Category Archives: politics

Leaving a Mark

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Diane Ravitch has a link up to this blog by a teacher fighting for public education.  Being hit from all sides, for sure.  We’re dealing with a sophisticated network that has $$$ behind it.  It’s hard to fight against that, but as Seamus says, I want to be able to look at my children and grandchildren and tell them I fought for public education with all that I had.

Senators who voted against GMO labeling

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(**edited to add tryptophan link.)

organic consumers has a post up on pressuring ten senators who voted against the Sanders’ amendment to allow states the right to label GMO food.

All we’re asking for is the right to know what is in our food!  We’re not asking them to ban GMO’s…although that’s certainly a dream of ours…we’re just asking for the right to refuse to eat food that is bad for us.

This is especially an issue for Celiacs, who can be seriously affected by genetically modified food that we cannot digest properly, and will only add to the leaky gut syndrome, possibly causing an emergency situation caused by gut inflammation. 

A debate (sort of) here.  The increase in gut inflammation since the 30s can easily be attributed to our increased use of wheat flour and undiagnosed Celiac / gluten intolerance.  I personally think it has been there, but now is becoming worse because of the GMO’s.  It just makes sense to me.

Here’s a trailer to the video by Dr. Smith : Genetic Roulette.  Glad to see Dr. Huber of Purdue University featured.  He has spoken out about the changes to the bee population.  I’m also glad to see other M.D.’s on board with this.

And then there’s this.  Holy crap, it’s worse than I thought…!  So, even if you stop eating GMO foods, you’re still subjected to this monster via your gut flora.  Holy crap.

The above page had a link to the Japan tryptophan disaster, but the link was dead.  I found it here.

It’s interesting that tryptohpan, which is a natural amino acid, was banned in supplement form…but it’s quite all right for GMO’s to go without scrutiny or restraint.  Many in the natural supplements industry felt that tryptophan was targeted because it was a natural supplement, that competed with Big Pharma.  This just adds more credibility to that claim.  If you’re Big Pharma or Monsanto, you can get away with it.

Here’s another page on GMO which mentions the Showa Denko incident.

What ver you doink Thursday night at 3:46 p.m.?

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Well, if you can’t remember, the NSA might be able to help fill in the memory gap.    (hat tip to fatster at  FDL.)

This quote from the comments brought a smile to my face in an otherwise somber article:

Candide08
I’m going to start calling random doctors and other businesses that have nothing to do with me. A little dis-information goes a long way.
~~~~~~~~~~
 

I don’t know everybody is surprised by this–anyone with half a brain could see the continuing violation of Fourth Amendment right to privacy.   All in the name of safety.  Um-hmmm….there’s no ulterior Nixon-like motive to gain an edge over someone by snooping into their private lives…./snark.  I’ve been saying all along that this whole thing smelled of Watergate–only on steroids.  Nixon sought the information so he could win at all costs.  Fortunately, we had Senator Frank Church to stand up for what was right.  Where’s our Church now?  Oh, right, drummed out of office by what is now the Tea Party.

 

 

Helping ourselves

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commondreams has this up.  Be sure to look at all the videos–well worth the time.

The idea is so simple it’s like “duh!”

I have a quibble, though, with Klein saying that it’s up to the Left to “seize the moment”.  There are those who are NOT in the Tea Party on the Right who also need and want to find a solution to the crashes around us.  I say this because the Left has not been of the same mind — I was shot down on a progressive website when I advocated buying American so we could put people back to work.  I knew that Washington wasn’t going to get off its collective duff and do anything about the job loss.  (NAFTA being a good example of monumental job loss.)

I just don’t think people have been given the skills or knowledge to feel confident enough to take over a business if the owners want to sell out.  I think it may be a case of learned helplessness?  Not believing in yourself can be such a huge obstacle that one stops before even getting started.

Perhaps the “teach-ins” of 2013 should be “Business 101:  how to own a business without going belly-up nor bankrupting the environment on your way to the bank…”

The Native Americans learned this a loooong time ago–nature was not a second thought.  They did not separate their actions from nature.

It’s still so incredibly stupid that business has ignored the laws of nature, as if we could exist without clean water, clean air and chemical free food…

Well…exist is probably a bad word choice…since we are existing right now…perhaps thriving  is the better word.  All one has to do is look at folks’ skin and see that we are not thriving, but existing.  The skin is such a barometer of what’s going on in the insides…not doing too well by that account.

Anyway, Washington isn’t going to help us…most likely profiting off of NAFTA…so, it’s up to us if we want to save ourselves.

 

 

 

 

Silencing Teachers

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Diane Ravitch has this up on the firing of teacher Mike Weston.  He spoke his mind about valid issues in education….and was fired for it.

And, of course, Gates Foundation’s dirty little fingers are in the pie, as well….

Weston spoke out against the Gates’ teacher evaluation test, ironically named Empowering Effective Teachers…gah, how he must have laughed himself silly when thinking up that name….for it is about disabling them, instead…

Note that Weston was questioning the curriculum for those not on the college-bound track.  I took the non-college path in high school because I never thought I would be able to attend, and I can say that there is such a chasm there between them.  I don’t think dumbing down the kids by not challenging them is the way to go.  How are they ever going to know their potential?

More about Mike Weston here.

 

Caging Birds

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I was flipping through the channels and saw that PBS was going to air a Nature spot featuring Hummingbirds.  Ah, I thought, a nice evening’s show.

Nope.

First, the hummers were doing their thing and going from flower to flower to get the nectar.  It showed ones with the ruby throat, ones with super-long beaks, and so on.

Then the show flips to the laboratory where a scientist is studying them.  The camera zooms into a hummer striking the glass “wall” in its confusion.  As the narrator tells the story of the scientist wanting to study the endurance of the hummer, it shows them attaching what looked to be a row of paper clips to the hummer’s feet, as it struggles to fly upward.

Well, that was it for me.

I can’t stand seeing animals caged.  I can’t understand why a scientist feels the need to, in essence, torture this bird that was once free to fly wherever it wanted.

And to those who would say, “hey, it’s getting food and is sheltered from predators…what’s the big deal…?”

To that I would say “Freedom is a big deal.”

That bird losing its ability to roam wherever and whenever and  just being let alone without someone poking at it –well, that’s what Spirit is about.  That’s what feeds the Soul. If that bird could talk, it would tell you the same thing.

Remember Fu Manchu?

The really chilling thing is….we’re not that far behind…

Rick Ross

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I edited the previous blog on the Webb story.  I can’t stop thinking about it–it is so compelling.  So…

I went looking for more of the story with Rick Ross. 

I wondered about his background.  I started with wiki, but there wasn’t much there.  Next I found the above site and it seems that it was the inability to read that sent him down the drug road.  It must have been devastating to him to have the talent of playing tennis well, especially in the time of doors being opened by Arthur Ashe,  (a side note~ how ironic that there is a picture of Ashe shaking Reagan’s hand, when Reagan’s ignoring the AIDS epidemic unfolding around him could be blamed for Ashe’s demise)  and not be able to see that through.  He is probably an undiagnosed dyslexic…possibly toxic (yeah, I know, some of you are groaning, but seriously…people are more affected by toxins than even they can recognize…and black folk who live in poor sections of town are more likely to be exposed to toxins dumped.  And don’t forget poor whites, too.)

This doesn’t mean that I excuse the behavior, because many who are dyslexic struggle but somehow compensate and overcome it.  ( I know that I had to read something two or three times while in school and college in order to understand and remember it.  )

–Rick Ross could have been affected while in school, and this in turn perhaps affected his ability to read and do well in school Just sayin’

It’s also important to note that without customers, Rick Ross had no busine$$.  It wasn’t just the poor blacks, as this article states, but the wealthy customers, too.  They’re just as guilty.

As I read the article on Ross, I began to think of all the devastation of cocaine.

David Crosby has said that cocaine was responsible for the end of the 60s.  Well, the love and peace and Light of it, anyway…

<sigh>

Enbridge pipeline

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I don’t know why this story wasn’t carried by the mainstream media, leaving Hoosiers in the dark about this monster….on second thought, they did.  Unfortunately, this was in the Indianapolis market, but even with cable TV, was out of range for their broadcast area.

And if anyone needs a little reminder of why the conservatives love Hillary Clinton….(you’re asking what?? You’ll notice, as I have, that they will alternatively trash her and then say “she’s not so bad…”.  )  And why they luvs them some Bill, too.  Teflon. Clinton.  From the president who brought us NAFTA, gutting the financial industry protections that were put into place after the Great Depression, the misspent Haiti disaster funds….and on….