Homeless and Alone in the Land of Milk and Honey

S. Paul Forrest
Activist Post

 America was once called the Land of Milk and Honey.  It was so named for the prosperity and promise associated with what was once available to anyone who, when willing to work, could acquire a piece of the American Dream.  Today, the story is much different.  Hard work seems to mean little in our current system where the elite control the money, and the associated greed so intrinsic their self service has robbed good, hard working Americans of their right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

After a lifetime of effort in the chase for their piece of the pie, some Americans are finding themselves out in the cold, having lost their jobs and their dreams in the aftermath of the Great Recession.  Some have fallen victim not only to Wall Street’s suspect derivative trading and over speculation in a system that could not support such monetary betting, but to a banking system that manipulated loan rates when looked to and trusted by home buyers for professional guidance.

Many of these unfortunate people are quickly finding themselves added to the homeless numbers of America.  Many are trying to survive the current economic depression by seeking federal assistance, but have found, much to their dismay, that government programs, one of their only rays of hope during their time of tribulation, are being taken by the same group of people who assisted in their demise: Congress.

Those responsible for the economic plunge are trying to phase out social systems that provide those who are suffering a lifeline in the ocean of betrayal in which they are drowning.  Even worse, it seems not to matter to those surviving the current economic disaster.  The “Haves” are scrambling to protect their own by supporting a political bureaucracy that has abandoned the "Have Nots."  Like prisoners protecting their plate of food, these people are surrendering conscience for three-squares and a warm cot of their own. 

In light of the actions taken (or, inaction in some cases) by our governmental representatives, those from rural and suburban areas have had no choice but to abandon their townships and move toward the cities in search of shelter and whatever government aide remains.  They have migrated en masse to the urban centers of this nation in search of the remnants of their national security, but in place of the Golden Lamp, they have only found iron bars and cold, impersonal streets.  In lieu of allowing the preservation of their survival, cities are beginning to enact anti-homeless initiatives to drive them back to where they came, while those responsible for this treachery receive record bonuses and wallow in ill-gotten gains.

St. Petersburg, Florida is a prime example of such inhuman approaches.  The City has enacted new laws toward the criminalization of the homeless.  A report by The National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty and The National Coalition for the Homeless, tells much about the current war on these unfortunates:

Since early 2007, St. Petersburg has passed 6 new ordinances that target homeless people. These include ordinances that outlaw panhandling throughout most of downtown, prohibit the storage of personal belongings on public property, and make it unlawful to sleep outside at various locations. 

In January 2007, the Pinellas-Pasco Public Defender announced that he would no longer represent indigent people arrested for violating municipal ordinances to protest what he called excessive arrests of homeless individuals by the City of St. Petersburg. According to numbers compiled by the public defender’s office, the vast majority of people booked into the Pinellas County Jail on municipal ordinances were homeless individuals from St. Petersburg.

This is not the only American city to turn its back on those in need.  Across America, the suffrage of economic victimhood is being called to the forefront as the newest criminal act.  Many laws have been put into place to make illegal people living in the streets, thereby dissuading them from coming to their cities at all.

Both sides of the Congressional aisle have argued the semantics of the mortgage crisis and the current economic strife, but the blame for the downfall of this once great nation means nothing when one is huddled beneath a dirty blanket trying to survive the cold or going hungry.  The homeless only know that their basic American rights have been denied.  Adding insult to injury, those Congressional representatives, who were put into office to ensure the continuation of our American system, are trying to take even more from them.

Many on the Right have argued that the US has become a nanny state.  They expound upon the belief that we must no longer allow the expenditure of “American” money to go to those who will not help themselves first.  This may have been a valid approach in strong economic times of yesteryear when work was plentiful and the American Dream was alive, but now in the shadow of Bush Era gluttony and growing Tea Party faux-Patriotic oligarchy, it stands as a slap in the face of hard-working Americans waking up to the American nightmare. 

Some on the Left, voted into office by an American public that needed to be protected, are making deals to further empower the elite in order to acquire their own earmarks and campaign contributor benefits. They too, seem to have lost sight of what America used to stand for. 
The only security this country seems to care for anymore is the one that allows for funds to be taken from social services and used for war, Patriot Act-driven oppression, and corporate welfare entitlement.  Those unfortunate souls who have to stand in line for a warm bed in an overcrowded dormitory, or in a food kitchen line to get a modest meal, are painfully finding that many of their lifelines are being denied by the very country they pledged their allegiance to.  Instead of solutions, politicians are only delivering rhetoric, excuses, and false promises.  In this, our nation’s greatest time of need, they would rather protect their own than fight to provide for the American people.

Many try to ignore these people, as they represent the errors and gluttony of a nation lost, but they are still American citizens and need to be cared for.  The Right and their Tea Party counterparts vehemently expound upon the protection of our borders against illegal immigrants, terrorists, foreign influences, and protecting the Constitution for the preservation of America’s citizens, but in the same breath they condemn social services to support Americans in their time of need.  The simple reality is this:  American governance has become detached from the lives lived by those whom it has been charged the protection and care of.

According to the principles of fascism, the rule of the elite class is inevitable in such a system of Corporatism.  Fascists feel that elite rule is natural and desirable, and those with the rare qualities of leadership will rise to the top.  This type of leader does not derive power from a constitution, but is the embodiment of the people.  Mussolini said a leader is "…the living sum of untold souls striving for a goal."  In short, the elite class is desired and needed because they will lead the people to greatness.  In the case of this country, however, our leaders are leading us to ruin and are far from the mantle of greatness.

Maybe this nation is not heading toward fascism after all.  That leap would take real intelligence and power derived through purpose.  I’m sure all American citizens can agree that this is not a danger in our current Congress, and it is especially lacking in our police force.  Fascism takes control and intelligence; but, recently, America is quickly losing the control it once had in the world, and our self-labeled leaders are emerging from places like Alaska -- and they are far from intelligent.  Still, the elite in this country try tirelessly to impose a fascist state . . . and, tirelessly, we true patriots resist.

In America today, people who have been misguided enough to believe in the American system and have lost their piece of the Dream because of it, are now hoping for a savior.  Unfortunately, none is to be found.  We as a nation are quickly falling into the realm of the second world.  The rise of a real, sincere leader is a pipe dream under the impotent umbrella of our current political system and the economic destruction they have reaped in their own name.  The future of this nation indeed looks dim.

Homelessness has in the past been viewed as a state of laziness, but today it is a growing condition that represents a dying world power.  The elite persist in the denial of this national illness, for its recognition would admit fault.  At the end of the day though, ignoring it will not lessen the inevitability that this, our once great nation, is now a declining Empire.  Many are on the brink of bankruptcy in this country where once lay the promise of prosperous times for all.  There now exists the reality that we are all only one misfortune away from being homeless and alone in the Land of Milk and Honey.

--------------------------------------------------------------
COMMENT: "This is America, and anyone who wants to can be successful, all you have to do is work hard." THAT'S EVIL.

You don't have to be a good person, you don't have to have a conscience, you don't have to be able to grow a soul; no, all you have to do is "work hard", and you can be (financially) successful. It is inevitable that under such a system,  the soulless monsters would rise to the top. This has long since happened.
--------------------------------------------------------------

'Beauty Sleep' May Be Best Beauty Treatment, Study Finds

By Amanda Chan, MyHealthNewsDaily Staff Writer
posted: 15 December 2010 01:32 pm ET

http://www.livescience.com/health/beauty-sleep-best-treatment-101215.html

© unknown

It looks like Mom's advice was right - to look your best, get a full night's rest, a new study shows.

People who get eight hours of sleep appear healthier, more rested and more attractive than those who stay up all night, said study researcher John Axelsson, of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.
"The study suggests that your sleep, and how you sleep, affects how other people perceive you, and probably how they treat you," Axelsson told MyHealthNewsDaily.

People often resort to beauty treatments to make them look awake and refreshed, and to boost self-confidence. But in the long term, simply getting enough sleep could achieve the same aesthetic results, Axelsson said.

"Sleep is the best beauty treatment that we have," he said.

Researchers asked 23 people, ages 18 to 31, to get eight hours of sleep one night, and then photographed them the next day. The pictures were taken between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. in a well-lit room, with a fixed distance between their faces and the camera.

On another night, those same people got five hours of sleep. Researchers then kept them awake for 31 hours, and took their pictures again at the same time of day.

During both photography sessions, the participants wore no makeup, wore their hair loose and combed back, and groomed themselves the same way. Their expressions in the photographs were required to be relaxed and neutral.

Sixty-five observers were then asked to rate the photographs, without knowing how much sleep the people in the pictures had gotten the night before.

The observers rated the photographs taken when people were sleep-deprived as 6 percent less healthy, 4 percent less attractive and 19 percent more tired-looking on average, than the photographs taken when they were well-rested.

The study shows that the amount of sleep people get affects how others judge their health, Axelsson said.

Past research has shown that the importance of getting enough sleep goes beyond looking pretty. A 2007 study in the journal Archives of Disease in Childhood found that people who don't get enough sleep have an increased risk of being obese. Another study that year in the journal Science found sleep is necessary to form memories.

Next, Axelsson and his colleagues hope to see how other sleep disturbances, such as sleeping for four to five hours a few nights in a row, impact how healthy and attractive people look. He is also looking to pinpoint the facial features that make a person think someone looks tired, unhealthy or less attractive.

The study was published online Dec. 14 in the British Medical Journal.

------------------------------------------------------------------
COMMENT: You should get 8 hours per night in Summer (e.g. 11pm - 7am), 9 hours per night Spring and Fall (e.g. 11pm - 8am), and 10 hours per night in Winter (e.g. 10pm - 8am).
------------------------------------------------------------------ 

'Virus' may be behind obesity epidemic

Yahoo!7 December 13, 2010, 10:54 am

 

http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/mp/8498425/virus-may-be-behind-obesity-epidemic/

A landmark study has found there may be more to the western world's obesity epidemic than first thought.
The study, published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, found that weight gain may be linked to a number of issues beyond diet and lifestyle; including the possibility that weight gain is related to chemicals in the human body, or of infectious-origin.
The scientists, from nine research centres around the globe, observed the weight gain trend in feral and domestic animals that were living in close proximity to humans.
The study of more than 20,000 animals found that their body weight was increasing uniformly, despite their different environments, raising the possibility of "several as-of-yet unidentified and/or poorly understood factors" in weight gain.
These factors may include a virus or genetic factors beyond that of changes in the underlying DNA sequence.
The findings appear to contradict the common belief that the obesity epidemic is caused almost entirely by our changing diet and lifestyle factors.
"This finding may eventually enhance the discovery ...of other factors that have contributed to the recent rise in obesity rates", the study claims.

 

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

COMMENT: They are DESPERATE to say it is ANYTHING other than the "hearthealthywholegrains" they have been pushing for 40 years.

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

Are These Dangerous Drugs in Your Medicine Chest?

By Martha Rosenberg

http://www.opednews.com/articles/1/Are-These-Dangerous-Drugs-by-Martha-Rosenberg-101215-461.html
 
 Since direct-to-consumer drug advertising was legalized 13 years ago, Americans have become a nation of pill poppers -- choosing the type of drug they desire like a new toothpaste, sometimes whether or not they need it.
But if patients want the drugs, doctors and pharma executives want them to have them and media gets full page ads and huge TV flights (when many advertisers have dried up), is the national pillathon really a problem?
Yes, when you consider the cost of private and government insurance (Medicare's budget is bigger than the Pentagon's) and the health of patients who take dangerous drugs like these.

Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, SSRIs
Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRIs) antidepressants like Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft and Lexapro probably did more to inflate pharma profits in the decades than direct-to-consumer advertising and Viagra put together, no pun intended: over 66 million prescriptions were filled in the US in 2007.
But many say the drugs have also inflated police blotters.
Columbine shooter Eric Harris (1999), Red Lake shooter Jeff Weise (2005), and NIU shooter Stephen Kazmierczak (2008) were all reportedly under the influence of SSRIs. Virginia Tech shooter Cho Seung-Hui (2007) was also influenced by psychoactive drugs say reports.
http://www.ssristories.com/
In addition to 4,200 published reports of SSRI-related violence, aggression, bizarre behavior, self-harm and suicide since the drugs were introduced in 1988,   the lucrative antidepressants also pack non-behavioral perks: SSRIs can cause life-threatening serotonin syndrome when taken with migraine drugs, gastrointestinal bleeding when taken with aspirin, Aleve or Advil and the bone condition osteoporosis.
The popular Paxil can reduce or abolish the effect of tamoxifen in breast cancer patients and increase deaths says British Medical Journal. It's linked to a two-fold increased risk of cardiac birth defects in infants according to its own manufacturer, GSK.
And sexually, SSRIs are so linked to dysfunction even the pharma identified web site WebMD admits many will experience impotence, delayed ejaculation or no orgasm. The solution? Add another antidepressant that's not an SSRI like Wellbutrin says WebMD.

Effexor, Cymbalta, Pristiq, SNRIs
Selective norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs) are like their SSRIs chemical cousins except their norepinephrine effects can modulate pain, which has ushered in your-depression-is-really-pain, your-pain-is-really-depression and other crossover marketing. But the problem with giving a psychoactive drug for pain is that you're giving a psychoactive drug for pain. "After three months of taking Savella [another SNRI], I started self-destructing and cutting myself," writes a 40 year old woman on askapatient.com. "I don't know why or anything, but it does similar to Prozac where it makes you think and do weird things."
And Cymbalta, approved this fall for chronic back pain and osteoarthritis?
Cymbalta was the drug healthy 19-year-old volunteer Traci Johnson was testing when she hung herself in an Eli Lilly dorm in 2005. It was the drug Carol Anne Gotbaum killed herself on at Phoenix's Sky Harbor airport in 2007.
SNRI's are also harder to quit than SSRIs, especially Effexor. 25-year-old Chicagoan David F. says he stood at the top of an 8-story parking lot contemplating jumping every day for weeks after quitting. It's also the drug Andrea Yates was on when she drowned her five children in 2001.
But not all SNRI side effects are behavioral. The FDA would not approve Pristiq, a newer version of Effexor, when Wyeth/Pfizer tried to market it for vasomotor symptoms, because it caused heart attacks, coronary artery obstruction and hypertension in clinical trials. That's similar to another SNRI, the diet pill Meridia, which was just withdrawn from the market for causing heart problems. Pristiq is still available. 

Seroquel, Zyprexa, Geodon, atypical antipsychotics
Even though the antipsychotic Seroquel tops 71 drugs on the FDA's January 2010 Medwatch quarterly report with 1766 adverse events , even though it's linked to eight corruption scandals, even though military parents blame Seroquel for unexplained troop deaths, it is the fifth biggest-selling drug in the world and netted AstraZeneca almost $5 billion last year.
Atypicals were originally promoted to replace side-effect prone drugs like Thorazine but soon became pharmaceutical Swiss Army Knives for depression, anxiety, insomnia, bipolar and conduct disorders and other off label uses -- and betrayed the same side effects as older antipsychotics. (Especially tardive dyskinesia-linked Abilify.)
Foisted disproportionately on the young, poor and disadvantaged, atypicals cause such weight gain and metabolic derangement -- 16 percent of Zyprexa patients gain 66 pounds and some gain over 100 -- manufacturer Lilly Eli Lilly agreed to pay the state of Alaska $15 million in 2008 for the Medicaid costs of Zyprexa patients who developed diabetes.
Atypicals carry warnings of death in demented patients but are widely used in nursing homes. And even though Risperdal maker Johnson & Johnson, Geodon maker Pfizer, Abilify maker Bristol-Myers Squibb, Lilly and AstraZeneca have all entered into government settlements that acknowledge fraudulent or wrongful atypical marketing,   FDA rewarded atypical makers by approving Zyprexa and Seroquel for children last year. And approved a new atypical antipsychotic, Latuda, in October. Maybe the FDA is bipolar.

Ritalin, Concerta, Strattera, Adderall and ADHD drugs
When it comes to the epidemic of 5.3 million US children between 3 and 17 diagnosed with ADHD, suspicions of pharma pushing the disorder are exceeded only by pharma's admissions thereof.
During an August conference call with financial analysts, Shire specialty pharmaceuticals president Mike Cola credited the "very dynamic ADHD market" to Shire's globalization efforts and "investments we have made in new uses for our existing products."
Those uses, a.k.a. diagnoses, for Shire products like stimulants Adderall, Vyvanse and Intuniv include adult ADHD, cognitive impairment, depression and excessive daytime sleepiness.
Still, Cola says despite the 10 percent ADHD "new starts" that are helping Shire "grow the market," and the "co-administration market" of add-on prescription drug$, the ADHD franchise suffers from patients who drop out when they quit seeing their pediatrician. "We don't see those patients show up again until their mid-to-late 20s," laments Cola.
ADHD drugs, in addition to "robbing kids of their right to be kids, their right to grow, their right to experience their full range of emotions, and their right to experience the world in its full hue of colors," as Anatomy of an Epidemic author Robert Whitaker puts it, are also deadly.
A 2009 article in the American Journal of Psychiatry called Sudden Death and Use of Stimulant Medications in Youths found 1.8 percent of youthful stimulant users died sudden deaths from cardiac dysrhythmia or unexplained causes versus 0.4 percent who were not on stimulants. Though it helped fund the study, the FDA said the results proved no "real risk" and kids should keep taking their meds.
Meanwhile, says Robert Whitaker, kids on ADHD meds "are told they are going to be on these drugs for life. And next thing they know, they're on two or three or four drugs," a phenomenon also known as the co-administration market.

Foradil Aerolizer, Serevent Diskus, Advair and Symbicort
How could asthma drugs that increase the chance of dying of asthma become pharma's top sellers? The same way antidepressants that cause depression and antifracture drugs that cause fractures become top sellers: good consumer marketing.
Still, unlike drugs that look safe in trials and develop safety signals postmarketing, the long-acting beta agonists (LABA), salmeterol and formoterol, found in many asthma products, never looked safe. In fact it was their links to deaths and adverse events that led to studies in the 1990s and 2000s which showed more deaths and adverse events: LABAS increase death in users, say the studies, especially African-Americans and children.
Original safety trials were also marred with major fraud click here
Pharma doctors, when reviewing the study results at FDA hearings in 2005 and 2008, blamed LABA deaths on patients' underlying disease and non-compliance and dismissed hospitalization as a side effect less serious than death. They danced around FDA testimony, including from Dr David Graham of Vioxx fame, that there is no scientific evidence that the inhaled corticosteriods found in Advair and Symbicort make the products safer and that LABA's modest clinical benefit does not justify their 28-fold increase in mortality risks. (5,000 deaths in ten years estimated Graham.)
While many regard LABAs as a medical mishap, marketing for "step up" asthma treatment is no mistake. Though inhaled corticosteriods are still considered the best asthma treatment, millions have been convinced they need two drugs to control their asthma and that the combination is keeping them out of hospitals. Except when it isn't.

Singulair and Accolate, leukotriene receptor antagonists
How did Merck convince Americans to use an allergy drug that works no better than over-the-counter antihistamines but costs eight times as much?
A drug in which "asthma control deteriorates when switched from low dose inhaled corticosteriods" according to original FDA reviewers in 1998 -- but was approved anyway?
How did Merck convince pediatricians and mothers to give kids such a drug on a daily basis for seasonal allergies, runny noses and minor wheezing? Even though FDA reviewers cautioned that adult trials "may not be predictive of the response" in children in the New England Journal of Medicine? And infant monkeys given Singulair had to be euthanized because "infants may be more sensitive" FDA reviewers wrote?
Last month, the saga of Singulair mismarketing continued when Fox TV reported that Merck's top selling allergy drug is suspected of producing aggression, hostility, irritability, anxiety, hallucinations and night-terrors in kids, symptoms that are being diagnosed as ADHD .And that Singulair is being huckstered to parents by the trusted educational service Scholastic, Inc. and the American Academy of Pediatrics. click here
Eight-nine parents on the drug site askapatient.com report hyperactivity, tantrums, depression, crying, school trouble, facial tics and strange eye movements after their children, some as young as one, were put on Singulair. Similar reports appear on medications.com and parentsforsafety.org. Most symptoms subside when Singulair is stopped.

"Do NOT recommend this drug to other parents," writes one mother. "4 year olds that suddenly talk about killing themselves are influenced by a DRUG!!"
"THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF THEMSELVES FOR APPROVING THIS!!!!" writes another mother, though the shame may well not stop there.

Martha Rosenberg is columnist and cartoonist based in Chicago.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
COMMENT: First of all, the Medical BUSINESS is NOT a "health care system." As the article above illustrates, the Medical Business Executives think and speak in terms of products, marketing, and sales. What sort of person rises to the top in that environment? To them, you are a revenue stream. Which brings us to 

Secondly, the "hot potato" issue in our world today, especially in the U.S.A., is the Conservative-Psychopath Clusterfuck. We non-Conservatives - who make up 60% of the population - all have to realize that 40% of the population - the Conservatives - are genetically unable to feel compassion; therefore, they are like a huge army for the Psychopaths,  who also cannot feel compassion (or shame).

But wait, it gets worse! A subset of the Conservatives - equal to 25% of the population - are Authoritarian Personalities. As Bob Altemeyer describes beautifully in his free PDF 
The Authoritarians http://www.electricpolitics.com/media/docs/authoritarians.pdf , the Authoritarian Conservatives (or, as I like to call them, the Krazy Kristian Konservatives) are so desperate to have their world-view validated that they will support any leader - in business, guvmint, or religion - so long as he or she just says the right things. The leader can lie, cheat, steal, rape, torture, or murder; just say the right things, and the KKK will support him or her. This means a full fourth of our country will support and obey the Psychopaths no matter what is revealed. We are an Occupied nation, and they are COLLABORATORS.

So, the rest of us need to stop trying to reason with them, or negotiate in good faith, and start taking steps to defend ourselves against the threat they represent. Telling the truth in public is the first of those steps.
---------------------------------------------------------

Elizabeth Edwards dies; lived her pain on a public stage

By Patricia Sullivan

Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 8, 2010; 12:54 AM

Elizabeth A. Edwards, who captured the nation's sympathy and admiration for her forthright grace in coping with her struggle with breast cancer and the infidelity of her husband, presidential candidate John Edwards, died Dec. 7 at her home in Chapel Hill, N.C., after a six-year battle with cancer. 

A day before her death at 61, her family announced that she had stopped treatment for her cancer because doctors had told her that further medical attention would be unproductive. 

Ms. Edwards had been a lawyer and formidable force in the political rise of her husband, who went from being a one-term U.S. senator from North Carolina to the Democratic vice presidential candidate in 2004 to a presidential candidate in the 2008 Democratic primaries. She separated from him in January.

Describing herself as the "anti-Barbie" for her real-woman figure and her serious intellect, Ms. Edwards's public stature was greatly defined by how she coped with cancer. She talked about it, wrote about it and managed the conversation in much the same way she managed her husband's political career.

She first learned that she had breast cancer just after Election Day 2004, when her husband's running mate, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), lost the presidential race to incumbent George W. Bush.

"The same day our campaign ended at Faneuil Hall, we saw Elizabeth head off to Mass General to confront this terrible disease," Kerry said Tuesday. "America came to know her in a different and even more personal way, as she fought back with enormous grace and dignity. She became an inspiration to so many."

The public rallied to her side, flooding her with nearly 65,000 messages of support. Ms. Edwards later wrote a best-selling memoir, "Saving Graces" (2006), in which she described her life and fight for survival. News coverage promoted her as one of the "100 most influential people in the world" (Time), "the most refreshing political spouse since Eleanor Roosevelt" (Oprah Winfrey's O magazine) and "shoo-in for regular person" (The Washington Post).

  
Political protector
 
Behind that persona, Ms. Edwards was a ferocious advocate who created briefing books for her husband, directed campaign staff and went after his political enemies, displaying a temper notable even in the high-pressure environment of politics. Their difference in appearance - the candidate was derided by opponents as "the Breck Girl" for his good looks, while she clearly struggled with her weight - attracted supporters as well, and John Edwards's commitment to her in her illness seemed to indicate that theirs was a marriage that mirrored many couples' ups and downs.

By the next presidential campaign cycle, when her husband was running for president, Ms. Edwards's cancer had returned, spreading to her bones. Doctors told her that it was treatable but incurable, and the couple's decision to continue seeking the Democratic presidential nomination stunned political observers.

...

-------------------------------------------------------------------
COMMENT: ONE HUNDRED PERCENT of cancer is man-made. We can prevent and cure all cancer with safe and natural means today, with no drugs or surgery. Elizabeth Edwards was KILLED by the Medical Business only two-thirds the way through her natural life-span FOR PROFIT.
-------------------------------------------------------------------

How super skinny TV stars are harming our health

By Dr Aric Sigman
Last updated at 11:10 AM on 18th October 2010

Jutting collar bones, ­Twiglet legs and razor-sharp cheek bones. It wasn’t so long ago that these were unenviable signs that a woman had lost too much weight or, worse, was suffering from an eating disorder.

Now, however, it’s hard to think of a female celebrity who isn’t that thin — not just models and actresses, but news­readers and children’s TV presenters. So much so that women and children not only view skeletal frames as normal, but as something they wish to emulate.

--------------------------------------------------------------
COMMENT: Scarlett Johansson? Keeley Hazell? Christina Hendricks? 
--------------------------------------------------------------
There has been an 80 per cent rise in young girls being hospitalised with ­anorexia in the past ten years. And body dissatisfaction is affecting younger and younger children.

In a recent study ­published in the British Journal of ­Developmental Psychology, almost half of the three to six-year-old girls surveyed said they worried about being fat.

Yet any serious correlation between visual media and the rise of eating disorders has largely been dismissed. Until now, so-called ‘body politics’ has been a cultural and psychological debate, owned by feminists and eating-disorder therapists. They dismissed blaming the visual media as too simplistic.
However, new research shows there is a much stronger link between visual media and eating disorders. Repeated exposure to images of thin women alters brain function and increases our propensity to develop eating disorders.

Even more interesting is the fact that while these neurological changes occur in women, they do not in men.

This week, I am publishing a paper on the topic in the Biologist — the journal of the Society of Biology. What triggered my research was hearing both the teenage girls I lecture and the rational, intelligent women I know, talk about their body hang-ups.

As a father, I also have concerns about the role models offered up to my children.

I’ve collated global research and travelled to remote cultures, including North Korea, Bhutan, West Papua, Burma and Burkina Faso, to observe the influence of electronic media, speaking to doctors, nurses, ­teachers, parents and children.

It all leads to the same conclusion: the prevalence of thin women on television is a public-health issue requiring urgent action.

Many studies have already confirmed the psychological effect such images have on women. But now we can see the biological effects. Scientists have identified sudden, unexpected changes in the brain function of healthy, body-confident women when they view certain female figures.

In a recent study at Brigham Young ­University in Utah, healthy women looked at images of models in skimpy bikinis.

Some of the models were overweight, some thin. On viewing each image, the women were told to imagine that someone else was ­saying the model looked like her.

When they were presented with the overweight images, the brain area called the medial prefrontal cortex (the front part of the brain linked with strong emotions such as unhappiness) showed increased activation in all of the women.

Merely imagining that they might be overweight seemed to lead women to ­question their sense of self. When the test was carried out on men, it had no such effect.

On the other side of the world, Hiroshima University found that when you show a woman her body on a screen and adjust the width, brain areas involved in emotional reactions such as fear and ­anxiety were ‘significantly activated’.

Even printed words such as ‘obesity’ or ‘heavy’ elicit similar neurological reactions — but, again, only in women.

Further evidence of the impact of visual media comes from ­Harvard Medical School. In a landmark study, scientists visited Fiji to evaluate the effect of the introduction of ­television on body satisfaction and disordered eating in ­adolescent girls. In Fiji, until recently, the ideal female form was full-­figured and dieting was rare.

In 1995, television arrived and within three years the percentage of girls demonstrating body dissatisfaction rose from 12.7 per cent to 29.2 per cent. Dieting among teenagers who watched TV increased dramatically to two in every three girls and the rate of self-induced vomiting leapt from zero to 11.3 per cent.

Molecular biologists at Harvard Medical School now believe that external stimuli may activate major psychiatric disorders by changing how our genes function. ­Childhood distress does precisely this and it is ­conceivable that early or prolonged body dissatisfaction may also disturb DNA, ­triggering eating disorders in susceptible girls. But how does this affect women and not men? It may be that it is evolutionary — a way of women ‘keeping up with the Boneses’.

An abundance of skinny women on screen makes viewers question their own attractiveness or ‘mating value’. Not to be left behind, women compete by losing weight themselves. Modern life has hijacked an ancient survival mechanism.

A decade ago, the British Medical Association’s Board of Science and Education demanded ‘a more responsible editorial attitude towards the depiction of extremely thin women as role models’. Yet matters have since worsened. While it’s easy to blame extreme catwalk models, it’s everyday images on television — those of children’s TV hosts, news­readers and talent-show judges who are deeply ­unrepresentative of most British women — that are dangerous to girls.

Surely this is discrimination? The BBC, for instance, is ‘committed to reflecting the diversity of the UK audience’ in terms of race and gender. Why isn’t female physique considered an aspect of ‘diversity’? Why aren’t size 16s — the average dress size of British females — allowed to read the news or be a CBeebies presenter?

Fortunately, more and more scientists and prominent medical bodies are beginning to view the media as playing a major role in eating disorders. The Royal College of Psychiatrists recently issued a ­statement saying the media propagates ‘unobtainable body ideals’ and that airbrushed images should carry a kite mark.

So it appears that while men eat food, women have a relationship with food. This relationship has grown increasingly ­dysfunctional. Forty years after the debut of body politics, biology is explaining more precisely why fat is indeed a feminine issue. And it’s one that requires urgent action.

Dr Aric Sigman is a Fellow of the Society of Biology. His paper A Source Of Thinspiration? The Biological Landscape Of Media, Body Image And Dieting is published in the Biologist.

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

COMMENT: We have an obesity epidemic, and this guy's concerned that girls and women are pressured to be thin? FUCK HIM.

Why didn't he mention cutting way down on flour and sugar? And tell women to get at least 100 grams of healthy fat (animal, nut, and fruit fats), and at least 100 grams of protein per day? What a fucking asshole.

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

4 dead, 53 homes destroyed in California fire

by TREVOR HUNNICUTT, Associated Press Writer

SAN BRUNO, Calif. – Fire crews flooded the ruins of burning homes with water early Friday and after a massive explosion apparently triggered by a broken gas line sent flames roaring through a neighborhood near San Francisco, killing at least four people and destroying more than 50 houses.

Thursday night's explosion was heard for miles and shot a fireball more than 1,000 feet in the air and sent frightened residents fleeing for safety and rushing to get belongings out of burning homes, witnesses said.

Utility officials said a natural gas line ruptured in the vicinity of the blast, which left a giant crater and sent flames tearing across several suburban blocks in San Bruno just after 6 p.m.

San Mateo Senior Deputy Coroner Michelle Rippy said Friday that officials at the scene confirmed at least four deaths. At least 20 others were injured, some with critical burns.

Authorities said there could be other casualties but the fire and darkness blocked them from checking.

"It's going to take us until at least until tomorrow into the afternoon to do a full search," Haag said late Thursday.

Resident Connie Bushman returned home to find her block was on fire. She said she ran into her house looking for her 80-year-old father but could not find him. A firefighter told her he had left, but she had not been able to track him down.

"I don't know where my father is, I don't know where my husband is, I don't know where to go," Bushman said.

After the initial blast, flames reached as high as 100 feet as the fire fueled itself on burning homes, leaving some in total ruins and reducing parked automobiles to burned out hulks. At least 120 homes also suffered serious damage.

The fire had spread to 10 acres and was 50 percent contained late Thursday, said Jay Allen, spokesman for the California Emergency Management Agency.

California Lieutenant Governor Abel Maldonado, acting governor while Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was in Asia on a trade mission, declared a state of emergency in San Mateo County.

"It was like a bomb went off," Maldonado told CNN from the scene early Friday.

He said the cause of the conflagration was still unclear.

"We don't know what happened. I don't know what happened. Tomorrow morning we'll find out," he said.

Crews with search dogs will go through whole area, he said. "We'll try to find folks if there are folks in their homes."

Pacific Gas and Electric Co. said in an e-mailed statement that "if it is ultimately determined that we were responsible for the cause of the incident, we will take accountability."

But later Thursday the company's president, Christopher Johns, said he didn't know what sparked the explosion.

"I don't have any details about if there was any work going on, Johns told KTVU-TV. "That will be part of the investigation as we go forward."

The company said Friday morning a damaged section of a 30-inch steel gas pipeline had been isolated and gas flow had been stopped. About 300 customers were without gas service and about 700 without electricity at 4 a.m. Friday.

The National Transportation Safety Board said Friday that it has sent a four-member team to San Bruno to investigate the blast. The NTSB's duties include investigating pipeline accidents.

Between 150 and 200 firefighters remained at the scene through the night, according to Haag. More than 100 people were being sheltered at nearby evacuation centers, but no estimate of the number of residents missing was available, he said.

San Bruno Fire Capt. Charlie Barringer said the neighborhood was engulfed by the time firefighters arrived, even though the fire station was only a few blocks away. He said the blast took out the entire water system, forcing firefighters to pump water from more than two miles away.

Haag said firefighters initially had trouble getting close enough to the ruptured 24-inch gas line to shut it down because of the flames.

As firefighters swarmed around blazers across the neighborhood, firefighting planes roared overhead and dumped retardant onto the blazes.

Brothers Bob and Ed Pellegrini, whose homes was near the center of the explosion, told The Oakland Tribune that they thought an earthquake had struck until they looked out the window.

"It looked like hell on earth. I have never seen a ball of fire that huge," Bob Pellegrini said.

The flames quickly chased them from their home.

"The house is gone," Ed said. "I have nothing. Everything is gone. We're homeless."

Victims suffering from serious burns began arriving at San Francisco Bay area hospitals shortly after the blast. An estimate of the number of injured wasn't immediately available. Hospitals reported receiving about 20 injured patients - several of whom were in critical condition.

Jane Porcelli, 62, said she lives on a hill above where the fire was centered. She said she thought she heard a plane overhead with a struggling engine.

"And then you heard this bang. And everything shook except the floor, so we knew it wasn't an earthquake," Porcelli said. "I feel helpless that I can't do anything. I just gotta sit by and watch."

Stephanie Mullen, Associated Press news editor for photos based in San Francisco, was attending children's soccer practice with her two children and husband at Crestmoor High School when she saw the blast at 6:14 p.m.

"First, it was a low deep roar and everybody looked up, and we all knew something big was happening," she said. "Then there was a huge explosion with a ball of fire that went up behind the high school several thousand feet into the sky.

"Everybody grabbed their children and ran and put their children in their cars," Mullen said. "It was very clear something awful had happened."

Several minutes later, Mullen was near the fire scene, about a half-mile away in a middle-class neighborhood of 1960s-era homes in hills overlooking San Francisco, the bay and the airport. She said she could feel the heat of the fire on her face although she was three or four blocks away from the blaze. It appeared the fireball was big enough to have engulfed at least several homes.

"I could see families in the backyards of the homes next to where the fire was, bundling their children and trying to get them out of the backyards," she recounted.

She said people in the neighborhood were yelling, "This is awful" and "My family is down there."

Judy and Frank Serrsseque were walking down a hill away from the flames with a makeshift wagon carrying important documents, medication and three cats.

Judy Serrsseque said she heard an explosion, saw that fire was headed toward their home and knew they had to leave. As they fled, they said they saw people burned and people struggling to get their things out of burning houses.

"We got everything together, and we just got out," Judy Serrsseque. "Mostly we're wondering if we have a house to go back to."

----------------------------------------------------------------
COMMENT: The Wave of impactors from space has already begun hitting the Earth, but the Govt/media will try to cover it up as long as they can.

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

Co-chair of Obama debt panel under fire for remarks

By Jeanne Sahadi, senior writer August 25, 2010: 4:07 PM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- An advocacy group is calling for the ouster of former Sen. Alan Simpson, the co-chairman of President Obama's bipartisan debt commission, who described Social Security as a "milk cow with 310 million tits!" in an email.

Ashley Carson, executive director of the Older Women's League, wrote in a blog post in April that Simpson is targeting Social Security to fix the deficit even though it "doesn't contribute" to the country's debt problem. She also accused Simpson of "disgusting ageism and sexism" in characterizing those who oppose cuts to benefits as "Gray Panthers" and "Pink Panthers."

In his email to Carson, which was sent Monday night, Simpson said he is defending Social Security, not trying to undermine it, and referred her to information showing the program's long-range shortfalls.

He went on: "I've made some plenty smart cracks about people on Social Security who milk it to the last degree. You know 'em too. It's the same with any system in America. We've reached a point now where it's like a milk cow with 310 million tits! Call when you get honest work!"

...

A coalition of groups including MoveOn.org, Social Security Works and others have pledged to "fight any effort" by the commission to cut benefits or raise the retirement age.

Such groups say that Social Security hasn't contributed to the country's fiscal woes since $2.5 trillion of surplus revenue was paid into the system over the years and borrowed by Uncle Sam.

Carson of OWL wrote that cutting defense spending should be the commission's first line of attack, and the Bush tax cuts second, when finding solutions to U.S. debt problems.

...

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

COMMENT: The Conservatives are genetically unable to feel compassion. Although they can be part of human civilization, they MUST NOT be allowed to be "in charge" of ANYTHING.

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

Human brain is 'unreliable and noisy'!

2010-07-01 17:20:00

The human brain, the most powerful computing device known, is also intrinsically unreliable and truly 'noisy', scientists have established. The study appears in the journal Nature. A long-standing hypothesis is that the brain's circuitry actually is reliable - and the apparently high variability is because your brain is engaged in many tasks simultaneously, which affect each other. It is this hypothesis that the researchers at University College London tested directly. The team - a collaboration between experimentalists at the Wolfson Institute for Biomedical Research and a theorist, Peter Latham, at the Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit - took inspiration from the celebrated butterfly effect - from the fact that the flap of a butterfly's wings in Brazil could set off a tornado in Texas. Their idea was to introduce a small perturbation into the brain, the neural equivalent of butterfly wings, and ask what would happen to the activity in the circuit. Would the perturbation grow and have a knock-on effect, thus affecting the rest of the brain, or immediately die out? It turned out to have a huge knock-on effect. The perturbation was a single extra 'spike', or nerve impulse, introduced to a single neuron in the brain of a rat. That single extra spike caused about thirty new extra spikes in nearby neurons in the brain, most of which caused another thirty extra spikes, and so on. This may not seem like much, given that the brain produces millions of spikes every second. However, the researchers estimated that eventually, that one extra spike affected millions of neurons in the brain. Lead author Dr. Mickey London, of the Wolfson Institute for Biomedical Research, UCL, said: "This result indicates that the variability we see in the brain may actually be due to noise, and represents a fundamental feature of normal brain function." This rapid amplification of spikes means that the brain is extremely 'noisy' - much, much noisier than computers. Nevertheless, the brain can perform very complicated tasks with enormous speed and accuracy, far faster and more accurately than the most powerful computer ever built (and likely to be built in the foreseeable future). The UCL researchers suggest that for the brain to perform so well in the face of high levels of noise, it must be using a strategy called a rate code. In a rate code, neurons consider the activity of an ensemble of many neurons, and ignore the individual variability, or noise, produced by each of them. Now know we know that the brain is noisy, but we still don't know why. The UCL researchers suggest that one possibility is that it's the price the brain pays for high connectivity among neurons (each neuron connects to about 10,000 others, resulting in over 8 million kilometres of wiring in the human brain). Presumably, that high connectivity is at least in part responsible for the brain's computational power. However, as the research shows, the higher the connectivity, the noisier the brain. Therefore, while noise may not be a useful feature, it is at least a by-product of a useful feature. (ANI) --------------------------------------------------------------- COMMENT: This is why you must tune your brain to the truth and reality. ---------------------------------------------------------------

Why Has Barack Obama Refused To Accept International Help To Clean Up The Oil Spill In The Gulf Of Mexico?

As the crisis in the Gulf of Mexico enters a third month, many are now asking how in the world Barack Obama can keep refusing offers from other countries to help clean up the oil spill. The truth is that cleaning up oil spills is not rocket science. There have been massive oil spills in other areas of the world before and there are some folks that have some real expertise when it comes to cleaning them up. But Barack Obama and BP have been stumbling around as if they are trying to reinvent the wheel. So exactly what in the world is going on here? When it comes to Obama's approach to this crisis, there are really two options. Either this is one of the most extreme examples of presidential incompetence in modern American history, or Barack Obama is using this crisis for a particular purpose (such as advancing a particular agenda). In either event, Obama's actions during this crisis have been completely and totally unconscionable.

The truth is that 13 different countries have offered to help clean up the oil in the Gulf of Mexico.

Barack Obama turned all 13 of them down.

So let's get this straight....

We are dealing with the greatest environmental disaster in U.S. history by far, and yet we completely refuse any assistance?

What kind of insanity is that?

In fact, it is being reported that just three days after the Deepwater Horizon sank to the floor of the Gulf of Mexico the Dutch government contacted Barack Obama and offered to loan BP ships outfitted with special oil-skimming booms. In addition, the Dutch had a plan to quickly build sand barriers to protect the vulnerable marshlands along the Louisiana coast.

Needless to say, those plans were not implemented.

According to one Dutch newspaper, the European oil companies that offered to help said that they could have completely cleaned all of the oil from the Gulf of Mexico in just four months.

But now Obama is telling us that the crisis in the Gulf of Mexico could last for years.

So what would keep Barack Obama from accepting international offers of help?

Well, Obama is using something called "the Jones Act" as an excuse.

Howard Portnoy recently described what is going on this way....

In order to accept the offers, which have come from Belgian, Dutch, and Norwegian firms that claim to possess some of the world’s most advanced oil skimming ships, Obama would need to waive the Merchant Marine Act of 1920 (P.L. 66-261). Also known as the Jones Act, the law requires essentially that all commercial acts conducted in U.S.-controlled waters be performed by “U.S.-flag ships, constructed in the United States, owned by U.S. citizens, and crewed by U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents.”

So why not simply waive the act? Other presidents have under similar circumstances. George W. Bush waived the Jones Act following Hurricane Katrina, allowing foreign ships into Gulf waters to aid in the relief effort.

The truth is that the Jones Act is not a barrier to receiving assistance at all and Barack Obama knows this.

There would be absolutely no problem with waiving the Jones Act in these circumstances.

So Barack Obama has no excuse.

Either he is completely and totally incompetent or he has been trying to make this crisis worse than it should be.

You see, this is not the first catastrophic oil spill in the history of the world. There have been others, and we have learned quite a bit about cleaning up oil from those events. Anthony G. Martin recently described what happened during one particularly brutal oil spill in 1993 and 1994....

In 1993 and '94 the Saudis faced an oil spill of historic proportions in the Arabian Gulf as four leaking tankers and two oil gushers threatened to spur a catastrophic event that was 65 times worse than the Exxon-Valdez spill.

An American engineer, Nick Pozzi, was part of a task force charged with developing a solution to the looming disaster.

Pozzi had used various methods to clean up oil spills prior to this event. However, the time was short, and an effective solution was needed post-haste.

That's when Pozzi decided that the huge, empty oil tankers, sitting in the dock, could be used to simply vacuum up the oil right off of the top of the water.

The result was that 85% of the oil was recovered.

In a recent interview with Esquire, Pozzi explained that cleaning up the oil in the Gulf of Mexico should not be that complicated....

Keep in mind that what supertankers typically do is they sit in the middle of the ocean waiting for all the traders to come up with the right price. When they feel that the price is right, the tankers that are full, they take off, and they can be anywhere in the world in a few days. Right now there are probably 25 supertankers, waiting for orders, full of oil. So all they got to do is come to Texas, in the Gulf, unload the oil, and then turn around and suck up all this other stuff and pump it onto shore into on-shore storage. It's not rocket science. It's so simple.

So why won't Barack Obama and BP implement the "supertanker method"?

When asked about it they just brush it off.

Are they that incompetent?

Or is something else going on?

If this crisis had been handled properly, oil would not currently be blanketing our pristine Gulf coast beaches.

An increasing number of Gulf coast residents have become so frustrated that they have decided to take it upon themselves to stop the oil that is headed towards their homes and businesses.

But BP and the Obama administration have been running around trying to keep anyone else other than themselves from doing anything about this oil spill. In fact, Barack Obama has authorized the deployment of more than 17,000 National Guard members along the Gulf coast to be used "as needed" by state governors, and BP is being allowed to use private security contractors to keep the American people away from the oil cleanup sites.

If they used as much energy cleaning up the oil as they are in keeping the American people away from the spill they might actually be accomplishing something.

Meanwhile, CBS News is reporting that there could be as much as 1 billion barrels of oil under the damaged BP oil well in the Gulf of Mexico and that it could keep flowing for more than a decade.

Apparently BP made one of the biggest oil discoveries in history, but the problem is that oil is now coming out of there at such high pressure that we simply do not have the technology to control it.

In addition, experts have discovered a massive gas bubble which is estimated to be 15 to 20 miles across and "tens of feet high" under the floor of the Gulf of Mexico.

So what in the world is going to happen if that thing blows?

Also, there are reports of fissures and cracks appearing on the ocean floor around the damaged wellhead.

If this thing goes from a "leak" to an "eruption" it could be a catastrophe beyond anything any of us could even imagine.

So let's hope that nothing like that happens.

But there is another very serious threat that we need to keep an eye on.

Some environmentalists are now warning that North America could be facing years of toxic rain because of the highly toxic chemical dispersants that BP is using to control the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Because it is so poisonous, the UK's Marine Management Organization has completely banned Corexit 9500, so if there was a major oil spill in the UK's North Sea, BP would not be able to use it. So BP really needs to start explaining why they are dumping so much of it into the Gulf of Mexico - especially since so much of it could end up raining down on us.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama and Joe Biden are busy playing golf and BP chief executive Tony Hayward has been busy watching his yacht race.

Well, considering the fact that Tony Hayward is set for a massive 10.8 million pound ($16 million) payout if he chooses to step down, perhaps he is not too concerned about exactly how things turn out.

As for Barack Obama, his main concern in all this seems to be advancing his climate agenda. During a recent interview, Obama directly compared the current crisis in the Gulf to 9/11, and indicated that he believed that it would fundamentally change the way that we all look at energy issues from now on. But the truth is that cleaning up the oil in the Gulf has nothing to do with the "cap and trade" carbon tax scheme that Obama is trying to foist on all of us.

What Obama needs to do is to accept all the help that is being offered, get everybody working together on cleaning up this mess, and find a way to stop all that oil from coming out of the ground.

Until he makes some progress on those things, the American people are not likely to want to hear the first thing about all of the new taxes, rules and regulations that he is so eager to impose on all of us.

The Gulf of Mexico is literally being destroyed, and already this disaster has been so horrific that the effects will be felt for decades. If Barack Obama cares one ounce about the American people he needs to start doing his job instead of playing politics with this crisis।

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

COMMENT: The BP/Obama Criminal Syndicate has done EXACTLY what they had to every step of the way to make the Gulf of Mexico oil crisis the worst disaster it could possibly be. We are way past "mistake" or "accident" here.

What the vast majority are still not grokking is that, for the psychopaths, causing pain and problems for others is meaningless fun. They are not sane. They are evil.

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

Lesbians and Gay Men in Zimbabwe Face Brutal “Corrective” Rape

By James Lovette-Black
NEWS JUNKIE POST

In a country long plagued by violence, corruption, and an authoritarian government, Zimbabwe’s President Mugabe is known as one of the worst anti-gay autocrats in Africa. Mugabe has repeatedly located blame for the country’s ills on lesbians and gay men, cultivating widespread bigotry and violence. His virulent homophobia has given rise to the rape of lesbian and gay male Zimbabweans, under the guise of “correcting” them into heterosexuality.

The US State Department’s 2009 Human Rights Report for Zimbabwe identified chronic, politically sanctioned anti-gay discrimination, violence, and torture at the hands of Mugabe’s minions, including rape of lesbians and gay men forced into heterosexual acts, with some raped by family members, ostensibly to “cure” them. The NGO, AIDS Free World, reported in December 2009 that the 70 women it surveyed reported being raped on average five times and possibly higher, as the women often became unconscious during the brutal sexual assaults.

Mugabe has created an atmosphere of terror through brutality and sexual assault, commonly using rape to intimidate and control anyone he deems to be undesirable or uncooperative. In a homophobic worldview such as Mugabe’s, it follows that lesbians and gay men would be seen as less than desirable and in need of a cure. Such detestable acts are clear violations of human rights as stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

Article 1. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 2. Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.

Other voices in Zimbabwe, notably the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum, have urged leaders to resist hate speech and to include protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation in the Constitution. However, Mugabe has pledged to block any effort to include gay rights.

Meanwhile, gay and lesbian Zimbabweans are finding life and identity threatened and endangered by a homophobe who uses thought police tactics to maintain power and control through the sexual abuse of lesbians, gay men, and others.

-------------------------------------------------------
COMMENT: Where has it been shown that rape is effective at correcting or curing homosexuality?

One of the hallmarks of the psychopath is "using the truth to lie". Here Mugabe of Zimbabwe identifies himself as a psychopath, NOT by being a "homophobe", but by using the FACT that homosexuality is an inherited disorder (for which we should be seeking a cure) as an EXCUSE to practice a campaign of terrorizing his own people.

The author of the above article has REACTED like a MACHINE, completely failing to "think with a hammer" or practice discernment.
-------------------------------------------------------

Shyness is all in your brain, study says

Introverted individuals may process the world a bit differently
By LiveScience Staff
April 6, 2010

The brains of shy or introverted individuals might actually process the world differently than their more extroverted counterparts, a new study suggests.

About 20 percent of people are born with a personality trait called sensory perception sensitivity that can manifest itself as the tendency to be inhibited, or even neuroticism. The trait can be seen in some children who are "slow to warm up" in a situation but eventually join in, need little punishment, cry easily, ask unusual questions or have especially deep thoughts, the study researchers say.

The new results show that these highly sensitive individuals also pay more attention to detail, and have more activity in certain regions of their brains when trying to process visual information than those who are not classified as highly sensitive.

The study was conducted by researchers at Stony Brook University in New York, and Southwest University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, both in China. The results were published March 4 in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience. Individuals with this highly sensitive trait prefer to take longer to make decisions, are more conscientious, need more time to themselves in order to reflect, and are more easily bored with small talk, research suggests.

Sensitive all around?
Previous work has also shown that compared with others those with a highly sensitive temperament are more bothered by noise and crowds, more affected by caffeine, and more easily startled. That is, the trait seems to confer sensitivity all around.

The researchers in the current study propose the simple sensory sensitivity to noise, pain, or caffeine is a side effect of an inborn preference to pay more attention to experiences.

They first used an established questionnaire to separate the sensitive from the non-sensitive participants. Then, the 16 participants compared a photograph of a visual scene with a preceding scene, indicating whether or not the scene had changed. Scenes differed in whether the changes were obvious or subtle, and in how quickly they were presented. Meanwhile, the researchers scanned each participant's brain with functional magnetic resonance imaging.

Sensitive persons looked at the scenes with subtle differences for a longer time than did non-sensitive persons, and showed significantly greater activation in brain areas involved in associating visual input with other input to the brain and with visual attention. These brain areas are not simply used for vision itself, but for a deeper processing of input.

The sensitivity trait is found in over 100 other species, from fruit flies and fish to canines and primates, indicating this personality type could sometimes provide an evolutionary advantage.

Biologists are beginning to agree that within one species there can be two equally successful "personalities." The sensitive type, always a minority, chooses to observe longer before acting, as if doing their exploring with their brains rather than their limbs. The other type "boldly goes where no one has gone before," the scientists say.

The sensitive individual's strategy is not so advantageous when resources are plentiful or quick, aggressive action is required. But it comes in handy when danger is present, opportunities are similar and hard to choose between, or a clever approach is needed.

© 2010 LiveScience.com. All rights reserved.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Comment: 1.) No, "introverted" is NOT the same thing as "shy".
2.) No, "introverted" is NOT the same thing as "neurotic", but some extroverted people think the way they are is SO AWESOME that there must be something wrong with anyone who is not like them.
3.) No, "introverted" is NOT the same thing as "the preference for the behaviors that make a person acquire depth".
4.) No, "introverted" is NOT the same thing as "inner-generated intensity combining with outer-generated stimuli to become overwhelming" (aka "highly sensitive").

The people who conducted these studies and the people who wrote this article are idiots. Begin learning about the science of inherited preferences here.

P.S.
"Aggressive" = "abusive".
----------------------------------------------------------------

Iceland Bans Strip Clubs

Iceland: the world's most feminist country

Iceland has just banned all strip clubs. Perhaps it's down to the lesbian prime minister, but this may just be the most female-friendly country on the planet

by Julie Bindel

Iceland is fast becoming a world-leader in feminism. A country with a tiny population of 320,000, it is on the brink of achieving what many considered to be impossible: closing down its sex industry.

While activists in Britain battle on in an attempt to regulate lapdance clubs – the number of which has been growing at an alarming rate during the last decade – Iceland has passed a law that will result in every strip club in the country being shut down. And forget hiring a topless waitress in an attempt to get around the bar: the law, which was passed with no votes against and only two abstentions, will make it illegal for any business to profit from the nudity of its employees.

Even more impressive: the Nordic state is the first country in the world to ban stripping and lapdancing for feminist, rather than religious, reasons. Kolbrún Halldórsdóttir, the politician who first proposed the ban, firmly told the national press on Wednesday: "It is not acceptable that women or people in general are a product to be sold." When I asked her if she thinks Iceland has become the greatest feminist country in the world, she replied: "It is certainly up there. Mainly as a result of the feminist groups putting pressure on parliamentarians. These women work 24 hours a day, seven days a week with their campaigns and it eventually filters down to all of society."

The news is a real boost to feminists around the world, showing us that when an entire country unites behind an idea anything can happen. And it is bound to give a shot in the arm to the feminist campaign in the UK against an industry that is both a cause and a consequence of gaping inequality between men and women.

According to Icelandic police, 100 foreign women travel to the country annually to work in strip clubs. It is unclear whether the women are trafficked, but feminists say it is telling that as the stripping industry has grown, the number of Icelandic women wishing to work in it has not. Supporters of the bill say that some of the clubs are a front for prostitution – and that many of the women work there because of drug abuse and poverty rather than free choice. I have visited a strip club in Reykjavik and observed the women. None of them looked happy in their work.

So how has Iceland managed it? To start with, it has a strong women's movement and a high number of female politicans. Almost half the parliamentarians are female and it was ranked fourth out of 130 countries on the international gender gap index (behind Norway, Finland and Sweden). All four of these Scandinavian countries have, to some degree, criminalised the purchase of sex (legislation that the UK will adopt on 1 April). "Once you break past the glass ceiling and have more than one third of female politicians," says Halldórsdóttir, "something changes. Feminist energy seems to permeate everything."

Johanna Sigurðardottir is Iceland's first female and the world's first openly lesbian head of state. Guðrún Jónsdóttir of Stígamót, an organisation based in Reykjavik that campaigns against sexual violence, says she has enjoyed the support of Sigurðardottir for their campaigns against rape and domestic violence: "Johanna is a great feminist in that she challenges the men in her party and refuses to let them oppress her."

Then there is the fact that feminists in Iceland appear to be entirely united in opposition to prostitution, unlike the UK where heated debates rage over whether prostitution and lapdancing are empowering or degrading to women. There is also public support: the ban on commercial sexual activity is not only supported by feminists but also much of the population. A 2007 poll found that 82% of women and 57% of men support the criminalisation of paying for sex – either in brothels or lapdance clubs – and fewer than 10% of Icelanders were opposed.

Jónsdóttir says the ban could mean the death of the sex industry. "Last year we passed a law against the purchase of sex, recently introduced an action plan on trafficking of women, and now we have shut down the strip clubs. The Nordic countries are leading the way on women's equality, recognising women as equal citizens rather than commodities for sale."

Strip club owners are, not surprisingly, furious about the new law. One gave an interview to a local newspaper in which he likened Iceland's approach to that of a country such as Saudi Arabia, where it is not permitted to see any part of a woman's body in public. "I have reached the age where I'm not sure whether I want to bother with this hassle any more," he said.

Janice Raymond, a director of Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, hopes that all sex industry profiteers feel the same way, and believes the new law will pave the way for governments in other countries to follow suit. "What a victory, not only for the Icelanders but for everyone worldwide who repudiates the sexual exploitation of women," she says.

Jónsdóttir is confident that the law will create a change in attitudes towards women. "I guess the men of Iceland will just have to get used to the idea that women are not for sale."

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

COMMMENT: Q. WTF does strip clubs or topless waitresses have to do with "trafficking" in women?

A. Not one goddamn thing.

Healthy heterosexuality is NOT the goal of modern feminism.

Statements like "sexual exploitation of women" and "women are not for sale" are psychological warfare, attempting to conflate strip clubs with human trafficking. Really what's going on is that the feminists HATE heterosexuality, and therefore are incensed that any woman would do anything to please a man.

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