The Three Party System – Left, Right And Reality

As the debate on distraction-tier issues rages on between the political left and the political right, more and more individuals are turning to the ‘third party’ of reality for answers.

There’s a reason that the mainstream media is continually losing viewers and readers to alternative news publications and aggregators like never before, and it comes down to the newly emerging ‘third party’ of reality. Of course this third party is so far away from the entire charade of left vs. right distraction-based debate that it really isn’t even within the confides of the part system, however it’s a suiting title for the mass number of individuals who find themselves going beyond Democrats and Republicans and into the search for truth.

People are discovering that it doesn’t matter if the current President identifies with blue or red, but instead what actions are taken to combat corruption and restore liberty. And now they’re looking beyond the blue and red, only to discover that the ‘bipartisan’ issues swept under the rug are in fact the reason this nation is being destroyed.

The reason for this grassroots movement towards reality really has to do with the growing realization of many ‘bipartisan issues’ that continue to sit at the bottom of the mainstream news articles — if they’re ever included at all. Bipartisan items like the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which allows for the President to indefinitely detain individuals from around the world under virtually any circumstance.

Bipartisan items like the recent renewal of the Bush-era Patriot Act by Obama, highlighting that ‘bipartisan’ issues include the warrantless searches of United States citizens. And a few more  ’bipartisan issues’ to add to the list that citizens are forced to fight without the aid of the two party system:

•  The backing of the Federal Reserve banking system

• Bailouts to mega banks funded with billions in taxpayer funding each year

• Non-stop wars in the Middle East and beyond

• Internet censorship and anti-privacy bills like CISPA and SOPA

• The use of drones on US soil to track and potentially kill US citizens

• The support of companies like Monsanto

And the list goes on. It’s these issues and many others that sit between the cracks of the two party system that are actually the most important. While countless hours of debate rages on over gender issues and slightly higher or lower taxes, the Federal Reserve banking system and the mega bankers make out like fat cats as they continue to do their work in the shadows. It’s already happening with post haste acceleration, but we must understand our ideological enemy is not the opposing party members — it’s those who support these ‘bipartisan’ items that endanger our freedom. The rest is either a distraction or horribly distorted — for example the idea that murdering children in the womb is an issue of ‘women’s rights’.

This image describes the space between the current two party system:

Anthony Gucciardi is the creator of Storyleak, accomplished writer, producer, and seeker of truth. His articles have been read by millions worldwide and are routinely featured on major alternative news websites like the infamous Drudge Report, Infowars, NaturalNews, G Edward Griffin’s Reality Zone, and many others. He is also a founding member of the third largest alternative health site in the world, NaturalSociety.com.

Source: http://www.storyleak.com/three-party-system-left-right-reality/#ixzz2SuGQvHdL

Farm Supports And Social Welfare

The planting season is in full swing as is the transfer of subsidies to big agriculture and social welfare food stamps. Which has more worth, paying the Monsanto and property tax bill or running a public assistance program that allows for the buying of lottery tickets? Well, if you are Congress, both have benefit, but mostly for their political value.Why are food stamps part of the Farm Bill? Nancy Marshall-Genzer makes a shrewd observation.

“There’s been an explosive expansion of the food stamp program. To understand why, you have to go back to the ’90s and President Clinton’s welfare reform, which trimmed welfare rolls. To help those cut off, Congress and President Bush made it easier to qualify for food stamps. That was in 2002. Since then, the food stamp program has more than doubled.

That’s about one in seven Americans. Many of them lost their jobs during the great recession. But why is the food stamp program in the farm bill, anyway? Like most things in Washington, it all boils down to politics.

Chad Hart is an economist at Iowa State. He says farm-state legislators needed a way to connect with more urban members of Congress, so the city slickers would support farm subsidies.”

Is it necessary to expand exponentially the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), to relieve starvation when a “Happy Meal” can be purchased at every turn? Yet the socialization culture boasts of the dietary benefits of being on the government dole, as the urban society continues to consume every cuisine of fast foods.

The Washington Times notes that under the Food stamp president: Enrollment up 70 percent under Obama and that present legislation “allow for those with higher incomes to take food stamps — the logic being that helping people before they reach crisis financial level will actually stimulate the economy.”

What did people do for food before the era of the “Great Society”? Farming was a way of life for rural America from the inception of the country. In spite of struggling out a livelihood from an often-harsh pastoral environment, agriculture capacity grew into the breadbasket of the world. Today, the gentleman farmer needs to master the skills of trading future contracts and applications for assistance.

A starting point for subsidies ”can supplement a farmer’s income and as well as provide funds for rental payments for land and assistance when the market price of a crop is low. Farm subsidies also play a role in the cost and availability of certain agricultural commodities.”

1. Contact the Farm Service Agency office in your state
2. Determine which farm subsidy you will apply for
3. Find out what type of government subsidized crop and animal insurance is available in your area
4. Determine if your farm is eligible for the Direct Payment subsidy program
5. Ask about the special loan programs the federal government has available for new farmers and ranchers who have been in business for at least three years but less than ten years

Farming as a productive enterprise is rapidly becoming big business. The family farm is no longer an independent endeavor based upon market prices and ingenious management. The quasi-government debt and subsidy cycle, demands a public partnership with federal and state agencies that distort production and consumer prices at every level. Economy of scale seems to be the only path left to plow the fertile fields of government subsidies.

The corporate agriculture conglomerates have become integral constituents of the seed, fertilizer and chemical industry. Both collaborators hire their political lobbyists to expand financial supports, resistive food labeling disclosures and apply economic pressure to stamp out holistic food competition.

The taxpayer should be concerned over the institutionalization and dependency of the SNAP mentality that eats at the fabric of a viable market economy. However, even more diabolical is the destructive subsidization of farming that dramatically benefits corporatist agriculture at the expense of organic agrarian alternatives.

US News takes the position that the Farm Bill’s Corporate Welfare Is Unacceptable.

“Under current law, businesses that produce commodity crops-corn, soy, cotton, or wheat for example-receive a variety of federal supports. One of these, direct payments, provides a per-acreage subsidy for certain farmland owners, regardless of prices, crop yield, or profitability. As a result some farm businesses making hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars each year also receive a generous annual check from the federal government even if they don’t grow a crop.

Federal crop insurance is out of control. In fiscal year 2012, the total cost of the crop insurance program set a new record at $14 billion-$3 billion more than FY2011. And here’s the kicker-2012 was a year of near record profits for agriculture, even before crop insurance payouts, despite and in part because of the drought many parts of the country experienced this past summer. In every state, participants in the crop insurance program have received more in claims payments than in premium dollars put in over the past 15 years. And remember, for every $1 in premiums, agribusinesses only chip in 38 cents to insure their own crops while taxpayers pick up the remaining 62 cents. That is not insurance or a safety-net, that’s a hand out.”

A comprehensive overhaul of government agriculture policy may not seem very probable from a political will perspective. Nevertheless, the gravy train of public money cannot be a substitute for tilling the soil and weeding the crops. When government legislation attempts to maintain an inexpensive retail food price with public grants, loans and subsidies, the true cost of national nourishment is unsustainable.

The urbanization of the political electorate dictates that the bottom feeders expect their groceries be delivered from a full service supermarket. As any rural resident knows, the nature of the land has its own set of rules and demands. Famine and undernourishment applies to much more than the food supply. It resides in the destructive and distorted government protection racket that leaves the public with a deep hunger in their belly.

The Linchpin Lie: How Global Collapse Will Be Sold To The Masses

In our modern world there exist certain institutions of power.  Not government committees, alphabet agencies, corporate lobbies, or even standard military organizations; no, these are the mere “middle-men” of power.  The errand boys.  The well paid hitmen of the global mafia.  They are not the strategists or the decision makers.

Instead, I speak of institutions which introduce the newest paradigms.  Who write the propaganda.  Who issue the orders from on high.  I speak of the hubs of elitism which have initiated nearly every policy mechanism of our government for the past several decades.  I am talking about the Council On Foreign Relations, the Tavistock Institute, the Heritage Foundation (a socialist organization posing as conservative), the Bilderberg Group, as well as the corporate foils that they use to enact globalization, such as Monsanto, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, the Carlyle Group, etc.

Many of these organizations and corporations operate a revolving door within the U.S. government.  Monsanto has champions, like Donald Rumsfeld who was on the board of directors of its Searle Pharmaceuticals branch, who later went on to help the company force numerous dangerous products including Aspartame through the FDA.  Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan have a veritable merry-go-round of corrupt banking agents which are appointed to important White House and Treasury positions on a regular basis REGARDLESS of which party happens to be in office.  Most prominent politicians are all members of the Council on Foreign Relations, an organization which has openly admitted on multiple occasions that their goal is the destruction of U.S. sovereignty and the formation of a “one world government” or “supranational union” (their words, not mine).

However, one organization seems to rear its ugly head at the forefront of the most sweeping mass propaganda operations of our time, and has been linked to the creation of the most atrocious military methodologies, including the use of false flag events.  I am of course referring to the Rand Corporation, a California based “think tank” whose influence reaches into nearly every sphere of our society, from politics, to war, to entertainment.

The Rand Corporation deals in what I would call “absolute gray”.  The goal of the group from its very inception was to promote a social atmosphere of moral ambiguity in the name of personal and national priority.  They did this first through the creation of “Rational Choice Theory”; a theory which prescribes that when making any choice, an individual (or government) must act as if balancing costs against benefits to arrive at an action that maximizes personal advantage.  Basically, the ends justify the means, and moral conscience is not a factor to be taken seriously if one wishes to be successful.

Hilariously, rational choice theory has been attacked in the past by pro-socialist (collectivist) critics as “extreme individualism”; a philosophy which gives us license to be as “self serving” as possible while feeling patriotic at the same time.  In reality, the socialists should have been applauding Rand Corporation all along.

What Rand had done through its propaganda war against the American people was to infuse the exact culture of selfishness needed to push the U.S. towards the socialist ideal.  At the onset of any communist or national socialist society (sorry socialists, but they do indeed come from the same collectivist mindset), the masses are first convinced to hand over ultimate power to the establishment in order to safeguard THEMSELVES, not others.  That is to say, the common collectivist man chooses to hand over his freedoms and participate in totalitarianism not because he wants what is best for the world, but because he wants what is best for himself, and he believes servitude to the system will get him what he wants with as little private sacrifice as possible (you know, except for his soul…).

The psychologist Carl Jung notes in his observations of collectivism in Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia that most citizens of those nations did not necessarily want the formation of a tyrannical oligarchy, but, they went along with it anyway because they feared for their own comfort and livelihoods.  Many a German supported the Third Reich simply because they did not want to lose a cushy job, or a steady paycheck, or they liked that the “trains ran on time”.  Socialism is by far the most selfish movement in history, despite the fact that they claim to do what they do “for the greater good of the greater number”.

Rand also used Rational Choice Theory as a means to remove questions of principle from the debate over social progress.  Rational Choice propaganda commonly presents the target audience with a false conundrum.  A perfect example would be the hardcore propaganda based television show ‘24’ starring Kiefer Sutherland, in which a government “anti-terrorism” agent is faced with a controlled choice scenario in nearly every episode.  This choice almost always ends with the agent being forced to set aside his morals and conscience to torture, kill, and destroy without mercy, or, allow millions of innocents to die if he does not.

Of course, the real world does not work this way.  Life is not a chess game.   Avenues to resolution of any crisis are limited only by our imagination and intelligence, not to mention the immense number of choices that could be made to defuse a crisis before it develops.  Yet, Rand would like you to believe that we (and those in government) are required to become monstrous in order to survive.  That we should be willing to forgo conscience and justice now for the promise of peace and tranquility later.

This is the age old strategy of Centralization; to remove all choices within a system, by force or manipulation, until the masses think they have nothing left but the choices the elites give them.  It is the bread and butter of elitist institutions like Rand Corporation, and is at the core of the push for globalization.

In my studies on the developing economic disaster (or economic recovery depending on who you talk to) I have come across a particular methodology many times which set off my analyst alarm (or spidey-sense, if you will).  This latest methodology, called “Linchpin Theory”, revolves around the work of John Casti, a Ph.D. from USC, “complexity scientist” and “systems theorist”, a Futurist, and most notably, a former employee of Rand Corporation:

http://www.viennareview.net/vienna-review-book-reviews/book-reviews/john-casti-an-optimist-of-the-apocalypse

Casti introduces his idea of “Linchpin Theory” in his book “X-Events:  The Collapse Of Everything”, and what I found most immediately striking about the idea of “Linchpin Events” was how they offered perfect scapegoat scenarios for catastrophes that are engineered by the establishment.

Linchpin Theory argues that overt social, political, and technological “complexity” is to blame for the most destructive events in modern human history, and it is indeed an enticing suggestion for those who are uneducated and unaware of the behind the scenes mechanics of world events.  Casti would like you to believe that political and social tides are unguided and chaotic; that all is random, and disaster is a product of “chance” trigger events that occur at the height of a malfunctioning and over-complicated system.

What he fails to mention, and what he should well know being a member of Rand, is that global events do not evolve in a vacuum.  There have always been those groups who see themselves as the “select”, and who aspire to mold the future to their personal vision of Utopia.  It has been openly admitted in myriad official observations on historical events that such groups have had a direct hand in the advent of particular conflicts.

For instance, Casti would call the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria an “X-event”, or linchpin, leading to the outbreak of WWI, when historical fact recalls that particular crisis was carefully constructed with the specific mind to involve the U.S.

Norman Dodd, former director of the Committee to Investigate Tax Exempt Foundations of the U.S. House of Representatives, testified that the Committee was invited to study the minutes of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace as part of the Committee’s investigation. The Committee stated:

“The trustees of the Foundation brought up a single question.  If it is desirable to alter the life of an entire people, is there any means more efficient than war…. They discussed this question… for a year and came up with an answer: There are no known means more efficient than war, assuming the objective is altering the life of an entire people.  That leads them to a question: How do we involve the United States in a war.  This was in 1909.” 

So, long before the advent of Ferdinand’s assassination, plans were being set in motion by globalist interests to draw the U.S. into a large scale conflict in order to “alter the life, or thinking, of the entire culture”.  When a group of people set out to direct thinking and opportunity towards a particular outcome, and the end result is a culmination of that outcome, it is obviously not coincidence, and it is definitely not providence.  It can only be called subversive design.

In the economic arena, one might say that the collapse of Lehman Bros. was the “linchpin” that triggered the landslide in the derivatives market which is still going on to this day.  However, the derivatives market bubble was a carefully constructed house of cards, deliberately created with the help of multiple agencies and institutions.  The private Federal Reserve had to artificially lower interest rates and inject trillions upon trillions into the housing market, the international banks had to invest those trillions into mortgages that they KNEW were toxic and likely never to be repaid.  The Federal Government had to allow those mortgages to then be chopped up into derivatives and resold on the open market.  The ratings agencies had to examine those derivatives and obviously defunct mortgages and then stamp them AAA.  The SEC had to ignore the massive fraud being done in broad daylight while sweeping thousands of formal complaints and whistle blowers under the rug.

This was not some “random” event caused by uncontrolled “complexity”.  This was engineered complexity with a devious purpose.  The creation of the derivatives collapse was done with foreknowledge, at least by some.  Goldman Sachs was caught red handed betting against their OWN derivatives instruments!  Meaning they knew exactly what was about to happen in the market they helped build!  This is called Conspiracy…

One might attribute Casti’s idea to a sincere belief in chaos, and a lack of insight into the nature of globalism as a brand of religion.  However, in his first and as far as I can tell only interview with Coast To Coast Radio, Casti promotes catastrophic “X-Events” as a “good thing” for humanity, right in line with the Rand Corporation ideology.  Casti, being a futurist and elitist, sees the ideas of the past as obsolete when confronted with the technological advancements of the modern world, and so, describes X-event moments as a kind of evolutionary “kickstart”, knocking us out of our old and barbaric philosophies of living and forcing us, through trial by fire, to adapt to a more streamlined culture.  The linchpin event is, to summarize Casti’s position, a culture’s way of “punishing itself” for settling too comfortably into its own heritage and traditions.  In other words, WE will supposedly be to blame for the next great apocalypse, not the elites…

I might suggest that Casti’s attitude seems to be one of general indifference to human suffering in the wake of his “X-Events”, and that he would not necessarily be opposed to the deaths of millions if it caused the “advancement” of humanity towards a particular ideology.  His concept of “advancement” and ours are likely very different, though.  I suspect that he is well aware that X-Events are actually tools at the disposal of elitists to generate the “evolution” he so desires, and that evolution includes a collectivist result.

With almost every major economy on the globe on the verge of collapse and most now desperately inflating, taxing, or outright stealing in order to hide their situation, with multiple tinderbox environments being facilitated in the Pacific with China, North Korea, and Japan, and in the Middle East and Africa with Egypt, Syria, Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, Mali, etc., there is no doubt that we are living in a linchpin-rich era.  It is inevitable that one or more of these explosive tension points will erupt and cause a chain reaction around the planet.  The linchpin and the chain reaction will become the focus of our epoch, rather than the men who made them possible in the first place.

Strangely, Casti’s theory was even recently featured in an episode of the ABC mystery/drama show “Castle”, called “Linchpin” (what else?), in which a writer turned detective uncovers a plot by a “shadow group” to use the research of the innocent Dr. Nelson Blakely (apparently based on Casti) to initiate a collapse of the U.S. economy by assassinating the ten-year-old daughter of a prominent Chinese businessman, triggering a dump of U.S. Treasuries by China and fomenting WWIII:

http://www.alterna-tv.com/castle/xevents.htm 

Now, I think anyone with any sense can see where this is going.  Casti and Rand Corporation are giving us a glimpse into the future of propaganda.  This is what will be written in our children’s history books if the globalists have their way. The fact that Linchpin Theory is featured in a primetime television show at all is a testament to Rand Corporation’s influence in the media.  But, as for the wider picture, are the trigger points around us really just a product of complex coincidence?

Not a chance.

Each major global hot-spot today can easily be linked back to the designs of international corporate and banking interests and the puppet governments they use as messengers.  Casti claims that “X-events” and “linchpins” cannot be accurately predicted, but it would seem that they can certainly be purposely instigated.

The globalists have stretched the whole of the world thin.  They have removed almost every pillar of support from the edifice around us, and like a giant game of Jenga, are waiting for the final piece to be removed, causing the teetering structure to crumble.  Once this calamity occurs, they will call it a random act of fate, or a mathematical inevitability of an overly complex system.  They will say that they are not to blame.  That we were in the midst of “recovery”.  That they could not have seen it coming.

Their solution will be predictable.  They will state that in order to avoid such future destruction, the global framework must be “simplified”, and what better way to simplify the world than to end national sovereignty, dissolve all borders, and centralize nation states under a single economic and political ideal?

Is it the Hegelian Dialectic all over again?  Yes.  Is it old hat feudalism and distraction?  Yes.  But, I have to hand it to Casti and Rand Corporation; they certainly have refined the argument for collectivism, centralization, technocracy, slavery, moral relativism, and false-flag dupery down to a near science.

Source: Brandon Smith | Alt-Market

Double Standards In America: Benefiting You But Not Me

Everywhere I look these days, I see hypocrisy and double standards being usedby Americans — locally, nationally and internationally.

Locally, for instance, a neighbor of mine recently intimidated and bullied her landlord into giving her all kinds of favors and perks.  However, when this same landlord attempted to do something that would have benefited all of his tenants, she suddenly threatened to take him to court.  “More stuff for me, less stuff for you,” seemed to be the argument that she plans to present to the judge.

And another neighbor of mine claims to be a devout Christian yet supports war (any war!) bigtime.  Jesus would never do that.

And our city’s current mayor, a developer himself, always seems to favor other developers and to go out of his way to twist, bend and chew up city procedures if this could possibly get yet another unnecessary highrise built downtown by his developer friends.  And yet our mayor screams bloody murder when city procedures might actually benefit just some Average Joe like you and me.

On the national level, Willard “Mitt” Romney wants to take from the poor and give to the rich — and he’s really really good at this too.  Fine.  He’s rich.  This policy benefits him.  I understand that.  But then he talks to the rest of us poor schmucks like he’s gonna be our savior too — when this is actually the farthest thing from his mind?  Hypocrisy?  Absolutely.

Obama claims to represent America’s grassroots community.  But who gets the most benefits from his largess?  Wall Street.  And War Street.  And “health insurance” companies.  Of course he’s better at benefiting you and me than Mitt is – but not by all that much.  Saint Obama he is not.

And during this current election cycle, Americans all seem to be bitching and moaning about the direction that their country is going in — yet no one will vote for a viable candidate with good ideas such as Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party (who just got arrested for having the gall to ask for her rightful place at the last presidential debate).  Or even Roseanne Barr.  Trust me.  Roseanne Barr has a lot more good ideas than Romney and Obama combined.  But Americans would rather just bitch and whine and “vote for the lesser of two evils”.  Hypocrisy.

There are two excellent films out right now, entitled “We’re Not Broke“ and “Story of Broke“ .  Both movies clearly demonstrate that we have more than enough money in our treasury to benefit the 99% wonderfully — but are benefiting the greedy 1% instead.  That’s just wrong.

And here is a link to a film about Monsanto — how it is systematically killing off as many human beings as possible for fun and profit, both in America and abroad.  Perhaps Monsanto has mistaken us humans for weeds?

And on the international scene, we can see the most hypocrisy of all.  Global corporate interests with American ties have caused the deaths of over ten million people in the Congo in the last three decades — and then these same enormous conglomerates actually have the NERVE to say they are just representing free enterprise.  Since when did Adam Smith ever tell us that capitalists need to take their market advantages from the barrel of a gun?  Or from welfare subsidies from the USA, the IMF and the UN?

America’s corporate-owned government bleats constantly that it is representing democracy abroad — despite all the election fraud, jailing of demonstrators, free speech suppression, media control, indefinite detention and phone-tapping going on here — which makes our “democratic” leaders on the international level the biggest hypocrites of all.

For instance, just look what happened recently regarding that low-rent porno flick, “Innocence of Muslims”.  It has been vigorously protected as supposedly representing “free speech”.  But when the Jenin Freedom Theater in Palestine puts on plays that highlight the brutal and insane injustice of the corporate-owned Israeli occupation and land-grab, the theater’s artistic director is jailed.  Jailed.  And tortured.    How protective of free speech is that?

And then there’s Al Qaeda — bad guys when you need a boogieman in America, but good guys when you need boogiemen in Libya and Syria.  And Israel?  It’s a heroic Jewish state when War Street needs to propagandize it – but an anti-Semite down-and-dirty commandment-breaker and disrespecter of Torah in real life whenever War Street needs a land-grab in the Middle East .

So.  Selfishness and hypocrisy have become the new American morality — both locally and nationally.  And internationally too.  Everyone in America seems to expect everyone else to play by the rules — except for themselves.  ‘What’s mine is mine — and what’s yours in mine too!” should be solemnly engraved on every single American coin and should definitely replace “E Pluribus Unum” on all dollars.

Either that, or Americans might actually consider going back to attempting to do things cooperatively so that everyone benefits — not just for benefiting you at a very high price to me.

Nah.  That will never happen.  Too late.

The Biggest Moneymaker of All Time: Cancer, And Why The Profiteers Don’t Want A Cure

People wail, cry, and question why him/her, how could this happen to a child? Immeasurable grief.

Yet the answers are quite clear: humans are unknowingly exposed to far too many chemicals on their food, in their water, their clothes – even when buying a new car. That new car smell? Major cancer causing chemicals that have been used to treat the new leather and the rugs in that new car. And people get in and snort it like they smelled a bouquet of flowers.

Food sprayed with chemicals to make them last? Preservatives. At one time, you could not patent food. Yet we now have a patented soybean. Just so Monsanto can profit. This fooling around and injecting chemicals in food has got to stop!

This is why you must demand that food be labeled GMO! Go California!

Even new clothing has been treated with chemicals that can seep into the body and wreak havoc especially in young children. Not to mention the pesticides that are used on your food. What is very interesting is how many people from Monsanto wind up working for the FDA. The FDA is supposed to protect US citizens from poisons, right? Do enough of your own research and the more you learn the more outraged you will become. This is what is meant by the wolf guarding the henhouse. They eat healthy, sure. And you can bet the ranch they don’t eat the food they sell.

Dr Max Gerson, who in 1938 made a startling discovery that his safe natural treatment for cancer patients held enormous promise. He was getting people well by using something that could not be patented – vegetables. At this time in history, a bill was appropriated for 100 million dollars to anyone who could show promise and results in treating cancer. Dr Gerson in 1946 presented 5 terminal cases and 5 additional patients’ records showing his effective treatment and cure of all of these cases. Well, guess what? The Pepper-Neely bill was defeated by four senators who were medical doctors.

Also of note, radio announcer Raymond Gram Swing who was in the room, was as astonished as any of the others and made a broadcast that night detailing these events and Gerson’s effective treatment. Two 2 weeks later, Swing was fired from his job.

The following video is life changing. The angel Charlotte Gerson is still alive and living in San Diego.

Gerson died in 1959, eulogized by long-time friend, Albert Schweitzer M.D.:

I see in him one of the most eminent geniuses in the history of medicine. Many of his basic ideas have been adopted without having his name connected with them. Yet, he has achieved more than seemed possible under adverse conditions. He leaves a legacy which commands attention and which will assure him his due place. Those whom he has cured will now attest to the truth of his ideas.

Dozens of treatments have come and gone and have just as quickly been termed “not effective”. When an individual encounters a pathogen (virus, bacteria, fungus) their immunomodulators in their brain kick in to use and many different self-preservation events occur. One of the first is a fever. Almost all pathogens function best at 98.6, or normal body temperature.

The aspirin companies have convinced the public that a fever is bad. “We’ve got to break the fever” “if it gets too high we could cause brain damage”. And so this is drilled into caring parents’ minds and they immediately freak and start giving aspirin.

The body knows what it is doing and we interfere. Because we have a degree from a prestigious school and a stethoscope around our neck-we know better. But the fever is designed to make a poor quality environment for the germ, and eventually kill it off.

Instead, the aspirin, or Tylenol, does lower the temperature in some cases and the pathogen can now flourish.

The following was written by a medical doctor and comes from The Cancer Prevention Coalition: The verdict is unassailable. The American Cancer Society bears a major responsibility for losing the winnable war against cancer. Reforming the ACS is, in principle, relatively easy and directly achievable. Boycott the ACS. Instead, give your charitable contributions to public interest and environmental groups involved in cancer prevention. Such a boycott is well overdue and will send the only message this “charity” can no longer ignore. The Cancer Prevention Coalition (chaired by the author) in April 1999 formally announced a nationwide campaign for an economic boycott of the ACS .

Mammography

The American Cancer Society has close connections to the mammography industry. Five radiologists have served as ACS presidents, and in its every move, the ACS reflects the interests of the major manufacturers of mammogram machines and films, including Siemens, DuPont, General Electric, Eastman Kodak, and Piker. In fact, if every woman were to follow ACS and NCI mammography guidelines, the annual revenue to health care facilities would be a staggering $5 billion, including at least $2.5 billion for premenopausal women. Promotions of the ACS continue to lure women of all ages into mammography centers, leading them to believe that mammography is their best hope against breast cancer. A leading Massachusetts newspaper featured a photograph of two women in their twenties in an ACS advertisement that promised early detection results in a cure “nearly 100 percent of the time.” An ACS communications director, questioned by journalist Kate Dempsey, responded in an article published by the Massachusetts Women’s Community’s journal Cancer:

The ad isn’t based on a study. When you make an advertisement, you just say what you can to get women in the door. You exaggerate a point. . . . Mammography today is a lucrative [and] highly competitive business.

The way women are treated when they have a mammography is deplorable. The tender, sensitive breast is jostled around, roughly handled and placed in the device to obtain the x-ray. The already angry area (angry with cancer cells) is now irritated further, enhancing the probability and possibility of cells spreading to other parts of the body.

Not only that, the tumor has a capsule around it. All the rough movement of the breast only helps to disrupt this capsule and enhance spreading or metastasis. Want a little more irritation? Let’s biopsy the area. A needle is stuck into the balloon and cells removed. Don’t you know there will be some leakage of the cells contained in that capsule?

Lung cancer and esophageal cancers too, are extraordinarily lucrative. It is one of the more difficult cancers to treat. There are miraculous stories about using Hydrogen Peroxide in the proper form to treat the body with oxygen.

Madison Cavanaugh has written a book called The One Minute Cure detailing the effectiveness of Hydrogen Peroxide on various health problems. Get the book.

To be clear, Hydrogen Peroxide must be Food Grade, meaning NOT WHAT YOU BUY IN THE SUPERMARKET. You must find food grade at 35% and then dilute it to 3%. What they sell in the brown bottle has preservatives in it and is not meant for internal use.

Cancer despises oxygen. It also loves 98.6. And it loves fatty tissue. It’s nirvana for the cancer cells. Cancer also has a unique capability to do what is called angiogenesis - it makes its own blood vessels to bring more blood and more food to feed its crazy appetite. It has this appetite because it is making cells at such a rapid pace.

Sugar is perfect fuel for cancer. High fructose corn syrup is a form of sugar that is ideal, as the high mitotic rate (cell division and tumor growth) calls for energy.

So here we have the “perfect storm”- you take a body, make it overweight – eat low quality food with all kinds of chemicals in the food and expose that person to fluoride in water, or vaccinations (additional cancer causing chemicals), air pollution, barbecued food (additional carcinogens) nitrates and nitrites, second hand smoke, etc and voila! You have a good potential to develop cancer.

Not everyone takes the cheese of standard treatment however, because there are alternatives to treating even difficult esophageal cancer as evidenced by this next video:

Tumors – Let’s pretend you were away and when you came home your home was extremely hot. You go to the thermostat an turn on the air conditioner. Nothing happens.

Would you then rip the thermostat out of the wall, thinking, “Well that should fix it”?

Of course not. This is what we do when we cut out a tumor. The tumors purpose just may be a “thermostat” a way to measure the presence of sickness. What if the tumor was only an indicator and not a sign of imminent death?

In so many cases, when treated successfully, there are reports of tumors shrinking and disappearing.

So what we do in America, we cut the tumor out. And the wonderful surgeon tells the family “I think we got it all”. Since cells are so vastly small, how could anyone, even with a microscope know for sure that they “got it all?” There is not a physician on the planet that could know for 100% sure they were able to “get it all”.

As a matter of fact, what if the tumors actually served a purpose and acted as indicators to tell us whether improvement is taking place? After all, unless the tumor is pressing on an airway or blood vessel, why take a chance and cut a person open who is already in a challenged state? And leave them susceptible to infection. Many people die from secondary infections due to the immunosuppresion of their bodies brought on by the side effects of chemotherapy. The radiation kills healthy cells. Cancer does not make hair fall out; radiation does that. And poor appetite causing poor nourishment? Caused by the drugs. So how can a body stay healthy if they are not getting proper nourishment?

This does not have to be. This is exactly where Dr Gerson was going. Take away the irritants (bad food, poor quality fluoridated water, fats, and sugars) and introduce ingredients the body can use to fight with-clean water-a healthy liver-vegetables-nutrients, and proper health can be restored.

This is a small sampling of incredible alternatives to fight cancer. The reason hemp is outlawed? Henry Ford many years ago said we should be using hemp for almost anything you can imagine –  more and better use than cutting down all the trees and insulting the earth with mining. Greed is why hemp is outlawed. It is a very powerful solution to a number of health problems.

Rick Simpson in his video Run From the Cure discusses his very effective treatment for cancer-hemp oil.

The suppression of this information is criminal.

Please read Death By Medicine. Gary Null PhD, Carolyn Dean MD ND Martin Feldman MD, Debora Rasio MD, Dorothy Smith PhD

This is not about bad mouthing anyone. There are better things to do with time. It is about exposing the truth. There are many fine, caring physicians. When a person experiences a trauma from an accident, a severe laceration, by all means, of course you require medical treatment. Let’s not mix compassion with profit. Medicine started out based on compassion. First, do no harm, right? We should prevent what we treat? Where are we now? Big Pharma sends their beautiful reps to doctors’ offices to convince them of how they should be getting more people on this drug or that one, despite side effects. It’s for profit and it is deplorable and sad.

Be aware of your rights; don’t be badgered or scared into doing what “everyone else is doing” only to wind up a statistic. Do your research now while you’re healthy. Don’t wait until you are in a crisis mode. Stay healthy. Grow your own vegetables. Drink purified water. Take nutrients. Question authority. And by all means Wake Up World!

Dr. Dennis Antoine

About the Author

Dr. Dennis Antoine graduated New York Chiropractic College in 1983. He opened his office in Ft Lauderdale to treat patients with chiropractic care and nutritional guidance, and  started Prevention@Work which focused on helping industry reduce injuries in the workplace. Using ergonomics, or the study of a person in the workplace, he assisted large companies in south Florida reduce their injuries, thereby helping companies save millions of dollars in health care costs. He has been a contributing editor for the Florida Sun Sentinel, The South Florida Business Journal, and ACA Journal of Chiropractic. He has also been a presenter for the American Chiropractic Association, the Florida Dairy Products Association, and Prevention Magazine. He now helps other doctors market their practices, and get the word out about options and alternatives that are safe and effective in the treatment of musculoskeletal conditions.

Source: Dr. Dennis Antoine, Wake Up World
Waking Times

Top 10 GMO Foods To Avoid

Genetically modified foods have been shown to cause harm to humans, animals, and the environment, and despite growing opposition, more and more foods continue to be genetically altered. It’s important to note that steering clear from these foods completely may be difficult, and you should merely try finding other sources than your big chain grocer. If produce is certified USDA-organic, its non-GMO (or supposed to be!) Also, seek out local farmers and booths at farmer’s markets where you can be assured the crops aren’t GMO. Even better, if you are so inclined: Start organic gardening and grow them yourself. Until then, here are the top 10 worst GMO foods for your “do not eat” GMO foods list.

Top 10 Worst GMO Foods for Your GMO Foods List

1. Corn: This is a no-brainer. If you’ve watched any food documentary, you know corn is highly modified. “As many as half of all U.S. farms growing corn for Monsanto are using genetically modified corn,” and much of it is intended for human consumption. Monsanto’s GMO corn has been tied to numerous health issues, including weight gain and organ disruption.

2. Soy: Found in tofu, vegetarian products, soybean oil, soy flour, and numerous other products, soy is also modified to resist herbicides. As of now, biotech giant Monsanto still has a tight grasp on the soybean market, with approximately 90 percent of soy being genetically engineered to resist Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup. In one single year, 2006, 96.7 million pounds of glyphosate was sprayed on soybeans alone

3. Sugar: According to NaturalNews, genetically-modified sugar beets were introduced to the U.S. market in 2009. Like others, they’ve been modified by Monsanto to resist herbicides. Monsanto has even had USDA and court-related issues with the planting of its sugar beets, being ordered to remove seeds from the soil due to illegal approval.

4. Aspartame: Aspartame is a toxic additive used in numerous food products, and should be avoided for numerous reasons, including the fact that it is created with genetically modified bacteria.

5. Papayas: This one may come as a surprise to all of you tropical-fruit lovers. GMO papayas have been grown in Hawaii for consumption since 1999. Though they can’t be sold to countries in the European Union, they are welcome with open arms in the U.S. and Canada.

6. Canola: One of the most chemically altered foods in the U.S. diet, canola oil is obtained from rapeseed through a series of chemical actions.

7. Cotton: Found in cotton oil, cotton originating in India and China in particular has serious risks.

8. Dairy: Your dairy products contain growth hormones, with as many as one-fifth of all dairy cows in America are pumped with these hormones. In fact, Monsanto’s health-hazardous rBGH has been banned in 27 countries, but is still in most US cows. If you must drink milk, buy organic.

9. and 10. Zucchini and Yellow Squash: Closely related, these two squash varieties are modified to resist viruses.

The dangers of some of these foods are well-known. The Bt toxin being used in GMO corn, for example, was recently detected in the blood of pregnant women and their babies. But perhaps more frightening are the risks that are still unknown.

With little regulation and safety tests performed by the companies doing the genetic modifications themselves, we have no way of knowing for certain what risks these lab-created foods pose to us outside of what we already know.

The best advice: steer clear of them altogether.

Source: Nation of Change

Nigeria Today: Taking Corporate Power To Its logical Conclusion

You think that America’s corporate-owned government has its drawbacks?  Wait until you hear what the corporate-owned government in Nigeria is up to!  You think that the results of having corporate Big Money buying off America’s politicians has been scary and sad?  Then you obviously haven’t ever been to Nigeria — where they have definitely gone way far beyond merely “scary” or “sad”.

When it comes to having a corporate-owned government, apparently Nigeria has become the prototype, the ideal, the epitome of what corporate-owned government can really achieve if it puts its mind to it.  Corporations in America like Citibank and Monsanto and Georgia-Pacific and Chevron can only hope to aspire to the high levels of corporatism that have been achieved in Nigeria.

Nigeria today has broken the mold and set the bar really high.

But how do I know all this?  From an interview with an expert on Nigeria that took place yesterday in a local park in Berkeley over tuna-fish sandwiches.

“So.  What’s up in Nigeria?” I asked him, immediately diving right in.

“Don’t even ask,” he replied.  “For one thing, our government is composed of mainly puppet thugs put into office by corporate neo-colonialists — but these office-holders have no power at all.  They are only there as a showcase, an illusion, a shadow puppet show created to make it look like someone with dark skin is in charge over there and to give corporations someone to officially sign the documents that have handed Nigeria over to them.”

That’s ironic.  In America, corporations try to dig up shadow puppets with light skin.

“When we were children in Nigeria,” continued the expert, “all of us wanted to go off to college because those in our villages who had gone to college would come home and everyone would honor them.  But not any more.  Now the children in the villages and towns of Nigeria all want to grow up to be government thugs!  To drive big shiny cars and take money from oil companies and beat people up.”

     “Something like that has happened in America too,” I replied.  “Little kids used to want to grow up to be doctors or firefighters or scientists.  High school kids wanted to go to college and become architects or engineers or Bob the Builder.  Now all they want to do is study business so they can rush off to Wall Street and make a killing.  Who wants to be a doctor when they can orchestrate pension-plan takeovers and outsource American jobs.  Or go into politics.”  Yeah.  And become corporate-owned government thugs like in Nigeria.

“And it used to be that everyone in Nigeria at least had a chance of going to high school,” said the expert.  “But the levels of available education there are falling fast.”  Keep them barefoot and dumb?  Seems to be the trend here in America too.

“Whenever we thought of America when we were children, we all wanted to be like that — democracy and all.  Owning something that said ‘Made in America’ on it was a very big deal.  And now it’s all made in China.  But what amazes me most about Americans today is that they all sit back and take this and say nothing.  They just listen to Rush Limbaugh and Glen Beck and Fox News and accept their fate like lambs to the slaughter.”

     I know what he means.  And in my humble opinion, it all started back in 1963 when no one really questioned who shot JFK — and who benefited most.  Who had the motive, means and opportunity?  It surely wasn’t Cuba or even the USSR.  “Who killed the Kennedys?  After all it was you and me,” sang the Rolling Stones — and they nailed it.  Then most Americans went on to never question the lack of preparedness before 9-11http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2012/09/11/the-11th-anniversary-911-paul-craig-roberts/ or the obvious lies about weapons of mass destruction or the need for bank bailouts or….  Sheep.

“Don’t Tread on Me” is now history, sent off to America’s outdated memorabilia rubbish heap.

     “When the BP oil spill happened over here in the Gulf,” my expert continued, “BP spent a lot of money on maintaining their public image in America and making excuses.  Well, Nigeria has a big oil spill almost every day.  Oil spills like that are common in Nigeria.  But the major difference between there and here is that BP doesn’t even bother to make excuses in Nigeria.  They don’t even consider Nigerians important enough to even make excuses.  They treat us like some kind of annoying pests that they just have to put up with while extracting our oil.  Not really human.”  Definitely beyond sad.

Imagine all those photos of shorebirds on the Gulf Coast covered with oil — and then imagine Nigerians covered with oil like that too.  The toxic “body burden” that many Nigerian villagers are bearing these days is tragic.

     “Have you ever been to Nigeria?” he asked me.  “Rich people there live in securely gated communities and behind high walls.  There is no walking down the streets in Nigeria for rich people.  Why would anyone ever want to live like that?  To always be guarded and gated and stuck behind walls?  That’s no way to live.  Having economic equality leads to more freedom — even for the rich.”

But as the rich become more and more separated from the poor here in America too, that’s definitely the direction we also are going in.  Freedom, like money, does not trickle down.

    Next we discussed a whole bunch of other reasons why having a corporate-owned government has led to a failed nation in Nigeria — and will also lead to a failed nation here.  But I forgot to take notes and can’t remember the rest of what all we discussed.  But you get the gist.  Government of the people, by the people and for the people is good.  Corporate-owned government is proving to be very very bad.

To paraphrase a recent saying that’s now making the rounds on FaceBook, “If Romney’s proposed corporatist policies actually work, then George W. Bush would have given the keynote speech at the Republican convention — and Nigeria would be a proud role model for democracy and freedom, not just another miserable failed state.”

PS:  Has anyone started to miss Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi yet?  If he hadn’t been brutally murdered and his corpse dragged through the streets of Sirte, Ambassador Stevens would still be alive and well too.

And does anybody but me find it ironic that the rockets used to attack the American consulate in Benghazi probably came from the same stockpile of weapons supplied to NATO’s allies, the al-Qaeda-linked Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, and paid for by America’s corporate-owned government?

Shades of Ronald Reagan’s favorite “freedom fighters” in Afghanistan — Osama bin Ladin and friends. 

America The Next Lost Atlantis: Geographically, Economically, Politically & Morally

Geographically:  Now that the world’s ocean levels have started rising much faster than predicted, America’s coastal cities may become submerged far sooner than we thought.  And, sooner rather than later, Manhattan stands a very good chance of becoming the next lost Atlantis.

Here’s a cute little video from NASA that describes what’s been happening to our planet’s climate over the last 131 years.  Check it out:  http://www.climatecentral.org/blogs/131-years-of-global-warming-in-26-seconds/  In this video animation, blue represents minus-two degrees Celsius and red represents plus-two degrees Celsius.  That’s only a four-degree variation — but what a variation it is!  At the blue point, ice all over the planet used to be still intact.  At the red point, however, it has melted.  At this rate, San Francisco will soon join Manhattan in its race to become the first lost Atlantis.

But enough said about that. I just hope that you don’t own a condo down in SoHo or beach-front property in Honolulu.  You do?  You’re screwed.

And then there’s Burning Man.  This year Black Rock City was completely engulfed in air-born dust particles and white-out sand storms almost 24/7.   If this drought doesn’t let up, perhaps they ought to change its name to Dust Bowl City.

And also, for the first time in memory, we have gotten a hecka lot of Canada geese hanging around Berkeley this summer instead of just passing by in the spring and the fall.  Guess they don’t have to fly so far south to get warm any more.  No winter vacation in Cancun for them!   And we humans don’t need to fly south to Puerto Vallarta during the winter months any more either.  Last year was the warmest winter in NorCal that I can remember (but I still love Puerto Vallarta).

Morally:  The Republican party (and the huge corporations that now own it) are completely using and abusing their only staunch allies — the older white American males and blind-faith Christians who support them — in order to enact laws and make policies that not only undermine these staunch allies’ beliefs but also their very existence.

Jobs, Social Security, homes, families, medical care, infrastructure, water supplies, energy sources, the very teachings of Christ Himself, you name it — all have been put in grave danger by the very corporate interests that naive older white Americans and gullible Christians have blindly trusted and supported all these years.  It’s just sad to watch these trusting staunch allies of the GOP constantly getting knifed in the back.

Then there are the famous Fetus Wars.  Jesus is being called upon to testify against Planned Parenthood — and yet Jesus isn’t even allowed on the premises when multiple brutal vicious and bloody wars have been declared against millions of innocent children all around the world.  You wanna call yourself a Christian?  Then you gotta act Christ-like!  Duh.

And Repubs are now actually saying that Ted Kennedy originated the War on Women.  Chappaquiddick was a tragic accident.  That’s not the same thing.  But a true war on women appears to be the GOP’s latest favorite game plan — as Repubs happily head down the same path that other “Christians” took back in the European Middle Ages when an estimated nine million women who dared to speak up for themselves, tried to get an education or attempted to practice medicine were burned alive at the stake.

Economically:  Since outsourcing and deregulation has hit America like a category-5 hurricane, our economy has become a disaster area — literally.  So many jobs have fled overseas and so much wealth has fled to the Caymans that many parts of the USA look almost like New Orleans after Katrina.

All the things that we used to make here?  We don’t even know how to make them any more.  And all that knowledge of how to make them has been lost too.

Sometimes I wish that the UN or NATO or whoever — perhaps the war-criminal-trial folks over at the Hague — would sanction America like they are now sanctioning Iran.  Then we would be FORCED to become economically independent again.

Republicans have deliberately created a vast pool of unemployed Americans so that they won’t have to pay us high wages.  Hence the GOP’s refusal to endorse a job program.  Why would they want to do that!

In their haste to make more and more money, large corporations are polluting our water and air and elevating our risk of cancer of course.  But they are also killing off billions of bees.  Good luck with getting our crops in when there is no pollination.  And bye-bye flowers too.  We don’t even have to wait until water drowns out the new American Atlantis to miss our fruit trees and flowers.  Monsanto has already taken care of that.

Politically:  Anyone can buy a seat in Congress these days — or even buy the White House itself or the Supreme Court (especially the Supreme Court).  Who would have ever thought that it would be that way here in the former Land of the Free.  Not since Boss Tweed and Tammany Hall have our public offices been so “For Sale”.  Shame on us for letting this happen.

And remember back in 1999 when we all thought that YK2 was going to be an international disaster?  Well all the computers didn’t crash, but YK2 turned out to be an incredible disaster anyway — when George W. Bush stole the 2000 election and almost NOBODY in America objected or even noticed.  Then Bush allowed 9-11 to happen, followed by the disastrous Afghanistan invasion, the incredibly expensive Iraq invasion and the 2008 economic crash.

Yes, YK2 really was a disaster.

More political immorality:  Who has been a very important ally of corporate-owned Washington in places like Afghanistan, Syria and Libya?  Wait for it.  “Al Qaeda!”  Arming and encouraging the people behind 9-11?  Isn’t that about as politically immoral as you can get?  But Americans seem to accept this hypocrisy without batting an eye.  Go figure.

And what can our bought-and-paid-for politicians possibly be thinking when they systematically alienate huge countries like Russia and China while kissing the booties of their corporate neo-con counterparts in teeny-tiny Israel.  Israel?  The size of New Jersey?  Israel’s neo-con corporatists are gonna save us from the wrath of Russia, China, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America and all the other places and countries that our corporate-owned government has thoroughly screwed over the years?  Huh?

And then there’s that cruel joke that used to be America’s legendary and heroic Supreme Court.  No justice at all to be had there these days — if you are merely working class.  Those guys in black robes take their reverse-Robin-Hood roles very seriously.

“Take from the worker bees and give to the drones” should be carved in marble over our corporate-owned government buildings in Washington — just before America, the next lost Atlantis, slowly sinks into the sea.

But you had better get to carving it soon — because there is something in the air in America these days, a sense that nasty undercurrents are moving stealthily toward us from somewhere very deep, somewhere that the average voter isn’t in touch with — except in our guts.

And our guts seem to be telling us that America is now sinking fast.  And that “We the People” have absolutely no life jackets — but that the billionaires who now own our government are already provisioning their yachtshttp://www.smirkingchimp.com/node/45275.

To paraphrase Plato, “…once upon a time your State stayed the course of a mighty host, which, starting from a distant point in the Atlantic ocean, was insolently advancing to attack the whole of Europe, and Asia to boot” — and then their city of Atlantis got all drowned out.

And to paraphrase Ray Bradbury, “Something wicked is definitely coming our way”.

La Nueva Guerra: Latin Spring Being Sprung?

From protests in Chile to a “coup” in Paraguay, the worrying signs come across Latin America that it may have an Arab Spring of its own, but in fact those are the signs of a new form of war waged against the region.

A specter haunts Latin America

Latin America is undergoing increasingly violent turmoil on many fronts. This often makes it difficult to distinguish between spontaneous, bona fide social protest and covert foreign intervention, just as we see today throughout the Arab world.

In spite of Latin America’s decades of experience with foreign-orchestrated military coups, in today’s world the local military are no longer an option. They were necessary proxies acting as local cops for the US during the Cold War, until they became a redundant embarrassment.

So just as the ’60s and ’70s saw a domino effect of “anti-communist military coups” – graciously applauded by the US and UK – the ’80s and ’90s saw a comeback of “democracy”, riding on the wave of “human rights”. In short: military boots were “out”; corrupt controllable “democratic” politicians were “in”.

Nominally “democratic” governments mean local power no longer managed by guns and bayonets but by tons of money. As the Global Power Masters execute a highly complex planet-wide strategic reset, Latin America is ripe for another turn of the screw: a new bout of “Spring” treatment.

It would, however, be a mistake to think this will be a copy of the Arab Spring, because a key factor behind today’s global Machtpolitik lies in understanding prevailing local conditions, which in Latin America are very different from those of the Arab world.

What makes each country tick?

Last year’s lighting of the Arab Spring fuse depended very much on understanding that fact huge sectors of the local populations – particularly the young – were fed up with authoritarian, long-entrenched regimes: whether Mubarak’s 31 years in Egypt, Gaddafi’s 42 years in Libya or the al-Assads’ 40 years in Syria.

But there’s no way this can be done in Latin America, because all governments here are nominally “democratic”, with corrupt politicians taking turns in mismanaging their countries.

On the religious front, Islam demands active militancy from its followers to defend the Faith, so an important dividing line for the Arab Spring is the centuries-old conflict between Shiites and Sunnis, plus the modern struggle between clerical and secular regimes.

Such highly complex issues have thwarted the Muslim world’s ability to unite under one solid and strong leadership, so fundamental to neutralize decades – centuries! – of Western interference and intervention in that region. Divide and conquer has always been imperialism’s leitmotiv.

By playing one side against the other; by appealing to the naïve young yearning for change whose paradigms are (de)formed by Western pop “culture”, last year’s triggering of social and generational conflict was really a “piece of cake”: from Tunisia to Egypt; from Libya to Syria; from Sudan to Iran.

At most, the tricky part was keeping FOW’s (Friends of the West) like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain isolated from this process. The West’s ability to slosh trillions of Petro-Dollars, plus the Western Media’s extreme discretion towards “friendly countries”, the ominous presence of the US Fifth Fleet and a little help from our (Israeli) friends seems to have done the trick. So far, anyway…

Latin America is not at all like this. Not a chance of violently pitting Catholics against Protestants…and since all countries are formally “democratic”, people won’t readily take to the streets to get rid of any authoritarian regimes because, officially, there are none. Maybe a Monsanto-coup in Paraguay or an electoral money-for-your-vote hiccup in Mexico, but the US is too busy looking at Chavez in Venezuela to bother.

Where, then, is the war front in Latin America?

War in ‘Spring’ time

When we talk of war, we normally think in terms of World War II-like invading armies. But war has become far more covert and far less overt. Today, more subtle forms are used like engineering financial or social coups or – as Libya and now Syria learned – engineering civil war.

In traditional war, the focus is on military hardware, strategy and territorial logistics. ‘Spring’ wars, however, are remote-planned, and then deployed inside the target country. First you identify dividing lines in local society: what are people’s grievances, which religious fervors and ethnic hatreds are ripe for stirring.

Then comes PsyWar channeling through NGO’s, local militants and lobbies, opposition politicians, paid journalists and, of course, yours truly “The Embassy”. Throughout Latin America, “la Embajada” is an ominous phrase pointing to US, UK and Israeli embassy meddling.

And if they can’t get their desired “Regime Change”, there’s always “Plan B”: escalate to blatant financing, training and arming of local subversives, terrorists and gangs as in Libya and Syria.

Latin America’s war front

The real war in Latin America, where deadly shots are fired and people get killed and maimed, lies in the increasingly huge gap pitting the rich (small numbers, huge power) against the poor (huge numbers, small power).

Latin America’s war is fought in the “villa miseria” slums of Buenos Aires, Bogotá and México; in the “favelas” of Rio de Janeiro; in the shanty towns of Caracas, Guayaquil and every single city in our region.

The poor are becoming increasingly aware of just how poor they are. In today’s global consumer society the rich slap them on the face through TV, the internet and “entertainment” media. The corporate overworld constantly reminds them of just how wonderful life can be if you’re rich and buy their cars, laptops, cell phones, houses, holiday packages. Too poor to enjoy that? Alas, too bad!

Mass social frustration lies at the root of Latin American war. It branches out into street crime, prostitution, drugs, alcohol, gang warfare, pornography. It physically, intellectually and spiritually annihilates untold millions of people in the streets of Mexico, Brazil, Colombia or Argentina.

In contrast to the Muslim world, where religious fervor keeps the rich-versus-poor divide in check, Latin American Catholic and Protestant churches have lost their social appeal and strength. The spiritual vacuum they left has been filled with greedy striving for material wealth.

Not that this is anything new. The big difference now is the unprecedented technological capability available to trigger and control social wars; escalating them to outright insurrection and civil war when it suits the global power masters’ objectives.

But that works both ways, because that same technology is making people more and more politically aware and active. As Trilateral Commission ideologue and former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski recently lamented, “people’s growing political awareness” is a threat… to the global elites.

The whole world is being pushed into war mode, where every victory or defeat in one region has far-reaching consequences for the rest of the world. We The People suffered defeat in Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan. In Syria, Iran and Venezuela, We The People fight ongoing battles.

Given the colossal economic crisis affecting the US, Europe, UK – even Israel – if a “Latin Spring” is unleashed on the Rich-versus-the-Poor Front, then Latin America’s ability to fight back intelligently and effectively could have dramatic and positive global consequences.

Adrian Salbuchi is a political analyst, author, speaker and radio/TV commentator in Argentina.www.asalbuchi.com.ar

Source: Adrian Salbuchi | RT

California Public To Vote On GMO Label Act; Biotech Lies Begin

Stroller-pushing mothers delivered nearly a million signatures in Sacramento on Wednesday, for an initiative to put to populist vote The California Right to Know Genetically Engineered Food Act.

The ten-week signature drive collected nearly double the amount needed to put the R2K Act on the November 6, 2012 ballot.

The state will take between five and seven weeks to validate the signatures, and then certify the results. Of the 555,236 needed, thousands of volunteers collected 971,126, just shy of the hoped-for million.

“In ten weeks, nearly a million registered voters signed the ballot initiative,” said Pamm Larry, who single-handedly started the drive on January 20, 2011. “Even biotech engineers gathered signatures for us.” Having founded LabelGMOs.org, Larry then coordinated with other pro-labeling civic groups across the state and nation.

Victory celebrations were held in Sacramento, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego today, reported CA Right to Know in a press conference.

If voters approve the measure this fall, beginning July 1, 2014, food makers will be required to label those products that contain genetically modified ingredients.

Significantly, the “natural” term can no longer be used if the product contains GMOs.

There are several exemptions, including GMO-fed and GMO-drugged animals, as well as any raw ag product that was unintentionally contaminated with GMOs. Suppliers and producers may be asked to provide a sworn statement that as far as they know, the food is GE-free.

According to the Act, anyone relying on those sworn statements is off the hook legally if the product turns out to have GMOs.

There is a requirement in the Act that grocery store bins or shelves must also be GE-labeled if any unlabeled raw agricultural GE products (like GE corn) are sold. But there’s no liability to the store owner if the supplier provides a sworn statement that the food is GE-free when it’s not.

Given the biotech industry’s penchant for hyperbole (relating to yield, cost and pesticide use), it’s no surprise tohear them declare the Act will cause food prices to spike.

But, as one of the organizers says, “They have 18 months after the election to change their labels, something that is frequently done in the food industry.” Gary Hirshberg, chairman of Stonyfield which has been organic-certified for 20 years, added, “All they have to do is add some ink.”

Several large organizations opposing the measure have organized behind Stop Costly Food Labeling (SCFL), including the Grocery Manufacturers Assn., the Council for Biotechnology Information, the CA Farm Bureau Federation, and, you guessed it, the Chamber of Commerce.

Another lie right out of their lying mouths is that the R2K Act will require, “prohibiting processed foods from being labeled as natural, even if they contain no GE ingredients.”

No such language exists in the eight-page Act.

Not only that, but there’s still a whole lot of wiggle room for GE-contaminated foods. See pages 4-6 for the list of exemptions, like this one:

“Until July 1, 2019, any processed food that would be subject to section 110809 solely because it includes one or more genetically engineered ingredients, provided that: (i) no single such ingredient accounts for more than one-half of one percent of the total weight of such processed food; and (ii) the processed food does not contain more than ten such ingredients.” §110809.2(e)

This means that food can have up to 5% genetically modified organisms by weight (and up to ten of the little buggers) and remain free of the GE label. Looks like biotech scored big on that exemption. GE-free should be GE-free.

Fundraising to Counter Biotech Lies

Both sides will engage in a media spectacle aimed at swaying voters, using TV and print to promote their positions. If their April 26 press release is any indication, the biotech sector of Big Ag and its supply chain plans to drive a wedge between small operators and consumers who want to know what’s in their food. “It’ll put you out of business!” screams the upcoming headline.

Heaven forbid. Requiring food labels is akin to truth in advertising. Big Pharma certainly hasn’t disappeared because they can’t keep nasty side effects a secret.

Grocery stores have nothing to fear, despite the SCFL’s spin that “right to know” means “right to sue.” Whining they’ll have to follow what’s done in 40 other countries, adding a little ink to food labels in the biggest agriculture state in the US won’t put anyone out of business.

We’re gonna be inundated with a barrage of lies to the point we’ll stand in muted awe at the audacity. Kinda like the informed’s reaction when Condi Rice objected to her “integrity” being impugned after she promoted the wild WMDs lie.

But now is not the time for muted silence. And the media campaign to support California’s initiative must be funded, nationally, says Dr. Mercola, who runs the biggest natural, homeopathic website in the world.

He’s teamed up with several groups including Organic Consumers Assn. and Food Democracy Now! to launch a major fundraising campaign for the upcoming battle of words, explained OCA spokesperson, Katherine Paul, in an email to Food Freedom. “But all of the funds will be turned over to the CARighttoKnow campaign to use for media consultants, advertising, and legal help,” she advised.

Mercola reports:

“Between May 1 and May 26, a broad coalition of food, farming, health groups, and organic food manufacturers, will attempt to raise one million dollars to defeat Monsanto propaganda and get the California Right to Know Genetically Engineered Food Act on the ballot for November 6, and passed into law. Money raised in this Million Dollar Money Bomb on Monsanto campaign will support the California Ballot Initiative and other state GE-labeling campaigns. If donations totaling $1 million is reached by May 26, a coalition of benefactors will MATCH it, bringing the Money Bomb to $2 million!”

According to the opposition, Mercola has already put up $800,000 of his own money. The busy man didn’t get back to me as to whether this is actually true, but it smells right that he’d want to back his own horse.

“We can’t leave California to battle the biotech giants on their own,” he says. “They need your help! Donating funds to this campaign may be the best money you’ll spend all year to safeguard your health, and the health of your children.”

This is all great news… and no one doubts California’s R2K GE Food Act will be on the ballot on November 6, 2012.

Which brings us to the ballot… cast on electronic voting systems that studies funded by Secretary of State Debra Bowen proved are not secure from hack. (See, e.g., here and here.)  Other studies by different states and universities and privately-hired tech firms agreed, but Bowen and her Sec-State peers across the nation all bought those expensive, hackable machines anyway.

Even so, since over 90% of US eaters want their food labeled, the vote result is a foregone conclusion. And, what’s done in the biggest Ag state in the union is sure to be followed in at least some of the 20-some states that allow an initiative process – a tool used by citizens to adopt laws and constitutional amendments without the support of the Governor or the Legislature.

Vermont, another state now undergoing an agricultural renaissance, does not have this freedom, so the GMO-food label bill passed by the legislature will not be enacted, as Governor Shumlin has advised he will veto it. We reported on this in the last half of this news video on Monday.

Robyn O’Brien of Allergy Kids Foundation says:

“My youngest daughter’s face began to swell shut at breakfast one day – and I had no idea why. We were only eating waffles, scrambled eggs, and tubes of blue yogurt…so what was happening to her? Before my daughter had a violent allergic reaction that morning, I honestly hadn’t given a lot of thought to what I fed my kids. I mean, if it was on grocery store shelves, it was all the same, right?But since then, like so many moms, I learned that there are all kinds of new ingredients in our foods that weren’t in what we ate as kids. That’s why we need labels.”

Just Label It is working on the FDA for a national directive requiring GMO-food labels, and sent their congrats to California. They’re still collecting petition signatures until May 13, and have produced this quick little video by Robert Kenner, director of Food, Inc.

But California may beat FDA to the punch, and its Right to Know Act will impact food labeling across the nation. This is the big one from which the biotech-feds’ House of Secrecy begins to crumble.  All those who support GMO-food labeling are going to have to drop a bomb of money on them to counter the war chest of the biotech industry.

Starving By Accident: Are Americans Eating Real Food?

I’ve been thinking a lot about food lately.  No, scratch that.  I’m ALWAYS thinking about food.  So the other day I wandered over to eat at Picoso, a family-run Mexican restaurant in north Berkeley that makes the world’s best guacamole.  And while walking home past the world-famous Chez Panisse restaurant, I spotted a huge crowd of people standing around out in front.

“What’s happening here?” I asked one of the people in line.

“Michael Pollan and Maira Kalman are doing a book-signing event — and there is also free food.”  Well, one of the major creeds that I live by is, “Never turn down free food” — so I bought a copy of Pollan’s and Kalman’s illustrated “Food Rules,” had it signed by the authors, went on a tour of Chez Pannise’s extensive stainless-steel kitchens and then sampled hors d’oeuvres that had been prepared using Pollan’s 83 rules about food.

And I also ran into Alice Waters herself.  “I usually celebrate my birthdays at Chez Panisse,” I told her, “because it gives me something to look forward to each year besides just getting old — but this year my birthday falls on a Sunday and you guys will be closed.  And it’s my 70th birthday too!  So what should I do?”

“Perhaps you could celebrate it here on either the day before or the day after?” Waters replied.

“Or you could try Aziza, a Moroccan restaurant over in San Francisco,” added Pollan.  Then other people recommended trying Camino, Dona Tomas, Pizzialol, Quince, Cotogna and Commis.  But it just wouldn’t be the same — not going to Chez Panisse on my big Seven-Zero.  So we worked out a compromise.  I’d have my dinner celebration at Chez Panisse the night before, eat very slowly, and then celebrate turning 70 at the exact stroke of midnight — even if it meant sitting out on the restaurant’s front steps after they closed.   Perfect.

Here are some of Pollan’s 83 really helpful food rules:

2.  Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food [and nothing highly processed or containing unpronounceable chemicals either].

5.  Avoid foods that have sugar or some form of sweetener listed in the top three ingredients.

11. Avoid foods that are advertized on television [this rule should also apply to restaurants too.  Thank goodness Chez Panisse doesn't advertize on TV].

40.   Make water [not soda] your beverage of choice. Do what animals do when they’re thirsty.

42.  “The whiter the bread the sooner you’ll be dead.”

45.  Eat all the junk food you want as long as you cook it yourself.

56.  Eat when you are hungry, not when you’re bored.

82.  Cook!   Cooking just might be the single most important thing you can do for your dietary health.

Pollan then summarized his book in just seven words:   “Eat [real] food, not too much, mostly plants.”

Which brings me to the “main course” of this article:   Why food is so important to us:   WITHOUT FOOD WE WOULD STARVE.  So bear that in mind the next time you read about how Monsanto or Archer Daniels Midland or Congress is screwing with our food supply again.

Christopher Cook, author of “Diet for a Dead Planet,” states that, “It is no longer news that a few powerful corporations have literally occupied the vast majority of human sustenance.  The situation is perilous….  This corporate occupation of our food isn’t just unfair and wrong; it’s impractical and destructive.  It’s ruining farmers, the land and our future food supply.”

Yes, large for-profit-only corporations are endangering the food supply in places where people are barely subsisting and we’re always seeing photos of starving babies from there.  However, here in America these same corporations are highly endangering you and me as well.  Why?  Because Americans just THINK that they are eating real food — when much of our food merely consists of the three Cs: Cardboard, chemicals and crap.

Americans may think that we are nourishing ourselves when we eat corporate junk-food but the reality is that all too many of us are dying young from heart disease or cancer or obesity or diabetes; that our thinking has become fuzzy due to lack of nutrients; and, even worse, we are always hungry even though we keep stuffing our faces with imitation “real” food.

A photo from Peter Wenzel’s book, “Hungry Planet,” shows a typical American family sitting around a kitchen table with all the food they will eat in a week — and there’s hardly even one real fruit or vegetable among all of that stuff!

Why You Should Avoid Fast Food At All Costs

It is no secret that the average American diet is in completely in the slumps. Consuming packaged foods, fast food, artificially enhanced products, and especially low quality cheap food is the norm, but is it any wonder that being overweight while also falling victim to a host of illnesses is also the norm. Being raised in this era of poor health makes it difficult to know what is truly healthy and unhealthy. Food has drastically changed since decades ago, and so parents often aren’t aware of the severe decline in food quality. Fast food in particular is one of the primary reasons for the drastic health decline seen today.

Why You Should Avoid Fast Food at All Costs

If you haven’t already, take a couple of hours to watch the documentaries Super Size Me or Fast Food Nation. After watching these films, you can see first hand how fast food causes severe damage to your body – even if you don’t consume it for every meal of every day like in one of the films. Fast food is nothing but a concoction of harmful and health-damaging chemicals which can easily be understood if you were to think for a moment how any restaurant could offer a double cheeseburger for only $1.

Most recently it was uncovered that these $1 cheeseburgers, along with the rest of McDonald’s’ beef and chicken, were actually harnessing ‘pink slime’ scrap meat covered with ammonium hydroxide. Not only does this fake meat provide no nutritional value at all, but it is chemically contaminated from ammonia, the toxic cleaning agent found under the sink. The meat is actually fat trimmings and connective tissue that are separated from the bone – scrap meat that is not fit for human consumption. The ammonia treatment is in response to the danger of contamination from salmonella or E. coli, but the scrap meats themselves are more likely to contain pathogens. Despite the chemical treatment, the meat is still in the line of fire for contamination.

Additionally, McDonald’s McNuggets contain 7 different ingredients making up the ‘meat’, many of which contain sub-ingredients. Instead of using real meat, the ingredient list utilizes sodium phosphate, safflower oil, wheat starch, dextrose, and autolyzed yeast extract – a particularly dangerous substance very similar to the toxic MSG. Along side with these ingredients comes the use of dimethylpolysiloxane, a silicon substance used as an anti-foaming agent and often found in breast implants and silly putty.

Of course the use of these ingredients is not limited only to McDonald’s. In fact, all of the fast food restaurants are guilty of using them. The worst part? They are aware of the destructive nature behind these ingredients, but truly couldn’t care any less. The truth behind such a statement can be exemplified by Taco Bell’s attempt to create a drive-thru diet where individuals would supposed to lose weight by eating fast food. It was only a few years ago when Taco Bell announced the “Drive-Thru Diet”, where they showcased their foods low in fat. But what they don’t tell you is that even if their food has 9 grams of fat, it is still made up of numerous ingredients contributing to the global health decline.

While the reasons for the influx of fast food consumption are many, one primary one is the usage of psychological advertising. Being one of the most powerful tools to reach both the conscious and subconscious, advertising plays a huge role in how society is ran today, and that includes which foods we eat. What’s more, children are much more influenced by what they see and hear, and research proves it. A study conduced late in 2011 showed that 71 percent of children will choose junk food like french fries over apple slices when given coupons for each of them. The number dropped only to 55 percent when parents encouraged children to choose the apple slices. But the desired reach does not stop at direct advertising and influence.

A new children’s educational book has recently been launched by the Council for Biotechnology Information, educating young children on the ‘numerous benefits’ of genetically modified food. Of course genetically modified food has time and time again been shown to cause human and environmental harm, but still the attempt to brainwash young children is carelessly made. The advertising for such food is also heavily tied in with fast food, as virtually all fast food is constructed with genetically modified food and ingredients.

These are but only a few of the countless reasons to never ingest fast food.

Source: Natural Society

Poland’s Monsanto Action Lays 1000s of Dead Bees on Govt Steps

On March 15, over 1,500 beekeepers and their allies marched thru the streets of Warsaw, depositing thousands of dead bees on the steps of the Ministry of Agriculture, in protest of genetically modified foods and their requisite pesticides which are killing bees, moths and other agriculturally-beneficial insects around the globe.

Later that day the Minister of Agriculture, Marek Sawicki, announced plans to ban MON810, which has becomeineffective at deterring pests in the US.

GM crops and the pesticides used with them have led to a host of problems (itemized here), including the development of new pathogens.  One is associated with spontaneous abortion in cattle and another is responsible for massive methane foaming on manure lagoons which explode, killing thousands of animals in the US since 2001.

The Polish Beekeepers Association organized the protest, joining forces with International Coalition to Protect the Polish Countryside (ICPPC) and the Coalition for a GMO Free Poland.  Targeting Monsanto’s MON810 GM corn in particular, they also called for a complete ban on all GM crops and harmful pesticides.

In 2008, the Polish Parliament banned GM feed, including both the planting and importing of GM crops. “Despite this progressive step,” reports Food Travels, “the European Commission has refused to accept regional bans on GMOs, keeping Polish farmers, producers, and activists on the offensive.”

Regardless, says the ICPPC, “None of the nine European Union countries that have already prohibited MON 810 did so by asking the permission of the EU.”

Beekeepers dressed in their traditional working uniforms and ran their hive smoke guns as they marched.  Some wore yellow jackets with the misattributed quote of Albert Einstein warning that if bees were to die, humanity would soon suffer the same fate.  Though he did not say it, it’s true.  Most food crops rely on bees for pollination.

Others wore a variety of original costumes, sported signs and banners and carried bee-like objects to draw attention to the plight of these all-important pollinators.  More pictures at Stop GMO Festival.

The ICPPC is asking Polish residents to write Minister of Agriculture Marek Sawicki, demanding that he implement an immediate moratorium on GM crops, without waiting for EU approval:

e-mail: marek.sawicki@minrol.gov.pl
tel.: 0048 226231510; fax: 0048 226231788

The Organic Consumers Assn. collected info about other actions around the planet during the Shut Down Monsanto Days of Action last week, including Australia, Brazil, Canada, Italy, Greece, Romania and, of course, the US.

Monsanto-FDA’s Michael Taylor to Keynote Food Safety Town Hall

An agtivist with chutzpa might want to perform a GMO label action at the Food Safety Summit where Monsanto-lobbyist-now-Obama’s-Food-Safety-Czar, Michael R. Taylor, plans to wax tyrannical at a Town Hall on April 19 in D.C.

For a mere grand, you can attend the entire 3-day Food Safety Summit set for April 17-19 in Washington, D.C. There you’ll get to hear Taylor describe how federal and state regulators will manage the inspectional requirements of the boondoggle Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA).

As Deputy Commissioner for Foods of the US Food and Drug Admin, Taylor also promises to whine about the lack of funding for his FSMA vision of stopping natural food production in the US during his April 18 workshop.

He’s seeking a $3 billion budget to “modernize” our food system.  By modernize, he means to hyper-regulate the small producer out of existence, while criminalizing natural food production and trade.

After his workshop, chemical company and GMO giant DuPont will announce this year’s winner of the Food Quality Award.  Can’t wait to see who they select. You can be sure a completely organic, unprocessed, unadulterated, natural food won’t take the prize.

The next morning, Taylor will co-host a Town Hall with the USDA’s Under Secretary for Food Safety, Elisabeth Hagen.

You can deliver a question to Taylor now, which he may address during the Town Hall. Here’s the question I submitted:  “Why are you opposed to raw milk and GMO food labeling?”

Taylor’s currently under fire to be fired.  Several consumer groups have joined to push for his dismissal from the FDA.  You can sign a petition to hand him his pink slip here.

As the poster boy for government-industry collusion, Taylor is behind several raids on natural milk producers throughout the nation.  He champions the biotech myth that genetically modified foods are “substantially equivalent” to real food.

Though “equivalent,” he refuses to require labeling of GM foods, despite that nearly all consumers want the ingredient labeled.  Just Label It is trying to get a million signatures on its legal petition filed with the FDA.  You have until March 27 to sign it.

Taylor even wrote the FDA white paper on recombinant bovine growth hormone, a GMO ingredient added to factory milk, suggesting that companies that label their milk rBGH-free should also be required to state that FDA asserts there is no difference between milk from drugged vs. undrugged cows.

“Taylor’s disclaimer was a lie,” says Jeffrey Smith. “Monsanto’s own studies and FDA scientists officially acknowledged differences in the drugged milk. No matter. Monsanto used Taylor’s white paper as the basis to successfully sue dairies that labeled their products as rBGH-free.”

In a victory for informed consent, last year an Ohio district court overturned the ban on labeling milk as free from artificial hormones.

Good folks fighting for clean, safe and natural foods might want to consider invading the Food Safety Summit and performing some action to raise awareness of the public’s demand that genetically modified foods be labeled and that the natural milk trade be left unmolested by government hyper-regulation.

Taylor’s “Town Hall” isn’t free.  The minimum you’ll pay to attend any portion of the 3-day summit is $650, if you register after March 30.  Registering now can get you in for one day for $350.

This could be similar to what Adam Eidinger did when he infiltrated Monsanto’s annual shareholder meeting earlier this year and gave a well-prepared three-minute speech.

Have someone videotape your action at the Food Safety Summit Town Hall; we’ll all want to see it.

If you can’t afford the Town Hall, there’s a Global Day of Action to Stop Monsanto from 7am on March 16 to 7am March 17.

An earlier version of this first article appeared at Activist Post.

Open Seeds: Biopiracy and the Patenting of Life

As the world begins to digest the implications of intellectual property for online censorship, another IP issue threatens an even more fundamental part of our daily lives: our food supply. Backed by legal precedent and armed with seemingly inexhaustible lobbying funds, a handful of multinationals are attempting to use patents on life itself to monopolize the biosphere.

Find out more about the process of patenting life and what it means for the food supply on this week’s GRTV Backgrounder.

Transcript and sources:

The oft-neglected legal minefield of intellectual property rights has seen a surge in public interest in recent months due to the storm of protest over proposed legislation and treaties related to online censorship.[1] One of the effects of such legislation as SOPA and PIPA and such international treaties as ACTA is to have drawn attention to the grave implications that intellectual property arguments can have on the everyday lives of the average citizen.

As important as the protection of online freedoms is, however, an even more fundamental part of our lives has come under the purview of the multinational corporations that are seeking to patent the world around us for their own gain. Unknown to a large section of the public, a single US Supreme Court ruling in 1980 made it possible for the first time to patent life itself for the profit of the patent holder.

The decision, known as Diamond v. Chakrabarty, centered on a genetic engineer working for General Electric who created a bacterium that could break down crude oil, which could be used in the clean-up of oil spills.[2] In its decision, Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger ruled that:

“A live, human-made micro-organism is patentable subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101”

With this ruling, the ability to patent living organisms, so long as they had been genetically altered in some novel way, was established in legal precedent.

The implications of such a monumental ruling are understandably wide-reaching, touching on all sorts of issues that have the potential to change the world around us. But it did not take long at all for this decision’s effects to make itself felt in one of the most basic parts of the biosphere: our food supply.

In the years following the Diamond v. Chakrabarty decision, an entire industry rose up around the idea that these new patent protections could foster the economic incentive for major corporations to develop a new class of genetically engineered foods to help increase crop yields and reduce world hunger.

The first commercially available genetically modified food, Calgene’s “Flavr Savr” tomato, was approved for human consumption by the Food and Drug Administration in the US in 1992 and was on the market in 1994.[3] Since then, adoption of GM foods has proceeded swiftly, especially in the US where the vast majority of soybeans, corn and cotton have been genetically altered.

By 1997, the problems inherent in the patenting of these GM crops had already begun to surface in Saskatchewan, Canada. It was in the sleepy town of Bruno that a canola farmer, Percy Schmeiser, found that a variety of GM canola known as “Roundup Ready” had infected his fields, mixing with his non-GM crop.[4] Amazingly, Monsanto, the agrichemical company that owned the Roundup Ready patent, sued Schmeiser for infringing their patent. After a years-long legal battle against the multinational that threatened to bankrupt his small farming operation, Schmeiser finally won an out-of-court settlement with Monsanto that saw the company agree to pay for the clean-up costs associated with the contamination of his field.

In India, tens of thousands of farmers per year commited suicide[5] in an epidemic labeled the GM genocide.[6] Sold a story of “magic seeds” that would produce immense yields, farmers around the country were driven into ruinous debt by a combination of high-priced seeds, high-priced pesticides, and crop failure. Worst of all, the GM seeds had been engineered with so-called “terminator technology,” meaning that seeds from one harvest could not be re-planted the following year. Instead, farmers were forced to buy seeds at the same exorbitant prices from the biotech giants every year, insuring a debt spiral that was impossible to escape. As a result, hundreds of thousands of farmers have committed suicide in the Indian countryside since the introduction of GM crops in 1997.

As philosopher, quantum physicist and activist Vandana Shiva has detailed at great length, the effect of the invocation of intellectual property in enabling the monopolization of the world’s most fundamental resources was not accidental or contingent.[7] On the contrary, this is something that has been self-consciously designed by the heads of the very corporations who now seek to reap the benefit of this monopolization, and the monumental nature of their achievement has been obscured behind bureaucratic institutions like the WTO and innocuous sounding agreements like the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights.

Although the deck appears to be stacked in favour of the giant multinationals and their practically inexhaustible access to lobbying and legal funds, the people are by no means incapable of fighting back against this patenting of the biosphere.

In India itself, where so much devestation has been wrought by the introduction of genetically engineered crops, the people are fighting back against the world’s most well-known purveyor of GMO foods, Monsanto. The country’s National Biodiversity Diversity Authority has enabled the government to proceed with legal action against the company for so-called biopiracy, or attempting to develop a GM crop derived from local varieties of eggplant, without the appropriate licences.[8]

Although resistance to the patenting of the world’s food supply should be applauded in all its forms, what is needed is a fundamental transformation in our understanding of life itself from a patentable organism to the common property of all of the peoples who have developed the seeds from which these novel GM crops are derived.

This concept, known as open seeds, is being promoted by organizations around the globe, including Dr. Vandana Shiva’s Navdanya organization.[9]

To be sure, it will be a long and arduous uphill battle to bring this issue to the attention of a public that seems to be but dimly aware of what genetically modified foods are, let alone the legal ramifications of the ability to patent life, but as the work of such organizations as Navdanya continues to educate people about the issues involved, the numbers of those opposed to the patenting of the biosphere likewise increases.

From seed-saving and preservation projects to an increased awareness of and interest in organic foods, people around the globe are beginning to take the issue of the food supply as seriously as the companies that are quite literally attempting to ram their products down the consumers’ throats.

As always, the power lies with the consumers, who can win the battle simply by asserting their right to choose where and how they purchase the food, a lesson that was demonstrated once again earlier this month in Germany.[10]

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8uO9bw1TNw
[2]http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/447/303/case.html
[3]http://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceComplianceRegulatoryInformation/Guidance…
[4] http://www.percyschmeiser.com/
[5] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4RA4hbNRkY
[6] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1082559/The-GM-genocide-Thousand…
[7] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYwOTLopWIw
[8] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmIBvA1Tf20
[9] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfNCCJECpss
[10] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqRbziwzVkk

Source: James Corbett and Vandana Shiva | GlobalResearch.ca

The DHS Defends Globalism, Not America

The Department Of Homeland Security is the very epitome of unnecessary bureaucracy.  Its formation was predicated on the existence of terrorist threats, many of which the U.S. government and orbiting alphabet agencies either created through acts of war, or fabricated out of thin air.  Its policies of centralization were sold to the public as necessary to prevent systemic “miscommunications” that never actually took place.  Throughout our history, it has been a rare occasion indeed when an attack falls upon American infrastructure or interests that was not influenced, directly or indirectly, by the actions of agencies which were supposedly employed to prevent such events from ever occurring.  Whether through ‘blowback’, or through ‘false flag’, frankly, most of the harm that comes to our nation is perpetrated by the guiding hand of our inexorably corrupt government.

Knowing that the DHS was established on false pretenses forces us to question the agency’s true intentions, especially when a professional fear-monger like Secretary Janet Napolitano announces that the globalization of the world economy falls within her jurisdiction:

http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2012/01/27/the-urgent-need-to-protect-the-global-supply-chain/

Average citizens would assume that the DHS is a U.S.-centric institution, and regardless of its Orwellian behavior, is at the very least a distinctly American brand of tyranny.  However, under encroaching strategies enforced since 2006 through the National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP), it is becoming very apparent that the Department Of Homeland Security is quickly taking on an “all-of-nation” role, most prominently in the defense of globalization:

http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/NIPP_Plan.pdf

In her most recent op-ed / propaganda piece published by Reuters, Napolitano makes it clear that the business of the DHS is lately focused on what she calls “global supply chain security”.  This by itself could be seen as a perfectly logical extension of the DHS mandate to protect America.  Unfortunately, the situation is not that simple.  A few talking points and guidelines within the NIPP platform are rather disturbing, and create an open door for the internationalization of the DHS.

Ironically, Napolitano sets the stage first by pointing out the brittle nature of globalization, along with its numerous vulnerabilities:

“A vulnerability or gap in any part of the world has the ability to affect the flow of goods and people thousands of miles away. For instance, just three days after the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear tragedies struck Japan last March, U.S. automakers began cutting shifts and idling some plants at home. In the days that followed, they did the same at their factories in more than 10 countries around the world…”

As I have pointed out many times in the past, the utter lack of redundancy within our globalized system makes it the most impractical and downright destructive economic model in history.  Janet Napolitano seems to agree at least in part on this point.  The problem is that the weaknesses of globalization are not a mistake; they are a deliberate and useful tool for further centralization of once sovereign economies.  Instead of addressing the obvious concern that globalization does not work, Napolitano, like every other globalist in our government, claims that it must be propped up at all costs for the “greater good”:

“Because protecting the global supply chain is inherently an international challenge, it will take an international effort to meet it. The tremendous benefits we all reap from an interdependent global economy means that we are all stakeholders in the security of that system…”

“…we will continue to think globally, enhancing our coordination with the international community and international stakeholders who have key supply chain roles and responsibilities. We will seek to develop and implement global standards, strengthen detection, interdiction, and information-sharing capabilities, and promote end-to-end supply chain security efforts with the international community.”

What “benefits” are we “reaping” from globalization?  I haven’t the foggiest idea.  The internationalization of banking and finance has led to the creation and subsequent implosion of the world’s largest debt bubble and further devaluation of many of the world’s currencies.  Centralized and corporatized food production has led to a complete lack of self reliance within our society, contributed to food scarcity, not abundance, and opened our means of sustenance to the mad-science and genetic criminality of monstrous entities like Monsanto.  The globalization of law through treaty has supplanted the U.S. Constitution, fed the growth of unaccountable and unelected councils and committees, and stricken our country with policy initiatives that weren’t even written by officials that live here.  There are absolutely no substantial benefits to globalization that outweigh its considerable detriments, unless, of course, you are one of the elite few who stand at the helm of the machine.

At the Davos Economic Summit which took place in the final week of January, Napolitano announced a program called the “National Strategy For Global Supply Chain Security”:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/national_strategy_for_global_supply_chain_security.pdf

Within this plan, the DHS seeks to unite with international corporate interests in an effort to ensure the dominance of the globalist ideal of centralized economy.  The collectivist rhetoric inherent within the document above is apparent.  Napolitano summarizes it well when she states:

“As globalization brings nations closer together, we need to jointly disprove and leave behind the notion that security and efficiency cannot coexist, and together build a security architecture that better uses information to assess risk. By taking a coordinated, strategic and thoughtful approach, we can expedite legitimate commerce while focusing our attention on that much smaller portion that poses harm. Security and confidence in the global supply chain enhance our collective economic strength, rather than impeding progress.”

Napolitano treats globalism as an inevitability; a future without recourse and without option.  A smart person might ask; “What business is it of Janet Napolitano to comment on the global economic model, let alone utilize DHS resources in its defense!”  But look at it this way; by using the failings of globalization and the spectral boogie-man of terrorism as a rationale, the DHS has created a grey area in which the U.S. government can be more fully integrated into the global corporate dynamic, which furthers the disintegration of American sovereignty.

The global supply chain encompasses everything!  It is a vast artificial international construct.  For the DHS to truly “defend” its integrity, it will be REQUIRED to sacrifice the specific and sovereign interests of the U.S.  In a globalized trade system, every economy is important, as long as it does not compete with any other economy.  The U.S. economy is no exception.  Harmonization diminishes the wealth of more successful nations and transfers it to less successful nations.  This transfer of wealth does, in a sense, create equality; it makes everyone equally poor.  By becoming the militant hand of globalization, the DHS is put in the position of hurting America in order to “save” America.

The National Strategy For Global Supply Chain Security document is extraordinarily vague when it comes to the manner in which the DHS will implement defense directives.  More DHS agents at shipping ports?  Of course.  More DHS involvement in airline cargo centers?  Certainly.  But what about DHS agents overseeing trucking and freight, or even stationed at highway checkpoints (remember, the TSA is an agency under the direct authority of the DHS)?  What about DHS agents acting as permanent corporate liaisons?  Will corporations decide who is a threat to the global supply chain and who isn’t?  What about the usage of copyrighted materials on the internet?  Is this a disruption of global trade?  How does the DHS actually plan to return a disrupted supply line to normal efficiency?  The DHS has no production capacity, and would have to TAKE (possibly by force) a supply from somewhere in order to reinstitute it elsewhere.  What about communities, states, or countries which refuse to participate in globalization?  What about those who choose to decentralize?  Could this not be labeled as an attempt to derail the global system, and thus be interpreted as an act of terrorism?

Under any collectivist society, the act of non-participation is always painted as an attack on the group.  In a fully interdependent system, refusing to contribute automatically hurts others, and therefore, makes you a criminal by default.  These systems are built this way deliberately, in order to control a population by exploiting their sense of innate guilt.  The DHS may claim a limited involvement in globalization, restricted to security issues, but the very process of integration with the international corporate framework as well as foreign institutions makes the agency a catalyst for forced collectivism.  Bombs in shipping containers (the bombs we’re supposed to believe are everywhere), do not warrant the massive shift of our security apparatus into a policy of global centralization.  In the end, this move on the part of the DHS has nothing to do with security, and everything to do with manipulating the attitude of the general public towards globalization.  It is much more difficult to challenge a methodology when that methodology is suddenly treated as a national security issue, and is defended by an army of bureaucrats and blue-shirted thugs.  When a world view is made violently essential to the very survival of a people, defiance is held tantamount to treason, and change, no matter how wise, becomes impossible.

Source: Brandon Smith | Alt-Market

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