global warming - updated 6/21/2007

I posted this on a blog in http://www.cbsnews.com/ where of course many of the posts are from people who don't understand the subject, and in many cases, are just plain silly jerks.
I'm putting it here so that if I want to, I can copy it instead of typing it again!

It is a fact of physics that some gases have a greenhouse effect. See the post by ubrew12 for a good explanation of what that means. It is a fact of physics that humans are causing an increase in these gases. Whatever natural processes there are that are affecting the earth's temperature, this man-made increase in greenhouse gases must cause the earth to be warmer than it would be w/o the extra gases, just like the inside of a car sitting in the sun with the windows up will be hotter than the outside temperature, whatever it is. Yes, when the temperature outside the car is hotter, it will be hotter inside the car, but that doesn't mean the windshield glass does not have a greenhouse effect.
octavianfdlr says that Mars and Jupiter have warmed. The implication seems to be that this is caused by the Sun. If this is the case, what about the other planets? After all, Mercury and Venus are closer to the sun. From my experience, this "fact" might be something that was made up by people like Mobil/Exxon.
Incidentally, Venus is so hot because of a runaway greenhouse effect, caused by water vapor, another greenhouse gas. Venus is closer to the sun than the Earth, which caused an increased evaporation of water, and water vapor is a greenhouse gas. So that caused warming, which caused more evaporation, etc.

(later)

Today is the summer solstice. If the greenhouse effect does not exist, then I guess we could expect the temperature to start getting cooler, since the amount of sunlight will be getting less. Also, we would expect the temperature to start getting warmer after the winter solstive, Dec. 20 or 21. Of course, that doesn't happen
.http://cires.colorado.edu/events/lectures/ruddiman/
William Ruddiman proposes that we would be in an ice age by now if it hadn't been for global warming caused by human activity, going back thousands of years ago.

processor2 What does this have to do with "America's fault"? This is a problem accidently caused by humans. If we continue, it won't be accidental any more, it will be because of irresponsible people who are too lazy and uncaring to change their ways; that would be unpatriotic.

I found this on the Nasa web site, for Mars.I couldn't find a reference to Jupiter warming.Could you provide us with a link?http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/research/2007/marswarming.html
05.14.07
For the past 30 years, NASA scientists have been using high-tech satellite equipment to study features on the face of Mars. It appears a slight change in the planet’s surface luster has caused its temperature to rise.
To determine the extent of surface changes on Mars, scientists took images from the Viking (launched 1975) and Mars Global Surveyor (1996) satellite missions and mapped them into a climate model developed at NASA Ames Research Center. They discovered that a wind-whipped, dusty surface has a measurable effect on the amount of sunlight that is reflected by the planet. The results of this research show that an increase in darkened surface areas may account for a one degree Fahrenheit rise in the surface air temperature of the planet.
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It has been noted that one of the reason's the earth is warming faster than older computer models predicted, is that as ice melts, the ground underneath, which is darker, is exposed, and thus does not reflect as much solar radiation back into space as the ice did.

Tenn. Candidates Go Homeless For Night

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/06/20/ap/national/main2958311.shtml

The National Coalition for the Homeless has been organizing similar experiences for college students and others for the past 25 years. But the group's executive director, Michael Stoops, said it was the first time political candidates agreed to take part.

What a good idea. We are too prone to have opinions that are not based on reality.

'Segregated' Schools Hinder Reading Skills

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070620112148.htm

Children in families with low incomes, who attend schools where the minority population exceeds 75 percent of the student enrollment, under-perform in reading, even after accounting for the quality of the literacy instruction, literary experiences at home, gender, race and other variables, according to a new study.

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Effect Of Removing TV, Games Consoles And Computers On Young Children

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070619172711.htm

Twenty-three 7 and 8-year-old school children from a single year group in a primary school in the Manchester area took part.

Over a five-week period, the children were observed in the classroom and along with their families in their homes. During weeks 3 and 4, half the participants had their TV sets, PCs and portable game consoles removed or disabled. The remaining families carried on as normal.

Even after just two weeks, families found they began to interact more, even to ‘rediscover’ their pleasure in each other’s company.

Children tired from an active evening were more liable to go to bed early and wake up refreshed and alert the next day.

One parent told the Panorama team after the two-week experiment: “Thinking of how we were as a family around the TV…the TV controlling us…and using the TV as a pacifier for the kids…just seems totally crazy now.”

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pet-food info

http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20070605/tc_usatoday/petfoodscandalignitesblogosphere

As the media focused on breaking news and other significant developments in the story, bloggers took the "completely logical approach" of finding what specific details pet owners need and putting them all together, says Paul Grabowicz, director of the New Media Program at the University of California at Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism.
•The Pet Connection , a longtime pet-care site, links to the
Food and Drug Administration' name=c1> SEARCHNews News Photos Images Web' name=c3> Food and Drug Administration's list of recalled foods, gives information on poisoning symptoms and provides live streaming text from FDA press conferences.
•Itchmo.com , named for a dog who loves to be scratched, went from a specialty site that founder Ben Huh of Bellevue, Wash., said got "about two visits a month" to a news source with 1.5 million visitors and a high enough profile that it has been banned in China.
•PetFoodTracker.com lists "the latest in head-exploding news."
•ThePetFoodList.com lists the foods that companies describe as safe for canine and feline consumption.

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college degrees for all?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-brook/the-most-dangerous-myth-a_b_52314.html

In my post on Sunday, I took on one section of the lead article in this week's New York Times Magazine, "The Inequality Conundrum." But before it becomes last week's news, I need to get something off my chest. The piece repeats what is probably the most dangerous and widespread myth about the new inequality -- that education is the answer to the problems of the working poor.

It's easy to see why this trap is so easy to fall into if you don't have an economics Ph.D. If you look at a chart of the average incomes of people by education level, you see it rises with each degree. Those with a high school diploma earn more on average than those without. Those with college degrees do better than those with high school diplomas and so on. The same trend continues for graduate and professional school. So you can see how one can easily make the mistake of assuming that if everyone had more education, everyone would make more money. But that's just not true.

There are lots of jobs for burger flippers not because there are lots of uneducated people who can't do other jobs. People don't flip burgers for a living because we have compassion on them and give them spatulas. There are lots of jobs for burger flippers because there's a high demand for burgers and because running a chain of restaurants that serve burgers is very profitable. (McDonald's stock recently hit an all-time high.)

In the U.K., the minimum wage is roughly twice ours -- about USD $10 an hour -- so their burger flippers get paid about twice what they do here (to say nothing of the fact that every British burger flipper and her children has health insurance). In many other European countries the minimum wage is even higher. And yet, those countries are still filled with burger flippers and McDonald's restaurants. And contrary to the Times' insinuation, their prices are not dramatically higher than our own. The American translation of Sweden's "8 Kronor Menu" would be the "$1.13 Menu" according to the latest exchange rate.

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Savings from outsourcing goes to good cause

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20070615/over-the-top-spending/

Forget about the $350 stilettos. Shoes with status these days come with $1,000 price tags. And $600 handbags have become so bourgeois. A-listers don't want to be seen with anything costing less than $5,000.

Montblanc recently sold a $700,000-plus pen just a few days after it showed up in the New York store. The pen, adorned with rubies, sapphires and diamonds, took 15 months to handcraft. At Cartier, $1 million to $2 million sales checks _ rare only a few years ago _ is occurring a couple times a month at its North American boutiques.

According to an analysis of the latest IRS tax data available by Prof. Emmanuel Saez, the University of California, Berkeley economist with Prof. Thomas Piketty of the Paris School of Economics, those in the top tenth of a percent reported an average income of $5.6 million in 2005, up $908,000 from the prior year; the top one-hundredth of a percent had an average income of $25.7 million, up almost $4.4 million from the year before, according to the study.

Meanwhile, real reported income in the U.S. rose 3.4 percent in 2005 on average but the average income for those in the bottom 90 percent fell slightly compared with the year before, according to the study.

We can see why it is so important to business to keep workers' wages depressed by various means. It would be such a hardship for their CEO's not to be able to buy a $700,000 pen.

Miracle Surgery Mends Cambodian Orphan

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/06/12/earlyshow/main2921010.shtml

When Scott Neeson first laid eyes on Lyda, the 13-year-old orphan was clambering over a mountain of garbage in a Phnom Penh, Cambodia slum. She was moving slowly and painfully because of a spinal deformity that left her with a severe hunchback. Still, she persevered.

Neeson and Lyda were truly from opposite ends of the world: He was a former film executive nicknamed "Mr. Hollywood" who gave up his home and Porche in exchange for a life in Phnom Penh and occasional head lice. "I've gone from Hollywood to the garbage dump, and I'm so much happier today," he explained.

Lyda "is such a loving girl," he told Early Show correspondent Hattie Kauffman. "She was living in the garbage dump. She was left there by her parents when she was five. She was fending for herself, basically."

Neeson resolved to get Lyda the medical help she needed through the charity he founded to fund three orphanages he's opened in Cambodia. But the surgery that could give her a pain-free and mobile life would cost dearly, and needed to be performed in an American hospital. Lyda needed an angel in her corner.

Enter Sumner Redstone, the chairman of Viacom and CBS Corporation, and a major philanthropist. "I had no idea how the children live in Cambodia. I mean, little girls being put out for prostitution, children living in dumps, scrounging for something to eat. The story really got to me," he told Kauffman.

Her surgeon, Dr. Robert Bernstein, feels that, without the surgery, Lyda would eventually have been paralyzed, because her bones were pressing against her spinal cord.

It's heartwarming and inspiring to read of these caring people.

deja vu all over again

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/06/13/politics/main2924206.shtml

The Bush administration is trying to roll back a Supreme Court decision by pushing legislation that would require prison time for nearly all criminals.

In a speech June 1 to announce the bill, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales urged Congress to re-impose mandatory minimum prison sentences against federal convicts — and not let judges consider such penalties “merely a suggestion.”

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http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/06/12/national/main2919067.shtml?source=search_story

One minute,a judge ordered him released from prison , saying the young man's 10-year sentence for consensual sex between teens was a "grave miscarriage of justice." Ninety minutes later, Georgia's attorney general said Wilson wasn't going anywhere — the state had appealed.

When the people in the Bush administration are out of their jobs, they can come to Georgia. They'll fit right in. Two or three days after a man was released after spending more than 18/20? years in prison for a crime he didn't commit, an idiot Republican Georgian legislator introduced a bill to reduce the number of jurors needed to impose the death sentence.
A few days ago, a judge ordered Genarlow Wilson released from prison, where he was serving a 10 year sentence for having consensual sex when he was 17 with a 15 year-old girl. Neither she nor her parents wanted Wilson charged. The law he was sentenced under has since been changed, reducing the matter to a misdemeanor (still riduculous) instead of a felony, but it was not made retroactive.
So now the Bush administration wants to impose mandatory minimums at the federal level. What timing!

Bodies at recycle plants ID'd as homeless couple

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19192734/

Two people whose bodies were found at paper recycling plants more than 1,000 miles apart were a homeless couple who apparently went to sleep in a recycling container before its contents were compacted, police said Tuesday.

Police believe both of the Jansens, who had recently become homeless, had gone to sleep in a recycling container in south St. Louis County before the container's contents were emptied into a truck and compacted.

Woman dies in ER lobby as 911 refuses to help

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19207050/

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/06/13/health/main2923545.shtml#ccmm

A woman who lay bleeding on the emergency room floor of a troubled inner-city hospital died after 911 dispatchers refused to contact paramedics or an ambulance to take her to another facility, newly released tapes of the emergency calls reveal.

Relatives reported she died as police were wheeling her out of the hospital after the officers they had asked to help Rodriguez arrested her instead on a parole violation.

(added later)
The CBS report is followed by reader comments. Some jerk said that if someone doesn't have medical insurance, it's ok that they die, that everybody could have insurance if they were willing to work hard. The following was my response:

I have an M.A. in math & more than 30 years experience in computer programming. Because of age discrimination, I worked for 4 years as a waitress. With so many baby boomers retiring, I was able to get back into the tech field, but I don't know for how long, because business is trying to get Congress to remove all caps on foreign visas, so they can bring in people from other countries, and go back to discriminating against older people. The jobs I can get now are as a contractor w/o benefits.

If everybody were identical, there were still be people who would end up working in low-paying jobs, because we don't have a need for well-paying jobs for everybody. The middle- and upper-class depend on the working class. Where do you think your food comes from? Do you grow it all yourself and cook it all from scratch? Do you build your car and other possessions from raw materials you have mined yourself? If so, how do you have the time to run your business?

For those who are capable, we are lucky. We could have been brain-damaged before birth because our mother was too poor to get enough to eat. We could have had a genetic mutation. Any day we might get brain-damaged or paralyzed in an automobile accident. If we are uncaring towards others, we help to create a world where others are uncaring to us.

Diet And Exercise Key To Surviving Breast Cancer

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070609112941.htm

Breast cancer survivors who eat a healthy diet and exercise moderately can reduce their risk of dying from breast cancer by half, regardless of their weight, suggests a new longitudinal study from the Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD).

Dirty Snow May Warm Arctic As Much As Greenhouse Gases

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070606113327.htm

The global warming debate has focused on carbon dioxide emissions, but scientists at UC Irvine have determined that a lesser-known mechanism – dirty snow – can explain one-third or more of the Arctic warming primarily attributed to greenhouse gases.

Economic Impact Of Hunger Affects All Americans

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070605120859.htm

While thirty-five million Americans feel the physical effects of hunger each day, every household and individual in our nation feels the economic effects. So finds a new study released today by the Sodexho Foundation and researchers affiliated with Harvard University School of Public Health, Brandeis University and Loyola University.

The study found that the lion's share of the overall cost, $66.8 billion, resulted from illness associated with hunger, said Brandeis health economist Donald Shepard, who led the economic analysis. These illnesses included iron deficiency, colds and depression, and other causes of fair and poor health.

"What was unusual about hunger was the wide range of problems associated with it, which included not only the illness burden, but also expenses on food pantries and other charities to mitigate the problem, and lost productivity due to hunger's adverse impact on learning,"

This is another area where the super-rich elite are whining about conditions for which they are at least partly the cause. They hold down wages to poverty levels for many of their employees, so that they themselves can make an amount that they can have no real use for. They make huge political donations to political candidates to vote to remove taxes from themselves and shift it to the poor and middle-class. This means there is less money for such things as educations and health care for the less advantaged. They fund "think tanks" to support their positions. They inflence the news media because of their advertising power. Also, they control the big media.

Then they complain that they can't get well-educated, intelligent employees.

Diet May Influence Survival After Treatment For Colon Cancer

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070604090434.htm

Unfortunately, this study describes my grandmother. But it could have been worse, since she didn't get cancer until she was in her middle 80's, and lived until 10 days before she would have been 92.

Patients with stage III colon cancer who have undergone surgery and chemotherapy with the goal of cure may have a higher risk of relapsing and dying early if they follow a predominantly "Western" diet of red meat, fatty foods, refined grains, and desserts

vitamins and pancreatic cancer

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070601072227.htm

investigators combined data from four large studies and found that people who were at or below normal body weight decreased their risk for developing pancreatic cancer if they took in high levels of vitamin B6, vitamin B12, and folate from food.

The study determined that their risk was 81 percent, 73 percent, and 59 percent lower, vitamin B6, vitamin B12, and folate respectively, compared with participants who did not eat as much of these nutrients or who weighed more.

The researchers also say that they uncovered another interesting trend that some people who received these nutrients from multivitamin pills had an increased risk of developing the disease. According to the researchers, individuals who said they used multivitamins, and whose blood showed traces of these nutrients, had a 139 percent increased relative risk of developing pancreatic cancer.

No one knows why vitamin pills may not help ward off cancer, or why, in this study, it might have a deleterious effect, Dr. Schernhammer said, but some research in animals suggests that "if there is a dormant tumor, folate and other similar vitamins may stimulate growth." That might be especially true if a person did not take in enough of these nutrients consistently through diet, and then suddenly started taking multivitamins in an effort to become healthy, she said.

A variety of studies have shown health benefits from getting a lot of vitamins from food, vs. increased risk from taking vitamin in pills.

I expect some of this is due to such things as interactions and balance among nutrients, and the intake of nutrients from food that are not in multivitamins, as well as the possiblity of "fertilization" of dormat cancer.

But I wonder if the fact that much of our vitamins come from China could account for some of the detrimental effects of vitamin supplements? Eg., almost all vitamin C comes from China. China shows the result of excessive Capitalism/free markets/libertarianism/freedom from governmen regulations situations. Of course, anybody who knows a little about history could have predicted such problems.

FDA: Toss Toothpaste Made In China

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/06/01/health/main2876566.shtml

The government warned consumers on Friday to avoid using toothpaste made in China because it may contain a poisonous chemical used in antifreeze.

How can we know. It might have some ingredients from China, but not be so labeled. I try to avoid buying products made in China. In the case of the pet food, there was no labeling indicating that foreign ingredients were used. Many vitamins are made in China, but are not labeled. I guess I am a horrible, unregenerate liberal, because I don't think that this should be left to the voluntary actions of business.

what's your religion?

Your daily life is your temple and your religion.
- Kahlil Gibran

The "Uninsurables"

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/23/cbsnews_investigates/main2843007.shtml

With 46 million Americans living without health insurance, thousands of uninsured people who can't get insurance contact call centers every month.

Last year one nationwide survey, the Commonwealth Fund, found that 89 percent, or 52 million, of those looking for individual health insurance didn't get it because it was too expensive or they were turned down.

I'm working as a contractor for a large company. If anybody complains because the company is not providing health benefits to us, they can self-righteously replay that the recruiting company has benefits. However, that recruiting company doesn't hire me or several of my co-workers directly. They hire us thru another recruiting company that has no benefits. I guess that at least helps keep the unemployment rate down a little.

Grandma told us this

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/18/health/webmd/main2825704.shtml

A new study shows the bulk of apples' anticancer properties lie in the peel.

Researchers analyzed the chemical composition of apple peels and identified a group of phytochemicals that proved potent against at least three different types of human cancer cells: breast, colon, and liver.

Countless studies have supported the old adage "An apple a day keeps the doctor away" by showing a diet rich in fruits and vegetables reduces the risk of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and a host of other chronic diseases.

But note that while drinking several cups of green tea a day may have health benefits, taking very large doses in pills can cause liver and bladder damage.

Ethicist: Health Care System Is 'A Mess'

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/15/ap/health/main2808161.shtml

The U.S. health care system is "a dysfunctional mess" and politicians who insist otherwise look ignorant, according to a medical journal essay by a prominent ethicist at the National Institutes of Health.

"If a politician declares that the United States has the best health care system in the world today, he or she looks clueless rather than patriotic or authoritative," Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel wrote in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association.

Emanuel, who supports sweeping health care reform, said the U.S. spends $6,000 per person per year on health care, an amount that is more than 16 percent of the nation's gross domestic product and more than any other country

He also said Americans' average life expectancy of 78 ranks 45th in the world, behind Bosnia and Jordan. And the U.S. infant death rate is 6.37 per 1,000 live births, higher than that of most developed nations.

Also, 90,000 people a year die in the U.S. because of lack of health insurance.

Link Between Mega Multivitamins And Cancer

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/15/health/webmd/main2809956.shtml

Men who take too many multivitamins may be increasing their risk of dying from prostate cancer, according to new research from the National Cancer Institute.

Taking a multivitamin more than seven times a week was associated with a 30 percent increased risk of advanced prostate cancer and a doubling of the risk of death from the disease in the study.

Regular multivitamin use (one to six times a week) did not appear to increase cancer risk, and excessive vitamin use was not associated with an increased risk of early, or localized, prostate cancer.

An analysis of 47 studies assessing antioxidant supplementation, published earlier this year, found a slight increase in deaths among people who took beta-carotene, vitamin E, or vitamin A supplements.

In an editorial accompanying the study, Gluud and colleague Goran Bjelakovic, both of Copenhagen University Hospital, offer an intriguing hypothesis on the role of free radicals and antioxidant supplements in the promotion and prevention of disease.

The thinking has been that antioxidant vitamins protect against diseases like cancer and heart disease by reducing the free radicals that are thought to promote these conditions through oxidative stress.

But Gluud and Bjelakovic suggest that free radicals may do some good by targeting and killing harmful cells, such as those that cause cancers to grow.

As usual, a balanced approach is best.

good news for fitness

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/15/health/webmd/main2809954.shtml

A new study shows that it may take as little as 72 minutes of moderate exercise per week to improve aerobic fitness.

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how to lied with statistics about globalization

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18699042/site/newsweek/

In a Newsweek article, Robert Samuelson says that globalization has not hurt the U.S. much because some studies found that only a small percent of mass layoffs could be attributed to offshoring.

In 2004 and 2005, the BLS counted almost 1 million workers fired in layoffs of 50 or more. That isn't a huge number in a labor force of about 150 million. Moreover, most causes were domestic. The largest reason (accounting for about 25 percent) was "contract completion"—a public works job done, a movie finished. Other big categories included "downsizing" (16 percent) and the combination of bankruptcy and "financial difficulty" (10 percent). Only about 12 percent of layoffs stemmed from "movement of work"—a category that would include offshoring. But two-thirds of those moves were domestic.

What about the "downsizing" category? Ignored was Why the company was downsizing. Maybe because some of the jobs were outsourced to other countries?

He also totally ignores the number of jobs lost to citizens because of the importation of workers through H1-B and L-1 visas.

And of course, he points to low official unemployment statistics :

Still, with the unemployment rate at 4.5 percent, it's clear that globalization hasn't crippled the U.S. job machine.

Of course, this doesn't take into effect cases like a person who has been a computer programmer for 25 or 30 years is working at a low-skilled job, or borrowed money to get a graduate degree, because they can't get a job in their field. Getting a degree in middle-age, certainly in late middle-age, is likely to result only in a higher debt load. Also, the baby boomers who can afford to, and want to, are starting to retire.

Thin people may be fat inside

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070510/ap_on_he_me/thin_fat_people;_ylt=AjMholDbXZugzbIv7aR6Nh3VJRIF

If it really is what's on the inside that counts, then a lot of thin people might be in trouble. Some doctors now think that the internal fat surrounding vital organs like the heart, liver or pancreas — invisible to the naked eye — could be as dangerous as the more obvious external fat that bulges underneath the skin.

According to the data, people who maintain their weight through diet rather than exercise are likely to have major deposits of internal fat, even if they are otherwise slim.

Of the women scanned by Bell and his colleagues, as many as 45 percent of those with normal BMI scores (20 to 25) actually had excessive levels of internal fat. Among men, the percentage was nearly 60 percent.

Experts have long known that fat, active people can be healthier than their skinny, inactive counterparts. "Normal-weight persons who are sedentary and unfit are at much higher risk for mortality than obese persons who are active and fit," said Dr. Steven Blair, an obesity expert at the University of South Carolina.

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the "benefits" of lack of government regulations

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070513/hl_afp/asiahealthfooddangers;_ylt=AvOkNx2q7YJ4MJ.yYp0w0zbVJRIF

Across Asia governments appear to be struggling to control the use of toxic chemicals in manufactured and fresh food, chemicals that experts believe are responsible for deteriorating public health.

Formaldehyde seems to be one of the most widely found chemicals, used for everything from keeping flies off fresh meat in wet markets to prolonging freshness and enhancing the colour of manufactured foodstuffs.

Experts across the region are beginning to blame a range of illnesses, including rising cancer rates, liver and kidney ailments, stunted mental and physical development in children -- and, in extreme cases, death -- on adulterated food.

"We have been eating these foods for decades. I think these foods are the reason why we have increasing numbers of liver and kidney ailments," said Rokon-ud-Dowla. "These manufacturers are killing thousands of people, yet we didn't notice."

We don't want excessive government regulation, but neither can we do without some. As in most things, what we need is balance. To depend on business to regulate itself is as rational as to do away with the police and depend on people to voluntarily obey the law.

Going green could beat the blues: British experts

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070514/hl_afp/lifestylebritainhealth;_ylt=AhNq.x4dVo_zpLNKS8HBfHDVJRIF

A walk in the country is an effective alternative to chemical anti-depression treatment, a leading mental health charity said Monday, calling on British doctors to prescribe outdoor activities.

Researchers from the University of Essex, eastern England, studied the effect of a 30-minute walk in a country park compared with one in an indoor shopping centre on a small sample of 20 people with mental health problems.

It found that 71 percent reported decreased levels of depression and anxiety after the outdoor walk while 90 percent said their self-esteem increased.

This compared with 22 percent who said their stress levels increased, 50 percent who felt more tense and 44 percent whose self-esteem plummeted while indoors.

A second study of 108 people with mental health problems suggested nearly all (94 percent) found "green exercise" boosted their state of mind.

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Chemical Compounds Boost Breast Cancer Risk

http://news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20070514/hl_hsn/chemicalcompoundsboostbreastcancerrisk;_ylt=AgoJZOOBo3iEGtATc25It..WSbYF

A detailed analysis of hundreds of completed breast cancer studies has linked disease development with environmental exposure to more than 200 chemical compounds.

Massive Carbon Dioxide Burps Came From Ocean At End Of Last Ice Age

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/05/070510164044.htm

A University of Colorado at Boulder-led research team tracing the origin of a large carbon dioxide increase in Earth's atmosphere at the end of the last ice age has detected two ancient "burps" that originated from the deepest parts of the oceans.

The new study indicated carbon that had built up in the oceans over millennia was released in two big pulses, one about 18,000 years ago and one 13,000 years ago

"This is some of the clearest evidence yet that the enormous carbon release into the atmosphere during the last deglaciation was triggered by abrupt changes in deep ocean circulation,"

There are proposals to "solve" the problem of increasing amounts of greenhouse gases by storing them in the ocean or underground. Of course, they will eventually come out, perhaps in large quantities at one time. Eg., the earth gets hit more than rarely by asteroids of various sizes. I would think that an asteroid which was not big enough to harm the earth as a whole, might be enough to free a large quantity of stored gases, causing catastrophe.

This sudy indicates another mechanism that has already caused the sudden release of gas that was stored in the oceans by natural processes.

Study: 1 In 4 Kids Go Without Health Care

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/02/eveningnews/main2755159.shtml

The group's report finds despite billions of dollars in government spending, more than one in four children still don't have full-time health care — a gap twice as big as anyone thought

biofuels

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/08/tech/main2774983.shtml

The United Nations said Tuesday that biofuels like ethanol can greatly help reduce global warming and create jobs for the rural poor, but warned that the benefits may be offset by serious environmental problems and higher food prices for the hungry.

Maggots Rid Patients Of Antibiotic-resistant Infection, MRSA

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/05/070503094447.htm

University of Manchester researchers are ridding diabetic patients of the superbug MRSA - by treating their foot ulcers with maggots. Professor Andrew Boulton and his team used green bottle fly larvae to treat 13 diabetic patients whose foot ulcers were contaminated with MRSA and found all but one were cured within a mean period of three weeks, much quicker than the 28-week duration for the conventional treatment.

Children of War

http://neilyoung.com/

Click on "Living With War Doc"
which goes to the following page :
http://neilyoung.com/lwwtoday/index.html

Near the top of the left column, click on LWW Top 1,680 Songs - Listen Here

Ctrl+f and search for "kemp"
His "Top Ten Stories" is currently at 294
Click on "Top Ten Stories"

This takes you to the MySpace blog of singer/songwriter Kemp Jones :
http://www.myspace.com/kempjones

All of his songs are good. I would say that "Children of War" is great, and deserves to become a classic. Kemp wrote it after seeing a documentary where a child in a war zone said "We children don't need war, we need chocolate".

Stress causes cancer development

http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20070411-14050700-bc-us-cancerstress.xml

U.S. medical scientists have discovered the stress hormone epinephrine makes prostate and breast cancer cells resistant to cell death.

Researchers at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine said they are the first to report that emotional stress might contribute to the development of cancer and might also reduce the effectiveness of cancer treatments.

Maybe this is part of the reason African-American and Hispanic women in this country have a higher rate of breast cancer.

=============================================================
High Levels Of Daily Stress May Result In Lower Risk Of Breast Cancer
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/09/050909221823.htm

High levels of daily stress appear to result in a lower risk ofdeveloping breast cancer for the first time, says a study in this week's British Medical Journal.

But high stress may put women at risk of other serious illnesses warn the researchers, a team from Denmark....

One explanation for the findings may be that sustained levels of high stress may affect oestrogen levels - which, over time, may have an influence on developing breast cancer. But this theory has not been tested, and research in this area so far has mainly been restricted to animals, caution the authors.

Despite the findings, the authors warn that stress-induced changes in hormonal balances are not a healthy response, and continued stress may play a damaging part in other illnesses - particularly heart disease.

Well, here is another factor that appears to lower my risk for this particular problem!

==============================================================

Animal Research Suggests That Stress May Increase Risk Of Uterine Cancer
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/07/040709081822.htm

Research in monkeys suggests the possibility that stress may increase risk for the most common type of uterine cancer, according to a report from Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center. The study results also suggest that two drinks a day won't increase breast or endometrial cancer risk for postmenopausal women who don't take estrogen.

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Red Meat Linked To Breast Cancer

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070407174018.htm

Eating red meat increases a woman’s chance of developing breast cancer, according to new research from the University of Leeds.

The findings are most striking for post-menopausal women – those with the highest intake of red meat, the equivalent to one portion a day (more than 57 grams) - run a 56 per cent greater risk of breast cancer than those who eat none.
Women who eat the most processed meat, such as bacon, sausages, ham or pies, run a 64 per cent greater risk of breast cancer than those who eat none.

Researchers at the University’s Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics have been tracking the eating habits and health of more than 35,000 women for the past seven years, and their latest findings are published in the British Journal of Cancer. Earlier findings, widely reported in January, showed that pre-menopausal women who have the greatest intake of fibre have cut their risk of breast cancer in half.

Good thing I'm a vegetarian. It may offset the increased risk I have of breast cancer because I've never been pregnant.

Male Births: Decline In The US And Japan

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070409115759.htm

A study published in this week's online edition of Environmental Health Perspectives reports that during the past thirty years, the number of male births has decreased each year in the U.S. and Japan. In a review of all births in both countries, the University of Pittsburgh-led study found significantly fewer boys being born relative to girls in the U.S. and Japan, and that an increasing proportion of fetuses that die are male. They note that the decline in births is equivalent to 135,000 fewer white males in the U.S. and 127,000 fewer males in Japan over the past three decades and suggest that environmental factors are one explanation for these trends.

... "Given the importance of reproduction for the health of any species, the trends we observed in the U.S. and Japan merit concern," added Dr. Davis. "In light of our findings, more detailed studies should be carried out that examine sex ratio in smaller groups with defined exposures as a potential indicator of environmental contamination."

Herbal Treatment Effective For Recurring Urinary Tract Infections

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070409082433.htm

A common herbal extract available in health food stores can greatly reduce urinary tract infections and could potentially enhance the ability of antibiotics to kill the bacteria that cause 90 percent of infections in the bladder.

Researchers at Duke University Medical Center, in a series of experiments in mice, believe they have also discovered why many urinary tract infections in the bladder return even after treatment with antibiotics. They found that some bacteria hide in cells lining the bladder, where they cannot be reached by antibiotics. But they also found that forskolin, an extract from the Indian coleus plant, flushes out hiding colonies of bacteria, making them susceptible to antibiotic treatment.

... Abraham said that a new and effective approach for treating urinary tract infections is needed, because constant antibiotic use has many drawbacks, including high expense, possible liver and kidney damage and the potential for creating strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

Getting Dirty May Lift Your Mood

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070402102001.htm

Bacteria found in the soil activated a group of neurons that produce the brain chemical serotonin.

Treatment of mice with a 'friendly' bacteria, normally found in the soil, altered their behavior in a way similar to that produced by antidepressant drugs, reports research published in the latest issue of Neuroscience.

Doctor Contrasts His Care With Patient's

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/03/ap/health/main2640883.shtml

An estimated 112,000 Americans with cancer have no health insurance, according to Physicians for a National Health Program.

And that's only cancer. Among the 45 million Americans who have no health insurance, there are countless people with chronic and developing health problems who are risking the same kind of fate that took Searcy's life.

recommended web site

www.dailyhowler.com

chronicles the main stream media and so-called liberal media bias and lies on behalf of conservatives and against liberals.

Spring Has Sprung

Spring has Sprung
copyright 1997 Patricia M. Shannon

Spring has sprung,
the flowers grow,
their pollen flows,
so does my nose.
Oh, hear it blow,
how it does glow.

everybody's creative, in their own way

Some years ago, I saw a very small article in a back page of a newspaper, that reported on some reseach genetic vs environmental influences on human thinking. It stated that it did not appear that heridity influenced creativity. There was no information on the way the study was conducted, but I felt doubtful of the conclusion.

However, with time, I have developed a different point of view. I have associated creativity with new ideas. However, I now see that great creativity is used by many people to rationalize their existing views.

inaccurate prediction

I made a spectacularly inaccurate prediction recently. I was talking to someone about the plan by some group to go around to high schools and colleges and lie to students, telling them that IT would be a good job to go into. I remarked that encouraging people to go into a field that they would have such a hard time getting jobs in, as beginners, was dangerous. Having educated people who can't get decent jobs can lead to the development of terrorists. I opined that the job discrimination against older IT people was probably safe enough in that respect, because older people are past the age when most violence occurs, and probably wouldn't suddenly become terrorists. Two or three days later, the following was reported :

http://cbs2.com/national/topstories_story_065072926.html

Mar 6, 2007 4:00 am US/Pacific
Police Investigate Why Gunman Shot Coworkers
(AP) SIGNAL HILL, Calif. Investigators were trying to determine Tuesday why a 68-year-old man opened fire at a menu printing plant, wounding three co-workers who had apparently helped him land a job there.Jose Mendez, of Hawthorne, killed himself as SWAT teams closed in the Kenyon Press offices Monday morning, police said.Capt. Mary Risinger said the business owner told authorities Mendez had been upset that his hours had been cut back amid a company slowdown. The victims had apparently helped him get the job assembling menus there about a year earlier."We're as confused as everybody else," Risinger said. "If he was mad about the hours, he should have been mad with her, not the co-workers."Mendez's longtime girlfriend, Gilma Newhouse, said Mendez hadn't worked since Feb. 9. "It's his only job, that's why he was so worried," Newhouse said in a phone interview.

NRA sickos

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17307316/

This man's career may have been destroyed because he made an intelligent remark. I support the right to own weapons, but the NRA has shown itself to be really sick.

Modern hunters rarely become more famous than Jim Zumbo. A mustachioed, barrel-chested outdoors entrepreneur who lives in a log cabin near Yellowstone National Park, he has spent much of his life writing for prominent outdoors magazines, delivering lectures across the country and starring in cable TV shows about big-game hunting in the West.
Zumbo's fame, however, has turned to black-bordered infamy within America's gun culture -- and his multimedia success has come undone. It all happened in the past week, after he publicly criticized the use of military-style assault rifles by hunters, especially those gunning for prairie dogs.
"Excuse me, maybe I'm a traditionalist, but I see no place for these weapons among our hunting fraternity," Zumbo wrote in his blog on the Outdoor Life Web site. The Feb. 16 posting has since been taken down. "As hunters, we don't need to be lumped into the group of people who terrorize the world with them. . . . I'll go so far as to call them 'terrorist' rifles."

The reaction -- from tens of thousands of owners of assault rifles across the country, from media and manufacturers rooted in the gun business, and from the National Rifle Association -- has been swift, severe and unforgiving. Despite a profuse public apology and a vow to go hunting soon with an assault weapon, Zumbo's career appears to be over.

His top-rated weekly TV program on the Outdoor Channel, his longtime career with Outdoor Life magazine and his corporate ties to the biggest names in gunmaking, including Remington Arms Co., have been terminated or are on the ropes.

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our share

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/02/22/earlyshow/main2504055.shtml

Carlson said that the average American is responsible for 50,000 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions each year. That is quite a substantial carbon footprint, which he defined as each person's "cumulative impact on global warming from the energy that you use from the electricity for your home, the gas in your car, flying in a plane."

50,000 pounds, that's 25 tons each year! I can't tell from this article if this figure includes the carbon footprint from items that we buy. If not, it's even worse.

elite whiners : H1-B visas and outsourcing

I am really tired of the rich power elite whining because of conditions they instigated, or at least made worse.

They are complaining that not enough young people are going into computers. When I got my first programming job, I had a degree in math, and a single programming course - in FORTRAN. I was given an IBM programmed instruction manual on Assembler language, and became an Assembler programmer. I taught myself COBOL from a programmed instruction manual, and got a COBOL job. For years, I continued to get jobs and assignments for which I did not have all of the specific experience needed, but which I was able to easily pick up on the job. Now, companies don't want to hire anyone who doesn't have several years of specific experience in every detail of the job, no matter how trivial. They don't want to hire people over a certain age, or people just out of school. In 2000, when many thousands of programmers had been thrown on the trash pile after saving the economy of the world, business got Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike, to greatly increase the number of H1-B visas, allowing the importing of technical people from other companies. Also, many companies have been outsourcing skilled jobs to other companies. Many skilled and capable people were out of work, or working at low-paid jobs. So college students made the intelligent decision not to go into IT. Now that many baby boomers are retiring, companies are being forced to hire older and less experienced people. So now they are trying to get Congress to again increase the number of H1-B visas. I saw an article in the last couple of weeks saying that there is a program to go to high schools and colleges and tell students that IT would be a great field to go into, at the same time they are trying to make sure this is a blatant lie by increasing the number of H1-B visas and outsourcing.

Of course, much of this is also true for other skilled professions. They are even outsourcing tax preparation and x-ray analysis to other countries.

We are also being told that we are going to have a problem in funding Social Security retirements of baby boomers. Increasing the number of H1-B visas will make this worse. If we can't get decent-paying jobs, we will be forced to take early Social Security retirement just to survive. We are criticized for not saving enough for retirement. If you have a low-paying job, you can't save much, if anything, for retirement.

neurological disease and pollution

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16885883/

Multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease and other neurological diseases may be far more common than most people had believed, according to the latest estimates.
Nearly one out of 1,000 Americans has multiple sclerosis or MS and one out of 100 elderly Americans has Parkinson’s disease the survey found.
“Our estimate of MS prevalence is about 50 percent higher than a comprehensive review from 1982,” said Dr. Deborah Hirtz of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, who led the survey.

http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/29/2/323

In the last two decades reports from different countries emerged associating pesticide and herbicide use with Parkinson's disease (PD).

Conclusions Our data show an increased PD mortality in California counties using agricultural pesticides.

http://www.annalsnyas.org/cgi/content/abstract/1035/1/117

Environmental factors that can trigger inflammatory events in the central nervous system are lipopolysaccharide, aluminum, and particulate matter present in air pollution. These factors may enhance existing age-related inflammation in the central nervous system and thus accelerate neuronal toxicity.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16902534/
The Bush administration continues to help business profits at the expense of the public health.

An order signed by President Bush on the oversight of thousands of government regulations issued every year was praised by business as a step toward controlling an unwieldy process but criticized by others as potentially a loser for consumers.
The White House said the executive order signed by Bush on Jan. 18 makes a senior official in each agency accountable for the regulations it issues and provides greater openness by ensuring that “guidance” documents issued to businesses are available to the public.

Consumer groups say the public would lose out because the order could slow the process by which regulations in the public interest such as pollution controls would be issued, and puts the process under the control of an official appointed by the president.

The Bush administration has repeatedly censored scientific findings, including on harmful effects of pollution on human health (for example, mercury), for the sake of protecting business profits. This sounds like more of the same.

There are names for someone who puts short-term profits for the rich above the good of the country and the world : traitor and sociopath (also know as psychopath).

here we go again

In 2000, when thousands of people in IT were out of work after saving the economy of the world by doing the Y2K conversions, Congress paid of its big business donors by greatly increasing the number of high-tech H1-B visas, which allow busingess to bring in cheap labor from other countries. The result is that people with 25 or 30 years of experience couldn't even get e-mails or phone calls returned, and ended up working at jobs such as teacher's aid, waitress, construction, etc. Also, people w/o experience could not get a job. Now many baby boomers are retiring, so companies are being forced to open up to older people, and those just out of colleges. So, no surprise, Congress is being lobbyed by the business community to greatly increase the limit on H1-B visas.

childhood cancer

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16705760/

A University of Texas study ... found that living within two miles of elevated levels of 1,3-butadiene around the ship channel’s petrochemical complex was associated with a 56 percent increased incidence of childhood acute lymphocytic leukemia compared with those living more than 10 miles away, according to a statement from the city of Houston, which financed the study.

This may be part of the reason the rate of childhood cancer has been increasing by about 20% every 20 years.

trans fat

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/06/060619133024.htm

"over six years, male monkeys fed a western-style diet that contains trans
fat had a 7.2 percent increase in body weight, compared to a 1.8 percent
increase in monkeys that ate monounsaturated fats, such as olive oil.
...
According to the FDA, trans fat is found in vegetable shortenings, some
margarines, crackers, cookies, snack foods, and other foods made with or
fried in partially hydrogenated oils. Unlike other fats, the majority of
trans fat is formed when food manufacturers turn liquid oils into solid fats
like shortening and hard margarine by adding hydrogen."

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Secret Santa dies

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070113/ap_on_re_us/obit_secret_santa

"Larry Stewart, a millionaire who became known as Secret Santa for his habit
of roaming the streets each December and anonymously handing money to
people, died Friday. He was 58."

How sad that such a good person has died.

_________________________________________________________________
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Milk Eliminates Cardiovascular Health Benefits Of Tea, Researchers Warn

"Research published online in the European Heart Journal has found that the
protective effect that tea has on the cardiovascular system is totally wiped
out by adding milk.
Tests on volunteers showed that black tea significantly improves the ability
of the arteries to relax and expand, but adding milk completely blunts the
effect. Supporting tests on rat aortas (aortic rings) and endothelial
(lining) cells showed that tea relaxed the aortic rings by producing nitric
oxide, which promotes dilation of blood vessels. But, again, adding milk
blocked the effect."

I guess I'd better stop adding hot chocolate mix (which contains powdered
milk) to my morning green tea! It sounds like what I do sometimes - adding
cooking cocao and crushed up peppermint candies - might be ok, since I don't
add milk then.

_________________________________________________________________
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Radiation Degrades Nuclear Waste-containing Materials Faster Than Expected

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/01/070110181212.htm

"Minerals intended to entrap nuclear waste for hundreds of thousands of
years may be susceptible to structural breakdown within 1,400 years, a team
from the University of Cambridge and the Pacific Northwest National
Laboratory reported today (Jan. 11) in the journal Nature.
...
This could lead to swelling, loss of physical strength and possible cracking
of the mineral as soon as 210 years, well before the radioactivity had
decayed to safe levels"

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power blinds

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/01/070110124121.htm

"Adam Galinsky of Northwestern University, Joe Magee of the Wagner Graduate
School of Public Service at NYU, and colleagues at Stanford University found
that possessing power itself serves as an impediment to understanding the
perspectives of others."

Experience, on both a personal and political level, show this is true.
However, another possibility for the results of this particular experiment
is that the powerful just don't care about other people's perceptions.

_________________________________________________________________
Dave vs. Carl: The Insignificant Championship Series. Who will win?

http://clk.atdmt.com/MSN/go/msnnkwsp0070000001msn/direct/01/?href=http://davevscarl.spaces.live.com/?icid=T001MSN38C07001

deficit vs. debt

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16599329/

"In its monthly budget report, the Treasury Department said Friday that the
deficit from October through December totaled $80.4 billion, the smallest
imbalance for the first three months of a budget year since 2002. The budget
year starts Oct. 1.
...
The Congressional Budget Office is projecting that the deficit for the 2007
budget year will rise to $286 billion, an increase of 15.2 percent from last
year, but that figure could be lowered when the CBO releases its revised
estimate later this month.
...
Bush, who took office while the country was running record surpluses, saw
the deficit hit an all-time high in dollar terms of $413 billion in 2004."

As usual, the news media only report the amount of the budget deficit (or
surplus, when Clinton was president). The deficit is the amount by which
the national debt has grown in a single year. We citizens also need to know
the national debt, the total amount which the government owes (much of it to
China), which is not usually given. Many people don't know the difference.

Since this administration has no regard for truth, I regard any information
it puts out with scepticism. (Of course, even with honest evaluations, it
takes time for all information to come in, so that there are always later
corrections). People who will change the meaning of scientific reports, to
protect the financial interests of the rich at the expense of the health of
our people and country, cannot be trusted to tell the truth on any topic.

_________________________________________________________________
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Pollutants' link to diabetes

http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20070105-18042600-bc-ecowellness-diabetes.xml

A preliminary study has found Americans who live near toxic waste sites are hospitalized more for diabetes than those who live in clean communities.

Such results suggest environmental triggers of diabetes, a fairly new research area, are worthy of more investigation, Carpenter said. As type 2 diabetes has exploded -- a two-fold increase from 5.8 million to 13.3 million Americans from 1980 to 2002 -- scientists have scrambled to find explanations for the rise. Although experts often point to the obesity epidemic, that alone can't account for it, Carpenter said.
Indeed, the "evidence is accumulating rapidly that environmental exposures are very important factors," he said.
Dr. Larry Deeb, president of medicine and science at the American Diabetes Association, also stressed obesity can't be the only culprit for the dizzying increase in diabetes.

harnessing child power

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14936341/

The Clinton conference began Wednesday with a slew of world figures, among them first lady Laura Bush, who announced a partnership aimed at bringing clean drinking water to communities in sub-Saharan Africa.
The program, called Play Pumps, will install specially designed playground equipment that will use the force generated by children using the equipment to pump clean water from beneath the ground.

After all the people (like me), remarking that we could supply much of our energy if we could harness the energy of children, someone has actually done it.

cheap computers

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16456043/

Rwanda is the eighth developing country to join the One Laptop Per Child initiative aimed at giving away inexpensive computers to all young students.

I would like to buy one of these myself. Microsoft keeps making more powerful and expensive computers. All many people need is a basic computer.

If I could afford it, I would get a Mac suitable for composing music, but since I don't anticipate being able to afford that soon, if ever, I would like to buy an inexpensive, basic computer.

torture

The most effective way I've found to get a lot of housecleaning done is to decide to do my taxes!

Maternal Diet During Pregnancy Can Impact Offspring For Generations, Study Shows

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061113180343.htm

A new study by scientists at Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute (CHORI) is the first to show that a mother's diet during pregnancy influences the health of her grandchildren by changing the behavior of a specific gene. ... The new research shows that the diet consumed by a pregnant Avy mouse affects the health of not only her pups, but also their pups -- her grandchildren.

I read a of a similar study several years ago. In that study, pregnant mice (or rats, I can't remember which), were fed a deficient diet. Their offspring had reduced IQs (no new results there), and so did their daughters' offspring, but not their sons' offspring. President Reagan tried to end the WIC (Women, Infants, and Chidrens nutrition) program, and was able to reduce it. His administration defined ketchup as a "vegetable" in order to save money on school lunch programs. There is no telling what harm this has caused our country. He also tried to eliminate Head Start. It boggles my mind when people claim the press was hard on Reagan, and now Bush. They treated both with blatant favoritism.

striking a balance

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15936990/

In a civilized society based on the rule of law, we live in a delicate balance between obeying those whose job it is to enforce the laws, and policing the police to make certain they do not abuse their special positions of authority.

This is an excellent discussion on this topic.

Rapist who preys on men sparks fear, interest

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16361153/

BAYTOWN, Texas - A rapist who has struck at least five times since April in and around Baytown has not only spread fear in this working-class community but also piqued the interest of those who study the criminal mind.
The reason: He preys on other men.
That makes him something of a rarity in the world of crime.

I worked on a crisis line many years ago. In one of our classes, rape was discussed. This caused the men to giggle, and at least one to comment they wouldn't mind being raped. When I commented that they were most likely to be raped by another man (men being far more likely to engage in violent acts than women), the giggling stopped. And this is not an isolated incidence of male insensitivity to rape - when it happens to women. As a result, I admit I don't feel the sympathy for these men that I would for a woman.

Combinations of over-the-counter drugs can cause serious side effects

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16282719/

However, overdoses of acetaminophen can cause serious liver damage, even death, the FDA said. For aspirin, ibuprofen and other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, there is a risk of gastrointestinal bleeding and kidney injury even when patients take the correct dose. Those risks too are linked to deaths, in this case thousands each year. ... For acetaminophen, the labels also would warn of the risk of severe liver damage if patients take more than the recommended dose or consume three or more alcoholic drinks a day while on the drugs.

This is definitely not an over-reaction on the part of the FDA. This killed my brother, who suffered from chronic back and neck pains from injuries.

Designer’ babies with made-to-order defects?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16299656/

Creating made-to-order babies with genetic defects would seem to be an ethical minefield, but to some parents with disabilities — say, deafness or dwarfism — it just means making babies like them.

And a recent survey of U.S. clinics that offer embryo screening suggests it’s already happening.
Three percent, or four clinics surveyed, said they have provided the costly, complicated procedure to help families create children with a disability.

As a fairly short person myself (5 feet), I have nothing against dwarfs, but as the article indicates, having a person with one such gene may need surgery for dwarfism-related bone deformities. A baby with two such genes dies. Unless/until we devastate the environment so badly that small people will have an advantage because we need less resources, it would be wrong to deliberately create people such disabilities. Since we know of widespread genes which are seriously harmful or fatal when two are present, but protective in some circumstances for those who have a single gene, we should be leary of trying to stamp out such genes, but it would be wrong to deliberately choose for them, at least when even the single gene causes problems.

I have progressive myopia, caused by a recessive gene. It is possible it is associated with increased IQ (there is still an open question, as far as I know). But I certainly wouldn't go out and deliberately try to have children with this condition.

Backpack generates its own electricity

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9245155/

A new backpack design may offer a way for first responders and disaster relief workers to generate their own electricity for communications devices, night vision goggles, water purifiers or other crucial, portable electronics.
All the person wearing the backpack has to do is walk — the backpack does the rest. The backpack captures energy from the up-and-down movements of its heavy contents and converts this energy to electricity.

This would be good for anybody. Batteries are horrible for the environment.

help our troops

www.geocities.com/helmetliner

This site contains instructions for knitting or crocheting wool helmet liners for our troops. The ones supplied by the government are of synthetic fiber, and not as warm.

I have finished one (will send it in next week), and have started another.

results of voluntary standards

Pres. Bush must be happy at the results of the voluntary standards he is so enamored of.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16222089/

Recent E. coli outbreaks have drawn attention to foodborne illnesses, and though officials say the overall number of cases is on the decline, produce — particularly leafy vegetables — is increasingly a carrier of germs once linked only to meat and dairy.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15821237/

A type of salmonella found in eggs is turning up more often in chicken meat and needs to be reduced, according to the Agriculture Department.
From 2000 through 2005, there was a fourfold increase in positive test results for salmonella enteritidis on chicken carcasses.

inspirational words

I cried because I had no shoes,
until I met a man who had no hair.

Jack Kevorkian to be paroled in June

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16191093/

After more than eight years in prison, a frail Dr. Jack Kevorkian will be paroled in June with a promise that he won’t assist in any more suicides, a prison spokesman said Wednesday.=

I never thought he should have been sent to prison, certainly not for so long. He wasn't killing people w/o their permission. He was giving them freedom to end their pain and suffering. The fear of not being able to make such a decision for myself would cause me to end my life earlier than otherwise in such a situation, before I became helpless to do so. If someone insists that people should be forced to endure agony, whether physical pain or severe depression, that person is a sadistic jerk.

I disagree with disabled people who said such actions devalue disabled people. Disabled people should be supported. And they should have the right to make decisions about their own lives that able-bodied people can do. If they are not in severe pain, it would be reasonable to not allow assisted suicide for a time after a person becomes unable to act on their own. Six months might be reasonable, because research has found that people tend to adjust to circumstances in that amount of time, and to end up about as happy or unhappy as they were before the disability.

I read once of a man who had been severely burned. He wanted to be allowed to die, but wasn't allowed to do so. After he recovered, he said that he should have been allowed to die, that even though he was recovered, he didn't want to have lived through such pain. I feel the same way for myself. If someone else makes a different decision, that's their choice.

cooperative fish

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16094301/

The giant moray eel is normally a lone hunter in the dark. Now scientists find these eels may at times hunt in the daytime in the Red Sea, and surprisingly cooperate with another predatory fish, the grouper, which is also normally a solitary predator.

If two differenct species of fish cooperate for mutual benefit, why not Republicans and Democrats?

lucky female chimps

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061120130545.htm

Researchers studying chimpanzee mating preferences have found that although male chimpanzees prefer some females over others, they prefer older, not younger, females as mates. The findings uncover a stark contrast between chimpanzee behavior and that of humans, their primate cousins.

passive smoking

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061116100826.htm

Over time, inhaling environmental tobacco smoke (ETS)--a process often called "passive smoking"--can cause otherwise healthy adults to develop chronic respiratory symptoms.

I myself have noticed a large decrease in asthma and hayfever since smoking has been banned in work places and restaurants.

good news on global warming

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061120182053.htm

Scientists at UC Irvine have determined that levels of atmospheric methane – an influential greenhouse gas – have stayed nearly flat for the past seven years, which follows a rise that spanned at least two decades....Methane has an atmospheric lifetime of about eight years. Carbon dioxide – the main greenhouse gas that is produced by burning fossil fuels for power generation and transportation – can last a century and has been accumulating steadily in the atmosphere.

Methane has a greater greenhouse effect than carbon dioxide, so this is good news, although methane is of lesser importance because of much smaller amounts in the atmosphere.

avoiding back pain

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061127112844.htm

Researchers are using a new form of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to show that sitting in an upright position places unnecessary strain on your back, leading to potentially chronic pain problems if you spend long hours sitting. The study, conducted at Woodend Hospital in Aberdeen, Scotland, was presented today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA).
"A 135-degree body-thigh sitting posture was demonstrated to be the best biomechanical sitting position, as opposed to a 90-degree posture, which most people consider normal," said Waseem Amir Bashir, M.B.Ch.B., F.R.C.R., author and clinical fellow in the Department of Radiology and Diagnostic Imaging at the University of Alberta Hospital, Canada.

ecstasy not ecstatic to brain

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061128084458.htm

Researchers have discovered that even a small amount of MDMA, better known as ecstasy, can be harmful to the brain, according to the first study to look at the neurotoxic effects of low doses of the recreational drug in new ecstasy users.

unexpected results

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061130191329.htm

Cincinnati researchers, led by David Bernstein, MD, have found that infants living in homes with high levels of endotoxins (bacterial contaminants) and multiple dogs were more than two times less likely to wheeze than other infants.

is deafness a handicap

http://www.newscientist.com/channel/health/mg19225795.000-ear-implant-success-sparks-culture-war.html

COULD the end of sign language for deaf children be in sight? A spate of new studies has shown that profoundly deaf babies who receive cochlear implants in their first year of life develop language and speech skills remarkably close to those of hearing children. Many of the children even learn to sing passably well and function almost flawlessly in the hearing world.
These findings may sound like a triumph to audiologists and the hearing parents of deaf babies. But they have done little to convince those in the deaf community who maintain that it is unethical to give deaf babies cochlear implants, which bypass damaged areas of the ear and stimulate the auditory nerve directly.

If deafness is not a handicap, then we can do away with tax deductions and other help, such as funding for special education.

It seems to me these parents are just selfish jerks.

the role is not the person

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15949240/

A former pastor has been accused of murdering an 85-year-old California man in a scheme to inherit his trust fund.

Another example of why we cannot assume that a person in a respected position is a good person.
In regards to several police shootings of unarmed people, there have been letters to the editor and vent right after the event, defending the police, assuming that the police were right. They may or may not be. Being hired by a police department, church, the military, doesn't prove that a person is perfect, competent, or even half-way decent. People can be drawn to these roles for good reasons, and also for bad reasons.

I have noticed that police often take a righteous attitude toward the law, even for something trivial like not coming to a total stop at an intersection where there is nobody in sight from any direction. But they will protect co-workers who frame or kill innocent people. If they were really so committed to the law and order, it seems to me they would be outraged when a co-worker transgressed their proclaimed ethics.

more of the same

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15937769/

The rate at which humans are pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere has more than doubled since the 1990s, according to Australian research, the latest report warning about the high rate of emissions accumulating in the atmosphere.

Just a couple of weeks ago, I heard a speaker say that global warming wasn't an individual responsibility; it was the responsibility of car makers, utility companies, etc.

Certainly, business can and should do a lot to reduce pollution, including greenhouse gases. But our individual actions share the blame. Business isn't creating pollution just for fun. They create gasoline and electricity because we buy it. They don't force us to buy SUVs. They don't yank our fingers away from the light switch when we turn out the lights.

Some people think that biofuels will be a magic solution. But if we continue to waste so much energy, surely we will burn more fuel faster than nature can regrow it. Even if we attained a break even situation, we will still be creating pollutants in addition to greenhouse gases.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15924353/site/newsweek/

In a study called “Going to the Extremes,” coming out in the December issue of the journal Climatic Change, researchers from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and Texas Tech University found strong evidence that by the end of this century, there will be significant increases in what the authors call “extreme weather events”—deadly heat waves, heavy rainfall and prolonged droughts.

=

Tarantula Venom And Chili Peppers Target Same Pain Sensor

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061108154516.htm

Venom from a West Indian tarantula has been shown to cause pain by exciting the same nerve cells in mice that sense high temperatures and the hot, spicy ingredient in chili peppers, UCSF scientists have discovered.

No surprise to me. I have never understood why anybody would want to eat hot chilis in the first place, unless they are masochistic.

Social Exclusion Changes Brain Function And Can Lead To Poor Decision-making

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061108154256.htm

In new research, reported in the current online issue of the journal Social Neuroscience, researchers from the University of Georgia and San Diego State University report for the first time that social exclusion actually causes changes in a person's brain function and can lead to poor decision-making and a diminished learning ability.

I read several years ago of research that found that school bullies were found to be of normal I.Q. when they entered school, but when they were older, they scored below average. Perhaps this new research is at least part of the reason. I suspect that it at least partly due to a dependence on bullying, rather than peaceful interaction, with others, resulting in less exercise of of the intellect. We know that using one's brain results in the growth of connections between brain cells, and possibly in the number of brain cells.

Secret Santa medical costs

More on the Secret Santa story:

It was mentioned in an Atlanta Journal-Constitution story (Nov. 19, 2006), that his cancer treatment costs $16000 a month. "His insurance company won't cover the cost, which has left him concerned about his finances."

msnbc.com didn't mention that. Not the first time I've noticed the appearance of possible conservative censoring on msnbc.com
This info was also missing on the news.yahoo.com report

on the one hand, on the other hand

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061112094549.htm

Researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine and Federal University of Ceará in Brazil have joined forces to study if the gene believed to contribute to Alzheimer's protects children from the developmental stresses of early childhood diarrhea.

In addition, Guerrant says the research will also shed further light on situations where negative genetic traits are found to have beneficial effects that likely help to explain their presence in human evolution. An example of this phenomenon, called a balanced polymorphism, is sickle cell anemia, a genetic disease in which a double "dose" of the sickle cell gene causes red blood cells to form odd shapes and results in pain and anemia. A single "dose" of the same gene, however, makes a person resistant to malaria, a deadly tropical disease.

results of piety

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061113180523.htm

This article explains how religious extremism in the Essenes, causing faithfulness to teachings on cleanliness, led to illness and greatly decreased life expectance.

According to Tabor, however, poor health might have had its own place in the cultural thinking of Qumran.
"As a group the men of Qumran were very unhealthy, but I think this would have been likely to have actually fed the Essenes' religious enthusiasm," said Tabor. "They would have seen their infirmities as punishment from God for their lack of purity and then have tried even harder to purify themselves further."

I could not have been a successful Essene, becuase no way could I have adhered to the following practices:

Josephus, in talking about the Essenes, mentions it as a point of admiration or piety -- he says that these people are so holy, that on the Sabbath day they won't even use the toilet, because on the Sabbath one can't go outside the settlement," he said.

This is an example of the necessity of the scientific method. Pure reasoning often leads one to faulty conclusions, because of lack of knowledge.

happy countries

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061113093726.htm

Results of a survey of happiness around the world.
(The U.S. is 23rd)

self-destruction

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061116081851.htm

A dioxin toxin contained in the herbicide Agent Orange affects male reproductive health by limiting the growth of the prostate gland and lowering testosterone levels, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have found in a cohort study of more than 2,000 Air Force veterans who served during the Vietnam War.

... the urgency of further research is underlined by a rise in disorders of the male reproductive tract over the past several decades.
These include a decrease in sperm production by almost 50 percent, a three- to four-fold increase in testicular cancer, an increase in the incidence of cryptorchidism (undescended testes, a condition where the testes are not in their normal location in the scrotum) and hypospadias (abnormality of the urethra).
The reason for this increase is not known, but it is thought that these disorders might be caused by environmental chemicals that are estrogenic and have endocrine-disrupting effects, Dr. Gupta said.
Dioxins are among the most toxic substances known and are thought to be partially responsible for this increase in male reproductive tract disorders. They are formed as byproducts of processes such as incineration, smelting, paper and pulp manufacturing and pesticide and herbicide production.
Humans are exposed to these chemicals primarily through consumption of animal fat and dairy products. Babies are exposed to the highest levels of dioxins through breast milk. Dioxins are eliminated extremely slowly from the body and they tend to stay in the body for several years to several decades after exposure.

radical religious influence

http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/mg19225776.100-homeschooling-special-preach-your-children-well.html

These students are part of a large, well-organised movement that is empowering parents to teach their children creationist biology and other unorthodox versions of science at home, all centred on the idea that God created Earth in six days about 6000 years ago. Patrick Henry, near the town of Purcellville, about 60 kilometres north-west of Washington DC, is gearing up to groom home-schooled students for political office...

Now evangelical home-schoolers can also opt for a college like PHC. The school was founded in 2000 to "prepare leaders who will fight for the principles of liberty and our home-school freedoms through careers of public service and cultural influence".
It worked. By 2004, PHC students held seven out of 100 internships in the White House, a number even more striking when one considers that only 240 students were enrolled in the entire college. Last year, two PHC graduates worked in the White House, six worked for members of Congress and eight for federal agencies, including two for the FBI. "Patrick Henry is something to worry about because these kids end up in the administration," says Glenn Branch, deputy director of the National Center for Science Education in Oakland, California, which campaigns against the teaching of creationism as science.

Home-schoolers are drawn to PHC partly because of its political connections and partly because, unlike most Christian colleges, it boasts high academic standards. Besides the focus on creationism, much of the curriculum is dedicated to rhetoric and debate, preparing students to fight political and legal battles on issues such as abortion, stem cell research and evolution. The technique is effective. For the past two years, the college has won the moot court national championship, in which students prepare legal briefs and deliver oral arguments to a hypothetical court, and has twice defeated the UK's University of Oxford in debating competitions.

Biology is not the only science being rewritten in home-schooling textbooks. Other sciences are also being modified to suit the creationist perspective that God created Earth about 6000 years ago. Take for instance this advice on climate change in the book Science Order and Reality published by A Beka Book: "Because most environmental scientists see the universe and even life itself as mere products of chance, it is easy for them to visualise potentially catastrophic changes occurring on the Earth. As Christians we must remember that God provided certain 'checks and balances' in creation to prevent many of the global upsets that have been predicted by environmentalists." For those who still worry about global warming, another A Beka book, Science of the Physical Creation, flatly denies it is happening: "All of the scientific evidence gathered indicates that there is no danger of a global warming disaster."
Chemistry textbooks argue that radiometric dating is unreliable and therefore not a concern for those who believe in a 6000-year-old Earth. And geology books claim that the Grand Canyon in Arizona - a gorge carved by the Colorado river, exposing 2 billion years of Earth's history - was formed rapidly during the worldwide Biblical flood, and all the sedimentary strata visible in the canyon walls were deposited then.
Even astronomy is being rethought to address what many creationists consider their most difficult challenge: explaining how starlight from billions of light years away has reached the Earth in only a few thousand years. Books like Taking Back Astronomy by Jason Lisle suggest possible explanations: maybe God created the light already en route; or maybe the Milky Way sits in a large gravitational well where the time-stretching effects of general relativity can explain the anomaly; or - the creationists' favourite - maybe the speed of light was much, much greater in the past.

This would, of course, be a return to the dark ages. I guess one could argue that it might have been better if we had stayed there. Then the population would not have increased as quickly as it has, so we wouldn't be having as much environmental destruction yet. But, since the population was increasing even then, we would have had many of the same problems eventually.

We are a vampire clan

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15747502/

Polar bear cubs in Alaska’s Beaufort Sea are much less likely to survive compared to 20 years ago, probably due to melting sea ice caused by global warming, according to a new federal government study.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15753131/

Signs of warming continue in the Arctic with a decline in sea ice, an increase in shrubs growing on the tundra and rising concerns about the Greenland ice sheet.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15752178/

If the sun warms the Earth too dangerously, the time may come to draw the shade. The "shade" would be a layer of pollution deliberately spewed into the atmosphere to help cool the planet.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15766285/

Hindus in India’s West Bengal state began burning wood and herbs in over a 1,000 deep pits on Friday in a ceremony they said will heal the ozone layer and cure disease, drawing anger from green campaigners.

These Hindus may be misguided, but at least they understand there is a problem.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15731235/

The famous flamingos of Nakuru are fading away.
The spindly, exquisite birds, clouds of pink rising on a million wings in generations of tourist photographs, are dying, flying off, fleeing a seemingly fatal brew of environmental threats in a shrinking Lake Nakuru, the home that has sheltered them for uncounted centuries.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15730491/

Fishermen who rake giant nets across the ocean floor to maximize their catch are destroying unique and unexplored ecological systems, according to a U.N. draft environmental report made public Wednesday.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15713400/

Global warming could stoke ferocious wildfires that will be more difficult and costly to fight and might drastically alter the environment in parts of the world, some scientists warn.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15717706/

A warmer world already seems to be producing a sicker world, health experts reported Tuesday, citing surges in Kenya, China and Europe of such diseases as malaria, heart ailments and dengue fever.

FW: chutzpa

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15765337/from/RS.4/

"About 1,000 nonunion workers, mostly Hispanics upset with the recent firing
of immigrants for allegedly providing false documents, walked off their jobs
at a Smithfield Foods Inc. slaughtering plant, a union spokeswoman said. ...
Smithfield Foods also has failed to address problems of sexual harassment
and denial of workers compensation claims, said Gene Bruskin, a
representative of the union who serves as the Smithfield campaign director."

I'm all for unions protecting legitimate worker's rights, but if it is true
that the unions are demanding that the company re-hire workers who provided
false documentation, that is outrageous. As noted in the article, it also
against federal law.

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consistantly unwise

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15757100/

The Bush administration has appointed a new chief of family-planning programs at the Department of Health and Human Services who worked at a Christian pregnancy-counseling organization that regards the distribution of contraceptives as "demeaning to women."

Weird. How is the use of condoms, which besides acting as a contraceptive, protects women (and men) from disease, demeaning to women? Is it demeaning to women to think they will willing have sex for reasons other than procreation? Is it demeaning to women to think they might be of use as other than breeders?

A friend of mine complained that Bush doesn't pick good advisors. I told her, to know that you need advisors more knowledgable than oneself, and to recognize them, requires a sufficient level of wisdom and emotional maturity that Bush does not have.

exception to rule

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15755870/

People who own vicious dogs such as pit bulls have significantly more criminal convictions — including crimes against children — than owners of licensed, gentler dogs such as beagles, researchers reported on Thursday.

There are always exceptions to such generalities. I owned a rottweiler, or rottweiler mix, one time. I found him as a stray, and never found the owner. He was a very sweet dog, but he scared people because he barked at them and was so big, although at 90 pounds, he was small for the breed. So I guess I could be considered a technical exception, because I didn't go out and choose this dog.

anti-Santa hospitals

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15752013/

A Los Angeles hospital accused of dumping homeless patients on downtown’s Skid Row is facing the first criminal charges in the city’s campaign to crack down on the practice and clean up the area.
Kaiser Permanente is among 10 hospitals under investigation by city prosecutors for allegedly discharging homeless patients to the streets of Skid Row rather than to a relative or shelter.

There should be more than fines. There should be jail time for the people responsible, but of course, that won't happen.