I find myself unable to adequately put into words what I feel when I read posts like the following.
Contained within the blog posts lines are a myriad of issues.
Economics, religion, faith, Christianity, cultural trends, fads, race, church…the list goes on
I have my own set of conclusions & thoughts but I’d like to know what some of you folk who call yerselves followers of Jesus think…
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Wow, never read lyrics for Billy Ocean “Suddenly”, but gotta say…that’s some serious corn…
I used to think that love was just a fairy tale
Until that first hello until that first smile
But if I had to do it all again I wouldn’t change a thing
Cause this love is everlasting
Suddenly life has new meaning to me
There’s beauty up above and things we never take notice of
You wake up suddenly you’re in love
Girl you’re everything a man could want and more
One thousand words are not enough to say what I feel inside
Holding hands as we walk along the shore
Never felt like this before now you’re all I’m living for
Each day I pray this love affair would last forever
There’s beauty up above and things you never take notice of
You wake and suddenly you’re in love
I’m not saying I know it all, but this is certainly
1) a story I’ve NEVER heard
and
2) very interesting, in that it underscores what many of us who dislike the notion of mandatory redistribution of wealth have been lamenting for a couple years now…
*disclaimer I haven’t listened to Rush regularly for years & years..
I’m just saying history is history, no matter who it’s recited by.
</disclaimer>
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2011/11/23/the_real_story_of_thanksgiving
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Now time for a tradition, an annual tradition, and that is The Real Story of Thanksgiving from my book that I wrote back in the early nineties. I wrote two of them, actually. In one of the books I wrote, The Real Story of Thanksgiving. And reading from it has become something we do every year on the program because it’s still not taught. The myth of Thanksgiving is still what is taught, and that myth is basically that a bunch of thieves from Europe arrived quite by accident at Plymouth Rock, and if it weren’t for the Indians showing them how to grow corn and slaughter turkeys and how to swallow and stuff, that they would have died of starvation and so forth. The Indians were great — and then, in a total show of appreciation, we totally wiped out the Indians!
We took their country from ‘em. We started racism, sexism, bigotry, homophobia; spread syphilis; and, basically, destroyed the environment. That is the multicultural version of Thanksgiving, and it simply isn’t true. The real version of Thanksgiving is in my second best-seller, 2.5 million copies in hardback: See, I Told You So. “Chapter 6, Dead White Guys, or What the History Books Never Told You: The True Story of Thanksgiving — The story of the Pilgrims begins in the early part of the seventeenth century … The Church of England under King James I was persecuting anyone and everyone who did not recognize its absolute civil and spiritual authority. Those who challenged ecclesiastical authority and those who believed strongly in freedom of worship were hunted down, imprisoned, and sometimes executed for their beliefs.” In England.
So, “A group of separatists first fled to Holland and established a community. After eleven years, about forty of them agreed to make a perilous journey to the New World, where they would certainly face hardships, but could live and worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences. On August 1, 1620, the Mayflower set sail. It carried a total of 102 passengers, including forty Pilgrims led by William Bradford. On the journey, Bradford set up an agreement, a contract, that established just and equal laws for all members of the new community, irrespective of their religious beliefs. Where did the revolutionary ideas expressed in the Mayflower Compact come from? From the Bible. The Pilgrims were a people completely steeped in the lessons of the Old and New Testaments. They looked to the ancient Israelites for their example.
“And, because of the biblical precedents set forth in Scripture, they never doubted that their experiment would work. But this was no pleasure cruise, friends. The journey to the New World was a long and arduous one. And when the Pilgrims landed in New England in November, they found — according to Bradford’s detailed journal — a cold, barren, desolate wilderness.” The New York Jets had just lost to the Patriots. “There were no friends to greet them, he wrote.” I just threw that in about the Jets and Patriots. “There were no houses to shelter them. There were no inns where they could refresh themselves. And the sacrifice they had made for freedom was just beginning. During the first winter, half the Pilgrims — including Bradford’s own wife — died of either starvation, sickness or exposure. When spring finally came, Indians taught the settlers how to plant corn, fish for cod and skin beavers for coats.
“Life improved for the Pilgrims, but they did not yet prosper! This is important to understand because this is where modern American history lessons often end. Thanksgiving is actually explained in some textbooks as a holiday for which the Pilgrims gave thanks to the Indians for saving their lives, rather than as a devout expression of gratitude grounded in the tradition of” the Bible, “both the Old and New Testaments. Here is the part that has been omitted: The original contract the Pilgrims had entered into with their merchant-sponsors in London called for everything they produced to go into a common store, and each member of the community was entitled to one common share. All of the land they cleared and the houses they built belonged to the community as well.” Everything belonged to everybody. “They were going to distribute it equally. All of the land they cleared and the houses they built belonged to the community as well.
“Nobody owned anything.” It was a forerunner of Occupy Wall Street. Seriously. “They just had a share in it,” but nobody owned anything. “It was a commune, folks.” The original pilgrim settlement was a commune. “It was the forerunner to the communes we saw in the ’60s and ’70s out in California,” and Occupy Wall Street, “and it was complete with organic vegetables, by the way.” There’s no question they were organic vegetables. What else could they be? “Bradford, who had become the new governor of the colony, recognized that this form of collectivism was as costly and destructive to the Pilgrims as that first harsh winter, which had taken so many lives. He decided to take bold action. Bradford assigned a plot of land to each family to work and manage,” as they saw fit, and, “thus turning loose the power of the marketplace. That’s right. Long before Karl Marx was even born, the Pilgrims had discovered and experimented with what could only be described as socialism.
“And what happened? It didn’t work!” They nearly starved! “It never has worked! What Bradford and his community found was that the most creative and industrious people had no incentive to work any harder than anyone else, unless they could utilize the power of personal motivation! But while most of the rest of the world has been experimenting with socialism for well over a hundred years — trying to refine it, perfect it, and re-invent it — the Pilgrims decided early on to scrap it permanently. What Bradford wrote about this social experiment should be in every schoolchild’s history lesson. If it were, we might prevent much needless suffering in the future.” If it were, there wouldn’t be any Occupy Wall Street. There wouldn’t be any romance for it.
“The experience that we had in this common course and condition,’” Bradford wrote. “‘The experience that we had in this common course and condition tried sundry years…that by taking away property, and bringing community into a common wealth, would make them happy and flourishing — as if they were wiser than God,’ Bradford wrote.” This was his way of saying, it didn’t work, we thought we were smarter than everybody, everybody was gonna share equally, nobody was gonna have anything more than anything else, it was gonna be hunky-dory, kumbaya. Except it doesn’t work. Because of half of them didn’t work, maybe more. They depended on the others to do all the work. There was no incentive.
“‘For this community [so far as it was] was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For young men that were most able and fit for labor and service did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children without any recompense,’” without being paid for it, “‘that was thought injustice.’” They figured it out real quick. Half the community is not working — living off the other half, that is. Resentment built. Why should you work for other people when you can’t work for yourself? that’s what he was saying. So the Pilgrims found that people could not be expected to do their best work without incentive. So what did Bradford’s community try next? They unharnessed the power of good old free enterprise by invoking the under-girding capitalistic principle of private property.
“Every family was assigned its own plot of land to work and permitted to market its own crops and products. And what was the result? ‘This had very good success,’ wrote Bradford, ‘for it made all hands industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been.’ … Is it possible that supply-side economics could have existed before the 1980s? Yes,” it did. “Now, this is where it gets really good, folks, if you’re laboring under the misconception that I was, as I was taught in school. So they set up trading posts and exchanged goods with the Indians.” This is what happened. After everybody had their own plot of land and were allowed to market it and develop it as they saw fit and got to keep what they produced, bounty, plenty resulted.
“And then they set up trading posts, stores. They exchanged goods with and sold the Indians things. Good old-fashioned commerce. They sold stuff. And there were profits because they were screwing the Indians with the price. I’m just throwing that in. No, there were profits, and, “The profits allowed them to pay off their debts to the merchants in London.” The Canarsie tribe showed up and they paid double, which is what made the Canarsie tribe screw us in the “Manna-hatin” deal years later. (I just threw that in.) They paid off the merchant sponsors back in London with their profits, they were selling goods and services to the Indians. “[T]he success and prosperity of the Plymouth settlement attracted more Europeans,” what was barren was now productive, “and began what came to be known as the ‘Great Puritan Migration.’
But this story stops when the Indians taught the newly arrived suffering-in-socialism Pilgrims how to plant corn and fish for cod. That’s where the original Thanksgiving story stops, and the story basically doesn’t even begin there. The real story of Thanksgiving is William Bradford giving thanks to God,” the pilgrims giving thanks to God, “for the guidance and the inspiration to set up a thriving colony,” for surviving the trip, for surviving the experience and prospering in it. “The bounty was shared with the Indians.” That’s the story. “They did sit down” and they did have free-range turkey and organic vegetables. There were no trans fats, “but it was not the Indians who saved the day. It was capitalism and Scripture which saved the day,” as acknowledged by George Washington in his first Thanksgiving Proclamation in 1789, which I also have here.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I want to quickly tell you about one passenger on the Mayflower, a guy named Francis Eaton. He was a carpenter. He was not one of the Pilgrims. He was another passenger. He was a carpenter. He died in 1633, 13 years after they landed at Plymouth, and here’s what he left in his will: “One cow, one calf, two hogs, 50 bushels of corn, a black suit, a white hat, a black hat, boots, saws, hammers, square augers, a chisel, fishing lead, and some kitchen items” and his season tickets for the Redskins-Cowboys game. No, no, seriously. This is the estate of one of the men who probably built many of the houses for the first settlers. Very modest. But it shows what he saw as wealth back then. By the way, the life expectancy back then was not much. Not compared to today. And just remember, they were not eating trans fats, and they didn’t live as long as we do today.
END TRANSCRIPT
http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/print_documents/v1ch16s1.html
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By Dr. Mercola
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends a yearly flu vaccine as “the first and most important step in protecting against flu viruses.”
This advice applies to everyone 6 months of age and older, and the CDC stresses that you “should get a flu vaccine as soon as [they] are available.”
With a promotion this strong, you might assume that getting a flu shot is a “sure thing” to protect you from all flu-like illness this year, but actually it’s not.
Not even close.
During the “flu season,” doctors and patients alike often attribute respiratory illness to “the flu” or influenza viruses when they most of the time flu-like symtpoms are actually associated with other types of viruses and bacteria.
The only way to know for sure what type of virus or bacteria is causing flu-ike symptoms is to have it lab confirmed.
The seasonal influenza vaccine only contains three strains of type A or type B influenza, which U.S. and WHO health officials select each year as the most likely influenza strains that will circulate around the world.
There are many influenza strains and most cases of flu-like illness that occur in the U.S. during a typical flu season are not associated with type A or type B influenza strains.
So, it is important to remember that, when you feel like you have the “flu,” you can’t automatically assume that your flu symptoms are caused by type A or type B influenza strains included in the seasonal flu vaccine. Also, people who do get a flu shot every year cannot automatically assume they will not get sick with either type A or type B influenza or another respiratory iillness that looks and feels like influenza.
A new study in The Lancet Infectious Diseases reveals that the flu vaccine prevents lab confirmed type A or type B influenza in only 1.5 out of every 100 vaccinated adults … but the media is reporting this to mean “60 percent effective.”
It is estimated that, annually, only about 2.7% of adults get type A or type B influenza in the first place. The study showed that the use of flu vaccines appear to drop this down to about 1.2%. This is a roughly 60% drop, but that ignores the fact that the vaccine has no protective health benefit for 97.5% of adults.
The researchers’ own conclusions are also somewhat more lackluster in their tone than the media would have you believe:
“Influenza vaccines can provide moderate protection against virologically confirmed influenza, but such protection is greatly reduced or absent in some seasons. Evidence for protection in adults aged 65 years or older is lacking.”
So where is the 60% effectiveness claim coming from? This number is based on relative risk, and it does not mean that 59 out of 100 people who get the flu shot will be protected against the flu … allow me to explain.
Some clinical trials are only able to show a meaningful benefit because they focus on relative risk reduction rather than absolute risk reduction. What’s the difference? You can find a very simple explanation of relative risk vs. absolute risk at the Annie Appleseed Project web site, but let me sum it up here.
- Relative risk reduction is calculated by dividing the absolute risk reduction by the control event rate
- Absolute risk reduction is the decrease in risk of a treatment in relation to a control treatment
In plain English, here’s what that means: let’s say you have a study of 200 women, half of whom take a drug and half take a placebo, to examine the effect on breast cancer risk. After five years, two women in the drug group develop breast cancer, compared to four who took the placebo. This data could lead to either of the following headlines, and both would be correct:
“New Miracle Drug Cuts Breast Cancer Risk by 50%!”
“New Drug Results in 2% Drop in Breast Cancer Risk!”
How can this be?
The Annie Appleseed Project explains:
“The headlines represent two different ways to express the same data. The first headline expresses the relative risk reduction — the two women who took the drug (subjects) and developed breast cancer equal half the number (50%) of the four women who took the placebo (controls) and developed breast cancer.
The second headline expresses the absolute risk reduction — 2% of the subjects (2 out of 100) who took the drug developed breast cancer and 4% of the controls (4 out of 100) who took the placebo developed breast cancer — an absolute difference of 2% (4% minus 2%).”
You can now see why clinical trials, especially those funded by drug companies, will cite relative risk reductions rather than absolute risk reductions, and as a patient you need to be aware that statistics can be easily manipulated.
As STATS at George Mason University explains:
“An important feature of relative risk is that it tells you nothing about the actual risk.”
As stated previsously, each year the flu shot contains three influenza viruses — one influenza A (H3N2) virus, one seasonal influenza A (H1N1) virus, and one influenza B virus. It only has a chance of preventing you from getting a flu-like respiratory illness during the flu season IF you so happen to be infected with one of these three specific influenza viruses.
In the United States, federal health officials at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are in charge of selecting which viruses to include in seasonal flu vaccine, a process that is based on international “surveillance-based forecasts about what viruses are most likely to cause illness in the coming season.” U.S. health officials works with World Health Organization (WHO) health officials to come up with projectons about which three type A or type B infuenza viruses should be included in seasonal influenza vaccine each year.
In other words, it’s an educated guess.
As you might suspect, getting a “good match” between the chosen vaccine virus strains and the actual influenza viruses that do end up circulating and causing most of the type A or type B influenza in the U.S. and around the world is challenging.
As the CDC notes:
“There are a number of factors that can make getting a good vaccine virus strain for vaccine production challenging, including both scientific issues and issues of timing. Currently, only viruses grown in eggs can be used as vaccine virus strains. If specimens have been grown in other cell lines, they cannot be used for vaccine strains.
However, more and more laboratories do not use eggs to grow influenza viruses, making it difficult to obtain potential vaccine strains. In addition, some influenza viruses, like H3N2 viruses, grow poorly in eggs, making it even more difficult to obtain possible vaccine strains.
In terms of timing, in some years certain influenza viruses may not circulate until later in the influenza season, or a virus can change late in the season or from one season to the next. This can make it difficult to forecast which viruses will predominate the following season, but it can also make it difficult to identify a vaccine virus strain in time for the production process to begin.”
When you add to this gamble, the little-known fact that, according to the CDC, only about 20 percent of flu-like illnesses are actually caused by influenza type A or B, you realize how limited an effect the flu vaccine has on keeping people well during the flu season. Too many people assume that all flu-like illness is caused by influenza viruses when the truth is that about 80 percent of flu-like illness is NOT caused by type A or type B influenza. Most flu-like symptoms are actually associated with more than 200 other bugs that can make you feel just as sick — respiratory syncytial virus, bocavirus, coronavirus, and rhinovirus, to name a few.
What this means is that if you think you have the flu, odds are five to one that you actually don’t have the flu but a flu-like virus, against which the flu shot is absolutely worthless!
Lisa Jackson, a physician and senior investigator with the Group Health Research Center in Seattle, found that healthy people tend to choose flu vaccination, while the “frail elderly” didn’t or couldn’t. Her research suggested that flu vaccine itself does not reduce mortality at all.
Healthy (and health-conscious) people tend to get the vaccine AND come down with influenza less often, not because of the vaccine itself but because they are healthier to start with.
Jackson concluded:
“The reductions in risk before influenza season indicate preferential receipt of vaccine by relatively healthy seniors… the magnitude of the bias demonstrated by the associations before the influenza season was sufficient to account entirely for the associations observed during influenza season.”
Unfortunately, Jackson’s papers were turned down for publication in the leading medical journals, even though her hypothesis makes perfect sense.
Every day you’re around viruses and bacteria and, when you’re healthy, you usually don’t get sick. But even if you do get sick, most healthy adults and children will not have serious problems moving through and recovering from influenza or other flu-like illnesses. If you do come down with influenza and have a good immune response, you will likely recover quickly without serious complications, as well as obtain natural immunity to that strain of influenza and to similar ones.
As an aside, this is one more health benefit to achieving immunity naturally by experiencing and recovering from normal infectious diseases, such as influenza.
Vaccine-acquired immunity is temporary, which is why even though the viruses in this season’s flu vaccine are the same viruses that were selected for the 2010-2011 influenza vaccine, the CDC is still recommending you get vaccinated again, even if you got the vaccine last year. The immunity that healthy individuals get by recovering from influenza naturally is usually much longer lasting.
Vaccine effectiveness simply cannot be taken at face value, and this applies not only to the flu vaccine but also to other diseases, like measles. Measles cases have greatly increased in parts of Canada and the United States this year. Although unvaccinated children and teens are often blamed for driving the high numbers, a recent investigation into a measles outbreak in a high school found that about half of the cases were in teens who had received the recommended two doses of vaccine in childhood.
In other words, many of the cases were among those whom health authorities would have expected to have been protected from the measles virus. Conventional medical wisdom states that the measles vaccine should protect against measles infection about 99 percent of the time.
“So the discovery that 52 of the 98 teens who caught measles were fully vaccinated came as a shock to the researchers who conducted the investigation … If other groups confirm what the Quebec investigation found, it could mean there is a lot more susceptibility to measles in the vaccinated population than is currently being assumed.”
In the United States, the minimum age for the first dose of measles vaccine is recommended as 12 months, but this may actually render the vaccine ineffective. If a breastfed child is given a measles vaccine too early, their mother’s antibodies transferred to the baby via breast milk (which also protect the baby from measles disease naturally), canl interfere with the baby obtaining measles vaccine strain virus induced antibodies. It was, in fact, due to a high rate of measles vaccine failure that a second dose of MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine was introduced in the United States in 1991.
As noted by the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC):
“An MMR vaccine manufacturer states that in a study of 279 children 11 months to 7 years of age, MMR vaccine was shown to be 95 to 99 percent effective. Protection is estimated to persist for up to 11 years. In a measles outbreak in the U.S. in the late 1980′s and early 1990′s, it was found that there were a significant number of vaccine failures in older children, teenagers and adults, when the disease can be more severe. The government proceeded to recommend that a second MMR shot be given to boost immunity either before entrance to kindergarten or before entrance to junior high school.
In the national outbreak of measles during the late 1980′s and early 1990′s, it also became apparent that children who had been vaccinated before 15 months of age were also at risk for vaccine failure, especially if their mothers had recovered naturally from measles disease as children.
An MMR vaccine manufacturer states “Infants who are less than 15 months of age may fail to respond to the measles component of the vaccine due to presence in the circulation of residual measles antibody of maternal origin, the younger the infant, the lower the likelihood of seroconversion.” The manufacturer goes on to advise that infants vaccinated at less than 12 months of age will have to be revaccinated after 15 months of age even though “there is some evidence to suggest that infants immunized at less than one year of age may not develop sustained antibody levels when later immunized.”"
Quite simply, vaccines do not confer the same type of immunity that exposure to the actual disease does …
Typically, vaccine promoters will stress the importance of compliance with the vaccine schedule that requires multiple doses of a vaccine in order to create and maintain vaccine induced “herd immunity,” because a vaccine is never 100 percent effective. However, they never quite seem to be able to explain why the majority of outbreaks occur in areas that are thought to HAVE herd immunity status, i.e. where the majority of people are vaccinated and “should” therefore never get the disease.
The problem is that there is, in fact, such a thing as natural herd immunity. But what has happened is that public health officials have taken this natural phenomenon and assumed that vaccine induced herd immunity is the same as disease induced herd immunity and it is not the same. The science clearly shows that there’s a big difference between naturally developed herd immunity and vaccine-induced herd immunity in a population.
To learn more, I urge you to listen to the video above, in which Barbara Loe Fisher and I discuss the concept of herd immunity.
“The original concept of herd immunity is that when a population experiences the natural disease… natural immunity would be achieved – a robust, qualitatively superior natural herd immunity within the population, which would then protect other people from getting the disease in other age groups. It’s the way infectious diseases work…” Barbara explains. “But the vaccinologists have adopted this idea of vaccine induced herd immunity.
The problem with it is that all vaccines only confer temporary protection… Pertussis vaccine is one the best examples… Pertussis vaccines have been used for about 50 to 60 years, and the organism has started to evolve to become vaccine resistant. I think this is not something that’s really understood generally by the public: Vaccines do not confer the same type of immunity that natural exposure to the disease does.”
Vaccine professionals would like you to believe they are the same, but they’re qualitatively two entirely different types of immune responses.
“In most cases natural exposure to disease would give you a longer lasting, more robust, qualitatively superior immunity because it gives you both cell mediated immunity and humoral immunity,” Barbara explains. “Humoral is the antibody production. The way you measure vaccine-induced immunity is by how high the antibody titers are. (How many antibodies you have, basically.)
But the problem is that cell mediated immunity is very important as well. Most vaccines evade cell mediated immunity and go straight for the antibodies, which is only one part of immunity. That’s been the big problem with the production of vaccines.”
The latest study showing the incredibly minimal benefit of the flu vaccine is in line with past research that has also concluded that flu vaccines appear to have very limited measurable benefits for children, adults or seniors.
The Cochrane Database Review—which is the gold standard for assessing the scientific evidence for the effectiveness of commonly used medical interventions — published the following telling statistics:
“Over 200 viruses cause influenza and influenza-like illness, which produce the same symptoms (fever, headache, aches and pains, cough and runny noses). Without laboratory tests, doctors cannot tell the two illnesses apart. Both last for days and rarely lead to death or serious illness. At best, vaccines might be effective against only influenza A and B, which represent about 10 percent of all circulating viruses. Each year, the World Health Organization recommends which viral strains should be included in vaccinations for the forthcoming season.
Authors of this review assessed all trials that compared vaccinated people with unvaccinated people. The combined results of these trials showed that under ideal conditions (vaccine completely matching circulating viral configuration) 33 healthy adults need to be vaccinated to avoid one set of influenza symptoms.
In average conditions (partially matching vaccine) 100 people need to be vaccinated to avoid one set of influenza symptoms.
Vaccine use did not affect the number of people hospitalized or working days lost but caused one case of Guillian-Barré syndrome [GBS] (a major neurological condition leading to paralysis) for every one million vaccinations.”
Is it really worth risking the health and well-being of 100 people in order to prevent ONE case of the flu, which may or may not result in serious illness or death in that one individual to begin with?
While infants and young children are at greatest risk, no one is exempt from the potential serious complications of vaccination, one of which is GBS.
In the video profile of vaccine injury above, Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of NVIC, interviews a Connecticut artist and her mother, a former professor of nursing, who developed Guillaine-Barre syndrome after getting a seasonal flu shot in 2008 and today is permanently disabled with total body paralysis. This family has chosen to share their heartbreaking story to help those who have had the same experience feel less alone, and to educate others about what it means to be vaccine injured.
What happened to this family is a potent reminder of just how important it is to make well-informed decisions about vaccinations.
Avoiding influenza and flu-like illness during the flu season or any season doesn’t require a flu vaccine. By following the simple guidelines below, you can help keep your immune system in optimal working order so that you’re far less likely to get sick or, if you do get sick, you are better prepared to move through it without complications and soon return to good health.
- Optimize your vitamin D levels. As I’ve previously reported, optimizing your vitamin D levels is one of the absolute best strategies for avoiding infections of ALL kinds, and vitamin D deficiency is likely the TRUE culprit behind the seasonality of the flu — not the flu virus itself. This is probably the single most important and least expensive action you can take. Regularly monitor your vitamin D levels to confirm your levels are within the therapeutic range of 50-70 ng/ml.
Ideally, you’ll want to get all your vitamin D from sun exposure or a safe tanning bed, but as a last resort you can take an oral vitamin D3 supplement. According to the latest review by Carole Baggerly (Grassrootshealth.org), adults need about 8,000 IU’s a day.
- Avoid Sugar, Fructose and Processed Foods. Sugar impairs the function of your immune system almost immediately, and as you likely know, a healthy immune system is one of the most important keys to fighting off viruses and other illness. Be aware that sugar is present in foods you may not suspect, like ketchup and fruit juice.
- Get Enough Rest. Just like it becomes harder for you to get your daily tasks done if you’re tired, if your body is overly fatigued it will be harder for it to fight the flu. Be sure to check out my article Guide to a Good Night’s Sleep for some great tips to help you get quality rest.
- Have Effective Tools to Address Stress . We all face some stress every day, but if stress becomes overwhelming then your body will be less able to fight off the flu and other illness. If you feel that stress is taking a toll on your health, consider using an energy psychology tool such as the Emotional Freedom Technique, which is remarkably effective in relieving stress associated with all kinds of events, from work to family to trauma.
- Exercise. When you exercise, you increase your circulation and your blood flow throughout your body. The components of your immune system are also better circulated, which means your immune system has a better chance of finding an illness before it spreads.
- Take a Good Source of Animal-Based Omega-3 Fats. Increase your intake of healthy and essential fats like the omega-3 found in krill oil, which is crucial for maintaining health. It is also crucial to avoid excessive and/or oxidized omega-6 fatty acids, as well as trans fatty acids commonly found in processed foods, as they will seriously damage your immune response.
- Wash Your Hands. Washing your hands will decrease your likelihood of spreading a virus to your nose, mouth or other people. Be sure you don’t use antibacterial soap for this — antibacterial soaps are completely unnecessary, and they cause far more harm than good. Instead, identify a simple chemical-free soap that you can switch your family to.
- Use Natural Antibiotics. Examples include colloidal silver, oil of oregano, and garlic. These work like broad-spectrum antibiotics against bacteria, viruses, and protozoa in your body. And unlike pharmaceutical antibiotics, they do not appear to lead to resistance.
- Avoid Hospitals. I’d recommend you stay away from hospitals unless you’re having an emergency and need expert medical care, as hospitals are prime breeding grounds for infectious microorganisms of all kinds. The best place to get plenty of rest and recover from illness that is not life-threatening is usually in the comfort of your own home.
So, today’s Saab story: after getting stranded with Levi at a gas station with the
contents of my cooling system on the ground, today I’m actually pleased
to have found the problem.
Could have been waaay more expensive a part.
This gem reminds me of the old days when we’d try & catch a wink with our
heads stuck in the B/N hood on the A6..
http://www.gadgetizer.com/2011/07/28/you-can-finally-sleep-at-your-desk-with-the-ostrich-pillow/
It’s a good thing this gem was edited , cause let me tell ya, he peels the paint off the walls with his…colorful metaphors.
And that’s coming from a Navy guy..
However…I dare say, this is likely what many people in this great nation think & feel, who consider themselves rational, thinking, traditionally-minded folk.
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Most parents dutifully take their infants to the doctor or clinic at the prescribed times to be vaccinated. Generally, it doesn’t occur to them to question this public health institution. However, growing numbers of doctors, scientists and parents have become suspicious about the long-term implications of what some consider a national experiment posturing as solid science. It could be said that the development of immunization theory has been compromised by the theory’s very successes.
The history of vaccines does indeed have some glorious chapters. In 1796, British country doctor Edward Jenner formulated a vaccine that led to the global eradication in our time of the deadly smallpox virus. A century later, French chemist Louis Pasteur formulated a vaccine against rabies and even foresaw serums made from nonliving substances that would one day materialize as synthetic, chemical vaccines.1
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Every time I see a piece on the danger of everyday household chemicals that we ingest, apply, breathe etc I want to cringe.
Why? Because-
a. I believe there IS a very present and credible silent health epidemic going on that most folks aren’t even aware of.
b. I myself, continue day after day for the most part, doing the same thing..applying chemicals on, in my body that I at the VERY least, question if they’re cancer causing.
Here’s a perfect example of what I’m talking about:
…..For example, take Aluminum. To reach the brain, aluminum must pass the blood-brain barrier, an elaborate structure that filters the blood to prevent toxic elements from entering the brain. This filtration system developed over a long period of time for our protection. Elemental aluminum doesn’t easily pass this barrier, but aluminum compounds found in many consumable products do.
Aspirin is commonly buffered with aluminum hydroxide or glycinate. If you drink some orange juice, the citric acid in it transforms these compounds into aluminum citrate – 5 times better able to find its way to the brain. And many consumable products besides Aspirin contain citric acid.
Now, if the aluminum in food combines with maltol, a sugar-like additive used in many baked goods, its capacity to pass the blood-brain barrier increases by as much as 90 times! How can you possibly know when you might use a product that will react negatively with another you just used?
The Dangers of DEA
One of the most common-and potentially toxic-compounds commonly found in personal care products is DEA (diethanolomine). Formulated into soaps, detergents and surfactants, it is found in over 600 home and personal care products. The shampoo and soap you use probably includes it.
Belonging to a class of chemicals known as alkanolamines (which includes monoethanolamine and triethanolamine or TEA), DEA has been linked with kidney, liver, and other organ damage according to several government-funded research studies, and has been proven to cause cancer in rats when applied to the skin.
According to a 1995 study funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, DEA has low acute toxicity but significant cumulative toxicity. This is because it cannot be easily excreted from the body but instead builds up in the fatty tissues of the liver, brain, kidneys, and spleen with repeated oral and dermal exposure. As DEA collects in the tissues, it spurs an accumulation of abnormal phospholipids that can lead to mounting tissue and nerve damage and premature death (Matthew et al., 1995).
Another study found that oral and topical application of DEA in rodents resulted in anemia, kidney degeneration, and nerve damage to the brain and spinal cord (Melnick et al., 1994). Even more disturbing was that several animals died before the study ended. The authors concluded, “DEA is toxic at multiple organ sites in rats, either by oral exposure in the drinking water or by topical application.”
In 1995, Steinman and Epstein stated,
“The FDA accepts that the presence of DEA and TEA in cosmetics can pose a significant consumer health threat. In the 1970s it published a notice in the Federal Register in which it urged the industry to remove these products from cosmetics.”
In spite of this, DEA is still one of the most common cosmetic and hair care ingredients. Approximately 200 million pounds of DEA are produced annually in the U.S., most of which goes into personal care products as emulsifiers, thickeners, and wetting agents (USITC, 1990). Despite its heavy use, however, research indicates that this compound may be highly toxic.
Are You Washing Your Hair and Brushing Your Teeth With
Anti-Freeze, Engine Degreasers, and Chemical Solvents?Many other potentially toxic petrochemicals are found in commercial personal care products. Some quarternium compounds, like behentrimonium chloride, can be fatal if ingested and can cause necrosis (tissue death) of the mucus membranes in concentrations as low as one percent. Moreover, some synthetic colors, such as FD & C Blue No. 1, are suspected carcinogens (cancer causing agents). Other studies have shown that the popular food additive, Yellow Dye #5, can instigate asthmatic breathing.
Here are a few other ingredients commonly found in shampoo, conditioner, and soap:
Propylene Glycol (also called Propanediol) – A colorless, viscous, hygroscopic liquid used in anti-freeze solutions, in brake and hydraulic fluids, as a de-icer, and as a solvent. It’s even found in some pet foods, processed foods and cosmetics, toothpastes, shampoos, deodorants and lotions.It is implicated in contact dermatitis, kidney damage and liver abnormalities. It can inhibit skin cell growth in human tests, can cause gastro-intestinal disturbances, nausea, headache and vomiting, central nervous system depression and can damage cell membranes causing rashes, dry skin and surface damage (according to the Material Safety Data Sheet).
Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) or Sodium Laureth Sulfate (SLES)-Used as a surfactant to break down the surface tension of water. It is used in concrete floor cleaners, engine degreasers, car wash detergents, and just about every soap and shampoo on the market. And yet, according to the Journal of the American College of Toxicology; Vol. 2, No. 7, l983, SLS is a mutagen. In sufficient amounts, it is capable of changing the information in genetic material found in cells! It has been used in studies to induce mutations in bacteria.SLS actually corrodes hair follicles and impairs ability to grow hair! It denatures protein, impairs proper structural formation of young eyes, creating permanent damage. SLS can damage the immune system. It can cause separation of skin layers and cause inflammation to the skin. If it interacts with other nitrogen bearing ingredients, Carcinogenic Nitrates can form as a result.
Behentrimonium Chloride, Guar Hydrosypropyltrimonium Chloride, Linoleamidepropyl PG-Dimonium Chloride Phosphate – These are toxic ammonium compounds. Ingestion can be fatal. Concentrations as low as 0.1% can be irritating to eyes and cause necrosis (tissue death) of mucus membranes.
Stearamidopropyl Dimethylamine – Synthetic surfactant; can cause eye irritation and dermatitis.
And these are just the tip of the iceberg! We expose ourselves day after day, many times hour after hour (through cosmetics and lotions), to these toxic ingredients – and then we wonder why cancer rates are soaring!
Way back in 1938, when the FDA published guidelines regarding suitable levels of ingredients in products for human use, little was known about long-term exposure. Quite possibly the absorption of these toxins through the skin was not even considered. Substances believed safe for human use then are now being proven otherwise.
And what has been the cosmetic industry’s response? It typically sounds something like this, “…has not been proven…in humans” or “our products are formulated within strict FDA guidelines” or “more studies are needed.”
I’m certain there will be more studies – but many years will pass. We all know debate and legislation progresses at a snail’s pace. And the health consequences associated with continued use will escalate.
Even when the FDA has all the scientifically valid, conclusive proof they need, they may only be able to require warning labels.
As a matter of fact, warning labels have been getting stronger and more visible lately. Have you noticed the warning on your toothpaste? Here’s one straight off a popular brand…
“Keep out of the reach of children under 6 years of age. If you accidentally swallow more than used for brushing, seek professional help or contact a poison control center immediately.”
I don’t know about you, but I find this very alarming. The very fact that such a strong warning is printed on toothpaste tells me there is a good reason for it! Yet, most children in America are taught to brush their teeth after every meal, using just this kind of toothpaste. Have you ever considered that if it’s not good for a child under 6, it couldn’t be good for adults either!
But I know that already. Other unsuspecting consumers may not. And the FDA is slow to let people know the dangers or to make changes.
While bureaucracy moves along at a snail’s pace, personal decisions about your health don’t have to. It is ultimately up to you, the consumer, to make changes for the better in your own life. It’s up to you to choose products that will truly enhance your life and your health rather than destroy it.
and
“Sodium Laurel Sulfate and Eye Damage in Young Children The greatest concern of many scientists is sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS), a detergent found in about 90 percent of commercial shampoos. Also known as sodium dodecyl, sodium laureth sulfate (SLFS) this chemical has been shown to damage protein formation in eye tissue in young animals, raising serious concerns about the possibility of ocular tissue malformation, blindness in infants and young children. In animal studies, Sodium Laurel Sulfate penetration and uptake is much greater in neonatal and young animal eye tissue, compared to adult animals, showing “penetration into the eye, as well as systemic tissues (brain, heart, liver, etc.)” SLS also showed long-term retention in tissues, up to 5 days after a single drop.1
Researcher Keith Green, Ph.D., D. Sc., of the Medical College of Georgia, also reports that Sodium Laurel Sulfate extends the healing of corneal tissue by a factor of 5, from 2 days (normal) to more than 10 days. He also has concerns about cataract formation from Sodium Laurel Sulfate. Writing for Research to Prevent Blindness, Inc., Dr. Green states in part: There is an immediate concern relating to the penetration of these chemicals into the eye and other tissues. This is especially important in infants…exposure to SLS results in accumulation in eye tissues, a process that could retard healing and possibly have long-term effects. Dr. Green concludes that exposure to Sodium Laurel Sulfate sulfate causes improper eye development in children and that since Sodium Laurel Sulfate is absorbed systemically through the skin, it doesn’t have to enter the eye directly.”
And as always, the operative question is:
“what am I now going to do with this information?”
I haven’t really been following the various debates, or even who’s who for GOP potentials.
But this recent fopah by Perry bothers me, or rather the reactions to it, bother me.
People on the webOsphere seem to think that a memory lapse, a mis-spoken word, phrase or a hair out of place is just cause to write folks off as intelligent, and viable leaders.
We have virtually replaced human, rational and earthy debate with some shell of a scripted, well rehearsed set of banter that frankly nauseates me in recent years.
ugh
Amazing..
What else will I witness in my lifetime?
I just came back from a run-through of a play that Levi is doing sound for.
He’s responsible for all sound effects.
I’m so proud!
This isn’t just a matter of disagreement with the activity. I personally have to shower in an open shower with other males every morning after PT. To say that it’s absurd that gay men won’t gawk at other naked men is saying that they aren’t normal. In “normal” sexual attractions, the sight of a naked body belonging to someone of the opposite sex is a natural thing to stare at. Are gays more capable of handling themselves than straights? I don’t think so. According to those trying to repeal this policy, gay behavior is just as “normal” as straight behavior. So, why can’t straight men and women shower together? Why can’t straight men and women dorm together the way gay and straight men will be forced? If it’s so natural and the “truth” being reported by proponents of repeal is that there is no way gays will care that they are surrounded with naked bodies of the sex to which they are attracted, then why are heterosexuals separated? Is it because heterosexuals aren’t normal? The argument is absurd in its contex
From: http://militarygear.com/asp/2010/12/18/dadt-repeal/
Hard to argue with the logic though, isn’t it?
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