You will be hollow. We shall squeeze you empty and then we shall fill you with ourselves.”

For more, please click here.

GM strain blows organic status away

GMO-s cannot be recalled or controlled. They spread in nature contaminating wild plants, non-GM and organic crops and destroying organic farmers' businesses. So how long till Monsanto and other biotech companies can claim all contaminated non-GM crops as their own?? This news is from Australia. 

By Natasha Bita

MUTANT canola crops genetically engineered to survive repeated sprayings of herbicide have been approved for planting.

This is despite the furore over GM contamination of an organic farm.

The West Australian Minister for Agriculture and Food, Terry Redman, has called on the organic industry to bend its rules to permit some GM material, declaring purity to be "unrealistic".

WA grain farmer Steve Marsh was stripped of his organic certification this week after GM canola seeds allegedly blew 1.5km over his boundary from a neighbouring property at Kojonup, southeast of Perth. He is now setting an Australian precedent by threatening to sue for damages.

"The GM industry must control its technology," Mr Marsh said yesterday.

"If a GM farmer wishes to grow it, that's his business, but he must be responsible that it doesn't impact on his neighbours."

Mr Marsh said he was considering legal action but was awaiting the results of a WA government investigation.

A spokeswoman for Monsanto -- which sells the GM canola seeds as well as the Roundup herbicide used to spray it for weeds -- yesterday said the multinational corporation would support the GM farmer if the case ended in legal action.

"The threshold for accidental presence in organic crops is an important issue which needs to be addressed to enable coexistence," the minister wrote in the letter, obtained by The Australian yesterday. "The European Union recently adopted a threshold of 0.9 per cent unintentional presence of approved GM material in organic products.

The federal Office of the Gene Technology Regulator yesterday approved a four-year trial of Monsanto's newest GM canola strain in NSW, Victoria and WA from next March.

To read the full article, click here.

US to Vatican: Genetically modified food is a "moral imperative"

Wikileaks cable reveals that the US was pressuring the Vatican to promote GMO crops amongst its millions of followers and in the third world.

By Mike Ludwig

Secret United States diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks detail efforts to promote genetically modified (GM) crops and biotechnology across the globe, including the Vatican, where US diplomats pushed the Roman Catholic Church to support biotech food in developing nations.

Cables from embassies in Spain, Austria and even Pakistan reveal the US diplomats have clearly sided with the biotech industry, even as court cases  and public debates over GM food raged in the US and abroad.

In 2005, a US diplomat and a USAID official met with Catholic leaders in Rome to discuss biotech foods, according to a leaked cable.  The diplomats reported that Catholic leaders said the science and safety of GM food would soon be a "non-issue" in the Vatican and signaled a cautious acceptance of biotech products despite active opposition among the faithful.

Preoccupation at the Vatican, they said, was tied more to economic arguments, as some fear that widespread use of GMO food in the developing world would subjugate its farmer population and become a form of economic imperialism simply serving to enrich multi-national corporations.

US diplomats pledged to continue pushing GM foods as a "moral imperative" to feed growing populations in order to counter opposition to the biotech food industry among Catholic activists and clergy.


To read the rest of the article, please click here.

The MRSA - animal factory farms connection

So where is antibiotic resistant bacteria coming from? Here is the answer.

By Dr John Mercola

Animals in factory farms are given doses of antibiotics -- both to keep them alive in stressful, unsanitary conditions, and to make them grow faster. The practice leads to new strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, such as the now-widespread form of staph (MRSA) known as ST398.

Federal regulators have in the past refused to release estimates of just how much antibiotics the livestock industry uses. But recently the FDA released its first-ever report on the topic. And the amount? Twenty-nine million pounds of antibiotics in 2009 alone.

MRSA ST398, also known as "the pig strain" of MRSA, was first discovered in pigs and pig-farm workers in the Netherlands in 2004. Since then, this livestock MRSA strain has spread across Europe, Canada and the United States, causing both mild and life-threatening infections, and has even been found in retail meat in Canada.

This livestock-acquired strain of MRSA (ST398) adds to an already troubling situation.

The human community-associated strain of MRSA, USA300, already affects close to 100,000 people a year in the US, and caused 18,600 deaths in 2005 alone. To put that number into perspective, HIV/AIDS killed 17,000 people that same year.

What's worse, it appears the various MRSA strains can be transmitted from humans to animals and vice versa, putting the health of both humans and animals (including pets) at ever increasing risk.

According to a 2009 University of Iowa study, 70 percent of hogs and 64 percent of workers in industrial animal confinements tested positive for the antibiotic resistant strain of MRSA. The study pointed out that, once MRSA is introduced, it could spread broadly to other swine and their caretakers, as well as to their families and friends.

Extended Spectrum Beta Lactamase (ESBL) is another antibiotic-resistant bacteria that has killed both people and swine.

But what has spawned these deadly superbugs?

It's important to realize that antibiotic-resistant disease like MRSA is a man-made problem, created by the excessive use of antibiotics. Medical overuse of antibiotics is one aspect, but the greatest, and most hidden, factor is the excessive use of antibiotics in food production.

Chickens, cattle and hogs are fed antibiotics, not to treat disease, but to make them grow faster, which increases profit margins for livestock producers.

It's been unclear just how many antibiotics were really used in the manufacturing of our food—until now.

According to the first-ever report by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on this subject, factory farms used a whopping 29 million pounds of antibiotics in 2009 alone.

Back in 2001, a report issued by the Union of Concerned Scientists estimated that the non-therapeutic livestock use of antibiotics accounted for 70 percent of the total antibiotic use in the US, and when all agricultural uses were considered, they estimated the share could be as high as 84 percent!

Clearly, agricultural antibiotic use is the smoking gun in the battle against antibiotic-resistant superbugs.

The connection between antibiotics in your meat and your gut health.

As an adult, you have three to four pounds of beneficial bacteria and yeast living within your intestines. These microbes compete for nutrients from the food you eat. Usually, the strength in numbers that beneficial bacteria enjoy both keeps the ever-present yeasts in check and causes them to produce nutrients such as the B vitamins.

However, every time you swallow antibiotics, you kill these beneficial bacteria within your intestines. When you do so, you upset the delicate balance of your intestinal terrain. Yeasts grow unchecked into large colonies and take over, in a condition called dysbiosis.

Yeasts are opportunistic organisms. This means that, as your intestinal bacteria die, yeasts thrive, especially when their dietary needs are met.

Using their tendrils (hyphae), yeast can literally poke holes through the lining of your intestinal wall, which results in a syndrome called leaky gut. In addition, parasitic yeasts can also cause you to change what you eat by causing "cravings" for carbohydrates like sugar, pasta and bread, for example.

So, it should come as no surprise that weight gain counts as one of the telltale signs of antibiotic damage and subsequent yeast overgrowth.

By altering the normal terrain of your intestines, antibiotics can also make food allergies more likely. An array of intestinal disorders can ensue, as well.

Sadly, many doctors dismiss the connection between their patients' intestinal disorders and the drugs they themselves prescribed. So, beware, and always make sure to repopulate your gut with a high quality probiotic every time you use an antibiotic.

The prevalence of antibiotics in the meats you eat could potentially also contribute to this intestinal imbalance, making organic, grass-fed meats all the more appealing.

About how to avoid factory farmed meat and to read the full article, please click here.

About the HPV vaccines

Barbara Loe Fisher from the National Vaccine Information Center warns about the HPV shots.



The HPV Vaccine: Science, Ethics and Regulation.
Examining the HPV vaccine deaths in India.
http://epw.in/epw/uploads/articles/15440.pdf

Dr. Gábor Máté on the stress-disease connection, addiction, attention deficit disorder and the destruction of american childhood

Today, a Democracy Now! special with the Canadian physician and bestselling author, Dr. Gábor Máté. From disease to addiction, parenting to attention deficit disorder, Dr. Máté’s work focuses on the centrality of early childhood experiences to the development of the brain, and how those experiences can impact everything from behavioral patterns to physical and mental illness. While the relationship between emotional stress and disease, and mental and physical health more broadly, is often considered controversial within medical orthodoxy, Dr. Máté argues too many doctors seem to have forgotten what was once a commonplace assumption, that emotions are deeply implicated in both the development of illness, addictions and disorders, and in their healing. 

Germany' new industry - the solar power revolution

Hemann Scheer (1944-2010) was interviewed about how Germany managed to create a new industry based on alternative energy, why other governments are not capable or willing to get rid of their oil dependence, and about public pressure to go green.  This was one of his last interviews.

Percy Schmeiser vs Monsanto

The story of the Canadian farmer who stood up to Monsanto. The interview reveals the dirty tricks of the GMO giant against farmers, contaminating their crop then suing them for patent violation! Monsanto destroyed Schmeiser's 50 years of work as a seed developer and through lawsuits, they wanted to destroy them financially too.

Percy Schmeiser: "They did everything to bring us down financially and mentally. And that's what they' re doing. Is to mentally and financially break people. They are totally ruthless. They have no ethics, they have no morals. It's the bottom line."

"GMOs never meant to feed the hungry, the starving world, they meant to control the seed supply. That gives them control over the world's food supply."

Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer, Dupont are already controlling most of the seed supply by buying up conventional seed companies.

Wikileaks cables reveal US sought to retaliate against Europe over Monsanto's GM crop

More on this story this time from Democracy Now!. Featuring Jeffrey Smith who is talking about the proven health dangers of GMOs that are on the market without any safety testing whatsoever. The situation is even worse under the current president whose food safety czar is Michael Taylor who was responsible for allowing GMOs in your food supply in 1992 without testing and labeling. Why GMOs so dangerous? Because GMO contamination of other crops even outlasts the effects of nuclear pollution!

The war you don't see

By John Pilger

A film about conventional media and journalists who are not doing their job properly. If they had done so, there would have been no war in Iraq, and there would not be more than a million people dead! 1 million dead is not unfortunate, it is genocide.

Who is next? Iran? or North Korea?

Fluoride in water linked to lower IQ in children

NEW YORK, Dec. 21, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Exposure to fluoride may lower children's intelligence says a study pre-published in Environmental Health Perspectives, a publication of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (online December 17, 2010). 

Fluoride is added to 70% of U.S. public drinking water supplies.

According to Paul Connett, Ph.D., director of the Fluoride Action Network, "This is the 24th study that has found this association, but this study is stronger than the rest because the authors have controlled for key confounding variables and in addition to correlating lowered IQ with levels of fluoride in the water, the authors found a correlation between lowered IQ and fluoride levels in children's blood. This brings us closer to a cause and effect relationship between fluoride exposure and brain damage in children."

"What is also striking is that the levels of the fluoride in the community where the lowered IQs were recorded were lower than the EPA's so-called 'safe' drinking water standard for fluoride of 4 ppm and far too close for comfort to the levels used in artificial fluoridation programs (0.7 – 1.2 ppm)," says Connett.

To read the full article, please click here.

Over 1 million sign petition in the EU to stop GM crap- I mean crop approvals

"The EU has kept genetically modified (GM) crops out of its countries much more so than other nations. But recent industry pressure and soft politicians have started changing course. The European Commission unveiled plans in the summer to allow the production of GM crops in some member countries. Additionally, even before that, the EU (in a back-room sort of way) approved cultivation of a genetically modified potato, the Amflora potato (aka Frankenstein potato). Of course, a number of people aren’t very happy with these decisions. Over a million people, to be precise."

“Over a million people across Europe have set the EU a democratic test — will the EU address the real concern people have about GM crops and food, or will it side with the chemical industry lobbyists controlling GM technology?” Greenpeace’s EU Director Jorgo Riss said."

For the rest, click here.

If you haven't known about it yet, the EU is allowing GM corn to be imported for processing, for animal feed and for human consumption, as of July this year. Be aware of  all corn derivatives in your food supply and also look for organic meat, non-GM meat and organic dairy.  The big bully, i.e. the US finally got through.

According to Wikileaks, "The former United States ambassador to France suggested "moving to retaliation" against France and the European Union (EU) in late 2007 to fight a French ban on Monsanto's genetically modified (GM) corn and changes in European policy toward biotech crops, according to a cable  released by WikiLeaks on Sunday."

"Country team Paris recommends that we calibrate a target retaliation list that causes some pain across the EU since this is a collective responsibility, but that also focuses in part on the worst culprits," Craig Stapleton wrote to diplomatic colleagues.

To read about Stapleton's connection to Bush and Monsanto, click here.

Everything you need to know about GMO-s

From Jeffrey Smith
"No food shall be grown that we don't own" (Monsanto)



GMO = God Move Over
= it's over

Chromium 6 in your drinking water

The Environmental Working Group says the possible carcinogen was found in D.C. and Bethesda Maryland tap water during random testing in 35 cities.

"There is no easy solution to the problem. It’s a widespread contaminant that occurs across the country. More than 70 million Americans are drinking it," said Jane Houlihan with the Environmental Working Group.

"There is not a debate about whether this chemical is toxic. It’s a confirmed toxin and a widespread tap water pollutant. We’ve been slow to react to this," said Houlihan.

Both D.C. Water and WSSC stand by the safety of their water and insist they follow current E-P-A guidelines.

Currently both water companies do test for total chromium but neither test specifically for Chromium-6, the dangerous one.

Article and video here.

Metal filings in your enriched cereal

No wonder I have never liked nasty cereals!

John Perkins

Interview with a real insider from the top about economic hit men, oil, the building of Saudi Arabia, Iran, the Iraq war, Afghanistan, the roots of terrorism, the Panama Canal, geopolitics, assassins, jackals, Colombia, the building of an empire and some hope for the future. A must see even though it is a bit long, approximately 100 minutes. 

Major books by John Perkins on this specific issue: Confessions of an Economic Hit Man (2004), The Secret History of the American Empire (2008), Hoodwinked (2010)

Depleted Uranium - the Trojan horse of nuclear war

By Leuren Moret

But what do oil, military partners, depleted uranium wars, and US foreign policy have to do with nuclear weapons? The answer came to me in 1991 when I became a whistleblower at the Livermore Nuclear Weapons Laboratory near San Francisco, California. Richard Berta, the Western Regional Inspector for the Department of Energy, told me "The Pentagon exists for the oil companies… and the nuclear weapons labs exist for the Pentagon."

The fact is that the United States and its military partners have staged four nuclear wars, "slipping nukes under the wire" by using dirty bombs and dirty weapons in countries the US needs to control. Depleted uranium aerosols will permanently contaminate vast regions and slowly destroy the genetic future of populations living in those regions, where there are resources which the US must control, in order to establish and maintain American primacy.

Described as the Trojan Horse of nuclear war, depleted uranium is the weapon that keeps killing. The half-life of Uranium-238 is 4.5 billion years, the age of the earth. And, as Uranium-238 decays into daughter radioactive products, in four steps before turning into lead, it continues to release more radiation at each step. There is no way to turn it off, and there is no way to clean it up. It meets the US Government’s own definition of Weapons of Mass Destruction.

After forming microscopic and submicroscopic insoluble Uranium oxide particles on the battlefield, they remain suspended in air and travel around the earth as a radioactive component of atmospheric dust, contaminating the environment, indiscriminately killing, maiming and causing disease in all living things where rain, snow and moisture remove it from the atmosphere. Global radioactive contamination from atmospheric testing was the equivalent of 40,000 Hiroshima bombs, and still contaminates the atmosphere and lower orbital space today. The amount of low level radioactive pollution from depleted uranium released since 1991, is many times more (deposited internally in the body), than was released from atmospheric testing fallout.

A 2003 independent report for the European Parliament by the European Committee on Radiation Risk (ECRR), reports that based on Chernobyl studies, low level radiation risk is 100 to 1000 times greater than the International Committee for Radiation Protection models estimate which are based on the flawed Atomic and Hydrogen Bomb Studies conducted by the US Government. Referring to the extreme killing effects of radiation on biological systems, Dr. Rosalie Bertell, one of the 46 international radiation expert authors of the ECRR report, describes it as:

"The concept of species annihilation means a relatively swift, deliberately induced end to history, culture, science, biological reproduction and memory. It is the ultimate human rejection of the gift of life, an act which requires a new word to describe it: omnicide."

Nearly 700,000 American Gulf War Veterans returned to the US from a war that lasted just a few weeks. Today more than 240,000 of those soldiers are on permanent medical disability, and over 11,000 are dead. In a US Government study on post-Gulf War babies born to 251 veterans, 67 per cent of the babies were reported to have serious illnesses or serious birth defects. They were born without eyes, ears, had missing organs, fused fingers, thyroid or other malfunctions. Depleted uranium in the semen of the soldiers internally contaminated their wives. Severe birth defects have been reported in babies born to contaminated civilians in Iraq, Yugoslavia, and Afghanistan and the incidence and severity of defects is increasing over time. Women in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq are afraid now to have babies, and when they do give birth, instead of asking if it is a girl or a boy, they ask ‘is it normal?’.

"Our collective gene pool of life, evolving for hundreds of millions of years has been seriously damaged in less than the past fifty. The time remaining to reverse this culture of ‘lemming death’ is on the wane. In the future, what will you tell our grandchildren about what you did in the prime of your life to turn around this death process?" (Rosalie Bertell, 1982)

You can find the original article in full here.

If you can bare more horror, you can also watch the documentary "Beyond Treason" on Youtube.

Is Bayer responsible for the dying off of the bees?

A new article on Gaia Health claims that Bayer's clothianidin is actually the main culprit in the dying off of the honey bees. Excerpts:

Clothianidin is a neonicotinoid, a neuro poison which is equally toxic to all living creatures, including us. They sicken bees, making them disoriented and weak, leaving them open to a host of secondary infections that they normally discharge without significant problems.

We're facing disaster to the environment, to agriculture, to the food supply, and to our own ability to survive because of the probable loss of bees. Pesticide makers like Bayer and Syngenta profit from the sale of a neurological poison that's the cause of the die-off of bees.

"This is the critical winter for the beekeeping industry. I don't think we can survive. If the beekeeping industry collapses, it jeopardizes a third of American agriculture." Tom Theobold- beekeeper; his honey crops are the smallest he has ever seen in the last 35 years. 

To read EPA's involvement and the rest of the article, please click here.

Bayer (an eco-criminal according to many) is the European equivalent of Monsanto. To read Bayer's history, please click here and here.

Unintended consequences

Unintended consequences of government interventions.

Georgia prisoners protest demanding healthcare, education and wage for their work

Meat - mad cow disease and the US beef industry

A Korean documentary about food safety; featuring Natural News and an interview with Howard Lyman. You can also learn about Japanese food safety standards, to which US food safety standards are nowhere near as rigorous!
Japan still does not allow GMO-s into their country either. 

Since lots of readers would like to know more about meat, this film is one of the documentaries to watch.  Most of your meat is produced (!) in factory farms, where animals are fed GM corn and soy they cannot properly digest; They are diseased, riddled with E-coli, and pumped with hormones and antibiotics regularly. They are "raised", I mean pumped up to the weight to be eligible for slaughter in half the time they would normally grow. 

The other important thing you should know about is rendering, which is basically a manual how to spread mad cow disease effectively! This is what it means:

“When a cow is slaughtered, about half of it by weight is not eaten by humans: the intestines and their contents, the head, hooves, and horns, as well as bones and blood. These are dumped into giant grinders at rendering plants, as are the entire bodies of cows and other farm animals known to be diseased. Rendering is a $2.4 billion-a-year industry, processing 40 billion pounds (18 billion kg) of dead animals a year. There is simply no such thing in America as an animal too ravaged by disease, too cancerous, or too putrid to be welcomed by the all-embracing arms of the renderer. Another staple of the renderer's diet, in addition to farm animals, is euthanized pets – the six or seven million dogs and cats that are killed in animal shelters every year. The city of Los Angeles alone, for example, sends some two hundred tons of euthanized cats and dogs to a rendering plant every month.”

“Added to the blend are the euthanized catch of animal control agencies, and road kill. (Road kill is not collected daily, and in the summer, the better road kill collection crews can generally smell it before they can see it.) When this gruesome mix is ground and steam-cooked, the lighter, fatty material floating to the top gets refined for use in such products as cosmetics, lubricants, soaps, candles, and waxes. The heavier protein material is dried and pulverized into a brown powder-about a quarter of which consists of faecal material. The power is used as an additive to almost all pet food as well as to livestock feed. Farmers call it protein concentrates. In 1995, five million tons of processed slaughterhouse leftovers were sold for animal feed in the United States. I used to feed tons of the stuff to my own livestock. It never concerned me that I was feeding cattle to cattle.”

You can also watch the Mad Cowboy documentary here.

Bon Appetite!

Top 10 food additives to avoid

This article is from Food Matters, written by Laurentine ten Bosch

1. Artificial Sweeteners

Aspartame, (E951) more popularly known as Nutrasweet and Equal, is found in foods labeled "diet" or "sugar free". Aspartame is believed to be carcinogenic and accounts for more reports of adverse reactions than all other foods and food additives combined. Aspartame is not your friend. Aspartame is a neurotoxin and carcinogen. Known to erode intelligence and affect short-term memory, the components of this toxic sweetener may lead to a wide variety of ailments including brain tumor, diseases like lymphoma, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, fibromyalgia, and chronic fatigue, emotional disorders like depression and anxiety attacks, dizziness, headaches, nausea, mental confusion, migraines and seizures. Acesulfame-K, a relatively new artificial sweetener found in baking goods, gum and gelatin, has not been thoroughly tested and has been linked to kidney tumors. Read more about the dangers of Aspartame here.

Found in: diet or sugar free sodas, diet coke, coke zero, jello (and over gelatins), desserts, sugar free gum, drink mixes, baking goods, table top sweeteners, cereal, breathmints, pudding, kool-aid, ice tea, chewable vitamins, toothpaste

2. High Fructose Corn Syrup

High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is a highly-refined artificial sweetener which has become the number one source of calories in America. It is found in almost all processed foods. HFCS packs on the pounds faster than any other ingredient, increases your LDL (“bad”) cholesterol levels, and contributes to the development of diabetes and tissue damage, among other harmful effects.

Found in: most processed foods, breads, candy, flavored yogurts, salad dressings, canned vegetables, cereals

3. Monosodium Glutamate (MSG / E621)

MSG is an amino acid used as a flavor enhancer in soups, salad dressings, chips, frozen entrees, and many restaurant foods. MSG is known as an excitotoxin, a substance which overexcites cells to the point of damage or death. Studies show that regular consumption of MSG may result in adverse side effects which include depression, disorientation, eye damage, fatigue, headaches, and obesity. MSG effects the neurological pathways of the brain and disengaged the "I'm full" function which explains the effects of weight gain.

Found in: Chinese food (Chinese Restaurant Syndrome ) many snacks, chips, cookies, seasonings, most Campbell Soup products, frozen dinners, lunch meats

4. Trans Fat

Trans fat is used to enhance and extend the shelf life of food products and is among the most dangerous substances that you can consume. Found in deep-fried fast foods and certain processed foods made with margarine or partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, trans fats are formed by a process called hydrogenation. Numerous studies show that trans fat increases LDL cholesterol levels while decreasing HDL (“good”) cholesterol, increases the risk of heart attacks, heart disease and strokes, and contributes to increased inflammation, diabetes and other health problems. Oils and fat are now forbidden on the Danish market if they contain trans fatty acids exceeding 2 per cent, a move that effectively bans partially hydrogenated oils.

Found in: margarine, chips and crackers, baked goods, fast foods

5. Common Food Dyes

Studies show that artificial colorings which are found in soda, fruit juices and salad dressings, may contribute to behavioral problems in children and lead to a significant reduction in IQ. Animal studies have linked other food colorings to cancer. Watch out for these ones:

Blue #1 and Blue #2 (E133)

Banned in Norway, Finland and France. May cause chromosomal damage

Found in: candy, cereal, soft drinks, sports drinks and pet foods

Red dye # 3 (also Red #40 – a more current dye) (E124)

Banned in 1990 after 8 years of debate from use in many foods and cosmetics. This dye continues to be on the market until supplies run out! Has been proven to cause thyroid cancer and chromosomal damage in laboratory animals, may also interfere with brain-nerve transmission

Found in: fruit cocktail, maraschino cherries, cherry pie mix, ice cream, candy, bakery products and more!

Yellow #6 (E110) and Yellow Tartrazine (E102)

Banned in Norway and Sweden. Increases the number of kidney and adrenal gland tumors in laboratory animals, may cause chromosomal damage.

Found in: American cheese, macaroni and cheese, candy and carbonated beverages, lemonade and more!

6. Sodium Sulfite (E221)

Preservative used in wine-making and other processed foods. According to the FDA, approximately one in 100 people is sensitive to sulfites in food. The majority of these individuals are asthmatic, suggesting a link between asthma and sulfites. Individuals who are sulfite sensitive may experience headaches, breathing problems, and rashes. In severe cases, sulfites can actually cause death by closing down the airway altogether, leading to cardiac arrest.

Found in: Wine and dried fruit 

7. Sodium Nitrate/Sodium Nitrite

Sodium nitrate (or sodium nitrite) is used as a preservative, coloring and flavoring in bacon, ham, hot dogs, luncheon meats, corned beef, smoked fish and other processed meats. This ingredient, which sounds harmless, is actually highly carcinogenic once it enters the human digestive system. There, it forms a variety of nitrosamine compounds that enter the bloodstream and wreak havoc with a number of internal organs: the liver and pancreas in particular. Sodium nitrite is widely regarded as a toxic ingredient, and the USDA actually tried to ban this additive in the 1970's but was vetoed by food manufacturers who complained they had no alternative for preserving packaged meat products. Why does the industry still use it? Simple: this chemical just happens to turn meats bright red. It's actually a color fixer, and it makes old, dead meats appear fresh and vibrant.

Found in: hotdogs, bacon, ham, luncheon meat, cured meats, corned beef, smoked fish or any other type of
8. BHA and BHT (E320)

Butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA) and butylated hydrozyttoluene (BHT) are preservatives found in cereals, chewing gum, potato chips, and vegetable oils. This common preservative keeps foods from changing color, changing flavor or becoming rancid. Effects the neurological system of the brain, alters behavior and has potential to cause cancer. BHA and BHT are oxidants which form cancer-causing reactive compounds in your body.

Found in: potato chips, gum, cereal, frozen sausages, enriched rice, lard, shortening, candy, butter, dehydrated potato, baked goods.

9. Sulfur Dioxide (E220)

Sulfur additives are toxic and in the United States of America, the Federal Drugs Administration have prohibited their use on raw fruit and vegetables. Adverse reactions include: bronchial problems particularly in those prone to asthma, hypotension (low blood pressure), flushing tingling sensations or anaphylactic shock. It also destroys vitamins B1 and E. Not recommended for consumption by children. The International Labour Organization says to avoid E220 if you suffer from conjunctivitis, bronchitis, emphysema, bronchial asthma, or cardiovascular disease.

Found in: beer, soft drinks, dried fruit, juices, cordials, wine, vinegar, and potato products.

10. Potassium Bromate

An additive used to increase volume in some white flour, breads, and rolls, potassium bromate is known to cause cancer in animals. Even small amounts in bread can create problems for humans. 

Found in: breads

Please print this out and take it with you shopping. Remember to read labels and shop as wholesome and organic as possible. The more whole, natural foods you eat, the better off you are - foods that do not contain preservatives, chemicals, fillers, artificial flavors or artificial colors.

Sources: www.drmercola.info, www.altmedangel.com, www.naturalnews.com and www.bestofmotherearth.com