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Laura Knight-Jadczyk
Sott.net 2015-01-16 15:43:00
At our house, the most interesting conversations take place around the breakfast table before we begin our day's work. The topics range from weird animal behavior to politics and everything in between. (Hmmm... in fact, "weird animal behavior" and "politics" may have more in common than one initially suspects!) Well, anyway, this morning the conversation led to an observation by one of the family members that everything is like I described in one of the chapters of The Wave some 16 years ago, that we can look out the window and see cars passing, birds hopping around, people going about their business as though everything was still the same, but it isn't; and knowing that it isn't the same can have a profound, visceral effect on a person. In The Wave, I was addressing the issue of becoming aware, via collecting evidence and connecting dots, that our reality may be/must be embedded in some bizarre 'hyperdimensional reality', and that we live our lives similar to the example given by Plato in his story of The Cave. Reading about such things as Platonic realms of ideas is an interesting intellectual exercise, but for me, and many others, it is a visceral experience. Anyway, the passage in question goes as follows: | |
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| Puppet Masters |
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Brandon Smith
Alt Market 2015-01-14 09:33:00
I was in the middle of working on an article covering real U.S. economic stats versus manipulated statistics when the Charlie Hebdo shootings took place. And though I knew the implications of the event would be far-reaching, I was originally undeterred from my financial subject matter. I had already covered in previous articles the inevitability of ISIS attacks on Europe and America,including the "warnings" of Saudi Arabia in August of last year that jihadists would target the EU within months and the U.S. a month later. In September of last year, ISIS publicly urged attacks on French and U.S. citizens. I have also published extensive analysis on the covert funding and training of ISIS militants by Saudi Arabia and Western intelligence agencies, including my article "The Time Is Ripe For A False Flag Attack On American Soil." | |
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RT
2015-01-16 18:14:00
Israeli hostilities against Syria should be considered an attack on all of Damascus' allies, said Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, warning that all necessary preparations for a future war with Israel have been made. "The repeated bombings that struck several targets in Syria are a major violation, and we consider that any strike against Syria is a strike against the whole of the resistance axis, not just against Syria," Nasrallah told Al-Mayadeen television in Beirut. "The axis is capable of responding," he said, referring to Syria itself, Iran, Hezbollah as well as Palestinian Hamas. "It could happen any time." "We are now stronger than we ever were as a resistance movement," Nasrallah said, adding that Hezbollah has all the weapons one can "imagine" in "great quantities." The organization is fully prepared to fight Israel, and it would be a mistake for Tel Aviv to believe the resistance has been weakened or exhausted, he warned. | |
Comment: Israel truly believes it can bomb other countries, assassinate foreign nationals, and manipulate world leaders with impunity. It has for years. The response to such behaviors should be obvious.
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RT
2015-01-16 18:05:00
The International Criminal Court in the Hague has opened a "preliminary examination" of possible war crimes conducted on Palestinian territory during the last year's military conflict with Israel in Gaza. A preliminary examination is the first step in the court's legal process, and evaluates whether a full investigation is necessary. In a statement released on the ICC website, its Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda promised that her office "will conduct its analysis in full independence and impartiality," mentioning that no deadline has been set for announcing the results of the investigation. | |
Comment: Israel has literally gotten away with murder for generations. So we're skeptical anything will change. However, there is always the hope that the power dynamics are changing enough on this planet, and that Israel's actions have become so obvious, that they cannot plausibly be denied any longer.
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Filip Kovacevic
MINA 2015-01-16 15:50:00
Translated into English for SOTT.net by the author In an interview with the Montenegrin National News Agency (MINA), published 10 January 2015, the Chairman of the Movement for Neutrality of Montenegro (MNMNE), Professor Filip Kovacevic, stated that, in the first part of 2014, many government officials and their "Atlanticist mentors and highly-paid lobbyists" claimed that Montenegro would get an invitation to join NATO at the organization's summit in Wales last September. "At the same time, I publicly stated that this would not happen. Now it is easy to see who was right. Getting the invitation depends on the overall geopolitical dynamic in Europe," said Kovacevic, asserting that we would see more and more skepticism toward the policies of Washington, especially given the open confrontation with Russia, which came about as a result of US imposition of its Atlanticist, neoliberal priorities on the European Union, which caused a great deal of economic damage. According to Kovacevic, this means that NATO's influence, whose only reason for existing is "the military occupation and intelligence surveillance of Europe by the Anglo-American, imperial centers of power", will gradually weaken. "In line with this trend, NATO will not have enough strength to expand further and it will find it more and more difficult to keep even the present member states together," said Kovacevic. | |
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Chris Spargo
The Daily Mail, UK 2015-01-15 20:24:00
Members of the North Miami Beach Police have been caught using photos of actual black teenagers for target practice. This was discovered during an incident last month when Sgt. Valerie Deant, a clarinet player in the Florida Army National Guard's 13th Army Band, showed up at the Medley Firearms Training Center after members of the department had been practicing, and recognized one of their targets - a mugshot of her brother from when he was just 18-years-old. The other targets were also black men, and some just teenagers. But now the department is defending the practice. | |
Comment: And some people think there is no racism problem among cops in the USA.
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Khaled Atallah
Al-Monitor 2015-01-14 11:20:00
Since the start of the Syrian crisis, the Syrian regime has routinely accused Israel of playing a hidden role, from Qusair in the Homs countryside in May 2013 to the emergence and advances of thesouthern front in September 2014. UN reports published in December appear to vindicate the regime's arguments that Israel is involved with the southern rebels. Comment: Rebels = terrorist groups unleashed in the region by U.S., Israel and their allies to topple the government in Damascus. According to a UN report covering the period from March to May 2014, the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) detected contact between rebels and the Israeli armyacross the Golan cease-fire line, particularly during fierce clashes between the Syrian army and the rebels. The report also confirmed that the UN forces spotted rebels transporting 89 wounded across the cease-fire line into the Israeli occupied zone, where they were handed over 19 people who had received medical treatment in addition to two dead. The UN forces also noted that the Israeli army delivered two boxes to rebels on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights. Communications increased between rebels and the Israeli army before the eruption of the southern front in Daraa and Quneitra in September, according to Quneitra opposition activist Mohammad Qasim, a pseudonym due to the sensitivity of the subject. | |
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TASS
2015-01-15 10:53:00
The Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor) will consider an appeal of St. Petersburg deputy Vitaly Milonov who asked to blacklist the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo as extremist literature banned in Russia, Roskomnadzor's press service told TASS on Thursday clarifying that it had not received the letter so far. "Roskomnadzor has not received any appeals as of yet. It will be considered upon receipt in deadlines established by the law," the source went on to say. In his letter to Roskomnadzor's Chief Alexander Zhukov, deputy Milonov wrote that the magazine was inciting inter-religious strife. Roskomnadzor, a federal executive body responsible for overseeing the media, including the electronic media and mass communications, information technology and telecommunications, has discussed a series of preventive measures with representatives of federal and regional media outlets with regards to publication of materials, including religious caricatures, that may lead to inciting religious strife. | |
Comment: The racist magazine Charlie Hebdo is being used to demonize Muslims, deputy Vitaly Milonov is spot on with his suggestion.
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Arthur Silber
Once Upon a Time 2015-01-16 04:30:00 Comment: Arthur Silber, author of this excellent essay, has thought deeply on the larger forces behind the Charlie Hebdo marches. His conclusions are disturbing. To amuse myself for a brief moment -- and perhaps you, too, dear reader, for I assuredly shall do my best not to lose sight of your concerns in what follows -- I might invoke the spirit of Master Dickens, as revealed in his work celebrating the holiday just recently passed. I therefore state: Any significant intellectual culture, especially any aspect of that always exceedingly fragile enterprise that rises to challenge established authority and its numerous, labyrinthine dictates of shoulds and should nots, what is permitted and what is not, the limits of correct thought and professed belief, and uncountable and often incomprehensible related matters, is dead: to begin with. Any significant intellectual culture is as dead as a door-nail.
I state this proposition in Master Dickens' manner: emphatically. I do this not only to amuse myself, if only momentarily, but to keep from going mad. As I further consider the Charlie Hebdo spectacle, its significance and implications grow ever more ominous and threatening. I watch this spectacle, and I want to scream: What is wrong with everyone? Don't you understand what is going on here? A few people do, and I am always deeply grateful to encounter them. But for the most part, everyone -- and here, I speak of everyone in the West, which is where I reside, most unhappily at present, and where you probably read this -- has enthusiastically rallied to the cause of "freedom," and "freedom of the press" and "freedom of speech" more specifically. Almost everyone screams: Je suis Charlie! So many damned liars. Allowing for the extremely rare exception, not one of the throng shouting "Je suis Charlie" is at any kind of risk at all, nor do they ever intend to be, not if they can help it. I see a crowd of millions, every single goddamned person holding aloft a sign emblazoned with big, bold lettering: I AM ONE OF A KIND!The message loses its charm around the fifty-thousandth repetition, roughly speaking. As I noted a few days ago, uniqueness, as well as courage, abhors a mob. We might be so bold as to say that seeking the comfort of the mob vitiates the message. | |
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Antinazistas for Donbass
The following documentary show graphic footage of civilian slaughter from shelling in Eastern Ukraine during the summer of 2014. Watch as Kiev's GRADs shell houses, hospitals, and nursing homes in Donetsk and other towns in Eastern Ukraine. Grandmothers and children alike are charred and shredded with shrapnel in the streets. These are the people that Western media would have you believe are 'pro-Russian terrorists'. This video should put to rest any doubts as to the true nature of the conflict.Voxkomm 2015-01-16 06:47:00 Warning: Graphic Content |
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Syddue
Overgrowthesystem.com 2014-12-29 03:00:00
American biotechnology has turned Argentina into the world's third-largest soybean producer, but the chemicals powering the boom aren't confined to soy and cotton and corn fields. They routinely contaminate homes and classrooms and drinking water. A growing chorus of doctors and scientists is warning that their uncontrolled use could be responsible for the increasing number of health problems turning up in hospitals across the South American nation. In the heart of Argentina's soybean business, house-to-house surveys of 65,000 people in farming communities foundcancer rates two to four times higher than the national average, as well as higher rates of hypothyroidism and chronic respiratory illnesses. Associated Press photographer Natacha Pisarenko spent months documenting the issue in farming communities across Argentina. Most provinces in Argentina forbid spraying pesticides and other agrochemicals next to homes and schools, with bans ranging in distance from 50 meters to as much as several kilometers from populated areas. The Associated Press found many cases of soybeans planted only a few feet from homes and schools, and of chemicals mixed and loaded onto tractors inside residential neighborhoods. In the last 20 years, agrochemical spraying has increased eightfold in Argentina- from 9 million gallons in 1990 to 84 million gallons today. Glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto's Round Up products, is used roughly eight to ten times more per acre than in the United States. Yet Argentina doesn't apply national standards for farm chemicals, leaving rule-making to the provinces and enforcement to the municipalities. The result is a hodgepodge of widely ignored regulations that leave people dangerously exposed. Just came across more info about this story.
BASAVILBASO, Argentina (AP) - Argentine farmworker Fabian Tomasi was never trained to handle pesticides. His job was to keep the crop-dusters flying by filling their tanks as quickly as possible, although it often meant getting drenched in poison. Now, at 47, he's a living skeleton, so weak he can hardly swallow or go to the bathroom on his own. | ||
Comment: Like every psychopathic corporation, what counts for Monsanto is making money - regardless of the cost to human lives.
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breitbart.com
2015-01-15 02:33:00
Comment: How long will it be before all Muslims are forced to wear an armband with insignia that notifies everyone they are Muslims? And then where do we go from there? Does Europe really wish to repeat history and become like Nazi Germany? Despite confiscating passports, Germany has found Jihadists have still been able to leave the country to fight and get training abroad by using their Federal identity cards, so the state has proposed to replace them, with specially designed 'Jihadi' cards. Having an identity document has been compulsory for many Germans since 1938 when the authoritarian Nazi Party introduced papers for adult men and Jews. The identity card programme has since expanded and covers all adult Germans, providing them with a convenient document for quick identification and travel within the European Union open borders area. Because the cards are valid travel documents, Germany has seen a number of suspected terrorists who have already had their passports revoked easily slip away to Turkey, with whom Germany has a borders agreement. From there, crossing into the Islamic State is relatively easy and can be arranged by any one of a number of smugglers for a small fee. | |
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Patrick Martin
World Socialist Web Site 2015-01-15 00:00:00
Early Wednesday morning, the new edition of Charlie Hebdo went on sale across France, with the press run ramped up from the usual 60,000 to 5 million. The new issue, with a degrading cartoon of the prophet Muhammad on its cover, is not a monument to "press freedom," as portrayed in media accounts, but rather a state-supported provocation. Through this publication and its echoes throughout the media, millions of French citizens are being bombarded by an anti-Muslim campaign that was, until recently, the province of the neo-fascist National Front. These sentiments are being deliberately whipped up to provide a base of support for renewed military operations by French imperialism. The conduct of the "war on terror" is acquiring ever more openly a racist character. That the campaign is being very carefully coordinated is evident in the fact that the French government paid for the enormously expanded press run, while leading journals of the French bourgeoisie made it possible: Le Monde supplied computers, Libération opened its offices to the surviving Charlie Hebdo staff. Prime Minister Manuel Valls dropped by to show his support. | |
Comment: Sadly, the Paris Shootings have opened up the floodgates for France's worst and most destructive political, social and militaristic inclinations towards its own - and the world's - Islamic people. They have basically taken the false flag events of recent days and ran with it; much to the approval of the failing Western Empire, and much to the horror of anyone anywhere who can see what this means and where this is all going.
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RT
2015-01-15 23:00:00
A former Guantanamo Bay prison guard and Marine has spoken to the press for the first time about what he claims were the CIA murders of three problematic detainees, covered up as a triple suicide. Army Staff Sergeant Joseph Hickman was on duty at the notorious prison camp when the three men died, and insists the official version of events is "impossible," he told Vice News. The three men were Salah Ahmed Al-Salami, 37, from Yemen, Mani Shaman Al-Utaybi, 30, from Saudi Arabia, and Yasser Talal Al-Zahrani, 22, also from Saudi Arabia. None of them had been charged with any crime. He explained in an incendiary interview with Vice News that the three men would have had to have committed suicide at exactly the same time in a cellblock where guards check on detainees every four minutes. "They would have had to all three tie their hands and feet together, shove rags down their throats, put a mask over their face, made a noose, hung it from the ceiling on the side of the cellblock, jumped into the noose and hung themselves simultaneously," he said. | |
Comment: Of course the senators don't want those prisoners released because it would shed more light on what is going on at Guantanamo.
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John Vibes
The Free Thought Project 2015-01-16 22:22:00
This week, as millions of Americans demand that Guantanamo Bay guards be prosecuted for war crimes, it seems that some of them may be getting jobs as cops instead. It was recently reported that large numbers of military police officers who were formerly stationed at the infamous torture prisons, are now getting jobs as local cops, and could be coming to a town near you. The Worcester Police department in Massachusetts is testing a pilot program, in which former Guantanamo prison guards will be given jobs as police. Although it is common practice for police departments to hire from the military, Worcester police sergeant Richard Cipro said that this is the first program in the country to specifically recruits from military prisons. He called the effort a "life-changing opportunity" when speaking to new recruits during a recent training class. Comment: "Life-changing" for the poor souls who have to deal with these torturing thugs, no doubt. New recruits from Guantanamo Bay receive a full-time, paid 35 week training course which is apparently designed to help them make the transition from military police to neighborhood cop.Each class is filled with dozens of potential recruits, many of whom have worked in Guantanamo Bay. There are many hundreds and even thousands more who worked at lesser known military prison camps that are run in very much the same way, being accepted to police departments nationwide. | |
Comment: As if America's non-Gitmo trained cops weren't bad enough.
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Chris Carrington
The Daily Sheeple 2015-01-15 13:42:00
Although it's not making the headlines as it was when the epidemic started, Ebola is still killing hundreds of people a week in Africa. With the death toll now heading towards 9,000, and with sporadic cases occurring elsewhere in the world, complacency could literally be the death of us all. British nurse Pauline Cafferkey, was diagnosed with the disease after returning from an aid mission is West Africa, she remains in isolation in the Royal Free Hospital, London. Today Infowars is reporting a soldier recently returned from a tour of duty in Liberia, was found dead in a pool of vomit outside his home. He was apparently self-monitoring in lieu of quarantine. The World Health Organization has admitted it has fallen short of its January target of treating 100% of Ebola victims and providing a biologically safe and dignified burial for those that die of the condition. You can read the latest situation report from the WHO here. Since the report, dated January 7th, many more have died of the disease. | |
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CBS News - Minnesota
2015-01-15 11:57:00
Police in Minnesota have closed their investigation of a 6-year-old girl's hanging death by ruling out foul play, and said the evidence points to an accident or suicide. Kendrea Johnson was found unconscious in a bedroom of her foster home in Brooklyn Park with a jump rope around her neck Dec. 27. There were no witnesses in the room. "All of the evidence leads back to either suicide or accidental," Deputy Chief Mark Bruley said. "The reality is she was in the room by herself and we'll probably never know the answer to that." Bruley said Kendrea had been getting treatment for emotional problems including suicidal thoughts. Child protection workers put the girl in foster care in December 2013 after her mother allegedly abused drugs. She had been at that particular home since March. Citing police investigative records, the Star Tribune reported Thursday that investigators found a note written in purple marker in a child's handwriting reading: "I'm sorry." A second note said: "I'm sad for what I do." Kendrea's foster mother said the girl had said she wanted to jump out a window and kill herself because "Nobody likes me," the newspaper reported. She drew pictures at school of a child hanging from a rope, and police found healed ligature marks on both sides of her neck, the newspaper said. Suicides among young children are rare. There were 33 suicides among children ages 5-9 in the U.S. between 1999 and 2006, according to statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Kendrea's biological mother and grandmother have said they believe somebody else killed her. Bruley said it was hard for him and his investigators to accept that a 6-year-old could have deliberately taken her own life. "She clearly had emotional issues. Does that mean she fully understood the consequences? I don't know," he said. | |
Comment: Children that young lack the verbal and cognitive ability to properly express their frustrations, fears, anxieties and other emotions. This tragedy could have been prevented - all of the signs were there.
Emotion Detectives Program Uncovers Ways to Fight-Off Youth Anxiety and Depression | |
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Officially it is called Highway 16. But to many, the notorious stretch of road where dozens of women have simply disappeared or turned up dead, has come to be known as the Highway of Tears. No one knows exactly how many have vanished along the 800km road through British Columbia in Canada, though some say the number could be as high as 40. Signs along the highway warn of a serial killer on the loose, cautioning girls not to hitchhike, though the killer theory has not been proved. The lack of answers only adds to the mystery, and for local people, the growing sense of alarm. Many of the missing belong to remote indigenous communities, with little or no transport or phone coverage, and who are forced to hitchhike to get around. Most disappeared on a remote stretch linking the cities of Prince George and Prince Rupert. "A lot of women are forced to hitchhike along the highway because there is no other option,'' anti-violence campaigner Wendy Kellas, who works on the Highway of Tears project to raise awareness, told news.com.au. She said one official estimate listed 18 women as missing or murdered in the past 30 years, however indigenous communities claim that number is far higher. The high number of cases have even sparked claims of at least one serial killer targeting vulnerable women along the remote route. The first killing was recorded back in 1969 when the body of Gloria Moody was found. The 26-year-old had gone out to a bar but never returned home, The Mirror reported. | |
Comment: It is conceivable that this area of British Columbia is a convenient hunting ground for predators. It is particularly disturbing how the police are treating these women.
Update: Highway Of Tears Hitchhiking Study Stalled Due To Lack Of Funding
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Tom Boggioni
Rawstory 2015-01-16 08:31:00
Manhattan Special Victims Unit detective has been demoted and is under investigation for allegedly assaulting a rape victim while working on her case, telling her during an evening of drinking, "You're my favorite victim," according to the New York Daily News. In an exclusive, the News reports that Det. Lukasz Skorzewski, 31, along with his supervisor Lt. Adam Lamboy, 44, have both been transferred from the sex crimes unit following their actions in Seattle where they were interviewing the woman who had alleged that she was raped while a student in New York City in 2013. According to the unidentified 24-year-old woman, the two detectives initially interviewed her in an office on July 15 of last year before agreeing to meet with her the next day to answer some additional questions she had. The woman states that she met the two policeman, who were accompanied by another unidentified woman, at a pier and they invited her to go have drinks which she agreed to after Lamboy assured her, "You'll be safe with us." The woman claims she spent the evening drinking with the detectives, during which time Skorzewski reportedly said to her, "You're my favorite victim." She says she stayed with the two officers after the other woman left - reportedly after having an argument with Lamboy - before pointing out that her car was located some distance away. The woman said that Skorzewski offered to let her stay in his hotel room, giving her the bed while he slept on the couch. Skorzewski reportedly told her "You're really cool. No, you're awesome," before turning in for the night. | |
Comment: Sexual predators often take positions where they are trusted and have easy access to their victims. See or read the SOTT editor's interview with Dr. Anna Salter, author of Predators: Pedophiles, Rapists, And Other Sex Offenders.
SOTT Talk Radio: Predators Among Us - Interview With Dr. Anna Salter See also: "Honey Traps" and the Strauss-Kahn Affair: A Stealthy Coup d'état at the IMF? | |
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RT
2015-01-16 17:58:00
In a sign of a new type of connectedness, almost one-third of the American population would forgo sexual relations for a year than surrender their mobile phone for that long, according to a new survey. The survey of 1,003 Americans was conducted from September through November of last year by the Boston Consulting Group, and was commissioned and partly paid for by semiconductor maker Qualcomm Inc. (QCOM), Bloomberg reported. America's love affair with the communication devices was proven in a number of other scenarios as well: More than 55 percent said they'd be willing to stop eating out for one year rather than part with their mobile phones, many of which give users an Internet connection, access to social media and an abundance of apps that Americans seem to find more indispensable than a healthy romp. | |
Comment: Brainwashing complete? We don't know what's sadder: the slavish dependency and attachment to a technology that takes you out of the real world or the suggestion that so many people seemingly lack a healthy, loving relationship in which sex can express that love.
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RT
2015-01-16 17:50:00
People in France have reportedly consumed a record number of tranquilizers over the week that followed the deadly Charlie Hebdo attack, with the intake increasing by 20 percent in just a few days. The research was conducted by French health data consultancy firm Celtipharm, the Times reported. After contacting 4,800 chemists, Celtipharm reported skyrocketing consumption of tranquilizers over the several days after the attack. Between January 9 and 13 there was an 18.2 percent rise. "This type of phenomenon has never been observed before," Celtipharm CEO Patrick Guerin toldThe Times. | |
Comment: How symbolic. The French, in response to a flagrant manipulation of their society and emotions chooses to 'go to sleep' rather than wake up and take a stand against their real enemy: the psychopaths in their own government and intelligence agencies. The Charlie Hebdo attacks were brutal, criminal, and highly traumatic. But after every trauma, it's important first of all to understand it. The French seem to have skipped that step, and are reacting based on manipulated emotional impulses, impulses that are only strengthening the racist tendencies advanced by publications likeCharlie Hebdo.
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Henry Samuel
The Independent, UK 2015-01-16 12:56:00
A hostage taking is under way in a post office in Colombes, a suburb of northwest Paris. According to police, an armed man is currently detaining two hostages, but they insisted there was no link to terrorism. The man is known by the authorities, and had contacted the police himself, they said. Police are in communication with the man, trying to talk him into giving up the hostages. According to local Socialist MP Alexis Bachelay, the man was carrying out an "armed robbery". The man, known to police for previous criminal offences, phoned emergency services claiming he was "heavily armed with grenades and a kalachnikov", AFP reported. Newspapers Le Figaro and Le Monde reported that the man was equipped with a military weapon. "He phoned number 17 [the French emergency number] saying rambling things," a source said, adding that no shots had been fired. The man is reportedly "mentally unstable and acted after failed relationship," according to France Info. Witnesses said he entered the post office at 12.30pm local time and some customers were able to escape. He is now inside with two hostages. | |
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This week, former Trumball police officer William Ruscoe began a drastically reduced 30-month prison sentence for handcuffing and raping a teenage girl in his home. The 45-year-old Ruscoe, who resigned from the police department following his arrest and later pleaded guilty to second-degree sexual assault, blamed his crime on financial problems that made it hard to support his wife and two children and a lack of support from the state's criminal justice system- he claimed a man who threatened him with a gun was released on probation, according to Connecticut Postings. Comment: "blamed his crime"?! There is NO reason to rape a woman EVER! During a sentencing hearing Ruscoe pleaded with the court to give him a downward departure in sentencing from the 6-year prison term he agreed to in his plea bargain. "Please show them (his children) the justice system their daddy worked to uphold for nearly 20 years is also fair and compassionate," Ruscoe urged the judge. State's Attorney John Smriga added that he felt the agreed upon plea deal of a 6-year sentence was appropriate for the crime committed by Ruscoe."It's not that he (Ruscoe) just had a bad day, this was an action that was planned out," said Smirga. | |
Comment: The police can shoot and kill unarmed civilians and dogs, so why not let them get away with rape too?
Anna Salter Ph.D wrote, Predators: Pedophiles, Rapists, And Other Sex Offenders - who they are, how they operate, and how we can protect ourselves and our children. It's a must read for anyone with children.
You can also find an interview SOTT did with Anna Salter: | |
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Brad Edwards
CBS Chicago 2015-01-14 02:41:00
An investigation into the possible illegal selling of human body parts continues after two suburban locations were raided Tuesday. CBS 2's Brad Edwards reports it is part of a year-long, national investigation. Sources tell Edwards that at Cremation Services Inc. in Schiller Park they're sifting through hundreds of body parts. The facility was raided by FBI agents on Tuesday, along with an office called the Biological Resource Center of Illinois in Rosemont, a body donation service. The ventures are owned by Donald Green. Green was seen in a YouTube video that also features Secretary of State Jesse White. His office tells Edwards Secretary White's appearance was never authorized for that video. A business under the same name was recently raided in Arizona, part of the tentacles in an ongoing investigation that started in Detroit, where a now shuttered east side warehouse was used to house thousands of body parts on ice, allegedly fresh for the black market. A lawyer for the Biological Resource Center of Illinois released a statement saying, "As part of an ongoing investigation of two former Biological Resource Center of Illinois business associates, the federal government and State of Arizona investigators executed search warrants today at Biological Resource Center of Illinois. We are aware that the two organizations have been under investigation for several months, and we are cooperating with authorities to better understand the issues and provide all requested information to assist in their investigation. "Biological Resource Center of Illinois remains committed to serving both our donor families and clients by providing safe anatomical material that further medical research, training and education. We are committed to continuing to serve our donor-families and clients with the highest level of integrity and standard of care, as we have done over the last two decades." | |
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Travis Gettys
Raw Story 2015-01-15 12:16:00
Growing up poor leaves a mark that can't be erased and habits that are hard to break. Thousands of poor or formerly poor Reddit users discussed their experiences after someone posted a topic asking: "What do insanely poor people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about?" Commenters described shopping for expired food, Dumpster-diving, and using improvised cleaning products to save money and meet their basic needs. "Often bakeries will toss out stale breads and things but leave the bag on them," wrote commenter robutmike. "We would get them, dump the breads out of the bags at home into something clean, wash our hands, and have some fancy bread that was still perfectly good. You had to carefully check the bag for punctures of course, unless you were particularly hungry, then you could just remove the portion that was exposed and eat the rest." "My mom would send my sisters and I to volunteer at the food pantry so we could get the freshest expired food," wrote another commenter, Dharma42. "We would ride along with the organizers of the pantry in a church bus early in the morning and collect day old KFC, pizza hut and any groceries that were past the 'sell by' date." They also recalled making meals with a bare minimum of cheap, barely palatable ingredients - such as lard or syrup sandwiches. "One time I also ate noodles covered in hot ketchup," wrote commenter workshits. "It was literally the worst thing." Some commenters shared tips for finding free food and avoiding hunger pangs. | |
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Adam Kredo
Washington Free Beacon 2015-01-15 23:05:00
One of Europe's most prominent Jewish organizations is petitioning the European Union to pass new legislation that would permit Jewish community members to carry guns "for the essential protection of their communities," according to a letter obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. The European Jewish Association (EJA), which represents Jewish communities across Europe, says that gun license laws must be altered following a string of deadly attacks on Jews in France and other European countries, where anti-Semitism has been growing at an alarming rate. The recent attacks, including one on a Kosher market that killed four, "have revealed the urgent need to stop talking and start acting" in a way that empowers Europe's Jews, according to a lettersent Tuesday by EJA General Director Rabbi Menachem Margolin to EU leaders. The EU, which has enacted very stringent gun control laws, should empower and train Jews to be proficient with guns in order to maintain their safety, according to Margolin. Comment: What's next, they alter laws to make it legal for Jews to shoot and kill anyone that they feel threatened by? Just carrying a weapon won't stop people from hurting each other. And what about the safety of everyone else? I guess it's not as important as the safety of Jews. "The Paris attacks, as well as the many challenges and threats which have been presented to the European Jewish community in recent years, have revealed the urgent need to stop talking and start acting," Margolin writes. | |
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| Secret History |
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John Pilger
John Pilger Blog 2014-03-16 03:36:00
Washington's role in the fascist putsch against an elected government in Ukraine will surprise only those who watch the news and ignore the historical record. Since 1945, dozens of governments, many of them democracies, have met a similar fate, usually with bloodshed. Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries on earth with fewer people than Wales, yet under the reformist Sandinistas in the 1980s it was regarded in Washington as a "strategic threat". The logic was simple; if the weakest slipped the leash, setting an example, who else would try their luck? The great game of dominance offers no immunity for even the most loyal US "ally". This is demonstrated by perhaps the least known of Washington's coups - in Australia. The story of this forgotten coup is a salutary lesson for those governments that believe a "Ukraine" or a "Chile" could never happen to them. Australia's deference to the United States makes Britain, by comparison, seem a renegade. During the American invasion of Vietnam - which Australia had pleaded to join - an official in Canberra voiced a rare complaint to Washington that the British knew more about US objectives in that war than its antipodean comrade-in-arms. The response was swift: "We have to keep the Brits informed to keep them happy. You are with us come what may." This dictum was rudely set aside in 1972 with the election of the reformist Labor government of Gough Whitlam. Although not regarded as of the left, Whitlam - now in his 98th year - was a maverick social democrat of principle, pride, propriety and extraordinary political imagination. He believed that a foreign power should not control his country's resources and dictate its economic and foreign policies. He proposed to "buy back the farm" and speak as a voice independent of London and Washington. | |
Comment: And so it goes. Perhaps the fact that the meddling in Australian politics was a "bloodless coup" was a tiny blessing. Still, it's just one more example of the decades of arrogance the US has displayed on the world stage, seeking to bend every other country to its will.
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| Science & Technology |
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John D. Cody
As thunderous tones deepen, their power seemingly intensifies over frail barriers such as glass windows. Certain abrupt thunder peals often shatter windows into tiny fragments. In the apparent absence of thunderous tones we may observe the strong and continuous vibration of glass window panes during storms. A sudden eerie silence, and the window is shattered before our eyes.Borderland Sciences Research Foundation 2007-06-11 06:44:00 Natural phenomena are prodigious generators of infrasound. The potent distal effects produced when natural explosions occur produce legendary effects. When Krakatoa exploded, windows were shattered hundreds of miles away by the infrasonic wave. Wind was not the causative agent of these occurrences, as no wind was felt or detected. Seismographic stations registered the blast, and barometers measured the shockwaves. The "ringing" of both earth and atmosphere continued for hours. It is believed that infrasound actually formed the upper pitch of this natural volcanic explosion, tones unmeasurably deep forming the actual "central harmonic" of the event. The island of Krakatoa was literally lifted into orbit in the fatal blast. Brilliant sunsets followed for many years thereafter, the sad memorial of all the souls who perished. The power of explosives, in shattering and devastating property, lies in two zones. The first zone is that with which we are principally familiar; the actual blast site, where chemically released gases and metal fragments push back everything in their perimeter. The second less familiar zone extends very much further from the blast site than can be imagined. It is in the powerful sonic wave which expands outward that an equally destructive danger lies. Thick pressure walls of incredible momentum, interspaced with equally thick walls of reduced air pressure, travel far away from the blast site. The blast site is the small destructive zone by comparison. Few objects can survive this destructive tide. |
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Female sea turtles, known to swim thousands of miles before returning to their birthplace to lay eggs, find their way home by relying on unique magnetic signatures along the coast, a new study finds. For more than 50 years, scientists have been mystified by how sea turtles do this, said the study's lead researcher, J. Roger Brothers, a graduate student of biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "Our results provide evidence that turtles imprint on the unique magnetic field of their natal beach as hatchlings, and then use this information to return as adults," Brothers said in a statement. | |
Comment: See also: Seals may use 'natural GPS'
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Mark Prigg
Daily Mail, UK 2015-01-15 16:18:00
Two miles below the surface of the ocean, researchers have discovered new microbes that 'breathe' sulfate. The microbes, which have yet to be classified and named, exist in massive undersea aquifers - networks of channels in porous rock beneath the ocean where water continually churns, researchers say. About one-third of the Earth's biomass is thought to exist in this largely uncharted environment. | |
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Nancy Atkinson
Universe Today 2015-01-15 07:42:00
Could there be another Pluto-like object out in the far reaches of the Solar System? How about two or more? Earlier this week, we discussed a recent paper from planet-hunter Mike Brown, who said that while there aren't likely to be any bright, easy-to-find objects, there could be dark ones "lurking far away." Now, a group of astronomers from the UK and Spain maintain at least two planets must exist beyond Neptune and Pluto in order to explain the orbital behavior of objects that are even farther out, called extreme trans-Neptunian objects (ETNO). | |
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| Earth Changes |
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Mrigank Tiwari
The Times of India 2015-01-16 22:08:00
A seven-year-old girl was mauled and killed by a pack of feral dogs in Bhidiya Rasoolpulpur village on Thursday afternoon. According to reports, the minor, daughter of a brick kiln worker, was attacked by the pack while she was on her way home after giving lunch to her father. Hearing her cries, villagers and passersby rushed to the spot and tried shooing the pack away but to no avail. The girl, after some time, started bleeding profusely and fell unconscious on the spot. The dogs did not leave the spot despite many attempts by the locals. It was only when some villagers armed with sticks rushed to the place, that the dogs left. By then, the girl had already died due to extensive bleeding and deep injuries, said inspector Bachchu Singh of Sheshgarh police station. "This is the first time that such an incident has been reported. Though the pack inhabits the forest area, it rarely ventures into the village to attack the locals," said Singh. The girl's body was taken away by her parents who refused to allow the police to conduct a postmortem and instead cremated her body quietly. | |
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T.J. Pignataro
The Buffalo News 2015-01-13 21:19:00
Lake Erie was less than six percent frozen last Tuesday with ice covering only a sliver of the lake's western basin. But, after a week with frigid temperatures in the single digits, heavy lake-effect snows and high winds, Lake Erie is freezing up fast. Nearly 60 percent of the lake waters were frozen today, according to graphs by the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL). Most of the western half of the lake is already under ice coverage. In some areas - the western basin, along the U.S. and Canadian shorelines, near Long Point, Ont. and close to Buffalo - it's nearly 100 percent iced over, according to GLERL charts. As Lake Erie iced, so too have the Great Lakes at large. Just a week ago, more than eight percent of the surface area of all of the lakes was frozen. But by Monday, nearly one-quarter of the Great Lakes were under ice. | |
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China Post
2015-01-16 21:21:00
Nuku'Alofa, Tonga -- A Tongan volcano has created a substantial new island since it began erupting last month, spewing out huge volumes of rock and dense ash that has killed nearby vegetation, officials said Friday. The volcano, about 65 kilometers (40 miles) southwest of the South Pacific nation's capital Nuku'alofa, rumbled to life on Dec. 20 for the first time in five years, the Lands and Natural Resources Ministry said. It said the volcano was erupting from two vents, one on the uninhabited island of Hunga Ha'apai and the other underwater about 100 meters offshore. The ministry said experts took a boat trip to view the eruption on Thursday and confirmed it had transformed the local landscape. | |
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Ashley Collman
Daily Mail, UK 2015-01-14 20:34:00
These images of drowned cattle are enough to make meat eaters and vegetarians alike shed a tear over the mistake that caused their mass death. Last week, about 100 cattle wandered onto a South Dakota reservoir covered in six-inch-thick ice while seeking shelter in a severe windstorm. Their hunt for rest turned tragic when the ice collapsed under their enormous weight of more than 1,000 pounds. | |
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thelocal.dk
2015-01-15 20:09:00
Storm-strength winds are once again hammering parts of Denmark on Thursday and winter is set to truly make its presence felt next week. After a beautiful blanket of snow hit parts of Denmark on Wednesday and then disappeared again in about an hour, many were left wondering if and when true winter conditions will set in. Meteorology institute DMI predicts that winter will truly make its presence felt as early as this weekend, with temperatures falling below the freezing point Saturday night and then remaining there for much of the next week. The national forecast calls for rain to turn to snow on Sunday, with small amounts predicted through the middle of next week. By late next week, DMI's forecast is short and to the point: "Cold, windy and snow showers." | |
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A plow truck was on its route in Cleveland when it hit a steel plate on the road, displacing the plate and sending the truck falling into the sinkhole. The steel plate was from the Cleveland Water Department and was not marked properly. The sinkhole was in place so the property owner's plumber could make repairs to the home. After the truck fell, it was removed from the hole shortly after. The plate has since been replaced. The driver was taken to the hospital as a precaution and there were no other injuries. | |
Comment: Heat map for sinkholes for the past year -
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thepostgame.com
2015-01-16 15:00:00
That 16-foot putt for birdie just got a whole lot easier. Scotland's Traigh Golf Club woke up one morning to find a large sinkhole had developed on the course. The 14-foot hole was created by erosion from a broken drainpipe underground. Fortunately, no one was hurt. But the golf course's troubles are far from over: The hole will cost about 20,000 British pounds, or more than $13,000 USD. That's a huge cost that the golf course, which has been used for more than 100 years, cannot afford. And since insurance isn't likely to cover the cost of the hole, it could spell the end of the beautiful course. "Without repairing this pipe about half of the golf course will revert to bog and this would effectively be the end of our golf course," said Traigh Golf Club spokesman Alec Stewart to GolfClubManagement.net. Even if the sinkhole is repaired, the erosion could be a harbinger for similar problems elsewhere on the course. The club is urgently seeking out any sources of funding to stay afloat. | |
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Dominic Smith
Daily Mirror, UK 2015-01-15 14:47:00
Lucky motorist Sheng Hsu was driving in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou when his car was pulled into the hole These incredible pictures show the moment a massive sinkhole swallowed a car just moments after the driver was able to escape in the nick of time. Sheng Hsu, 43, was on his way to work when the huge chasm appeared in the road. Luckily, he was able to make a dramatic, last-gasp exit from the vehicle. He said: "I had just slowed down because there was a bit of a queue and leaned in to switch the radio on. | |
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Yucatan Times
2015-01-14 23:03:00
An earthquake was registered on the evening of Sunday January 10th, with an epicenter near Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo, an area traditionally considered non seismic. According to Margarita Vidal Amaro of the National Seismological Service, an earthquake of magnitude 4.2 on the Richter scale occurred at 9:49 pm on Sunday January 10th 2015. The epicenter was located exactly 67 kilometers (41 miles) southwest of Playa del Carmen, in Quintana Roo. | |
Comment: And if it's not tectonic plates, then WHAT is causing the increase in earthquakes or ones deemed "unprecedented"?
Also see: | |
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Lucy Christie
The Daily Record 2015-01-15 11:24:00
Weatherr Channel UK meteorologist Liam Brown warned: "We should prepare for freezing temperatures and very icy conditions for the coming days, and probably much of next week too. Blizzards swept across the country yesterday - as Scots were warned that the worst of the wintry weather was yet to come. The Met Office have issued "be aware" warnings for wind, ice and rain for much of central and southern Scotland for today. Travel chaos is set to continue as severe gales of up to 80mph hit the country, while heavy rain and a thaw caused by slightly milder temperatures could lead to localised flooding. Snow is forecast to return from tomorrow, when the mercury will fall again - and by early next week temperatures could plummet to a teeth-chattering -15C. Weather Channel UK meteorologist Liam Brown warned: "We should prepare for freezing temperatures and very icy conditions for the coming days, and probably much of next week too. | |
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Joe Wiercinski
The Sharon Herald 2015-01-14 11:09:00
Movie fans might think a snake in an apartment wouldn't have the shock value of the thriller "Snakes on a Plane." Just don't expect Debbie LaMotte to agree. The Sharon woman said she had just answered the call of nature at about 4 a.m. Tuesday when "something on the floor" she hadn't noticed on the way into the bathroom caught her attention. "At first I thought it was a scarf because it had such a beautiful pattern," the resident of Riverview Manor said. "I use a cane, so I reached out to touch it and that's when I saw its head move." At that point, the 62-year old said, she found she could still move pretty fast and close the door in a hurry if she had to. | |
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Harold F. Pierce and Rob Gutro
Phys.org 2015-01-16 12:48:00
Tropical Depression Mekkhala strengthened and organized on Jan. 14 and overnight into Jan. 15 when it reached tropical storm status. As the storm was consolidating, NASA's Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission core satellite captured rainfall data of the storm. The GPM core satellite flew above Mekkhala on January 14, 2015 at 1043 UTC (5:43 a.m. EST). GPM's Microwave Imager (GMI) instrument observed rain falling at a rate of over 71.63 mm (about 2.8 inches) per hour in intense convective storms near the tropical cyclone's center. At NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland a 3-D view was created using data collected by GPM's Radar (Ku Band). The data showed that thunderstorm tops in rain bands east of Mekkhala's center reached heights of over 13 km (8 miles). On January 15 at 0900 UTC (4 a.m. EST), Mekkhala's maximum sustained winds were near 35 knots (40 mph/62 kph). The center of the storm was located near 11.6 north latitude and 132.2 east longitude, about 277 nautical miles (318.8 miles/513 kph) north-northwest of Koror, Palau. Mekkhala was moving to the west at 8 knots (9.2 mph/14.8 kph). Satellite data showed that the bulk of convection and thunderstorms were over the western quadrant of the storm on January 15, indicating moderate vertical wind shear. The Joint Typhoon Warning Center forecast calls for Mekkhala to slowly intensify over the next day and a half reaching a peak intensity of 50 knots (57.5 mph/92.6 kph) prior to making landfall. Mekkhala is expected to approach the central of Visayas region of the Philippines on January 17. After landfall, interaction with the land, increased friction from moving over land and more stable air are expected to weaken the storm as it moves through the central and northern Philippines in a northwesterly direction, passing Manila in Luzon on January 19 and emerging into the South China Sea. | |
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myfoxny.com
2015-01-15 02:48:00
A 2.2-magnitude earthquake has rattled eastern Connecticut again. In what's becoming a daily seismic event, the Weston Observatory of Boston College said the earthquake occurred at about 4:40 a.m. Thursday near Plainfield, where previous earthquakes were recorded. It says two minor earthquakes were recorded on Wednesday and another on Tuesday. Several were recorded on Monday and last week, too. The observatory says that while the greatest earthquake activity in the United States is in the west, earthquakes are "quite common" in many areas of the eastern United States, including New England. Plainfield officials have invited Alan Kafka, director of the observatory, to an informational meeting at 6:30 p.m. Friday at the town's high school. | |
Comment: While this earthquake activity is being described as "quite common", it certainly seems as though something strange is going on in Connecticut for all this earthquake activity to be happening.
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| Fire in the Sky |
No new articles.
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| Health & Wellness |
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Joel Salatin
Mother Earth News 2015-01-01 20:23:00
Author and "renegade farmer" Joel Salatin calls for food producers to tell a better story of a "new-fashioned" food system that rejects the industrial agriculture paradigm while embracing technology. Calling something "old-fashioned" might encourage tourists and antique buyers to take note, but it does not captivate the hearts and minds of our mainstream culture. Too often, the Earth-stewardship movement positions itself as one of returning to a bygone era - to the good old days, pre-electricity and pre-petroleum. While washboards, hoop skirts and hearth cooking may have romantic appeal, living that way doesn't inspire the imagination of today's solution-seekers. Even the majority of people who yearn for simpler times and a slower lifestyle don't really want to go without electricity and automobiles. Those of us who strive to bring about a sustainable food system need a message that's dynamic enough to convert fast-food junkies. The industrial food system spends a lot of time and resources refining its message. Along with disparaging the do-it-yourself ethos, pastured livestock and fertilizing with compost, it promotes phrases such as "technology," "futuristic" and "feeding the world." | |
Comment: Read more about The Lunatic Farmer: Joel Salatin:
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Yahoo! News
2015-01-15 02:54:00
Comment: Not only would people be better off not getting the flu shot, since it typically gives people the flu soon after, but it's also not even effective once taken. There are also all the negative side affects of the flu shot to consider as well:
This US winter season's flu vaccine has been just 23 percent effective at preventing doctor visits for people of all ages, according to health authorities' early estimates out Thursday. The flu vaccine for 2014-2015 is not the worst ever -- the past decade has ranged from 10 percent to 60 percent effective -- but its record is worrying enough that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have urged doctors to ramp up the use of antiviral medications in people who fall ill with influenza. Its lack of punch is being blamed on multiple strains of the H3N2 virus that are circulating and making people sick, but that were not included in this season's vaccine. "Physicians should be aware that all hospitalized patients and all outpatients at high risk for serious complications should be treated as soon as possible with one of three available influenza antiviral medications if influenza is suspected, regardless of a patient's vaccination status and without waiting for confirmatory testing," said Joe Bresee, branch chief in the CDC's Influenza Division. | |
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| Science of the Spirit |
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University of Montreal
2015-01-13 22:12:00
Researchers look at how mothers support their babies' autonomy and the effect on executive functioning. This news release is available in French. Higher cognitive skills are found in the children of mothers who are consistently able to support the development of their baby's sense of autonomy, according to a study led by researchers at the University of Montreal. The researchers specifically looked at executive functioning, which refers to a range of cognitive processes that are essential for cognitive, social and psychological functioning. "We have shown that the child's executive functioning is linked to the mother's ability to support his or her autonomy. Autonomy support includes things such as teaching children problem solving skills and involves taking the child's perspective while ensuring he or she takes an active role in completing tasks," said Célia Matte-Gagné, who led the study. "Importantly, the study shows that it's not just about getting off to a good start. While many studies have confirmed that a mother's support are critical, few have looked at how these skills might change over time and what effect that might have." | |
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| High Strangeness |
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Youtube
2015-01-14 18:47:00
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Comment: Are we beginning to experience a spike in the High Strangeness phenomena? From the last few days:
Strange purple object in the sky over Tynemouth UK Mysterious footage of teleporting dog that appears on motorway out of thin air |
