http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/who-stole-the-american-dream-by-hedrick-smith/2012/10/27/37f115da-f081-11e1-adc6-87dfa8eff430_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines
By Frederick R. Lynch, Published: October 27, 2012
Saving the middle class has become a battle cry in the 2012 presidential campaign — and it’s no wonder. According to a recent Pew Research Center study, the percentage of Americans considered middle class has dwindled to 51 percent from 61 percent in 1971. But the Pew report does not explain the political and economic forces behind this decline. That’s a task Hedrick Smith sets for himself in his new book, “Who Stole the American Dream?”
Long before most reporters and social scientists took note, Smith had established himself as television journalism’s foremost expert on the forces eroding the ranks of the middle class. In a series of penetrating “Frontline” documentaries over more than a decade, he chronicled the rise of a new buccaneer brand of global capitalism that relentlessly undermined the middle-class dream of “a steady job with decent pay and health benefits, rising living standards, a home of your own, secure retirement, and the hope that your children would enjoy a better future.” Now in a sober, self-described reporter’s book, Smith deepens his analysis using the latest data.
.....
In Smith’s telling, America’s corporate plutocracy has largely abandoned even the pretense of stewardship, loyalty or patriotism. It has imported cheap foreign workers to replace millions of Americans in an increasingly wide range of occupations: from agricultural and construction labor to high-tech and banking professionals. Corporate chieftains also moved offshore many of the nation’s once-unionized, blue-collar jobs and low-level white-collar jobs, such as working in call centers. (Smith cites Thomas Jefferson’s prescient warning: “Merchants have no country.”)
.....
“Who Stole the American Dream?” provides a grim panorama of the real-world consequences of these power shifts: concentration of financial assets and higher incomes in fewer hands; race-to-the-bottom wage and sales dynamics (epitomized by the rise of Wal-Mart) that pit American producers against Asian sweatshop factories and result in massive sales of imported, cheap merchandise that, in turn, eviscerates small, local retailers; efforts by America’s highly admired high-tech moguls (from Steve Jobs to Bill Gates) to transfer overseas much of our knowledge-based economy;the evolution of a Washington-Wall Street “symbiosis” that dominates White House and congressional policymaking and thrives on political gridlock.
.....
Sunday, October 28, 2012
Students Demand Fossil Fuel Divestment
http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=12-P13-00043&segmentID=2
Air Date: Week of October 26, 2012
Some 25 yrs ago, students demanded their universities pull investments out of South Africa to fight Apartheid. Now, activists want to fight climate change emissions using the same tactic. Host Steve Curwood talks to Harvard students who are asking the college to pull investment from all fossil fuel stocks.
CURWOOD: A new battle-line has formed in the wider push to rein in fossil fuel use – on college campuses. Students at some 18 colleges and universities just held a National Day of Action to pressure their administrations to divest their endowment holdings from fossil fuel stocks, a move already taken by Hampshire College in Western Massachusetts.
Among the institutions involved - Cornell, Amherst, Bryn Mawr, Boston University – and the university with the fattest endowment of all – Harvard. Down in Harvard Yard I met one of the organizers of the protest, sophomore Alli Welton.
Harvard student Alli Welton (Photo: Annie Sneed)
WELTON: I think students feel very scared and worried about climate change because this issue will really determine the sort of planet that we live on and the society in which we have our lives. And I think it’s particularly strong to students because we see our entire lives spread out ahead of us.
Also, we’re trying to raise awareness among the members of our administration that the impacts of climate change are already happening right now, and they’re already taking a serious toll – if you look at the drought in the Midwest this summer, the wildfires in Colorado…– we just feel that it’s a really important issue that needs some action right now.
.....
Air Date: Week of October 26, 2012
Some 25 yrs ago, students demanded their universities pull investments out of South Africa to fight Apartheid. Now, activists want to fight climate change emissions using the same tactic. Host Steve Curwood talks to Harvard students who are asking the college to pull investment from all fossil fuel stocks.
CURWOOD: A new battle-line has formed in the wider push to rein in fossil fuel use – on college campuses. Students at some 18 colleges and universities just held a National Day of Action to pressure their administrations to divest their endowment holdings from fossil fuel stocks, a move already taken by Hampshire College in Western Massachusetts.
Among the institutions involved - Cornell, Amherst, Bryn Mawr, Boston University – and the university with the fattest endowment of all – Harvard. Down in Harvard Yard I met one of the organizers of the protest, sophomore Alli Welton.
Harvard student Alli Welton (Photo: Annie Sneed)
WELTON: I think students feel very scared and worried about climate change because this issue will really determine the sort of planet that we live on and the society in which we have our lives. And I think it’s particularly strong to students because we see our entire lives spread out ahead of us.
Also, we’re trying to raise awareness among the members of our administration that the impacts of climate change are already happening right now, and they’re already taking a serious toll – if you look at the drought in the Midwest this summer, the wildfires in Colorado…– we just feel that it’s a really important issue that needs some action right now.
.....
Georgia State School Superintendent Against the Charter School Amendment
http://johnbarge.com/newsroom/state-school-superintendent-dr-john-barge-on-the-constitutional-amendment-for-charter-schools-2
October 23, 2012
State School Superintendent Dr. John Barge released the following statement today about the constitutional amendment on charter schools:
“I fully support the continued creation of high quality charter schools for Georgia’s students, but after careful consideration of what is best for all of Georgia’s students, I have decided to take a position in opposition to the constitutional amendment that will be on the Nov. 6 ballot.
Until all of our public school students are in school for a full 180-day school year, until essential services like student transportation and student support can return to effective levels, and until teachers regain jobs with full pay for a full school year, we should not redirect one more dollar away from Georgia’s local school districts – much less an additional $430 million in state funds, which is what it would cost to add seven new state charter schools per year over the next five years (the annual average of the Charter Commission that would be revived if the amendment passes).
I cannot support the creation of a new and costly state bureaucracy that takes away local control of schools and unnecessarily duplicates the good work already being done by local districts, the Georgia Department of Education, and the state Board of Education. What’s more, this constitutional amendment would direct taxpayer dollars into the pockets of out-of-state, for-profit charter school companies whose schools perform no better than traditional public schools and locally approved charter schools (and worse, in some cases).
I trust our local school districts will continue to approve only high quality charter schools for Georgia’s students, and I am committed to working with all of our school districts to ensure that high quality applicants are not denied locally – including mediating between high quality charter school applicants and any local districts that are reluctant to approve them, as provided by existing Georgia law.”
October 23, 2012
State School Superintendent Dr. John Barge released the following statement today about the constitutional amendment on charter schools:
“I fully support the continued creation of high quality charter schools for Georgia’s students, but after careful consideration of what is best for all of Georgia’s students, I have decided to take a position in opposition to the constitutional amendment that will be on the Nov. 6 ballot.
Until all of our public school students are in school for a full 180-day school year, until essential services like student transportation and student support can return to effective levels, and until teachers regain jobs with full pay for a full school year, we should not redirect one more dollar away from Georgia’s local school districts – much less an additional $430 million in state funds, which is what it would cost to add seven new state charter schools per year over the next five years (the annual average of the Charter Commission that would be revived if the amendment passes).
I cannot support the creation of a new and costly state bureaucracy that takes away local control of schools and unnecessarily duplicates the good work already being done by local districts, the Georgia Department of Education, and the state Board of Education. What’s more, this constitutional amendment would direct taxpayer dollars into the pockets of out-of-state, for-profit charter school companies whose schools perform no better than traditional public schools and locally approved charter schools (and worse, in some cases).
I trust our local school districts will continue to approve only high quality charter schools for Georgia’s students, and I am committed to working with all of our school districts to ensure that high quality applicants are not denied locally – including mediating between high quality charter school applicants and any local districts that are reluctant to approve them, as provided by existing Georgia law.”
Remember When Mitt Romney Called Disaster Relief Immoral and Wanted to Privatize It?
http://www.politicususa.com/remember-mitt-romney-called-disaster-relief-immoral-wanted-privatize-it.html
By: Sarah JonesOctober 28th, 2012
As Sandy bears down with a potentially life-threatening storm, we flash back to the 2011 primaries when Mitt Romney called the debt resulting from disaster relief ‘immoral’ and wanted to privatize it. Asked about federal spending on disaster relief in the context of the tornadoes and flooding hitting many states at the time, Romney claimed we can’t keep spending money on disaster relief and putting our children in debt.
.....
Mitt Romney also said the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be privatized — you know, so it would be for profit, which has proven to be a disastrous idea in and of itself. See, corporations whose only responsibility is to make a profit tend to not want to pay up when disaster strikes. It’s expensive to pay up, so they try to find ways to duck and dodge doing so.
If Romney had his way, those same folks who ignored Katrina victims would be in charge of preparing for disaster.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/06/14/244973/mitt-romney-federal-disaster-relief-for-tornado-and-flood-victims-is-immoral-makes-no-sense-at-all/
By Brad Johnson on Jun 14, 2011
Asked about federal disaster relief for recent tornado and flood victims at last night’s GOP debate, candidate Mitt Romney called the spending “immoral” and said the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be privatized. With greenhouse pollution on the rise, the United States has been struck by a “punishing series of billion-dollar disasters.”
Embracing a radical anti-government ideology from the most extreme elements of the Tea Party, Romney said that the victims in Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, Massachusetts, and other communities hit by tornadoes and flooding should not receive governmental assistance. He argued it is “simply immoral” for there to be deficit spending that could harm future generations:
By: Sarah JonesOctober 28th, 2012
As Sandy bears down with a potentially life-threatening storm, we flash back to the 2011 primaries when Mitt Romney called the debt resulting from disaster relief ‘immoral’ and wanted to privatize it. Asked about federal spending on disaster relief in the context of the tornadoes and flooding hitting many states at the time, Romney claimed we can’t keep spending money on disaster relief and putting our children in debt.
.....
Mitt Romney also said the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be privatized — you know, so it would be for profit, which has proven to be a disastrous idea in and of itself. See, corporations whose only responsibility is to make a profit tend to not want to pay up when disaster strikes. It’s expensive to pay up, so they try to find ways to duck and dodge doing so.
If Romney had his way, those same folks who ignored Katrina victims would be in charge of preparing for disaster.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/06/14/244973/mitt-romney-federal-disaster-relief-for-tornado-and-flood-victims-is-immoral-makes-no-sense-at-all/
By Brad Johnson on Jun 14, 2011
Asked about federal disaster relief for recent tornado and flood victims at last night’s GOP debate, candidate Mitt Romney called the spending “immoral” and said the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be privatized. With greenhouse pollution on the rise, the United States has been struck by a “punishing series of billion-dollar disasters.”
Embracing a radical anti-government ideology from the most extreme elements of the Tea Party, Romney said that the victims in Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, Massachusetts, and other communities hit by tornadoes and flooding should not receive governmental assistance. He argued it is “simply immoral” for there to be deficit spending that could harm future generations:
The Scourge of High School Concussions
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2012_10/the_scourge_of_high_school_con040781.php
October 28, 2012 11:06 AM
While we’re on the topic of football, some news from the darker side of the sport. A brand new survey out of Massachusetts, prompted by a 2010 state law, found that 3,000 youth athletes from 164 schools suffered concussions last year. (A revelation that comes on the heels of a five-concussion peewee football game in central Mass.) Over 500 schools didn’t respond to the survey. Scaled-up, this study implies 600,000 youth concussions occur yearly in the US, about double the 300,000 commonly estimated.
.....
But at least in football, none of that will matter much. As Jonah Lehrer rightly noted in (what appears to be a well-sourced and plagiarism-free) article on high school concussions, there’s almost nothing we can do to prevent brain injury in football, short of say, eliminating tackling. The only shield we have against concussions, the helmet, doesn’t actually protect the brain.
If the head isn’t shielded from the strongest physical impacts — and this is best done with soft, pliable materials — then it can break and bleed. But the very act of protecting players from those severe collisions means that the head will bounce around the cushioned helmet, thus allowing the brain to move within its bony cage.
This is, of course, a problem in the professional ranks as well, but it’s worse for high school kids. Not only are their brain cells still developing, but 99 percent of them don’t have a professional future in the sport, making their efforts especially worthless. Recently, as Lehrer noted, a BU neuropathologist found the earliest-ever recorded evidence of irreversible CTE—a brain disease similar to Alzheimer’s—in the brain of a deceased 18 year-old who suffered multiple concussions playing high-school football.
.....
October 28, 2012 11:06 AM
While we’re on the topic of football, some news from the darker side of the sport. A brand new survey out of Massachusetts, prompted by a 2010 state law, found that 3,000 youth athletes from 164 schools suffered concussions last year. (A revelation that comes on the heels of a five-concussion peewee football game in central Mass.) Over 500 schools didn’t respond to the survey. Scaled-up, this study implies 600,000 youth concussions occur yearly in the US, about double the 300,000 commonly estimated.
.....
But at least in football, none of that will matter much. As Jonah Lehrer rightly noted in (what appears to be a well-sourced and plagiarism-free) article on high school concussions, there’s almost nothing we can do to prevent brain injury in football, short of say, eliminating tackling. The only shield we have against concussions, the helmet, doesn’t actually protect the brain.
If the head isn’t shielded from the strongest physical impacts — and this is best done with soft, pliable materials — then it can break and bleed. But the very act of protecting players from those severe collisions means that the head will bounce around the cushioned helmet, thus allowing the brain to move within its bony cage.
This is, of course, a problem in the professional ranks as well, but it’s worse for high school kids. Not only are their brain cells still developing, but 99 percent of them don’t have a professional future in the sport, making their efforts especially worthless. Recently, as Lehrer noted, a BU neuropathologist found the earliest-ever recorded evidence of irreversible CTE—a brain disease similar to Alzheimer’s—in the brain of a deceased 18 year-old who suffered multiple concussions playing high-school football.
.....
Colin Powell’s former white chief of staff: ‘My party [Republican] is full of racists’
http://tv.msnbc.com/2012/10/26/colin-powells-former-chief-of-staff-my-party-is-full-of-racists/
Jillian Rayfield
9:09 pm on 10/26/2012
Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell’s chief of staff during his time as secretary of state, decried John Sununu’s comment that Powell only endorsed Barack Obama because they are both black. “To say that Colin Powell would endorse President Obama because of his skin color is like saying Mother Teresa worked for profit,” Wilkerson told Ed Schultz.
Wilkerson said on The Ed Show that though he respects Sununu, a top Romney adviser and surrogate, “I don’t have any respect for the integrity of the position that he seemed to codify. Look at me, Ed, I’m white. I’m not black. Colin Powell picked me because of the content of my character and my competence.”
He added that he thinks Sununu’s remark was an “unfortunate slip of words,” but that it speaks to larger problem in the Republican party.
“My party, unfortunately, is the bastion of those people, not all of them, but most of them, who are still basing their decision on race,” Wilkerson said. “Let me just be candid: My party is full of racists. And the real reason a considerable portion of my party wants President Obama out of the White House has nothing to do with the content of his character, nothing to do with his competence as commander-in-chief and president, and everything to do with the color of his skin. And that’s despicable.”
In an interview with radio host Michael Smerconish Friday, the president brushed off Sununu’s remarks, saying he will let Powell’s statement and support “speak for itself.”
“I don’t think that there are many people in America who would question Gen. Powell’s credibility, his patriotism, his willingness to tell it straight,” Obama said. “So any suggestion that Gen. Powell would make such a profound statement in such an important election based on anything other than what he thought would be best for America doesn’t make much sense.”
Jillian Rayfield
9:09 pm on 10/26/2012
Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell’s chief of staff during his time as secretary of state, decried John Sununu’s comment that Powell only endorsed Barack Obama because they are both black. “To say that Colin Powell would endorse President Obama because of his skin color is like saying Mother Teresa worked for profit,” Wilkerson told Ed Schultz.
Wilkerson said on The Ed Show that though he respects Sununu, a top Romney adviser and surrogate, “I don’t have any respect for the integrity of the position that he seemed to codify. Look at me, Ed, I’m white. I’m not black. Colin Powell picked me because of the content of my character and my competence.”
He added that he thinks Sununu’s remark was an “unfortunate slip of words,” but that it speaks to larger problem in the Republican party.
“My party, unfortunately, is the bastion of those people, not all of them, but most of them, who are still basing their decision on race,” Wilkerson said. “Let me just be candid: My party is full of racists. And the real reason a considerable portion of my party wants President Obama out of the White House has nothing to do with the content of his character, nothing to do with his competence as commander-in-chief and president, and everything to do with the color of his skin. And that’s despicable.”
In an interview with radio host Michael Smerconish Friday, the president brushed off Sununu’s remarks, saying he will let Powell’s statement and support “speak for itself.”
“I don’t think that there are many people in America who would question Gen. Powell’s credibility, his patriotism, his willingness to tell it straight,” Obama said. “So any suggestion that Gen. Powell would make such a profound statement in such an important election based on anything other than what he thought would be best for America doesn’t make much sense.”
Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/lets-just-say-it-the-republicans-are-the-problem/2012/04/27/gIQAxCVUlT_story.html
By Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein, Published: April 27
Rep. Allen West, a Florida Republican, was recently captured on video asserting that there are “78 to 81” Democrats in Congress who are members of the Communist Party. Of course, it’s not unusual for some renegade lawmaker from either side of the aisle to say something outrageous. What made West’s comment — right out of the McCarthyite playbook of the 1950s — so striking was the almost complete lack of condemnation from Republican congressional leaders or other major party figures, including the remaining presidential candidates.
It’s not that the GOP leadership agrees with West; it is that such extreme remarks and views are now taken for granted.
We have been studying Washington politics and Congress for more than 40 years, and never have we seen them this dysfunctional. In our past writings, we have criticized both parties when we believed it was warranted. Today, however, we have no choice but to acknowledge that the core of the problem lies with the Republican Party.
The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics. It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition.
When one party moves this far from the mainstream, it makes it nearly impossible for the political system to deal constructively with the country’s challenges.
.....
Today, thanks to the GOP, compromise has gone out the window in Washington. In the first two years of the Obama administration, nearly every presidential initiative met with vehement, rancorous and unanimous Republican opposition in the House and the Senate, followed by efforts to delegitimize the results and repeal the policies. The filibuster, once relegated to a handful of major national issues in a given Congress, became a routine weapon of obstruction, applied even to widely supported bills or presidential nominations. And Republicans in the Senate have abused the confirmation process to block any and every nominee to posts such as the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, solely to keep laws that were legitimately enacted from being implemented.
.....
And seven Republican co-sponsors of a Senate resolution to create a debt-reduction panel voted in January 2010 against their own resolution, solely to keep it from getting to the 60-vote threshold Republicans demanded and thus denying the president a seeming victory.
.....
Democrats are hardly blameless, and they have their own extreme wing and their own predilection for hardball politics. But these tendencies do not routinely veer outside the normal bounds of robust politics. If anything, under the presidencies of Clinton and Obama, the Democrats have become more of a status-quo party. They are centrist protectors of government, reluctantly willing to revamp programs and trim retirement and health benefits to maintain its central commitments in the face of fiscal pressures.
No doubt, Democrats were not exactly warm and fuzzy toward George W. Bush during his presidency. But recall that they worked hand in glove with the Republican president on the No Child Left Behind Act, provided crucial votes in the Senate for his tax cuts, joined with Republicans for all the steps taken after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and supplied the key votes for the Bush administration’s financial bailout at the height of the economic crisis in 2008. The difference is striking.
The GOP’s evolution has become too much for some longtime Republicans. Former senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraskacalled his party “irresponsible” in an interview with the Financial Times in August, at the height of the debt-ceiling battle. “I think the Republican Party is captive to political movements that are very ideological, that are very narrow,” he said. “I’ve never seen so much intolerance as I see today in American politics.”
And Mike Lofgren, a veteran Republican congressional staffer, wrote an anguished diatribe last year about why he was ending his career on the Hill after nearly three decades. “The Republican Party is becoming less and less like a traditional political party in a representative democracy and becoming more like an apocalyptic cult, or one of the intensely ideological authoritarian parties of 20th century Europe,” he wrote on the Truthout Web site.
By Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein, Published: April 27
Rep. Allen West, a Florida Republican, was recently captured on video asserting that there are “78 to 81” Democrats in Congress who are members of the Communist Party. Of course, it’s not unusual for some renegade lawmaker from either side of the aisle to say something outrageous. What made West’s comment — right out of the McCarthyite playbook of the 1950s — so striking was the almost complete lack of condemnation from Republican congressional leaders or other major party figures, including the remaining presidential candidates.
It’s not that the GOP leadership agrees with West; it is that such extreme remarks and views are now taken for granted.
We have been studying Washington politics and Congress for more than 40 years, and never have we seen them this dysfunctional. In our past writings, we have criticized both parties when we believed it was warranted. Today, however, we have no choice but to acknowledge that the core of the problem lies with the Republican Party.
The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics. It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition.
When one party moves this far from the mainstream, it makes it nearly impossible for the political system to deal constructively with the country’s challenges.
.....
Today, thanks to the GOP, compromise has gone out the window in Washington. In the first two years of the Obama administration, nearly every presidential initiative met with vehement, rancorous and unanimous Republican opposition in the House and the Senate, followed by efforts to delegitimize the results and repeal the policies. The filibuster, once relegated to a handful of major national issues in a given Congress, became a routine weapon of obstruction, applied even to widely supported bills or presidential nominations. And Republicans in the Senate have abused the confirmation process to block any and every nominee to posts such as the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, solely to keep laws that were legitimately enacted from being implemented.
.....
And seven Republican co-sponsors of a Senate resolution to create a debt-reduction panel voted in January 2010 against their own resolution, solely to keep it from getting to the 60-vote threshold Republicans demanded and thus denying the president a seeming victory.
.....
Democrats are hardly blameless, and they have their own extreme wing and their own predilection for hardball politics. But these tendencies do not routinely veer outside the normal bounds of robust politics. If anything, under the presidencies of Clinton and Obama, the Democrats have become more of a status-quo party. They are centrist protectors of government, reluctantly willing to revamp programs and trim retirement and health benefits to maintain its central commitments in the face of fiscal pressures.
No doubt, Democrats were not exactly warm and fuzzy toward George W. Bush during his presidency. But recall that they worked hand in glove with the Republican president on the No Child Left Behind Act, provided crucial votes in the Senate for his tax cuts, joined with Republicans for all the steps taken after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and supplied the key votes for the Bush administration’s financial bailout at the height of the economic crisis in 2008. The difference is striking.
The GOP’s evolution has become too much for some longtime Republicans. Former senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraskacalled his party “irresponsible” in an interview with the Financial Times in August, at the height of the debt-ceiling battle. “I think the Republican Party is captive to political movements that are very ideological, that are very narrow,” he said. “I’ve never seen so much intolerance as I see today in American politics.”
And Mike Lofgren, a veteran Republican congressional staffer, wrote an anguished diatribe last year about why he was ending his career on the Hill after nearly three decades. “The Republican Party is becoming less and less like a traditional political party in a representative democracy and becoming more like an apocalyptic cult, or one of the intensely ideological authoritarian parties of 20th century Europe,” he wrote on the Truthout Web site.
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Higher Speed Limits Cost Lives, Researchers Find
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090716164339.htm
ScienceDaily (July 18, 2009) — The repeal of the federal speed control law in 1995 has resulted in an increase in road fatalities and injuries, according to researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health.
The research is published in the September issue of the American Journal of Public Health. It is the first long-term study to evaluate the impact of repealing the National Maximum Speed Law on road fatalities and injuries in fatal crashes between 1995 and 2005.
The law, which restricted the maximum speed limit to 55 mph on all interstate roads in the United States, was initiated in 1974 in response to the oil embargo and had an immediate impact.
"During the first year there was a drop of almost 17 percent in fatalities after the speed laws were reduced to 55 miles per hour," said Lee Friedman, assistant research professor of environmental and occupational health sciences at UIC and lead author of the study.
The law was modified in 1987 and allowed states to raise the legal speed limits to 65 mph on some interstates. In 1995, the federally mandated 55 mph speed law was revoked, allowing states to set their own speed laws.
"The primary finding of our study was that over the 10-year period following the repeal of National Maximum Speed Law, there were approximately 12,500 deaths due to the increased speed limits across the U.S.," said Friedman.
ScienceDaily (July 18, 2009) — The repeal of the federal speed control law in 1995 has resulted in an increase in road fatalities and injuries, according to researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health.
The research is published in the September issue of the American Journal of Public Health. It is the first long-term study to evaluate the impact of repealing the National Maximum Speed Law on road fatalities and injuries in fatal crashes between 1995 and 2005.
The law, which restricted the maximum speed limit to 55 mph on all interstate roads in the United States, was initiated in 1974 in response to the oil embargo and had an immediate impact.
"During the first year there was a drop of almost 17 percent in fatalities after the speed laws were reduced to 55 miles per hour," said Lee Friedman, assistant research professor of environmental and occupational health sciences at UIC and lead author of the study.
The law was modified in 1987 and allowed states to raise the legal speed limits to 65 mph on some interstates. In 1995, the federally mandated 55 mph speed law was revoked, allowing states to set their own speed laws.
"The primary finding of our study was that over the 10-year period following the repeal of National Maximum Speed Law, there were approximately 12,500 deaths due to the increased speed limits across the U.S.," said Friedman.
America's Media Just Made Vote-Rigging Easier
http://truth-out.org/news/item/12213-americas-media-just-made-vote-rigging-easier
Friday, 19 October 2012 10:15 By Victoria Collier, Truthout
The news that America's mainstream media has cancelled exit polling in 19 states, means that insider election theft this November is now even harder to track, and therefore easier to get away with - something that scarcely seemed possible.
As I've written in the November issue of Harper's Magazine ("How to Rig an Election"), our voting system is already privatized, corporatized, computerized and arguably less secure than Vegas slot machines. It's also controlled by a shadowy cartel of right-wing affiliated companies that keep merging and changing their names, perhaps - and almost certainly in the case of Diebold - to avoid association with the record of white-collar criminal charges and convictions that trail them from state to state.
Precious few methods now remain for verifying results generated by these corporate "black box" touch-screen voting machines and optical scanners, which have been proven (ad nauseam) by experts to be vulnerable to insider rigging and outsider hacking. This evidence remains long unreported by the mainstream media, which ignore the kind of stories now broken weekly at the Brad Blog, like the latest White Hat hack of Diebold voting machines: In September, 2011, the Vulnerability Assessment Team at Argonne National Labs gained controlling access to the electronic votes within the machines using $20 in parts and the equivalent of an 8th grade science education.
.....
To make the case that we've got to toss these corporate Trojan Horse voting machines into the scrap heap (as was just done by Ireland), the EI movement has heavily relied on public opinion polls, tracking polls and exit polls for election forensics: comparing polling data to the "trust us" numbers spit from the secret innards of the voting machines.
Election forensics has turned up some very serious discrepancies in elections spanning the past few decades, and even led to the coining of a new term: The Red Shift.
The Red Shift has been detected in both state and federal American elections, where computerized vote totals have consistently "shifted" - often by a 5 percent to 7 percent margin disparity (sometimes less, but sometimes much greater) - in comparison to hand-counts and polling data. This mysterious seismic lurch invariably pushes votes to the right, and when the dust settles, it has inordinately benefitted GOP candidates and ballot issues.
To conceal these unnerving discrepancies that strongly suggest computerized vote rigging, exit pollsters began "adjusting" their final reported numbers - literally forcing polls at the end of Election Day to better align with the voting machine results.
Surprisingly, this is not a criminal or even covert act, but common knowledge amongst pollsters (though certainly not the American public) and accepted practice.
Therefore - and here's the rub - only the early, "unadjusted" exit polls numbers can provide evidence of the "red shift." But this smoking-gun data has been increasingly guarded by the pollsters, and withheld from release to EI analysts.
Nevertheless, the "red shift' reports we do have are beginning to attract attention, thanks to the tenacity of EI activists spreading them on the Internet. Could this be why the media consortium that controls the exit polls is shutting them down in 19 states?
David Moore, former Vice President of the Gallup poll for 13 years, agreed in an interview with me that the killing of the exit polls in 19 states is a "disaster" for the Election Integrity movement, "because you don't have the kind of polling data to help you determine whether polls and vote statistics are in accordance with each other."
The non-exit poll states in 2012 will be Alaska, Arkansas, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming.
.....
In 2004, for example, "unadjusted" exit polls showed John Kerry winning the Presidency by what many considered an insurmountable margin, until Ohio's votes surged for George W. Bush late on election night. The unexpected windfall that handed Bush Ohio's electoral votes - and therefore the White House - was reported on the web site controlled by the Republican Ohio Secretary of State, Kenneth Blackwell, a fundamentalist Christian, and - yes, it's true - Honorary Co-Chair of the Committee to Re-elect George W. Bush.
Blackwell's web site was programmed by two companies deep under the sheets with the GOP - GovTech and SMARTech - and operations were coordinated behind the scenes by campaign manager, Karl Rove.
Which brings us back, full circle, to the problem of this new blackout of exit polls.
"The problem," writes Jonathan Simon, "is that Karl Rove now has 19 states to mine votes to cover a Romney popular vote loss (undermining and casting suspicion upon his easily arranged Electoral College 'win'), without the remotest trace of the theft, not even the telltale 'red shift.' This was done in 2004 for Bush, and it showed up in the 'red shift' in states like Alaska and New York, as millions of votes were shifted in non-competitive states where there was little forensic vigilance. And if it turns out that they need even more votes for Romney, with the public now 100 percent blind to these 19 states, they'll have them by the millions."
The same threat hangs over competitive Senate races across the country, which will determine the balance of Congress, and the courts, for years to come.
Now more than ever, if we suspect our vote is stolen, we couldn't prove it if we tried.
Yes, You Should Still Vote: But That's Not All
Remember, low voter-turn out makes it easier to rig elections. Don't kill your own vote by not casting it. Cast a ballot, but do it with your eyes wide open to the reality of the changes that need to be made in our vote counting system, then get busy organizing to make those changes happen before the next election.
Join the Election Integrity movement. If there's not a group in your area, start one. Educate, organize and help us restore transparent, publicly observable hand-counted paper ballot elections in communities across America.
Democracy is quite literally in our hands.
Friday, 19 October 2012 10:15 By Victoria Collier, Truthout
The news that America's mainstream media has cancelled exit polling in 19 states, means that insider election theft this November is now even harder to track, and therefore easier to get away with - something that scarcely seemed possible.
As I've written in the November issue of Harper's Magazine ("How to Rig an Election"), our voting system is already privatized, corporatized, computerized and arguably less secure than Vegas slot machines. It's also controlled by a shadowy cartel of right-wing affiliated companies that keep merging and changing their names, perhaps - and almost certainly in the case of Diebold - to avoid association with the record of white-collar criminal charges and convictions that trail them from state to state.
Precious few methods now remain for verifying results generated by these corporate "black box" touch-screen voting machines and optical scanners, which have been proven (ad nauseam) by experts to be vulnerable to insider rigging and outsider hacking. This evidence remains long unreported by the mainstream media, which ignore the kind of stories now broken weekly at the Brad Blog, like the latest White Hat hack of Diebold voting machines: In September, 2011, the Vulnerability Assessment Team at Argonne National Labs gained controlling access to the electronic votes within the machines using $20 in parts and the equivalent of an 8th grade science education.
.....
To make the case that we've got to toss these corporate Trojan Horse voting machines into the scrap heap (as was just done by Ireland), the EI movement has heavily relied on public opinion polls, tracking polls and exit polls for election forensics: comparing polling data to the "trust us" numbers spit from the secret innards of the voting machines.
Election forensics has turned up some very serious discrepancies in elections spanning the past few decades, and even led to the coining of a new term: The Red Shift.
The Red Shift has been detected in both state and federal American elections, where computerized vote totals have consistently "shifted" - often by a 5 percent to 7 percent margin disparity (sometimes less, but sometimes much greater) - in comparison to hand-counts and polling data. This mysterious seismic lurch invariably pushes votes to the right, and when the dust settles, it has inordinately benefitted GOP candidates and ballot issues.
To conceal these unnerving discrepancies that strongly suggest computerized vote rigging, exit pollsters began "adjusting" their final reported numbers - literally forcing polls at the end of Election Day to better align with the voting machine results.
Surprisingly, this is not a criminal or even covert act, but common knowledge amongst pollsters (though certainly not the American public) and accepted practice.
Therefore - and here's the rub - only the early, "unadjusted" exit polls numbers can provide evidence of the "red shift." But this smoking-gun data has been increasingly guarded by the pollsters, and withheld from release to EI analysts.
Nevertheless, the "red shift' reports we do have are beginning to attract attention, thanks to the tenacity of EI activists spreading them on the Internet. Could this be why the media consortium that controls the exit polls is shutting them down in 19 states?
David Moore, former Vice President of the Gallup poll for 13 years, agreed in an interview with me that the killing of the exit polls in 19 states is a "disaster" for the Election Integrity movement, "because you don't have the kind of polling data to help you determine whether polls and vote statistics are in accordance with each other."
The non-exit poll states in 2012 will be Alaska, Arkansas, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming.
.....
In 2004, for example, "unadjusted" exit polls showed John Kerry winning the Presidency by what many considered an insurmountable margin, until Ohio's votes surged for George W. Bush late on election night. The unexpected windfall that handed Bush Ohio's electoral votes - and therefore the White House - was reported on the web site controlled by the Republican Ohio Secretary of State, Kenneth Blackwell, a fundamentalist Christian, and - yes, it's true - Honorary Co-Chair of the Committee to Re-elect George W. Bush.
Blackwell's web site was programmed by two companies deep under the sheets with the GOP - GovTech and SMARTech - and operations were coordinated behind the scenes by campaign manager, Karl Rove.
Which brings us back, full circle, to the problem of this new blackout of exit polls.
"The problem," writes Jonathan Simon, "is that Karl Rove now has 19 states to mine votes to cover a Romney popular vote loss (undermining and casting suspicion upon his easily arranged Electoral College 'win'), without the remotest trace of the theft, not even the telltale 'red shift.' This was done in 2004 for Bush, and it showed up in the 'red shift' in states like Alaska and New York, as millions of votes were shifted in non-competitive states where there was little forensic vigilance. And if it turns out that they need even more votes for Romney, with the public now 100 percent blind to these 19 states, they'll have them by the millions."
The same threat hangs over competitive Senate races across the country, which will determine the balance of Congress, and the courts, for years to come.
Now more than ever, if we suspect our vote is stolen, we couldn't prove it if we tried.
Yes, You Should Still Vote: But That's Not All
Remember, low voter-turn out makes it easier to rig elections. Don't kill your own vote by not casting it. Cast a ballot, but do it with your eyes wide open to the reality of the changes that need to be made in our vote counting system, then get busy organizing to make those changes happen before the next election.
Join the Election Integrity movement. If there's not a group in your area, start one. Educate, organize and help us restore transparent, publicly observable hand-counted paper ballot elections in communities across America.
Democracy is quite literally in our hands.
Consistent exercise associated with lower risk of colon cancer death
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-12/wuso-cea123010.php
Public release date: 30-Dec-2010
Contact: Jim Dryden
Washington University School of Medicine
Consistent exercise is associated with a lower risk of dying from colon cancer, according to a new study led by researchers at the Siteman Cancer Center at Washington University School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. The study is among the first to show that physical activity can make the disease less deadly.
.....
"People who were consistently active over the course of their adulthood had a lower risk of death from colon cancer than those who were sedentary," says first author Kathleen Y. Wolin, ScD. "People often wonder around the start of a new year whether exercise really will help them stay healthy or whether it's already too late. It's never too late to start exercising, but it's also never too early to start being active. That's the message we hope people will take away from this study."
Wolin, assistant professor of surgery in the Division of Public Health Sciences, says the benefits of starting an exercise program include not just preventing colon cancer and death from the disease, but also reduced risk of heart disease, diabetes and other cancers.
She says the greatest benefits seem to accrue in those who have exercised for the largest percentage of their lives. But it isn't necessary to run marathons or to work out for many hours every day.
"You get enormous 'bang for the buck,'" she says. "You go for a 30-minute walk every day, and you're going to reduce your risk of a number of diseases. And in addition, our research has also shown that you feel better, physically and mentally, so you're able to function better."
And physical activity even can be beneficial after a cancer diagnosis already has been made.
"There is evidence that being physically active can reduce the risk of recurrence and death following a cancer diagnosis," Wolin says. "So even those who haven't been physically active can begin exercising after their diagnosis and see some real benefits as well."
Public release date: 30-Dec-2010
Contact: Jim Dryden
Washington University School of Medicine
Consistent exercise is associated with a lower risk of dying from colon cancer, according to a new study led by researchers at the Siteman Cancer Center at Washington University School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. The study is among the first to show that physical activity can make the disease less deadly.
.....
"People who were consistently active over the course of their adulthood had a lower risk of death from colon cancer than those who were sedentary," says first author Kathleen Y. Wolin, ScD. "People often wonder around the start of a new year whether exercise really will help them stay healthy or whether it's already too late. It's never too late to start exercising, but it's also never too early to start being active. That's the message we hope people will take away from this study."
Wolin, assistant professor of surgery in the Division of Public Health Sciences, says the benefits of starting an exercise program include not just preventing colon cancer and death from the disease, but also reduced risk of heart disease, diabetes and other cancers.
She says the greatest benefits seem to accrue in those who have exercised for the largest percentage of their lives. But it isn't necessary to run marathons or to work out for many hours every day.
"You get enormous 'bang for the buck,'" she says. "You go for a 30-minute walk every day, and you're going to reduce your risk of a number of diseases. And in addition, our research has also shown that you feel better, physically and mentally, so you're able to function better."
And physical activity even can be beneficial after a cancer diagnosis already has been made.
"There is evidence that being physically active can reduce the risk of recurrence and death following a cancer diagnosis," Wolin says. "So even those who haven't been physically active can begin exercising after their diagnosis and see some real benefits as well."
Confirmation that vitamin D acts as a protective agent against the advance of colon cancer
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-02/csp-ruo020312.php
Public release date: 16-Aug-2011
Contact: Amanda Wren
Vall d´Hebron Institute of Oncology
A study conducted by VHIO researchers confirms that a lack of vitamin D increases the aggressiveness of colon cancer
The indication that vitamin D and its derivatives have a protective effect against various types of cancer is not new. In the field of colon cancer, numerous experimental and epidemiological studies show that vitamin D3 (or cholecalciferol) and some of its derivatives inhibit the growth of cancerous cells. Researchers at the Vall d'Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO), in collaboration with the Alberto Sols Institute of Biomedical Research (CSIC-UAB), have confirmed the pivotal role of vitamin D, specifically its receptor (VDR), in slowing down the action of a key protein in the carcinogenic transformation process of colon cancer cells. These results are being published in the journal PLoS One.
.....
In light of these findings, chronic vitamin D deficiency represents a risk factor in the development of more aggressive colon tumours. Patients in the initial stages of colon cancer, the time when the VDR still has a substantial presence in the cells, could benefit from being treated with vitamin D3. However, this would not be useful in the advanced stages of the disease when the presence of the VDR is very much reduced.
The study data support the development of anti-tumour medicines based on the structure of vitamin D, although their use in patients will require further research in the next few years.
The body not only obtains vitamin D from food, especially milk and fish oils, but also manufactures it from exposure to sunlight. Prolonged exposure is not necessary; just 10 minutes in the sun every day when it is not at its peak is sufficient to stimulate its production. During the summer, when we are more likely to sunbathe, it is important to use the appropriate protective measures against sunburn to avoid future sun damage. Use high-factor solar protection products and do not expose the skin to the sun in the middle of the day to protect against skin cancers.
Public release date: 16-Aug-2011
Contact: Amanda Wren
Vall d´Hebron Institute of Oncology
A study conducted by VHIO researchers confirms that a lack of vitamin D increases the aggressiveness of colon cancer
The indication that vitamin D and its derivatives have a protective effect against various types of cancer is not new. In the field of colon cancer, numerous experimental and epidemiological studies show that vitamin D3 (or cholecalciferol) and some of its derivatives inhibit the growth of cancerous cells. Researchers at the Vall d'Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO), in collaboration with the Alberto Sols Institute of Biomedical Research (CSIC-UAB), have confirmed the pivotal role of vitamin D, specifically its receptor (VDR), in slowing down the action of a key protein in the carcinogenic transformation process of colon cancer cells. These results are being published in the journal PLoS One.
.....
In light of these findings, chronic vitamin D deficiency represents a risk factor in the development of more aggressive colon tumours. Patients in the initial stages of colon cancer, the time when the VDR still has a substantial presence in the cells, could benefit from being treated with vitamin D3. However, this would not be useful in the advanced stages of the disease when the presence of the VDR is very much reduced.
The study data support the development of anti-tumour medicines based on the structure of vitamin D, although their use in patients will require further research in the next few years.
The body not only obtains vitamin D from food, especially milk and fish oils, but also manufactures it from exposure to sunlight. Prolonged exposure is not necessary; just 10 minutes in the sun every day when it is not at its peak is sufficient to stimulate its production. During the summer, when we are more likely to sunbathe, it is important to use the appropriate protective measures against sunburn to avoid future sun damage. Use high-factor solar protection products and do not expose the skin to the sun in the middle of the day to protect against skin cancers.
Traumatic consequences long after fall of the Berlin Wall
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-10/uoz-tcl102512.php
Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
Contact: Prof. Andreas Maercker
University of Zurich
Previously, there had been a lack of reliable data in Germany on the long-term psychological consequences of political imprisonment in the GDR. Professor Andreas Maercker, Head of the Department of Psychopathology and Clinical Intervention at the University of Zurich, and private lecturer Dr. Matthias Schützwohl, Group Leader at the Clinic and Polyclinic of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at Dresden University of Technology, interviewed 146 former political prisoners in the mid-1990s. 15 years later, they studied the majority of those concerned (78 men and 15 women) again.
"To our surprise, post-traumatic stress disorder is still present in a third of the people studied," says Professor Maercker, summing up the results. "While some have recovered compared to 15 years ago, in others the stress disorder has only manifested itself in recent years." In all, such a delayed or recurrent post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was apparent in 15 percent. We know from studies from other countries – mostly on prisoners of war or other victims of violence – that delayed or recurrent PTSD exists, albeit to a lesser extent. Maercker and Schützwohl's study is the first to demonstrate this for former political prisoners. It appears in the journal Nervenarzt and additional analyses are to be published in the English-language journal Torture.
Decline in dependency on addictive substances
Other psychological disorders that former GDR prisoners suffered from decreased during the 15 years. Specific phobias such as claustrophobia were less common, for instance. The number of people addicted to alcohol and medication also fell. However, the number with acute depression quadrupled to 41 percent of those studied last year. At both time points, a more or less equal number suffered from anxiety disorders such as panic disorder (24 percent last year).
"We made another key discovery: Those affected tend to rate their own psychological condition after their release too poorly in retrospect but their current state more realistically," says PD Schützwohl. From this, the authors conclude that there is no distortion of memory for the purposes of a current desire for compensation, for instance, but rather that psychological factors play a role in the tendency towards a negative life evaluation.
Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
Contact: Prof. Andreas Maercker
University of Zurich
Previously, there had been a lack of reliable data in Germany on the long-term psychological consequences of political imprisonment in the GDR. Professor Andreas Maercker, Head of the Department of Psychopathology and Clinical Intervention at the University of Zurich, and private lecturer Dr. Matthias Schützwohl, Group Leader at the Clinic and Polyclinic of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at Dresden University of Technology, interviewed 146 former political prisoners in the mid-1990s. 15 years later, they studied the majority of those concerned (78 men and 15 women) again.
"To our surprise, post-traumatic stress disorder is still present in a third of the people studied," says Professor Maercker, summing up the results. "While some have recovered compared to 15 years ago, in others the stress disorder has only manifested itself in recent years." In all, such a delayed or recurrent post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was apparent in 15 percent. We know from studies from other countries – mostly on prisoners of war or other victims of violence – that delayed or recurrent PTSD exists, albeit to a lesser extent. Maercker and Schützwohl's study is the first to demonstrate this for former political prisoners. It appears in the journal Nervenarzt and additional analyses are to be published in the English-language journal Torture.
Decline in dependency on addictive substances
Other psychological disorders that former GDR prisoners suffered from decreased during the 15 years. Specific phobias such as claustrophobia were less common, for instance. The number of people addicted to alcohol and medication also fell. However, the number with acute depression quadrupled to 41 percent of those studied last year. At both time points, a more or less equal number suffered from anxiety disorders such as panic disorder (24 percent last year).
"We made another key discovery: Those affected tend to rate their own psychological condition after their release too poorly in retrospect but their current state more realistically," says PD Schützwohl. From this, the authors conclude that there is no distortion of memory for the purposes of a current desire for compensation, for instance, but rather that psychological factors play a role in the tendency towards a negative life evaluation.
Genetic tradeoff: Harmful genes are widespread in yeast but hold hidden benefits
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-10/uom-gth102312.php
Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
Contact: Jim Erickson
University of Michigan
ANN ARBOR— The genes responsible for inherited diseases are clearly bad for us, so why hasn't evolution, over time, weeded them out and eliminated them from the human genome altogether? Part of the reason seems to be that genes that can harm us at one stage of our lives are necessary and beneficial to us at other points in our development.
The idea that the same gene can be both beneficial and harmful, depending on the situation, is called antagonistic pleiotropy. The theory has been around since the 1950s and has been used to explain aging, cancer and genetic diseases.
But until now, no one has been able to determine just how common antagonistic pleiotropy is -- on a genome-wide scale -- in any organism. In a paper to be published online Oct. 25 in the journal Cell Reports, Jianzhi "George" Zhang of the University of Michigan and his coworkers report that antagonistic pleiotropy is very common in yeast, a single-celled organism used by scientists to provide insights about genetics and cell biology.
Zhang and his colleagues say the findings have broad biomedical and evolutionary implications.
"In any given environment, yeast expresses hundreds of genes that harm rather than benefit the organism, demonstrating widespread antagonistic pleiotropy. The surprising finding is the sheer number of such genes in the yeast genome that have such properties," said Zhang, a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.
"From our yeast data we can predict that humans should have even more antagonistic pleiotropy than yeast," he said. "This suggests that special cautions are needed when treating inherited diseases, because a treatment that removes a disease-causing genetic effect may lead to adverse effects in other aspects of life."
.....
Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
Contact: Jim Erickson
University of Michigan
ANN ARBOR— The genes responsible for inherited diseases are clearly bad for us, so why hasn't evolution, over time, weeded them out and eliminated them from the human genome altogether? Part of the reason seems to be that genes that can harm us at one stage of our lives are necessary and beneficial to us at other points in our development.
The idea that the same gene can be both beneficial and harmful, depending on the situation, is called antagonistic pleiotropy. The theory has been around since the 1950s and has been used to explain aging, cancer and genetic diseases.
But until now, no one has been able to determine just how common antagonistic pleiotropy is -- on a genome-wide scale -- in any organism. In a paper to be published online Oct. 25 in the journal Cell Reports, Jianzhi "George" Zhang of the University of Michigan and his coworkers report that antagonistic pleiotropy is very common in yeast, a single-celled organism used by scientists to provide insights about genetics and cell biology.
Zhang and his colleagues say the findings have broad biomedical and evolutionary implications.
"In any given environment, yeast expresses hundreds of genes that harm rather than benefit the organism, demonstrating widespread antagonistic pleiotropy. The surprising finding is the sheer number of such genes in the yeast genome that have such properties," said Zhang, a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.
"From our yeast data we can predict that humans should have even more antagonistic pleiotropy than yeast," he said. "This suggests that special cautions are needed when treating inherited diseases, because a treatment that removes a disease-causing genetic effect may lead to adverse effects in other aspects of life."
.....
Lonely older adults face more health risks
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-10/cu-loa102512.php
Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
Contact: Clea Desjardins
Concordia University
Adopting a positive attitude later in life positively alters body functions, Concordia study shows
Montreal, October 25, 2012 – Always look on the bright side of life. Thanks to a new study from Concordia University, this catchy refrain offers a prescription for staying healthy during one's golden years.
Research has shown that lonely older adults are at greater risk of developing health problems but a new study by Carsten Wrosch, a professor in Concordia's Department of Psychology and member of the Centre for Research in Human Development, offers hope. In a forthcoming article in Psychosomatic Medicine, Wrosch proves that older adults who approach life with a positive outlook can reverse the negative health issues associated with a lonely life.
"Our aim was to see whether using self-protective strategies, such as thinking positively and avoiding self-blame in the context of common age-related threats could prevent lonely older adults from exhibiting increases in stress hormones and inflammatory biomarkers," explains Wrosch, who co-authored the article with Concordia's PhD graduate, Rebecca Rueggeberg, and colleagues Gregory Miller from the University of British Columbia and Thomas McDade from Northwestern University in Illinois.
.....
Their findings showed that, among lonely older adults, the use of positive thinking helped protect against an increase in cortisol secretion. Four years down the road, further tests showed the participants' CRP levels had improved. In essence, lonely older adults who reframe problematic health circumstances positively and do not blame themselves for negative health issues can decrease health threats associated with stress and inflammation. For those older adults who did not report feelings of loneliness, this type of thinking had no effect – supposedly because their social networks may help them deal with age-related problems.
Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
Contact: Clea Desjardins
Concordia University
Adopting a positive attitude later in life positively alters body functions, Concordia study shows
Montreal, October 25, 2012 – Always look on the bright side of life. Thanks to a new study from Concordia University, this catchy refrain offers a prescription for staying healthy during one's golden years.
Research has shown that lonely older adults are at greater risk of developing health problems but a new study by Carsten Wrosch, a professor in Concordia's Department of Psychology and member of the Centre for Research in Human Development, offers hope. In a forthcoming article in Psychosomatic Medicine, Wrosch proves that older adults who approach life with a positive outlook can reverse the negative health issues associated with a lonely life.
"Our aim was to see whether using self-protective strategies, such as thinking positively and avoiding self-blame in the context of common age-related threats could prevent lonely older adults from exhibiting increases in stress hormones and inflammatory biomarkers," explains Wrosch, who co-authored the article with Concordia's PhD graduate, Rebecca Rueggeberg, and colleagues Gregory Miller from the University of British Columbia and Thomas McDade from Northwestern University in Illinois.
.....
Their findings showed that, among lonely older adults, the use of positive thinking helped protect against an increase in cortisol secretion. Four years down the road, further tests showed the participants' CRP levels had improved. In essence, lonely older adults who reframe problematic health circumstances positively and do not blame themselves for negative health issues can decrease health threats associated with stress and inflammation. For those older adults who did not report feelings of loneliness, this type of thinking had no effect – supposedly because their social networks may help them deal with age-related problems.
Sanders to CEOs: Look in the Mirror
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=9D15C4D6-189A-41D6-848B-F07B523C2EEE
October 25, 2012
Sen. Bernie Sanders said corporate leaders should look in the mirror before lecturing the American people on ways to tackle the deficit. After the heads of more than 80 big companies issued a statement Thursday on deficit reduction, Sanders released a report detailing how many of the companies headed by the same CEOs have avoided taxes, sent American jobs overseas and took taxpayer bailouts. "There really is no shame," Sanders said. "The Wall Street leaders whose recklessness and illegal behavior caused this terrible recession are now lecturing the American people on the need for courage to deal with the nation's finances and deficit crisis. Before telling us why we should cut Social Security, Medicare and other vitally important programs, these CEOs might want to take a hard look at their responsibility for causing the deficit and this terrible recession."
"Our Wall Street friends might also want to show some courage of their own by suggesting that the wealthiest people in this country, like them, start paying their fair share of taxes. They might work to end the outrageous corporate loopholes, tax havens and outsourcing provisions that their lobbyists have littered throughout the tax code - contributing greatly to our deficit," Sanders added.
Many of the CEOs who signed the deficit-reduction letter run corporations that, in total, evaded at least $34.5 billion in taxes by setting up more than 600 subsidiaries in the Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens since 2008. As a result, at least a dozen of the companies avoided paying any federal income taxes in recent years, and even received more than $6.4 billion in tax refunds from the IRS since 2008.
Several of the companies received a total taxpayer bailout of more than $2.5 trillion from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department.
Many of the companies also have outsourced hundreds of thousands of American jobs to China and other low wage countries, forcing their workers to rely on unemployment insurance and other federal benefits.
"In other words," Sanders said, "these are some of the same people who have significantly caused the deficit to explode over the last four years."
October 25, 2012
Sen. Bernie Sanders said corporate leaders should look in the mirror before lecturing the American people on ways to tackle the deficit. After the heads of more than 80 big companies issued a statement Thursday on deficit reduction, Sanders released a report detailing how many of the companies headed by the same CEOs have avoided taxes, sent American jobs overseas and took taxpayer bailouts. "There really is no shame," Sanders said. "The Wall Street leaders whose recklessness and illegal behavior caused this terrible recession are now lecturing the American people on the need for courage to deal with the nation's finances and deficit crisis. Before telling us why we should cut Social Security, Medicare and other vitally important programs, these CEOs might want to take a hard look at their responsibility for causing the deficit and this terrible recession."
"Our Wall Street friends might also want to show some courage of their own by suggesting that the wealthiest people in this country, like them, start paying their fair share of taxes. They might work to end the outrageous corporate loopholes, tax havens and outsourcing provisions that their lobbyists have littered throughout the tax code - contributing greatly to our deficit," Sanders added.
Many of the CEOs who signed the deficit-reduction letter run corporations that, in total, evaded at least $34.5 billion in taxes by setting up more than 600 subsidiaries in the Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens since 2008. As a result, at least a dozen of the companies avoided paying any federal income taxes in recent years, and even received more than $6.4 billion in tax refunds from the IRS since 2008.
Several of the companies received a total taxpayer bailout of more than $2.5 trillion from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department.
Many of the companies also have outsourced hundreds of thousands of American jobs to China and other low wage countries, forcing their workers to rely on unemployment insurance and other federal benefits.
"In other words," Sanders said, "these are some of the same people who have significantly caused the deficit to explode over the last four years."
Omega-3 Intake Heightens Working Memory in Healthy Young Adults
http://www.news.pitt.edu/Omega_3_Fatty_Acids_Memory
October 25, 2012
While Omega-3 essential fatty acids—found in foods like wild fish and grass-fed livestock—are necessary for human body functioning, their effects on the working memory of healthy young adults have not been studied until now.
In the first study of its kind, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have determined that healthy young adults ages 18-25 can improve their working memory even further by increasing their Omega-3 fatty acid intake. Their findings have been published online in PLOS One.
“Before seeing this data, I would have said it was impossible to move young healthy individuals above their cognitive best,” said Bita Moghaddam, project investigator and professor of neuroscience. “We found that members of this population can enhance their working memory performance even further, despite their already being at the top of their cognitive game.”
October 25, 2012
While Omega-3 essential fatty acids—found in foods like wild fish and grass-fed livestock—are necessary for human body functioning, their effects on the working memory of healthy young adults have not been studied until now.
In the first study of its kind, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have determined that healthy young adults ages 18-25 can improve their working memory even further by increasing their Omega-3 fatty acid intake. Their findings have been published online in PLOS One.
“Before seeing this data, I would have said it was impossible to move young healthy individuals above their cognitive best,” said Bita Moghaddam, project investigator and professor of neuroscience. “We found that members of this population can enhance their working memory performance even further, despite their already being at the top of their cognitive game.”
Autism early intervention found to normalize brain activity
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-10/uoc--aei102612.php
Public release date: 26-Oct-2012
Contact: Phyllis Brown
University of California - Davis Health System
Autism early intervention found to normalize brain activity in children as young as 18 months
An intensive early intervention therapy that is effective for improving cognition and language skills among very young children with autism also normalizes their brain activity, decreases their autism symptoms and improves their social skills, a nationwide study has found. The researchers said the study is the first to demonstrate that an autism early intervention program can normalize brain activity.
"We know that infant brains are quite malleable and previously demonstrated that this therapy capitalizes on the potential of learning that an infant brain has in order to limit autism's deleterious effects," said study author Sally Rogers, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and a researcher with the UC Davis MIND Institute.
"The findings on improved behavioral outcomes and the ability to normalize brain activity associated with social activities signify that there is tremendous potential for the brains of children with autism to develop and grow more normally," Rogers said.
Published online today in the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, the randomized, case-controlled, multi-centered study titled "Early behavioral intervention is associated with normalized brain activity in young children with autism," found that the children who received the intervention exhibited greater brain activation when viewing faces rather than objects, a response that was typical of the normal children in the study, and the opposite of the children with autism who received other intervention.
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Named the Early Start Denver Model (ESDM), the intervention method was developed by Rogers and Geraldine Dawson, chief science officer of the research and advocacy organization Autism Speaks. The therapy fuses a play-based, developmental, relationship-based approach and the teaching methods of applied behavioral analysis.
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Public release date: 26-Oct-2012
Contact: Phyllis Brown
University of California - Davis Health System
Autism early intervention found to normalize brain activity in children as young as 18 months
An intensive early intervention therapy that is effective for improving cognition and language skills among very young children with autism also normalizes their brain activity, decreases their autism symptoms and improves their social skills, a nationwide study has found. The researchers said the study is the first to demonstrate that an autism early intervention program can normalize brain activity.
"We know that infant brains are quite malleable and previously demonstrated that this therapy capitalizes on the potential of learning that an infant brain has in order to limit autism's deleterious effects," said study author Sally Rogers, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and a researcher with the UC Davis MIND Institute.
"The findings on improved behavioral outcomes and the ability to normalize brain activity associated with social activities signify that there is tremendous potential for the brains of children with autism to develop and grow more normally," Rogers said.
Published online today in the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, the randomized, case-controlled, multi-centered study titled "Early behavioral intervention is associated with normalized brain activity in young children with autism," found that the children who received the intervention exhibited greater brain activation when viewing faces rather than objects, a response that was typical of the normal children in the study, and the opposite of the children with autism who received other intervention.
.....
Named the Early Start Denver Model (ESDM), the intervention method was developed by Rogers and Geraldine Dawson, chief science officer of the research and advocacy organization Autism Speaks. The therapy fuses a play-based, developmental, relationship-based approach and the teaching methods of applied behavioral analysis.
.....
Friday, October 26, 2012
Follow The Money: Why Romney Wants A Bigger Navy
No surprise, just what I expected. The only surprise would have been if Romney and/or one or more of his supporters didn't benefit from increased ship-building.
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2012/10/25/1088291/why-romney-wants-bigger-navy/
By Annie-Rose Strasser on Oct 25, 2012
The airwaves of three key battleground states — Florida, Virginia, and New Hampshire — were hit this morning with advertisements from the Romney campaign about the size of the American navy. “Our navy is smaller now than any time since 1917,” Romney warns in the radio spots. A narrator adds, “As commander in chief, Mitt Romney… will invest in our military.”
Expanding the Navy has become a theme of the campaign; during Monday’s debate Romney used the same line, and Obama responded with a now-famous zinger about “horses and bayonets.” But new information discovered by Wired casts a new light on Romney’s push to beef up ship building: One of his top military advisers is in the ship building business.
John Lehman was Secretary of the Navy under Ronald Reagan, but is now an investment banker with stakes in several ship building companies:
Romney Criticizes 3rd Quarter GDP Growth of 2%; Doesn’t Mention He Never Hit 2% As Governor
http://www.classwarfareexists.com/romney-criticizes-3rd-quarter-gdp-growth-of-2-doesnt-mention-he-never-hit-2-as-governor/#ixzz2ARwWuy6Q
This is a chart highlighting the GDP growth of the U.S. economy from the start of the recession in December of 2007 to the end of September 2012. The economy beat expectations and hit 2% GDP growth in the third quarter of 2012 fueled by consumer spending, autos and housing. The report isn’t AWESOME but it’s solid.
So – today … Mitt Romney gave a statement on the economic #’s – he said:
So … it’s DISCOURAGING according to Mitt. But as Salon points out HERE … Mitt Romney never even hit 2% GDP growth in Massachusetts when he was governor:
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This is a chart highlighting the GDP growth of the U.S. economy from the start of the recession in December of 2007 to the end of September 2012. The economy beat expectations and hit 2% GDP growth in the third quarter of 2012 fueled by consumer spending, autos and housing. The report isn’t AWESOME but it’s solid.
So – today … Mitt Romney gave a statement on the economic #’s – he said:
Today, we received the latest round of discouraging economic news: Last quarter, our economy grew at only two percent, less than half the 4.3% rate the White House projected after passing the stimulus bill. Slow economic growth means slow job growth and declining take-home pay. This is what four years of President Obama’s policies have produced.
So … it’s DISCOURAGING according to Mitt. But as Salon points out HERE … Mitt Romney never even hit 2% GDP growth in Massachusetts when he was governor:
By the way, how fast did the economy grow when Mitt Romney was governor of Massachusetts? According to data from the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis, average real GDP growth was 1.5 percent per year in Massachusetts from 2002 to 2006. For each of the years Romney was in office, the economy grew 1.49 percent, 1.86 percent, 1.14 percent and 1.43 percent, respectively.
And how did Romney assess the economic growth of the state under his leadership? “When we took office, the state economy was in a tailspin. Today, jobs are being created by the thousands and our economy is stronger,” he said in early 2006, his last year in office. So less than 2 percent was good then, but 2 percent is bad now.
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