At issue here, to start with, is the idea, and reality, of powerful people treating the mass of us like sheep, to be sheared at will. It's the herd mentality of the likes of the medical-pharmaceutical complex (or more correctly, the medical-pharmaceutical-government complex). Take their vaccines. These medical products have cut the incidences of the childhood diseases. So far so good. But at what cost? I've gone into this before, so I won't belabor the point; just to point out the notion, that we are considered like a herd to them; not individuals. Or take other drug company products: the drug cos. have pushed drugs that main and kill people - and sometimes get taken off the market, when the results get too blatant. Has it been because of an honest mistake in the development process?
Maybe sometimes. But let's look at that process. In the video 'Money Talks', an expose of the drug industry, wherein some honest souls blow the whistle on their peers, it is pointed out that in the deregulation spirit engendered in the Reagan era, much research was moved out of universities into the hands of for-profit organisations, where control over the terms of the research was moved to - the drug companies. Or they would just give big financial grants to the universities, and buy some influence.
It's like the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) being responsible for both the implementation of the vaccine schedule and their safety. (Go figure.)
Terrible stuff; right? Right.
It just shows that man is inherently bad ('fallen'), and if left to his own devices, will automatically revert to selfishness and egotism; right?
Er - not necessarily. It just shows that, in a phrase: Without a vision, the people perish.
And another clue to what I am getting at is in the title of the video mentioned above.
Money. And the effects on humans thereof.
Not just the 'the love of money is the root of all evil' observation. But the basic premise of the profit motive. Which automatically pits one against another.
I'm not talking 'communism' here; which is just another form of control, of some over others. Power over, rather than power with. Which is, in a word, love.
Growing out of the awareness that we are one another.
Over and over. Playing parts. 'The play's the thing, wherein to catch the conscience of ' - the players.
To grow. And to grow one another.
The man had it right: We are spiritual beings having a human experience.
And before we are going to be able to leave our lovely nest, of Mother Earth, and go exploring the physical universe, we will need to get our act together.
With 'together' being the operative word, and concept.
Not pitted against one another, in the drama of human existence. But leaving our kindergarten stage behind, and graduating to the next level.
(Remember the book title, 'Everything I Know I Learned in Kindergarten'? The author had a good point. And if we stay at that stage of development, we will continue to play out those experiences, and lessons.)
I am saying: It's time, to move up a notch. The circumstances have been set for us ('God moves in mysterious ways'?) to leave the western monetary system behind - as it creaks and groans and nears collapse - and enter into a new covenant with one another; one which recognises that We Are All One. And that we have one destiny.
In the words of the motto of the old Planetary Citizens NGO that I worked for many years ago:
One Planet. One Humanity. One Destiny.
The New World Order?
Oh no. Oh my, no.
That's of the old.
I'm talking about the new.
Which recognises that a major change has taken place, in our earthly experience, and which now allows us to be AS One.
The change, of communications technology - which allows us to connect with one another, and with information, in unprecedented ways - and with other technology, in many areas of endeavor, that can bring about abundance, and eliminate drudgery.
If we let it.
And realize that giving, not taking, is the key, with which to unlock this new era.
Go to venusproject.com and you'll see a good sampling of what I'm getting at. Which posits, and concludes, that we can be free if we work together.
A big 'if'?
Not if you believe in the ultimate, overriding nature of Man.
A nature just waiting for us to unfold into being.
The choice is ours.
And it IS a choice.
We can make it. Or blow it.
That's what the exercise is all about.
Graduation time, anyone?
Tuesday, 3 March 2009
Privatisation & People Control
"If the truth be known..."
Carrying on from yesterday, particularly regarding the corporations perched on high in our world - that is to say, our current world of reality - I'd like to pull some further thoughts together on this subject.
Where to begin...ah. A good place, and person: George Monbiot's column in today's Guardian. He talks about the scam in both the US and the UK of prisons being turned over to private corporations, to be run for a profit; whereupon, it turns out, that a couple of judges in one of the American states have been caught out assigning youngsters to prison for a kickback. Because the corporation involved makes more money the more prisoners they are assigned. So we're talking corruption here. Yawn? So what's new? Well, for one thing, the way it is taking place: through what are known as PFIs, private finance initiatives (aka PPPs, or Private-Public Partnerships). To say: the government contracts out previous public-sector projects - hospitals, schools, etc. - to the private arena. The rationale is that they are more efficient, and other such euphemisms; the reality is that it is because (a) the government can then take such projects off their books, which look cleaner, then; and (b) powerful friends of their boyos in government can make a lot of money, some of which can - as we have seen above - find its way back into the pockets of said boyos. Everybody, then, benefiting - except the poor dumb taxpayer, who is now saddled with debts for 25-30-year contracts, whether or not the project is even fit for purpose by then. (Whereas if the government had borrowed the money to do the job in the first place, it could have borrowed it at lower rates of interest than can private contractors.)
But even this particular issue, of public facilities being used for private gain - which Monbiot rightly deplores - is not my main
point, and concern. That has to do with the uses which these scams can be put to.
Take the sale of water suppliers to private enterprisers, and therefore out of the (controlling) hands of the public. Problem? Besides the public's water supply now in private hands (think Ecuador, and the public's demonstration against such a setup, ultimately tossing the 'responsible' government out, and reclaiming their control over their fate), here is another little matter; as referred to in an article in the 27 February Guardian, headed: 'Plan may open fluoride floodgates'. Quote: "The [English] government changed the law in 2003 to enable health chiefs to order, rather then (sic) request, water companies to add fluoride." (Say Ahhh...)
The government, echoing its "health chiefs", "argues that the practice cuts tooth decay and that long-established schemes in both the US and England...have thrown up no evidence that it is harmful." I'll pause to throw up here, and then continue: "Opponents object to what they see as mass medication and say there are potential health risks, including lower IQ in children, bone cancer, and hip fractures in older people."
And that's not the half of it; but well done, Guardian, for being willing to mention at least part of the downside of this story. And if one digs a little deeper, one will find out that this is not just a matter of making a lot of money out of an industrial by-product - whereby the manufacturers (primarily the aluminium and artificial fertilizer industries) not only evade major charges for environmental pollution otherwise, but make money out of it as well; clever lads, these - but it is a matter of engaging in (and here it comes; put on your anti-conspiracy theory hat) people control.*
Why would the government be interested in people control?
If you had to ask that, you're not paying attention to what's going down these days. National ID cards; the surveillance society; the insidious erosion of civil liberties...One would think the government was preparing for rough times ahead.
And therefore that they know something that we, the people don't.
Or at least, not widely. Not widely enough, yet. To mount a sustained objection to. And pay sufficient attention to. Including the desired inclusion on centralized databases of everyone's medical records.
Why would the PTB want to have that info?
Well; it might be because of the cover story. Instant access to people's medical histories in case of car accidents, and such.
And then again, it might be because the surveillance society would like to know who has received what medication, and who has not.
Example of what this subject area might entail.
Some years ago, some citizens in a developing country in the Americas got suspicious about a vaccine that was being administered to young girls. They were told that it was a vaccine for tetanus. So why young girls?...an interesting story short: it was discovered that the vaccine contained an anti-fertility component. (And a footnote to the story is that a former CIA agent was interviewed for a documentary video, years later, and admitted on camera that they were behind it, 'for national security purposes'. To keep the US from being overwhelmed from the south by economic refugees. If the global economy tanked. But let's not go there right now. But: interesting, no? Since this was in the decade previous to the globalized economy beginning to show signs of collapse.)
I'll cut to the chase, of the truth in these matters. In short: People can be controlled - or sickened - by ingredients in vaccines.
Or even killed.
If you wanted to get rid of a lot of people fast - say, the "useless eaters" of Kissinger's Elite Team considerations - how would you go about it? You could explode a nuclear bomb; but that might affect you, too. So how could you do it in a more specific way? I got it: create a panic; say a panic about bird flu - and line everybody up for a jab. And if they don't want it, tough. Make them out to be a menace to their neighbors, and make it mandatory.
Like health chiefs ordering, rather than requesting, something to be put into the water supplies.
Like the UK government slowly creating the conditions for a move to make vaccines mandatory in this country, as they are in the US, for children to be able to enter the education system. (And along that line: I note that a Murdoch is now on the board of Glaxo-Smith-Kline (GSK), manufacturers of the MMR jab, which the Sunday Times -a Murdoch publication - has recently been in the business of pushing, by demonizing the gastroenterologist who voiced concerns about it, in regards to its possible association with gut damage to a subset of children who became autistic after its application.)
I am saying that the corporate elite, in cahoots with their placemen in government, are making a move for their vaunted New World Order, when the citizenry will be beholden to them, on pain of incarceration, or worse.
But that's only part of where I want to go with this thread of thought.
I want to get to the fundamental issue of human nature. And of human potential. For evil. And for good.
And how we are verging on the potential of going either way, at a major turning-point time for humanity.
Down. Or up. It's up to us.
To be continued...
* Fluoride has a tranquilizing effect. It also creates illness conditions, which the pharmaceutical industry can then make a lot of money from. But that's another part of the story.
Carrying on from yesterday, particularly regarding the corporations perched on high in our world - that is to say, our current world of reality - I'd like to pull some further thoughts together on this subject.
Where to begin...ah. A good place, and person: George Monbiot's column in today's Guardian. He talks about the scam in both the US and the UK of prisons being turned over to private corporations, to be run for a profit; whereupon, it turns out, that a couple of judges in one of the American states have been caught out assigning youngsters to prison for a kickback. Because the corporation involved makes more money the more prisoners they are assigned. So we're talking corruption here. Yawn? So what's new? Well, for one thing, the way it is taking place: through what are known as PFIs, private finance initiatives (aka PPPs, or Private-Public Partnerships). To say: the government contracts out previous public-sector projects - hospitals, schools, etc. - to the private arena. The rationale is that they are more efficient, and other such euphemisms; the reality is that it is because (a) the government can then take such projects off their books, which look cleaner, then; and (b) powerful friends of their boyos in government can make a lot of money, some of which can - as we have seen above - find its way back into the pockets of said boyos. Everybody, then, benefiting - except the poor dumb taxpayer, who is now saddled with debts for 25-30-year contracts, whether or not the project is even fit for purpose by then. (Whereas if the government had borrowed the money to do the job in the first place, it could have borrowed it at lower rates of interest than can private contractors.)
But even this particular issue, of public facilities being used for private gain - which Monbiot rightly deplores - is not my main
point, and concern. That has to do with the uses which these scams can be put to.
Take the sale of water suppliers to private enterprisers, and therefore out of the (controlling) hands of the public. Problem? Besides the public's water supply now in private hands (think Ecuador, and the public's demonstration against such a setup, ultimately tossing the 'responsible' government out, and reclaiming their control over their fate), here is another little matter; as referred to in an article in the 27 February Guardian, headed: 'Plan may open fluoride floodgates'. Quote: "The [English] government changed the law in 2003 to enable health chiefs to order, rather then (sic) request, water companies to add fluoride." (Say Ahhh...)
The government, echoing its "health chiefs", "argues that the practice cuts tooth decay and that long-established schemes in both the US and England...have thrown up no evidence that it is harmful." I'll pause to throw up here, and then continue: "Opponents object to what they see as mass medication and say there are potential health risks, including lower IQ in children, bone cancer, and hip fractures in older people."
And that's not the half of it; but well done, Guardian, for being willing to mention at least part of the downside of this story. And if one digs a little deeper, one will find out that this is not just a matter of making a lot of money out of an industrial by-product - whereby the manufacturers (primarily the aluminium and artificial fertilizer industries) not only evade major charges for environmental pollution otherwise, but make money out of it as well; clever lads, these - but it is a matter of engaging in (and here it comes; put on your anti-conspiracy theory hat) people control.*
Why would the government be interested in people control?
If you had to ask that, you're not paying attention to what's going down these days. National ID cards; the surveillance society; the insidious erosion of civil liberties...One would think the government was preparing for rough times ahead.
And therefore that they know something that we, the people don't.
Or at least, not widely. Not widely enough, yet. To mount a sustained objection to. And pay sufficient attention to. Including the desired inclusion on centralized databases of everyone's medical records.
Why would the PTB want to have that info?
Well; it might be because of the cover story. Instant access to people's medical histories in case of car accidents, and such.
And then again, it might be because the surveillance society would like to know who has received what medication, and who has not.
Example of what this subject area might entail.
Some years ago, some citizens in a developing country in the Americas got suspicious about a vaccine that was being administered to young girls. They were told that it was a vaccine for tetanus. So why young girls?...an interesting story short: it was discovered that the vaccine contained an anti-fertility component. (And a footnote to the story is that a former CIA agent was interviewed for a documentary video, years later, and admitted on camera that they were behind it, 'for national security purposes'. To keep the US from being overwhelmed from the south by economic refugees. If the global economy tanked. But let's not go there right now. But: interesting, no? Since this was in the decade previous to the globalized economy beginning to show signs of collapse.)
I'll cut to the chase, of the truth in these matters. In short: People can be controlled - or sickened - by ingredients in vaccines.
Or even killed.
If you wanted to get rid of a lot of people fast - say, the "useless eaters" of Kissinger's Elite Team considerations - how would you go about it? You could explode a nuclear bomb; but that might affect you, too. So how could you do it in a more specific way? I got it: create a panic; say a panic about bird flu - and line everybody up for a jab. And if they don't want it, tough. Make them out to be a menace to their neighbors, and make it mandatory.
Like health chiefs ordering, rather than requesting, something to be put into the water supplies.
Like the UK government slowly creating the conditions for a move to make vaccines mandatory in this country, as they are in the US, for children to be able to enter the education system. (And along that line: I note that a Murdoch is now on the board of Glaxo-Smith-Kline (GSK), manufacturers of the MMR jab, which the Sunday Times -a Murdoch publication - has recently been in the business of pushing, by demonizing the gastroenterologist who voiced concerns about it, in regards to its possible association with gut damage to a subset of children who became autistic after its application.)
I am saying that the corporate elite, in cahoots with their placemen in government, are making a move for their vaunted New World Order, when the citizenry will be beholden to them, on pain of incarceration, or worse.
But that's only part of where I want to go with this thread of thought.
I want to get to the fundamental issue of human nature. And of human potential. For evil. And for good.
And how we are verging on the potential of going either way, at a major turning-point time for humanity.
Down. Or up. It's up to us.
To be continued...
* Fluoride has a tranquilizing effect. It also creates illness conditions, which the pharmaceutical industry can then make a lot of money from. But that's another part of the story.
Sunday, 1 March 2009
Anaphylaxis, Vaccines, & Truth-telling - or Not
"If the truth be known..."
As is not uncommon for me, I wrote a 'letter to the editor' of one of the newspapers we take here in my home base in life (a community setting), last week. It didn't get published; which is also not uncommon for me. (I can be very opinionated about issues that in the expression often seems to run against the grain of the established order of things. But then, maybe I wouldn't have bothered to write about it otherwise. Anyway: so much for a truthseeker's eye.) But what was decidedly uncommon about the matter was that I didn't receive the customary acknowledgment of receipt of my letter.
And therein lies a tale, I feel...
From the top, then. My letter was occasioned by a remark in her column in the (Scotland) Sunday Times of 22 February of one India Knight, a regular in its stable of such commentators on the human/political scene. Her main theme was on another subject in the news (since you asked: 'Men's lust, women's pride: twin forces of the vice divide', in comment on a recent Jesuit study; the article adorned with a decidedly eye-catching photo of Raquel Welch in her customary, but particularly fetching, state of dish-abille. Would my eye have been caught to this column otherwise? Pah. Is the Pope Catholic? Now where was I...Oh yes:), but she mused on a sub-theme, also in the news that week. Her comment opened thus:
"A preliminary clinical trial at Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridge suggests it may be possible to modify an allergy by desensitising the sufferer. Researchers gave a group of children with severe peanut allergies a small daily amount of peanut flour over a six-month period. By the end of the trial, the children could eat up to 12 nuts a day without suffering anaphylaxis.
"This is great, obviously, but I wish somebody could explain where peanut allergy has come from and why. In my childhood it was unheard of; today you have to check that a cake doesn't contain even a whisper of nut before allowing your child to bring it to school..."
My letter to the editor in response:
"Dear Editor,
"India Knight wishes that 'somebody could explain where peanut allergy has come from and why' (Comment, 22 February). It's very simple, really.
"Such allergic reactions come either from the proteins that were in the infant's mother's milk when they were vaccinated - and thus sensitised to them as well in temporal association - or from the proteins that were used in the manufacture of the vaccines, which the body's immune system then recognises as foreign along with the other ingredients. These can the very proteins (eg, peanut oil has been used as an adjuvant in some vaccines), or similar proteins by molecular weight, in a process called molecular mimicry.
"How come all this isn't better known? Well; indeed.
Yours sincerely," etc.
Two comments. The first is simply in a generic way, as it were. The conversation that took place - if any - might have gone something like this:
'No. Don't print it.' [Or even acknowledge its receipt?] 'People might not let their kids get their jabs.'
[Continuing, hypothetically:] So...don't let them know the truth abut vaccines: that their side effects are far more extensive and severe than the medical profession lets on?
'No. Because the average person can be swayed emotionally, one, and two, doesn't know how to calculate the relative risks and benefits of them.'
So...you do? And when, for an example, the relative risk of getting type 1 diabetes from the application of the Hib vaccine is greater than the risk of serious damage from the microbe involved - what then, Lord Pooh-Bah?
'Look, layman. The doctors know what's best for the public. You don't.'
And the parents. They don't?
' - Right. Actually. They don't have all the facts at hand.'
And you do? When many doctors don't know the extensive literature on this subject, are not fully aware of the facts?
'That's it. Conversation over.'
My mind's made up, don't confuse me with the facts?
'What's your name?'
My name is Everyman. And I will be heard. No thanks to your (apparent) attempts at censorship. Where your attempts to control the conversation, and information available to the public, are as noxious as any dictatorship that ever came down the pike. So be warned, Overlord. And be afraid. Be very afraid, of the power of The People, once they get moving to knock you off your corporate perch. Perched up there on high, controlling the debate, from your economic and political control over the mass media.
Except for the internet.
So far.
The second comment is specific to the Sunday Times, and its (apparent) editorial inclinations.
A little history here. A Dr Andrew Wakefield and associates in the UK ran a study on the gut damage of a number of children whose parents felt that the MMR jab was involved in their subsequent slide into autism. Their results - as announced in 1998 - did not specifically blame the MMR jab, but Dr Wakefield opined in public that until further studies could be undertaken, it might be best for parents to consent to single vaccines. Bad career move; occasioning a move to the US to continue his research in the subject, of gut damage associated with autism and with in particular the measles component of the MMR jab. The US, because he was finished in the UK professionally.
How did it come about? Well, for one interesting thing, a head editor in the Sunday times Newsroom commissioned an investigative journalist - name of Brian Deer - to, er, investigate Dr Wakefield; the article - published in 2004 - not only finishing Dr Wakefield professionally in the UK, but occasioning an investigation by the General Medical Council of Dr Wakefield and 2 of his co-authors, who wouldn't recant (and which investigation is just concluding). The link? The commissioner, name of Paul Nuki, is the son of a Professor George Nuki, who sat on the committee oversighting the safety of GSK's MMR vaccine.
Any problem here? Not necessarily. Maybe the safety of the MMR vax is not an issue, and it is above reproach, and so are all those associated with it. But that would also include the boss of the editor of the medical journal involved - The Lancet - whose editor, Dr Richard Horton, decided to regret publishing the study after the article by Deer was published. His boss? One Sir Crispin Davis, who was appointed a non-executive director of MMR court defendant's GSK in the summer of 2003, only a few months before the Sunday Times article in February 2004 that accused Dr Wakefield of a conflict of interest (relating to the families of the damaged children). And lo and behold: the high court judge who dismissed the MMR-autism cases just a few days after Dr Horton's accusation of Dr Wakefield's irregularity was: Sir Crispin's younger brother, Nigel Davis.
All in the family...
Am I accusing anybody of anything? I am accusing the power elite of this country, in particular the medical-pharmaceutical-government complex, of being in cahoots financially to the detriment of Truth - the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, about vaccines.
Their benefits. And their risks. And let the chips fall where they may. Because nothing is more important than truth.
At least to this Everyman.
ADDENDUM - 9 March
To be fair, a followup report:
When my letter did not appear in the following week's edition, I decided to give the Sunday Times another chance to at least
acknowledge receipt of my letter - to be crystal clear on the matter, so as not to accuse them of anything improperly. So I resubmitted my letter, on 1 March, underneath a covering letter, stating:
"Dear Editor,
"Below is a copy of an e-letter that I sent to you on the date indicated [ie, 23 Feb].
"I never received your normal notification of receipt of a submission.
"Could you please do that this time, as I resubmit it for consideration?
"Thank you, [etc]"
Interestingly enough, I not only subsequently received their normal notification of receipt, from the Office Manager of the Sunday Times in their Glasgow office, but also an email from the Times's Letters Editor, stating:
"Dear Mr Stanfield,
"Thank you for your letter. I have ensured that the points you raised were drawn to the attention of India Knight and the Editor responsible.
"Yours sincerely, [etc]"
My letter was not printed in this past weekend's edition of the Times either. But at least India Knight will get an answer to her question. If no one else. Except you, dear reader, of this attempt at truth seeking, and telling.
As is not uncommon for me, I wrote a 'letter to the editor' of one of the newspapers we take here in my home base in life (a community setting), last week. It didn't get published; which is also not uncommon for me. (I can be very opinionated about issues that in the expression often seems to run against the grain of the established order of things. But then, maybe I wouldn't have bothered to write about it otherwise. Anyway: so much for a truthseeker's eye.) But what was decidedly uncommon about the matter was that I didn't receive the customary acknowledgment of receipt of my letter.
And therein lies a tale, I feel...
From the top, then. My letter was occasioned by a remark in her column in the (Scotland) Sunday Times of 22 February of one India Knight, a regular in its stable of such commentators on the human/political scene. Her main theme was on another subject in the news (since you asked: 'Men's lust, women's pride: twin forces of the vice divide', in comment on a recent Jesuit study; the article adorned with a decidedly eye-catching photo of Raquel Welch in her customary, but particularly fetching, state of dish-abille. Would my eye have been caught to this column otherwise? Pah. Is the Pope Catholic? Now where was I...Oh yes:), but she mused on a sub-theme, also in the news that week. Her comment opened thus:
"A preliminary clinical trial at Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridge suggests it may be possible to modify an allergy by desensitising the sufferer. Researchers gave a group of children with severe peanut allergies a small daily amount of peanut flour over a six-month period. By the end of the trial, the children could eat up to 12 nuts a day without suffering anaphylaxis.
"This is great, obviously, but I wish somebody could explain where peanut allergy has come from and why. In my childhood it was unheard of; today you have to check that a cake doesn't contain even a whisper of nut before allowing your child to bring it to school..."
My letter to the editor in response:
"Dear Editor,
"India Knight wishes that 'somebody could explain where peanut allergy has come from and why' (Comment, 22 February). It's very simple, really.
"Such allergic reactions come either from the proteins that were in the infant's mother's milk when they were vaccinated - and thus sensitised to them as well in temporal association - or from the proteins that were used in the manufacture of the vaccines, which the body's immune system then recognises as foreign along with the other ingredients. These can the very proteins (eg, peanut oil has been used as an adjuvant in some vaccines), or similar proteins by molecular weight, in a process called molecular mimicry.
"How come all this isn't better known? Well; indeed.
Yours sincerely," etc.
Two comments. The first is simply in a generic way, as it were. The conversation that took place - if any - might have gone something like this:
'No. Don't print it.' [Or even acknowledge its receipt?] 'People might not let their kids get their jabs.'
[Continuing, hypothetically:] So...don't let them know the truth abut vaccines: that their side effects are far more extensive and severe than the medical profession lets on?
'No. Because the average person can be swayed emotionally, one, and two, doesn't know how to calculate the relative risks and benefits of them.'
So...you do? And when, for an example, the relative risk of getting type 1 diabetes from the application of the Hib vaccine is greater than the risk of serious damage from the microbe involved - what then, Lord Pooh-Bah?
'Look, layman. The doctors know what's best for the public. You don't.'
And the parents. They don't?
' - Right. Actually. They don't have all the facts at hand.'
And you do? When many doctors don't know the extensive literature on this subject, are not fully aware of the facts?
'That's it. Conversation over.'
My mind's made up, don't confuse me with the facts?
'What's your name?'
My name is Everyman. And I will be heard. No thanks to your (apparent) attempts at censorship. Where your attempts to control the conversation, and information available to the public, are as noxious as any dictatorship that ever came down the pike. So be warned, Overlord. And be afraid. Be very afraid, of the power of The People, once they get moving to knock you off your corporate perch. Perched up there on high, controlling the debate, from your economic and political control over the mass media.
Except for the internet.
So far.
The second comment is specific to the Sunday Times, and its (apparent) editorial inclinations.
A little history here. A Dr Andrew Wakefield and associates in the UK ran a study on the gut damage of a number of children whose parents felt that the MMR jab was involved in their subsequent slide into autism. Their results - as announced in 1998 - did not specifically blame the MMR jab, but Dr Wakefield opined in public that until further studies could be undertaken, it might be best for parents to consent to single vaccines. Bad career move; occasioning a move to the US to continue his research in the subject, of gut damage associated with autism and with in particular the measles component of the MMR jab. The US, because he was finished in the UK professionally.
How did it come about? Well, for one interesting thing, a head editor in the Sunday times Newsroom commissioned an investigative journalist - name of Brian Deer - to, er, investigate Dr Wakefield; the article - published in 2004 - not only finishing Dr Wakefield professionally in the UK, but occasioning an investigation by the General Medical Council of Dr Wakefield and 2 of his co-authors, who wouldn't recant (and which investigation is just concluding). The link? The commissioner, name of Paul Nuki, is the son of a Professor George Nuki, who sat on the committee oversighting the safety of GSK's MMR vaccine.
Any problem here? Not necessarily. Maybe the safety of the MMR vax is not an issue, and it is above reproach, and so are all those associated with it. But that would also include the boss of the editor of the medical journal involved - The Lancet - whose editor, Dr Richard Horton, decided to regret publishing the study after the article by Deer was published. His boss? One Sir Crispin Davis, who was appointed a non-executive director of MMR court defendant's GSK in the summer of 2003, only a few months before the Sunday Times article in February 2004 that accused Dr Wakefield of a conflict of interest (relating to the families of the damaged children). And lo and behold: the high court judge who dismissed the MMR-autism cases just a few days after Dr Horton's accusation of Dr Wakefield's irregularity was: Sir Crispin's younger brother, Nigel Davis.
All in the family...
Am I accusing anybody of anything? I am accusing the power elite of this country, in particular the medical-pharmaceutical-government complex, of being in cahoots financially to the detriment of Truth - the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, about vaccines.
Their benefits. And their risks. And let the chips fall where they may. Because nothing is more important than truth.
At least to this Everyman.
ADDENDUM - 9 March
To be fair, a followup report:
When my letter did not appear in the following week's edition, I decided to give the Sunday Times another chance to at least
acknowledge receipt of my letter - to be crystal clear on the matter, so as not to accuse them of anything improperly. So I resubmitted my letter, on 1 March, underneath a covering letter, stating:
"Dear Editor,
"Below is a copy of an e-letter that I sent to you on the date indicated [ie, 23 Feb].
"I never received your normal notification of receipt of a submission.
"Could you please do that this time, as I resubmit it for consideration?
"Thank you, [etc]"
Interestingly enough, I not only subsequently received their normal notification of receipt, from the Office Manager of the Sunday Times in their Glasgow office, but also an email from the Times's Letters Editor, stating:
"Dear Mr Stanfield,
"Thank you for your letter. I have ensured that the points you raised were drawn to the attention of India Knight and the Editor responsible.
"Yours sincerely, [etc]"
My letter was not printed in this past weekend's edition of the Times either. But at least India Knight will get an answer to her question. If no one else. Except you, dear reader, of this attempt at truth seeking, and telling.
Friday, 13 February 2009
Vaccination, Social Violence, & Criminality
Having lived in Australia for several years in the 90s-early oughties, I feel a personal sadness, and anger, at the forest fires raging there now, some having wreaked their havoc, some still a threat. Anger, at the role of arsonists, in these and other such fires. And my anger is not directed simply at them. It is directed at 'the authorities', of various stripes.
Item. Harris L Coulter, PhD - arguably the US's foremost medical historian - in his 1990-published book 'Vaccination, Social Violence and Criminality: The Medical Assault On the American Brain', detailed the case for a whole upsurge of conditions of what were then generically labeled Minimal Brain Damage/Disorder (MBD) being caused by vaccines, and the mass vaccination programs started in the late 40s-50s. Among the symptoms of these conditions were: cruelty to animals; excessive bedwetting; and fire-starting.
Item. The FBI man behind the developing of what has become known as profiling, in interviewing serial killers in prison, was struck by some common themes in their childhoods - so common that he coined an expression: the 'homicidal triad'. These three common traits were...cruelty to animals; excessive bedwetting; and fire-starting.
Item. In their book 'A Mind to Crime' - first published in 1995 - Anne Moir, PhD and David Jessel summarized the research to that date which revealed how "child abusers, domestic murderers, psychopaths, rapists, burglars - all have different kinds of chemical imbalances and brain malfunctions".
'Brain dysfunction' = MBD.
Go figure...
Are vaccines alone responsible for this upsurge in brain dysfunction and consequent massive antisocial behavior in our day and age? No. We're talking about what Dr Coulter calls subclinical encephalitis (also 'post-vaccinal encephalitis'); and encephalitis - BRAIN DAMAGE (literally, inflammation of the brain) - can be caused by other factors. (Indeed, it was the similarity between cases & their symptoms of encephalitis in the 30s, and what started to become a veritable epidemic of similar symptoms in the wake of the mass vaccination programs, that first drew Dr Coulter's attention to this phenomenon, and link.) But vaccines (especially certain ones; and especially the pertussis component of the DPT vaccine) ARE A FACTOR.
And it is long past time that this was recognized, and dealt with, in some responsible way.
P.S. The research summary by Moir & Jessel shows that particular brain disorder patterns (a) can be identified by PET scanning, and (b) are more likely than others to result in the person engaging in antisocial behavior. Thus, those persons can be identified earlier in life, and helped through their potential difficulties. Theirs. And ours.
Sunday, 1 February 2009
Depression-Allopathic med false approach
2009; start of a new year. And uppermost, I find, I need to get something off my chest. It has been occasioned by a personal, 'Real Life' story I read today in the Independent on Sunday's New Review magazine about a young woman's "lovely, lost best friend" who, while on an anti-depressant - after years of being so medicated - drove to a quiet lane, poured a can of petrol over herself, and lit it. Dying shortly thereafter in a burns unit, nearly unrecognisable.
I shall take a moment here, to collect myself, and then proceed.
Questions, questions. And answers, answers.
Depression. Depression - what is called clinical depression - can be caused by a number of things. A wonky thyroid. (Which can be caused by fluoride, which displaces the iodine.) Vaccines. Stress in general - and here we come to the kernel of my anger.
Any physician worth his or her salt should know (notice that I didn't say 'knows') that stress, in particular prolonged stress, increases the nutritional requirements to keep the adrenals functioning properly, especially in the B vitamins and in vitamin C. ("Vitamin C not only increases the production and utilization of cortisone, but also appears to prolong its effectiveness." - Adelle Davis, 'Let's Get Well'.) And speaking of the B complex: another cause of stress is a malnourished diet. Which can come from poor eating habits; but can also come from our modern-day diet, which has been stripped of much of its nutritional value. One cause of that is the over-abundant use of artificial fertilizers, which has leached many nutrients out of the soil, and thus out of the foods grown on that soil. Another cause is the delay between harvesting and eating. And another cause - directly relating to the issue at hand - has been the invention of the high-speed milling process, which strips the B complex out of a large percentage of our bread & other wheat products.
As to that relationship to 'the issue at hand'; again from A Davis's book:
"When too little vitamin B6 (pyridoxin) is obtained, an essential amino acid from complete proteins, tryptophane [sic], is not used normally; instead it is changed into a substance known as xanthurenic acid." This substance damages the pancreas and can cause diabetes; but for our purposes here, the key factor in this statement has to do with the subsequent lowering of levels of tryptophan. For this essential amino acid is the precursor for serotonin; the so-called feel-good neurotransmitter.
What do the major class of anti-depressants do? They artificially increase the levels of serotonin in the brain, by not allowing it to be reabsorbed normally (Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitor, or SSRIs). Besides this not being a normal biochemical process, the question arises: Why the shortage of 'normal' levels of serotonin in the first place?
One answer: A deficiency in the B complex, esp. in B6.
For the want of a nail...
And as to the whole of the B complex: components of this vitamin complex are responsible for our wellbeing in many ways, INCLUDING OUR MENTAL WELLBEING.
Irritability. Apprehension. The feeling of not being able to cope. Mental confusion.
Sound familiar?
There's more to this aspect of our mental wellbeing. For example, magnesium is also a major factor in all this (it decreases the body's need for vitamin B6, and can clear up a lot of these SYMPTOMS OF NUTRITIONAL DEFICIENCIES by itself). And where do we get our magnesium from, mostly? From green leafy vegetables. And who eats their greens well these days?? But I highlight this role of the B complex, and vitamin B6 in particular, in affecting our states of mental wellbeing, to make a point: that it is well-nigh criminal for a medico to treat depression just with a drug, without checking for the factors that could be causing that symptom to appear. Or it will most likely just keep coming back. Because IT IS A SYMPTOM; NOT A DISEASE IN ITS OWN RIGHT.
And thus why I'm so angry. That this approach to our wellbeing has been going on for so long, by a type of medical training - the allopathic school of medicine - that ignores the causative level of conditions, and concentrates rather on treating the symptomatic level of conditions.
Why? One good reason: because of a medical-pharmaceutical complex. And unfortunately, as well, a government component of that complex.
Personally, I prefer the B complex approach to these problems - these problems, of our iatrogenically-induced state of ill-being.
A couple of references (besides the Adelle Davis book referenced herein):
* 'Racketeering in Medicine' by James P. Carter, M.D., Dr. P.H.
* 'The Truth About the Drug Companies' by Marcia Angell, M.D.
Read, and weep, for our country, and far too many individuals therein. Who could be helped, meaningfully, if only we will release our trust in our current medical-profession authorities, and allow the new breed of doctors to take their places - doctors working as well with the likes of naturopathy, and energetic medicine - CAM: Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
And thus will we save our country, and the whole world, from charlatans. The kinds of charlatans who would prescribe, endlessly, drugs for a depressed young woman, without at least as well checking her out for the root cause of her mental condition.
I'll say it again, and end on the note, of calling that sort of person a criminal. I don't care how overworked he or she is. That is a criminal practice. And should be treated as such.
The young woman who wrote about her best friend hoped that some physician somewhere would read her story, and take something of value from it into their medical practice.
I agree. And that would ease my anger. Somewhat.
And confession time: perhaps I feel so strongly about this, because - having been a pre-med in university - I might just as well have been one of those arrogant, hubristic criminals that I now act as an accuser of, if I had stayed on that path in life. I hope I wouldn't have. But who knows. Life plays out its dramas in mysterious ways...
Perhaps, about now, I should be feeling some forgiveness. Sort of, 'they know not what they do'. But they DO know, dammit. Just as they know better than to tell a parent with a child with autism that there's nothing that can be done for the child. They say that, because they are protecting themselves, from the wrath that is building to a boil. 'But we didn't know. All the studies...' Yeah yeah. Nice try. But no cigar. YOU - KNEW. And justice will be served.
Unfortunately, too late for some.
And now I need to let the anger pass, and grieve a little. For all those for whom justice is too late.
But better late than never.
Thursday, 18 December 2008
The Bushes, Clintons & Kennedys: Down the Rabbit Hole of Modern American History
"If the truth be known"....
Where to go on this blog, possibly to round off this year with. Some hot button items to consider. The autism issue, & in relation to a new administration taking over in the US, allowing for the possibility of 'change we can believe in'. The bailout and the Constitution; a serious matter, that, whereby the country is flirting dangerously with 'the rule of men' - relative law; 'pragmatic law', not constitutional law. And we will rue the day - some decades ago, in particular - that we started down that road. But the subject that has my attention at the moment has been occasioned by a recent blog at Capitol Hill Blue, entitled 'Memo to Clinton Fanatics: Leave Caroline Alone'. It has to do with Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg expressing interest in running for the Senate seat being vacated by Hillary, and some Clintonistas trying to disparage the very idea. They see (a fair assumption) a competition issue there. But I see a deeper one; and a very intriguing one, at that.
It's a matter of America having unfinished business from the past; having to do with the Bush and Clinton 'clan' on the one hand, and the Kennedys on the other. And I think I'll go for comment on this matter, to see the year out with. Because America's reconciliation with its past may well take place in this coming year; and this issue - of the battle between these clans - is a key part of that picture.
Where to begin. Well, because the 'matter' between Hillary and Caroline started this line of thinking, I'll start there - with Hillary, and her background.
First, a few, somewhat random pieces to the picture; adding up, hopefully, to a whole picture at the end.
* The suspicious death of former Hillary lover Vincent Foster. 'Suspicious': His body was found deep in some woods near the White House, but the soles of his shoes were perfectly clean. A gun was found near or in his right hand, but - a blow to this carefully orchestrated scenario - he was left handed. A witness, who was in the area at the time, said the reality of the various cars in the parking lot was different from the official story. And what was a Hillary aide looking for in Foster's WH office before the FBI could seal it as a site under investigation?
This 'background' aspect brings up Hillary's time at
* The Rose Law Firm back in Arkansas, where various suspicious activities were taking place during her time there. (Google Arkancide.) And who arranged for her to make a killing on the Chicago Futures Market exchange, and what was the quid pro quo?
This - in general, regarding the Clintons' time in Arkansas - brings up the subject of, in a word:
* Mena. In a couple more words: the Mena, Arkansas airport. Where Bill and Papa Bush were partners - or at least associates - in a drug-running enterprise, drugs coming in to the airport in exchange for guns being smuggled to the Contras in Nicaragua. (Google Barry Seal/Arkancide.)
So the Clintons were involved in criminal activities with the Bushes. At least with Papa Bush. Who was involved in the assassination of JFK. (Google Zapata Petroleum Bush crime family JFK assassination.) And there is some evidence that son George W. was involved, with his dad, in the assassination of John Jr. Whose last flight, and its search aftermath, is the subject of an in-depth video investigative report on the internet, among other interesting allied items (Google John F Kennedy Jr assassination plane crash).
There's more. But this should be enough to consider a case for the accusation: that the Bushes and the Clintons have been involved in criminal activities in the United States, separately and jointly. And need to be brought to justice for their crimes.
To be continued. And to include Hillary's 'business' relationship - alleged - with Michelle Obama. Which connection interfaces with - of all things - 9/11.
As this story gets curiouser and curiouser, the further down the rabbit hole of modern American history one goes, in search of the truth.
That past is not - must not be allowed to be - a closed book; even though some people would prefer it to be.
Who are those people? A hint, from Bill's Inaugural Address, when he paid conspicuous (for those who had eyes to see, and ears to hear) homage to his self-avowed mentor, history professor Carroll Quigley, who wrote, among other books, one called 'Tragedy and Hope', wherein he acknowledged the history-making work of a highly-placed circle - cabal, really - of movers and shakers. And thus did Clinton signal to this crowd - over the heads of most of his listeners - his obeisance to them and their New World Order. Made somewhat notorious in a speech by - you will recall - 'Poppy' Bush.
What goes around, comes around.
Including, ultimately, justice.
And Caroline Kennedy may just be the karmic handmaiden to administer that.
Sunday, 9 November 2008
Questions About Obama
"If the truth be known"...
Here's how I feel about the US elections.
First of all, I want to acknowledge Obama's impressive campaign and oratorical skills. He was, truly, the man of the hour. He deserved the win; and so did America; and so did the world. It was a defining moment in American history, and it helped immensely to put the US on a different path than the toxic one that it was on, in the hands of the neocons and their acolytes in power.
However...
I think the best thing I can do at this point on this blog is to quote (slightly edited) the comment I made, on Nov 7th, on a Comments thread to a blog by Michael Tomasky of the Guardian entitled 'The Transition Has Begun':
"Now that the hoopla of the election is over, and the beginning of the fairytale has moved into the stage of practicalities, I'd like to address one inconvenient question. It has to do with Obama's birth certificate.
"Michael, you said in your op-ed column in the Guardian's Nov 3 edition, regarding 'the swift-boating of Obama' not working, that one example was the charge 'that he's not really a citizen of the US (disproved over the weekend by birth registrars in the state of Hawaii)...'. Since when did you, especially as a journalist, and all your other MSM fraternity mates, decide to buy a pig in a poke? All that I can find on the internet is that the spokeswoman said there was a 'valid' copy of his birth certificate on file. But a 'valid' copy of what, precisely? It has been pointed out on the internet that - at least in Hawaii - there is a difference between a Certificate of Live Birth and a Certification of Live Birth, and that the document released by the Obama camp website is a document that the state of Hawaii also produces for children who were not actually born there.
"Not to put too fine a point on this; let me just summarize the case for the prosecution: that he was actually born in Kenya - as attested to by his paternal grandmother - when his mother wasn't allowed to travel by air back to Hawaii because of her advanced state of pregnancy; and that they returned as soon as they could, so that she could register his birth there, under the circumstances that obtained in Hawaii, in order for him to have US citizenship. (Question at this point: the Guardian, in reporting on reactions around the world to Obama's election, interviewed 'Mama Sarah' - his step-grandmother. Why didn't they, or anybody in the media, interview his paternal grandmother herself?)
"How could this matter not have been uncovered before this? Surely the Repub camp would have investigated the rumours? Well, the report is that they did send investigators to Kenya. Then...two possible outcomes:
(1) They found no proof of his birth there, and let the matter go; and
(2) They found proof of it, and let the matter go.
"Why the latter possibility? Suggestion: because their own man's birth is questionable in terms of the Constitutional requirements, and this issue would open up a whole can of worms. (Why is it questionable? He was born of US citizens - but on a military base in another country. It was not US soil; it was leased land from another sovereign. Even some in the Repub camp have said it could be a legitimately debatable point.)
[N.B. Later edit: There is evidence that he wasn't even born on the base, but in the town hospital. Which makes his case even weaker.]
"I bring this up because the issue has not been resolved sufficiently. There are even a number of lawsuits currently wending their way through the judicial process in the States, on this very point: that Obama has yet to produce his 'vault' copy of his birth certificate (which would contain such info as the doctor in attendance, the hospital at which he was born, etc).
"Why?
"Isn't that a legitimate investigative-journalist question? And if so, why has it not been followed up on properly by the MSM? Because it might produce An Inconvenient Truth??"
********
This issue is not going to go away. Nor should it. Why; if he has been such an overwhelming favourite in the race, and it feels so good to have him there, and isn't it just a mere technicality anyway?
Because of one main reason, with a secondary reason to it. Second things first: because he was not all that "overwhelming" a favourite. He won the popular vote by ab. 52-47%. Not 51-49, granted; but close. It APPEARED from the MSM that he was the "overwhelming favorite". But a lot of people voted against him, even though McCain wasn't that solid an opponent - even though McCain/Palin wasn't that solid a ticket. (Some of that was obviously racial. But some of that was also due to legitimate concerns about what he meant precisely by 'change'.)
But the main reason is because of the main concern about Bush that had developed during his tenure: that he was beginning to evidence the danger of the rule of men over the rule of law. That if the law is cut down and tossed out, there is nothing to stand in the way of a tyrant ruling the land.
It is at least as recent a warning as that portrayed in the play, and then film, of A Man for All Seasons, with Thomas More standing up to the King of England; and at least as old a warning as that given by Cicero, during the rise of Caesar, and the collapse of the Roman Republic. And of other examples in history. Including that of Adolf "I am the law" Hitler. And Stalin, who remarked that it doesn't matter who votes, but who counts the votes.
And I especially point this out because of a couple of factors in particular regarding Obama.
(1) During his campaign he spoke of the desirability of a having a "civilian national security force just as powerful as the military". (For 'Homeland Security'. But I took note of this call in the light of a video on YouTube showing some young black men, in a uniform of sorts, swearing fealty to Obama. Not America. Obama.)
(2) In the last days of the campaign a recording surfaced of a radio interview with Obama back in 2001, when he was a State senator. He was talking about the limitations of the Constitution; that it contained "negative liberties" - what the state couldn't do to the citizenry, such as take away their freedom of speech, etc - but never spoke of "what the federal government must do on your behalf".
What the federal government must do on your behalf...Presumably meaning things like universal health care. And. And...that is, a Marxist/socialist perspective.*
He also spoke in it of the value of the law being a respecter of persons, ie, rulings for the 'downtrodden' simply because they are the minority, or a liberally-minded protected category; and that "empathy" and "heart" would be "the criteria by which I would select my judges" - if he ever got the chance.
Fancy that. Here we are.
I am saying that there are some authoritarian tendencies here, that need to be watched carefully; in order that America doesn't get moved away from authoritarianism - and possible outright fascism - on the right, only to succumb to authoritarianism - and possible outright socialism - on the left. By people who believe that 'the law' is a malleable thing. Personified by "just a goddamn piece of paper".
Do I think Obama would do such a thing?
I don't know. He seems a reasonable, realistic, pragmatic person. But - don't we know - power corrupts. And absolute power corrupts absolutely.
And we've had enough of that sort of thing to last us a few lifetimes.
* The Guardian, some days into 'the Transition' period, quoted a young woman exclaiming excitedly that she wouldn't "have to pay my mortgage now! Obama will do it for me!"
Well; the wiseacres who put us in this mess - to make their quotas, and fees, and bonuses, from bosses who put them up to it - have certainly made it look as though someone else will carry the can regarding (toxic) mortgages...
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