Government Shutdown Or Not, The Police State Will Continue To Flourish

by Tyler Durden

Wed, 12/26/2018 - 23:45

Authored by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,
“There is no more dangerous menace to civilization than a government of incompetent, corrupt, or vile men.”
- Ludwig von Mises

The government has shut down again. 
At least, parts of the government have temporarily shut down over President Trump’s demand for a $5 billion border wall.

Yet while these political games dominate news headlines, send the stock market into a nosedive, and put more than 800,000 federal employees at risk of having to work without pay, nothing about this government shutdown will diminish the immediate and very real dangers of the American Police State with its roadside strip searches, government surveillance, biometric databases, citizens being treated like terrorists, imprisonments for criticizing the government, national ID cards, SWAT team raids, censorship, forcible blood draws and DNA extractions, private prisons, weaponized drones, red light cameras, tasers, active shooter drills, police misconduct and government corruption.



 Shutdown or not, war will continue. Drone killings will continue. Surveillance will continue. Censorship and persecution of anyone who criticizes the government will continue. The government’s efforts to label dissidents as extremists and terrorists will continue.

Police shootings will continue. Highway robbery meted out by government officials will continue.

Corrupt government will continue. Profit-driven prisons will continue. And the militarization of the police will continue.
Indeed, take a look at the programs and policies that are not affected by a government shutdown, and you’ll get a clearer sense of the government’s priorities, which have little to do with serving taxpayers and everything to do with amassing money, power and control.

Not even NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command that tracks Santa Claus’ route across the globe, will have its surveillance efforts curtailed one iota.

Surveillance will continue unabated. On any given day, whether you’re walking through a store, driving your car, checking email, or talking to friends and family on the phone, you can be sure that some government agency, whether the NSA or some other entity, is listening in and tracking your behavior. Police have been outfitted with a litany of surveillance gear, from license plate readers and cell phone tracking devices to biometric data recorders. Technology now makes it possible for the police to scan passersby in order to detect the contents of their pockets, purses, briefcases, etc. Full-body scanners, which perform virtual strip-searches of Americans traveling by plane, have gone mobile, with roving police vans that peer into vehicles and buildings alike—including homes. Coupled with the nation’s growing network of real-time surveillance cameras and facial recognition software, soon there really will be nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.

Government spying will continue unabated. Government shutdown or not, the National Security Agency (NSA), with its $10.8 billion black ops annual budget, will continue to spy on every person in the United States who uses a computer or phone using programs such as PRISM and XKEYSCORE. By cracking the security of all major smartphones, including iPhone, Android, and Blackberry devices, NSA agents harvest such information as contacts, text messages, and location data. And then there are the NSA agents who will continue to use and abuse their surveillance powers for personal means, to spy on girlfriends, lovers and first dates.

10 FACTS About Fluoride

Why Haven't We Heard About This?

Class-Action Lawsuit Accuses New England Utility Companies of Causing $3.6 Billion in Excessive Electricity Costs

11/16/2017

Suit says Eversource Energy and Avangrid’s years-long manipulation impacted six states: Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut and Rhode Island

BOSTON – New England residents today hit Eversource Energy and Avangrid Inc. with a class-action lawsuit stating that the two energy companies caused electricity consumers to incur overcharges of $3.6 billion in a years-long scheme that impacted six states and affected 14.7 million people, according to the lawsuit filed in federal court in Boston.

The lawsuit, filed Nov. 14, 2017, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts states that 7.1 million retail electricity customers and an overall population of 14.7 million people have been affected by Eversource and Avangrid’s “unique monopoly” spanning at least from 2013 to 2016. The scheme raised electric prices by at least 20 percent for those living in Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut and Rhode Island. The complaint alleges the scheme violates multiple federal and state competition laws and state consumer protection statutes.

Eversource and Avangrid own multiple electric utility subsidiaries, including United Illuminating, Connecticut Light and Power Company, Central Maine Power Company, Western Massachusetts Electric Company, NSTAR Electric Company and Public Service Company of New Hampshire.
If you lived in New England during the relevant time period, you may be affected. Find out more about the lawsuit against Eversource and Avangrid.

“Eversource and Avangrid are two of the largest energy companies in New England, and we believe they chose to use their substantial market power to unlawfully jack-up consumers’ electric bills,” said Tom Sobol, partner at Hagens Berman, a national class-action law firm leading the case for consumers. “It appears these companies willfully engaged in this scheme for years, and we intend to help those affected reclaim their losses, and stop this behavior.”

The electric overbilling scheme at the crux of the lawsuit begins with Eversource and Avangrid’s manipulation of the amount of natural gas available to power plants, the lawsuit states. The two companies regularly constrained the amount of natural gas that could flow throughout New England by reserving far more than they knew they would need, according to the complaint. This artificially limited the amount of gas, which is used to fuel many of the region’s power plants, therefore pushing electric costs higher.

The lawsuit calls the market manipulation scheme the largest since Enron: “Not since Enron’s greedy heyday during the California energy crisis, nearly two decades ago, have American energy markets been manipulated for private profit at such expense to everyday electricity consumers.”
Eversource operations generate approximately $8 billion in revenue each year.

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Haley Brooks set for key role in town

By Chance Viles
Reporter

Posted Dec 26, 2018 at 8:35 PM Updated at 9:11 AM

Highly Prepared People

 

 

 

The 10 Daily Habits Of Highly Prepared People

by Tyler Durden

Wed, 12/26/2018 - 23:05

Authored by Daisy Luther via SilverBearCafe.com,
For some people, preparedness is about the big things: the well-stocked retreat home, buying yet another firearm, or getting a super-fancy generator. While these things can certainly be classified as preparedness endeavors, it isn’t the expensive and dramatic gestures that make us truly prepared people.

The way prepared people spend their time before an emergency is the real key to survival, and this is something that no amount of money can buy.

It’s the small daily habits that become an innate part of our everyday lives – habits that may not even be noticeable to someone outside the lifestyle.



Real preppers, the ones you should look to for advice if you happen to be new to preparedness, are the ones who quietly conduct their daily lives with an eye towards readiness. Not only are these the qualities you should strive for yourself, but they are also the qualities that can help you to determine whether someone is the “real deal” or an armchair survivalist.

#1: Prepared people think beyond “Plan A”

Anytime one disaster occurs, several others are bound to follow closely in their wake. One of the most dramatic examples of this was the tsunami that followed closely on the heels of the 2011 earthquake in Japan, resulting in one of the most horrific nuclear disasters in the history of the world.
But it doesn’t have to be on such an epic scale to qualify. No matter how excellent your survival plan is, if things go awry you must immediately be able to accept that monkey wrench and adapt your plan to it.

Prepared people understand that even the most perfect plans can go wrong, and they are willing to abandon it and act on the fluid situation at hand.

#2: Prepared people react calmly.

Panic kills. When something terrifying happens, if your reaction is to freeze or to run around like a chicken with your head cut off, you’re probably going to die unless Lady Luck steps in and saves you through no action of your own.

Panic can show itself in two ways. For example, during the King Fire, a massive forest fire that burned over 97,000 acres of California wilderness, we witnessed some very visible panic in some of our neighbors.

When we got the first evacuation alert (a notice that evacuation was highly likely within the next 24 hours), a woman who lived down the street was wailing and sobbing as her husband tried to pack up their vehicle.  She was rendered absolutely useless by fear.

Alternatively, panic can manifest in the inability to act. In psychology circles, completely freezing is called “tonic immobility”.  This is a biological impulse related to an overload of stimuli due to extreme stress. It can also show itself in as an irrational sense of calmness as the brain denies the reality that a horrible event is truly happening. In her book, The Unthinkable, Amanda Ripley wrote about the cognitive dissonance experienced by some in the World Trade Center on 9/11.

The story that stands out in my mind the most was the one about the people in the World Trade Center on September 11. They described the last time they saw some of their coworkers.  There were many people who simply could not accept the fact that a plane had crashed into the building and that they must immediately evacuate. They gathered their belongs, tidied their desks, finished reports. They didn’t feel the same sense of urgency that those who survived did, because the situation was so horrible that they just couldn’t accept it. Their inability to accept the scope of the danger caused many of them to perish in a tragic incident that other people, who acted immediately, survived. (source)

You can enhance this ability to accept events and act calmly by thinking through possibilities ahead of time and considering courses of action while your pounding heart is not pumping vast amounts of adrenaline through your veins.
Prepared people know that the ability to calmly accept the event, make a speedy plan, and then act on that plan is the key to survival.

#3: Prepared people are critical thinkers.

Thinking critically is an important skill. Those who passively accept everything they see on the TV news are missing the concept of propaganda. Six enormous corporations control just about everything seen on mainstream television. Through this control, they can promote their own desired agendas by putting their own spins on events. They can influence how the American people think about guns, about our nation’s enemies, and about the food we eat. It’s vital to think about how these corporations earn money – through advertising dollars. Will they really show the truth if it negatively affects their advertisers?
The same is true of nearly any situation. The “truth” presented is most often the “truth” that benefits the presenter.
Prepared people are able to assess the information provided to them and distinguish the difference between facts and manipulations. They keep up with current events, but strive to separate the reality of the event from the opinions of the broadcasters.

#4: Prepared people carry a kit with them everywhere, every day.

If you don’t have a basic everyday carry kit, you can’t consider yourself to be a prepared person. I personally carry the basics for fire, water, and safety in my purse at all times. I also have an extensive emergency kit stashed away in my vehicle for times that I am far from home.
Prepared people know that disasters don’t usually give warnings, so it’s necessary to have a few basics on hand at all times. Here are some ideas for gifts to enhance day to day preparedness and here is an article that gives the basics of an EDC kit.

#5: Prepared people are MacGuyvers.

People who are prepared don’t really solely on tools and preps though. They rely on a mindset that allows them to create what they need from what they have on hand.
Being able to work with what you have and develop solutions is a vital skill for preppers. Here are some tips on enhancing your make-shift engineering skills. As well, Jim Cobb’s new book, Prepper Survival Hacks, is a great way to develop that mindset if you are new to this line of thinking.
Prepared people are creative problem solvers who enjoy challenges to their skills.

#6: Prepared people live a skills-based lifestyle.

HEMP!

Today( December 20, 2018) the 2018 Farm Bill gets Signed into Law!
    
   
Note from Chairman, Geoff Whaling

Very early today, I received a phone call from the White House confirming that President Trump would be signing the Farm Bill, which contains the Hemp Farming Act of 2018 language, at a WH ceremony at 2:30 today. I was thrilled to hear the news, sorry that I would not be able to be there in person and then took a moment to reflect on the path that brings us all to this, most important and historical day. Congratulations All!

I reflected on how far we have come and those that I have met along the way. My path started some 5 years ago after seeing, like so many others the plight of Paige Figi, mother of Charlotte. It was Charlotte’s story and the challenges that those producing her “Marijuana Oil”, which I was sure came from hemp, that motivated me to become more involved in advancing this crop, something I had a small role in advancing in my homeland.

Since then, as a full time volunteer, I’ve met thousands of Americans, all who shared a common goal – let’s rekindle this crop! I worked first in PA with hemp historian Les Stark and Erica McBride (now Erica Stark). Les has worked for 20 years towards this very day. Together we organized the Pennsylvania Hemp Industry Council, passed legislation in our Commonwealth and then helped Delaware and New York.

I started speaking on panels, attending conferences and hearing from athletes whose own stories would make grown men cry. I heard from farmers across the country that were desperate and needed every helping hand to save the family farm.

Pick Your Poison

How To Say No To Vaccinations and Smart Meters

Downloadable Documents from FreedomTaker

(MS Word Format)
These documents are provided free of charge as a public service of FreedomTaker.com for those who wish to oppose and resist unsafe and unlawful "advanced" electronic utility metering. See explanations of each document below.

(Filename "a2"): INSTRUCTIONS: DOWNLOAD LINK
(Filename "a4"): "Notice: Refusal of Unsafe and Unlawful Metering": DOWNLOAD LINK


Notice of Liability: DOWNLOAD LINK
Notice of Default: DOWNLOAD LINK
Notice to Police and Sheriff: DOWNLOAD LINK
Posted Notice - Constructive Contract: DOWNLOAD LINK
Notice of Self Defense: DOWNLOAD LINK
Basics of Building an
OFF-GRID SOLAR/WIND POWER SYSTEM:
DOWNLOAD LINK


Vaccination Notice: DOWNLOAD LINK

The article below is what the mainstream media wants you to believe about vaccinations. Receive a $5.00 gift card for a vaccination! All the liability is on you, if you are harmed!

Which flu shot should you get? Here’s what you need to know

 By Emily Sohn / Special To The Washington Post

Posted Dec 18, 2018 at 8:00 PM

My kids and I tried something different for our flu shots this year. Instead of making separate visits to my doctor and their pediatrician, we all went to the same place: our local Target, where the in-store clinic offered us each a $5 gift card for getting vaccinated.

The visit was convenient: We walked right in without an appointment on a Saturday morning. For the first time, my 5-year-old didn’t scream as the needle went in. And the boys were thrilled to shop for new toys after their shots.

Just before the injections started, however, I started to wonder which flu shot we were going to get. Was it the same one that we’d get at our doctors’ offices or that my husband received at a nearby hospital? Was it the best one? Was there even such a thing as the “best one”?[no. There is NOT]

The number of choices available for getting immunized against influenza is unrivaled in the vaccine world. There are10 varieties of flu vaccine made by multiple companies approved for use in the United States.

Options vary in the way they are produced, the way they are delivered and how many strains of influenza virus they include. Also, unlike other types of vaccines, flu shots are available seemingly everywhere: not just in health clinics and pharmacies but in grocery stores, fitness centers, and pop-up fairs at schools and workplaces.

“Nothing approaches flu in terms of the numbers of products available and the number of different ways they are made,” says Paul Offit, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia who also serves on the Food and Drug Administration advisory committee that determines which strains to include in the seasonal vaccine. “There are no other vaccines that offer so many choices.”

So, what’s a confused flu-shot seeker to do?

For most people, simply getting the flu vaccine — any flu vaccine — is what matters most, says David Cennimo, an infectious-disease specialist at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School in Newark. And in practice, most of us don’t really end up making a decision at all. Each clinic decides which varieties to carry, so by the time you get there the decision has been made.

Generally, the most standard flu shot is a quadrivalent vaccine, which comes in five varieties that contain the same four strains of influenza most likely to be circulating each season. The shot goes into a muscle, usually the arm. This is what my kids and I got, I learned when I called the Target clinic to ask which shots they generally offer. The woman who answered said they have a few kinds but give most people “the regular one.” Pressed for more detail, she told me it was a quadrivalent variety called Fluzone.

Also available are three trivalent options, which contain three strains of influenza instead of four. Offit says one of them, approved for people ages 6 months to 64 years, will probably be phased out over time because it offers less protection than the quadrivalent versions. (If you have received a trivalent version, Offit says, there’s no harm in getting a second shot with the quadrivalent formulation.)

If you’re 65 or older, however, the other trivalent options are probably your best bet. One, the Fluzone High-Dose, contains four times the number of viral particles that prompt the body to produce antibodies. The other, Fluad, contains a compound called an adjuvant, which induces the immune system to react more forcefully to the injection. Both types address the weakened immune response that happens with age.

Fluzone High-Dose and Fluad are both produced by Seqirus and both work equally well, Offit says. One 2014 study showed that, among nearly 32,000 people, the Fluzone High-Dose elicited more antibodies and was 24 percent more effective at preventing influenza infections compared with a regular-dose flu shot. More recent data from last year suggest the high-dose vaccine was better but less so — offering about 8 percent more protection.

On the other side of the age spectrum, kids who are 2 and up can get FluMist, a quadrivalent vaccine that includes bits of live virus (modified so that they can replicate in the nose but not replicate in the warm conditions of the lungs). The American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended shots over the nasal spray for kids, based on some evidence that FluMist didn’t work particularly well in the winters of 2013-2014 and 2015-2016.

Fluoride Lawsuit Timeline Trial August 2019

Fluoride Lawsuit Timeline

THE TSCA LAW SUIT TIMELINE

The Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) authorizes EPA to prohibit the “particular use” of a chemical that presents an unreasonable risk to the general public or susceptible subpopulations. TSCA gives EPA the authority to prohibit drinking water additives.

On November 22, 2016, a Citizens Petition under Section 21 of TSCA was presented to the U.S. EPA requesting that they exercise its authority to prohibit the purposeful addition of fluoridation chemicals to U.S. water supplies. We made this request on the grounds that a large body of animal, cellular, and human research shows that fluoride is neurotoxic at doses within the range now seen in fluoridated communities.

The Petition was submitted by the Fluoride Action Network together with the  Food & Water Watch, American Academy of Environmental Medicine, International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology, Moms Against Fluoridation, Organic Consumers Association, and others (see * The Petitioners below).

• See also the news articles relating to law suit
__________________________________________________

November 22, 2016: Fluoride Action Network (FAN), together with a coalition of environmental, medical and health groups, collectively known as the “Petitioners” (see *below), served the EPA with a Petition calling on the Agency to ban the addition of fluoridation chemicals to public water supplies due to the risks these chemicals pose to the brain. The Petition was submitted under Section 21 of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) because it authorizes EPA to prohibit the “particular use” of a chemical that presents an unreasonable risk to the general public or susceptible subpopulations. TSCA also gives EPA the authority to prohibit drinking water additives.

February 27, 2017: EPA denied the TSCA Section 21 Petition. Read their reasons here. In their decision the EPA claimed, “The petition has not set forth a scientifically defensible basis to conclude that any persons have suffered neurotoxic harm as a result of exposure to fluoride in the U.S. through the purposeful addition of fluoridation chemicals to drinking water or otherwise from fluoride exposure in the U.S.”

April 18, 2017: FAN et al.’s response to EPA’s rejection of Petition.


September 25, 2017: Motion to Dismiss FAN et al. Petition by the Department of Justice, on behalf of the EPA.

October 25, 2017: FAN et al. response to EPA’s rejection of Petition.

October 25, 2017: Amicus Curiae Brief of the Natural Resources Defense Council and Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families in Support of Neither Party. Their brief against EPA’s basis to dismiss our section 21 Petition focused on EPA’s unacceptable demand: “must evaluate all of a chemical’s conditions of use”

November 30, 2017: Hearing with arguments from both parties. Michael Connett, JD, put forward the arguments of why EPA’s Motion to Dismiss should be denied.

December 21, 2017: Court rules in our favor and denies EPA’s Motion to Dismiss.

December 14, 2017:  The EPA requests court for “a protective order limiting review to the administrative record and an order striking Plaintiffs’ Jury Demand.”

January 5, 2018: FAN et al. submitted a brief in opposition to EPA’s motion to the court for a sweeping order that would exempt this “civil action” from Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b) and deny Plaintiffs their right to discovery.

January 5, 2018: The National Resource Defense Council (NRDC) submitted an Amicus Curiae Brief in opposition to EPA’s motion to limit petitioner’s right to discovery. They state, “To the contrary, the language, structure, and history of section 21 all support the district court’s consideration of new evidence.” The NRDC involvement supports neither party on the merits of the case.

January 15, 2018: The U.S. EPA’s Reply “in Further Support of Motion to Limit Review to Administrative Record.”

January 18, 2018: The Defendant, EPA, “Answer” to FAN et al’s “Complaint of Fluoride’s harm submitted April 18, 2017. EPA’s response to each (107) paragraph in FAN et al’s “Complaint” of April 18, 2017, concluding: “Except as expressly admitted or otherwise stated herein, EPA denies each and every allegation in Plaintiff’s Complaint.”

February 7, 2018: The Court ruled in our favour: Order Denying Defendant’s (EPA) Motion to Limit Review to the Administrative Record

October 24, 2018: The court orders more discovery in TSCA fluoride suit

August 2019: TSCA fluoride lawsuit trial dates, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, San Francisco
_________________________________________________

* The Petitioners:

Fluoride Action Network
Food & Water Watch
American Academy of Environmental Medicine
International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology
Moms Against Fluoridation
Organic Consumers Association

And others:

Audrey Adams, a resident of Renton, WA (individually and on behalf of her son),
Jacqueline Denton, a resident of Asheville, NC (individually and on behalf of her children),
Valerie Green , a resident of Silver Spring, MD (individually and on behalf of her children),
Kristin Lavelle, a resident of Berkeley, CA (individually and on behalf of her son),
Brenda Staudenmaier from Green Bay, WI (individually and on behalf of her children)

Back to the Future

Templeton hires Szocik as its new DPW director

By Chance Viles
Reporter

Posted Dec 18, 2018 at 6:47 PM  

Updated Dec 18, 2018 at 6:47 PM

 

TEMPLETON — The town has named Bob Szocik, a Lunenburg native, as its new Department of Public Works director.

The town has been looking for a permanent DPW director since Alan Mayo resigned in July to take a cemetery supervisor job in Westminster, as Mayo was working with cemeteries prior to his job as DPW director. For a while, Town Administrator Carter Terenzini was interim director, before naming Mark Shay interim director. Szocik was named director in late October.

“He is a good fit for the community and town and for the workers he manages,” Board of Selectmen Chairman John Caplis said. “He definitely comes to the table with a lot of knowledge and experience, and as far as I am concerned, Templeton hit the lottery with him. He has over 30-plus years’ experience. I am sure there are some learning curves, but based on his attitude and how he presents himself, he won’t have any issues.”

Szocik grew up in Lunenburg, working with the family business of excavation for 54 years.

“After my father’s passing, rest his soul, we decided to sell the business to save the family type deal,” Szocik said.

Szocik eventually became the general foreman for the Westminster DPW, but he left for Templeton after five years, looking to secure a superintendent or director position.

As Markets Brace For Recession, Illinois Is Nation’s Least Prepared

by Tyler Durden

Tue, 12/18/2018 - 19:45

 

 Submitted by Ted Dabrowski of WirePoints
Wall Street’s best predictor of a recession has reared its ugly head and Illinois is nowhere near ready for a slowdown. In fact, Illinois is the nation’s least-prepared state for an economic downturn. When that recession finally comes, Illinoisans should expect to get hit hard.

The predictor of that next recession is the U.S. interest rate curve. It’s somewhat technical, but all you need to know is that when long-term interest rates fall to levels below short-term interest rates – called a yield-curve inversion – a recession typically follows within 21 months. And those interest rates have started to invert.*

The last time U.S. interest rates predicted a downturn? It was 2007, right before the Great Recession.




Of course, there’s no guarantee of when the next recession will come. It may take time since many parts of the national economy are still humming. We also don’t know how deep the next recession will be. Most recessions are short, but it’s the long ones that do real damage.

Nevertheless, the market signal should serve as a stark warning to Illinoisans. An economic downturn is inevitable and their politicians are doing nothing to prepare the state for it.

Unprepared
Most well-run states are prepared for when the national economy tanks. They have rainy-day funds and slack in their budgets,which allows them to prioritize what must be spent and what can be delayed.

Illinois has none of that. Quite the contrary.

Moody’s, for example, rates Illinois’ finances and governance the worst in the nation, just one notch above junk. The U.S. News and World Report places Illinois dead last in fiscal stability nationwide and next to last when looking just at short-term indicators. Only New Jersey was worse. And the Mercatus Center also finds Illinois worst in terms of fiscal stability nationwide.



The next recession will hit Illinoisans particularly hard

Many Illinoisans have yet to recover from the Great Recession. Statistics from manufacturing to black unemployment to underwater homes show Illinois has continued to underperform since 2009. And Illinois is shrinking after losing population four years in a row, a distinction shared nationally only with West Virginia.

Compulsory Indoctrination: In UK Schools, Boys Have Periods Too

by Tyler Durden

Tue, 12/18/2018 - 05:00

 

Authored by Sarah Cowgill via Liberty Nation,
Science thrown to the dogs in UK's only Green Party seat.



Transgender rights activists are celebrating with cosmopolitans, dark chocolate, and passing around palette loads of Midol, because the U.K.’s Brighton and Hove city council has declared that boys also menstruate. The East Sussex city’s local government brain trust issued guidelines earlier this month, under the heading “Taking a Period Positive Approach in Brighton & Hove Schools” and will be compulsory inside the classrooms of all primary school children.

The council, which is far beyond the label of extreme and lunatic left, issued the statement:

“Trans boys and men and non-binary people may have periods ... and menstruation must be inclusive of all genders.”

Yes, these people are seemingly bat-dung nuts.

And although women worldwide would be ecstatic for men to have cramps, bloating, and irritability for several days a month, alas, this report is devoid of, well, science. In short, it’s completely whackadoodle.

Teach Your Children Well

Health class for school children is about to get a bit more interesting in the Green Party bonkers bastion by the sea as the guidelines require full compliance in or before 2020, and will be included in the curricula for children enrolled in grades one through eight.

The prospectus has come under fire from Member of Parliament for the Conservative Party, David Davies, who told reporters the plan was insane:

“Learning about periods is already a difficult subject for children that age, so to throw in the idea girls who believe they are boys also have periods will leave them completely confused.”

But the city council believes otherwise. Heck, in 2016, they sent letters to parents before class enrollments requesting that children, as young as age four, choose the gender “they most identify with.” They also make teachers use a Trans Inclusion Schools Toolkit, one of the aims being “developing understanding of trans and gender questioning children and young people.”

With so much time spent on LGBTQ issues, gender neutralizing and confusing every child in town, how do they have the time to teach reading, writing, and arithmetic? Jeez Louise, can one imagine the syllabus for science class? Anatomist Albrecht von Haller, the father of modern physiology, is surely pounding his fists against the walls of his sarcophagus in hopes of haunting the fools in Brighton and Hove.

Are our European cousins losing their collective minds? Germany now allows citizensto list their newborn humans as “diverse,” removing the pesky male or female designation simply because LGBTQ warriors are triggered.

A Portrait Of Brighton And Hove

Brighton and Hove is the United Kingdom’s version of America’s Boulder, Colorado – a city The Denver Post describes as “nestled between the Rockies and reality.”

The seaside town appears bucolic; lovely beaches, coffee houses, and trinket shops interspersed with a business corridor that cannot wrap their heads around the policies set by the local government.
The only Green Party Member of Parliament – out of 650 –  is Caroline Lucas, who appears to be as nutty as the recent council decisions. With her guidance, the Brighton area was declared a non-fracking zone, although there is no prospect of ever drilling for shale gas in the city, anyway.
The council have banned bacon sandwiches, have employed sheep for traffic calming, and levied fines up to £50,000 for improper recycling disposal; ironically, the city ranks 302nd out of 326 councils in successful recycling.

Made up of 89% white people, with an even 50-50 split male to female ratio, Brighton and Hove also has the highest percentage of residents claiming their religion as Jedi. Yes, that Jedi – of Star Wars.

Codification of the Bylaws posted December 20? Merry Christmas!

How much of Templeton's Chapter 90 money has been spent to date on engineering? This road project is NOT on the TIP list yet.
Projected date  to begin work -2024?  Invest in struts and tie rods.

Truth Vs Lies About Flu Vaccines *Updated*

Dr. John Bergman

Published on Nov 16, 2011

SUBSCRIBED 565K

Learn the truth about vaccines! Truth vs lies about vaccines updated .

 We are constantly bombarded with commercials saying there is a newly discovered epidemic that they "luckily" have a new vaccine for. Stop the madness! Learn the truth and educate yourself about the risks.

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Science & Technology

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What You Need to Know to Crush the Cold & Flu

Posted on: 

Monday, December 10th 2018 at 9:45 am

Written By: 

Linda Woolven & Ted Snider

This article is copyrighted by GreenMedInfo LLC, 2018
Visit our Re-post guidelines

 

Did you know that the science itself on the flu vaccine shows it does virtually nothing to protect you? Here's why you should look to the evidence and not the media for guidance this cold and flu season...

Though the media and the government keep telling you to get the flu shot, the highly respected Cochrane Collaboration found that “[e]vidence from systematic reviews shows that vaccines have little or no effect on the effects measured” (BMJ2006;333:912). That means flu vaccines have not helped prevent the flu. A 2014 Cochrane Collaboration evaluation of 116 studies---all the research up to 2013--found that vaccinating adults did not change the number of people hospitalized or the number of lost days of work (Cochrane Database of Syst Rev 2014, Issue 3. Art. No.: CD001269).

That still leaves the constant claim that the flu vaccine protects seniors from serious complications from the flu that can lead to death. But this claim, too, fails to stand up to scientific scrutiny. When subjected to proper analysis, the claimed protection against risk of death in the elderly drops to statistically insignificant levels (Am J Respir Care Med2008 ;178: 527-533). Another study concluded that increased vaccination is not correlated with decreased mortality among seniors (Arch Intern Med 2005;165:265-272).

The More Often You Get it, the Worse it Works

But, it gets worse. Canadian researchers identified the troubling result that getting the flu vaccine each year diminishes its effectiveness. When they followed 1,939 people, they found that the ones who got the flu vaccine in the 2014-2015 season, but not the year before, had a 53% vaccine effectiveness. However, the people who got it that season and also the season before had their effectiveness rate drop significantly to -32%. If they got it that year and the two years before, the effectiveness dropped to -54%. The researchers concluded that there is a negative effect of repeated vaccination (Clin Infect Dis 2016;63(1):21-32).

No Benefit During Pregnancy for You or Your Baby

Doctors don’t only recommend the flu shot for seniors, they also recommend that pregnant women get inactivated flu vaccines even though there is little research on the safety of that recommendation during the first trimester. An important study set out to see if the recommendation is responsible by studying the effect of getting a flu vaccine that included protection against swine flu (pH1N1) on spontaneous abortions. The results were unexpected and disturbing.

The study compared 485 women who had had spontaneous abortions with those who had not. It found that women who had spontaneous abortions were twice as likely to have had the flu shot 1-28 days before the abortion. For women who were getting the flu shot for the second year in a row, the risk of miscarriage went up by a significant 770%. For women who were not also vaccinated the year before, the increase in risk was a nonsignificant 30% (Vaccine 2017;35(40):5314-22).

But, since there is no reason for the recommendation that pregnant women get the flu vaccine, there is no reason to chance the risk of miscarriage. It is currently recommended that women in the second or third trimester of pregnancy get the flu vaccine. But an analysis of hospital admissions found that women who got vaccinated during pregnancy had the same risk for influenza like illnesses as women who did not get vaccinated. There was also no difference in the risk for outpatient visits. As for the babies, the ones who were born to vaccinated mothers had the same risk of influenza and pneumonia as infants born to unvaccinated mothers. There was also no benefit when it came to outpatient visits. The study concluded that there is no demonstrable benefit to the flu vaccine for pregnant women (Am J Perinatol 2004;21(6):333-9).

No Benefit for Your Children Either

When a double-blind study put vaccinating kids to the test by comparing vaccinated children to unvaccinated children who received a placebo for 272 days, there were 88 cases of the flu in the unvaccinated group, but—wait for it—there were 116 cases in the vaccinated group. What’s worse is that there were 487 non-flu respiratory viruses in the vaccinated group but only 88 in the unvaccinated group. So, the flu vaccine makes things significantly worse for kids (Clinical Infectious Diseases 2012;54(12):1778-83).

A second study looked at the flu vaccine for infants between 6 and 24 months. It found that the rate of influenza was not significantly different between infants who were vaccinated and infants who were not. They concluded that getting the flu vaccine did not reduce the rate of influenza in infants and children between 6-24 months (Pediatr Int 2004;46(2):122-5.

Cold Medicine: Is the Case Better for Treatment?

So conventional medicine cannot help you prevent a cold. Can it help you treat one?

Nope. When children were given the popular decongestant/antihistamine Dimetapp, they actually did worse than children given a placebo (J Pediatr 1991;118:125-30). And, though taking Aspirin or Tylenol for cold relief is a common practice, they actually make congestion and other symptoms worse (J Infect Dis 1990;162:1277- 82). They also suppress the immune system. What’s even worse is that taking a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) during an acute respiratory infection, like a cold or flu, increases your risk of a heart attack (J Infect Dis 2017;jiw603).

In 2007, an FDA advisory panel said that over-the-counter cough and cold medicines offer no benefit, but considerable risk, for children under six and recommended against their use.

So, the pharmaceutical approach offers nothing for the prevention or treatment of colds.

The Natural Approach

Echinacea: Echinacea, however, does both prevent and treats colds (Lancet Infect Dis 2007;7:473-80). In the largest study ever done on echinacea, 673 healthy people were given either echinacea or a placebo for 4 months in a double-blind fashion. The people on the echinacea had significantly fewer colds and cold symptoms, showing that echinacea both prevents colds and treats them if you already have one. The echinacea group caught 149 colds that lasted a total of 672 days; the placebo group caught 188 colds that lasted 850 days. The echinacea group also had significantly less recurrence of colds: 65 compared to 100 in the placebo group (Evid Based Complement Altern Med2012(2):841315).

If you do catch a cold, echinacea helps you get better faster: symptoms improve by day 4 instead of taking twice as long on a placebo (Eur J Clin Res 1997;9:261-8). A double-blind study found that when echinacea is given at the first sign of a cold, the cold lasted an average of 6 days versus 9 days when they were given a placebo (Arzneimittelforsch2001;51(7):563-8). Echinacea also reduces the symptoms you’ll suffer. One study found echinacea to reduce symptoms by 23.1% (J Clin Pharm Ther 2004;29:75-83). Other studies have also shown that echinacea helps you get rid of your cold faster (Phytother Res 2005;19:689-94).

A systematic review of echinacea looked at 24 double-blind studies. It found that echinacea significantly reduces your chance of catching a cold by 17%. It also had a small beneficial effect on the severity of colds compared to a placebo. The results were mixed in studies of cold duration. The authors said that it is difficult to draw conclusions from reviews like this of echinacea because of the huge variety of forms of echinacea used in the different studies (Cochrane Database of Syst Rev2014;doi:10.1002/14651858.CD000530.pub3).

An important meta-analysis included 6 high quality, placebo-controlled, long term studies of echinacea on respiratory tract infection recurrence and complication (including pneumonia, bronchitis, ear infection, sinusitis). Echinacea reduced the risk of recurrence by a significant 35%. In people with higher susceptibility due to stress or weakened immunity, the reduction was an even more impressive 50%. Echinacea reduced the risk of complications by 50%, including 64.9% reduction of risk of pneumonia, ear infection and tonsillitis (Adv Ther 2015;32:187-200).

As for Tamiflu, the leading flu drug, a double-blind study that compared a blend of Echinacea purpurea and elderberry found that by day 5, the herbs were already slightly more effective; by day 10, 90.1% of the herb group had recovered versus 84.8% of the drug group. There were less complications and side effects in the herb group (Curr Ther Res 2015;77:66-72).

Elderberry: Elderberry boosts immunity and stops viruses from penetrating into your cells, preventing them from replicating. Elderberry helps you recover from the cold in only 2-3 days compared to 7-8 days on a placebo (J Altern Comp Med 1995;1:361- 9; J International Med Res 2004;32:132- 40). A placebo-controlled study found that elderberry relieves fever, headache, congestion and cough in only 2 days. Elderberry was also better than placebo for nasal congestion. The researchers concluded that elderberry was fast, effective and as good as or better than antiviral drugs for the flu (Online Journal of Pharmacology and Pharmacokinetics 2009;5:32-43). In the most recent double-blind study, airplane travelers who took elderberry suffered a significant 52% fewer days with a cold and a significant 58% milder symptoms (Nutrients 2016;8(4)).

Vitamin C: This most famous cold fighter both prevents and treats colds. When you take 500mg a day of vitamin C, you are 70% less likely to catch a cold than when you take a placebo dose of 50mg (Eur J Clin Nutr 2005;60:9-17). A review of 21 studies that used 1-8g of vitamin C found that, in each of them, vitamin C reduced the length and severity of colds by 23% (Scand J Infect Dis 1994;26:1-6). Taking at least 2g a day works even better (Med Hypotheses 1999;52:171-8). A recent double-blind study gave 1g of vitamin C or placebo to 28 people for 8 weeks. In the vitamin C group, 7 people got colds; in the placebo group 11 people did: that’s a 45% reduction in risk. Compared to placebo, vitamin C shortened the length of the cold by 59% (Nutrients 2014;6:2572-83).

The most recent evidence for vitamin C comes from a meta-analysis of 9 controlled studies that found that taking extra vitamin C on top of regular supplementation at the onset of a cold shortened the cold by a significant 56% and significantly relieve symptoms, including chest pain, fever and chills (Biomed Res Int 2018 ;2018:1837634).