Saturday, April 21, 2012

Woman Who Drank Over 2 Gallons of Coca-Cola Per Day Dies

© naturalsociety.com
Woman Who Drank Over 2 Gallons of Coca-Cola Per Day Dies by Anthony Gucciardi

A woman from New Zealand who reportedly drank as much as 2.6 gallons of Coca-Cola per day to fuel her ‘Coke addiction’ has died, and experts are saying that her serious craving for pop was a major contributor. The news could not come at a worse time for Coca-Cola, who has already been hit by both government bodies and consumers alike for their cancer-linked beverage. In fact, the Coca-Cola company made an emergency recipe change in March to remove an ingredient known as 4-methylimidazole (4-MI or 4-MEI) that would have required a cancer warning labeling to be slapped onto the soft drink.

As it was recently removed to avoid the label, this means that Natasha Harris’ Coca-Cola excessive consumption was accompanied by the carcinogenic ingredient. In addition to 4-methylimidazole, Harris also consumed gallons and gallons of a liquid containing aspartame, high-fructose corn syrup, and 40 grams of sugar per can. When you perform some simple math, you can see that Harris actually consumed around 41 and one half 8-ounce cans of Coca-Cola on her heaviest binge drinking days. Further equations show that, at 39 grams per 8-ounce can, Harris was taking in around 1,618 grams of sugar per day. To put that into perspective, that’s 1,598 grams more than the recommended daily limit.

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According to expert Dr. Dan Mornin, Harris probably suffered from hypokalemia, or low potassium. Mornin says that this was most likely a result of her excessive Coke consumption, which severely affected her bones. To answer the question as to how anyone could possibly consume such copious amounts of soda despite the serious health risks, it’s important to examine the research regarding sugar addiction. Not only has sugar addiction been labeled as the ‘new alcoholism‘ by health professionals, but a growing body of research also has found that it is actually as addictive as cocaine.

Another health professional expressed concerns over the consumption of Coca-Cola and other sugary beverages, stating:

“it is certainly well demonstrated that excessive long or short term cola ingestion can be dramatically symptomatic, and there are strong hypothetical grounds for this becoming fatal in individual cases.”

Friday, April 20, 2012

Planet Earth: The Reality of Chemical Terrorism In Our Food

The Reality of Chemical Terrorism In Our Food by Marco Torres

Is it really that hard for most people to believe that we are being assaulted on a daily basis by chemical terrorism? Genetically modified foods, artificial flavours, colors, preservatives, emulsifiers, and sweeteners all made with toxic chemicals, all of which are proven toxic to human health. We are being bombarded on a daily basis by an astronomical level of toxicity, all controlled by these chemical terrorists on behalf of the food industry. Worse is we let them.

© Prevent Disease.com
 How many more toxins will we permit in our food supply before we stand united and simply say "we've had enough?" How long will it take until we assertively proclaim that we will not allow any more chemicals or toxins in our foods?

Since food and health regulators cannot properly do their job to protect the public, there will come a tipping point when the people will have to do it for them. We discuss toxic chemicals almost every day, but what percentage of the population is interested enough, curious enough or most of all disciplined enough to actually make the dietary changes necessary to rid all the toxins from the foods they eat? How many people can avoid all processed foods every single day? I would estimate that percentage to be extremely small. Barriers are typically societal pressure, convenience and income. The reality is that we could all have a safe and healthy food industry if we truly wanted it. There are just not enough of us that want it that badly....yet.

Every year or two we have a new chemical terrorist making its way into the food supply almost like clock work. Once the public becomes savvy to the harmful nature of the new toxin, it is then renamed, rebranded and often modified into a deadlier form than its predecessor. Aspartame and aminosweet, and high fructose corn syrup and corn sugar are two excellent examples.

Let's take a look at some of the biggest offenders that are in more than 80% of the foods we eat.

Artificial Flavors and Colors

Artificial flavors and colors means it is derived from a chemical made in a laboratory and has no nutritional value. Every single artificial flavor and color in the food industry has some kind of detrimental health effect. These include neurotoxicity, organ, developmental, reproductive toxicity and cancer.

* Examples
- Glutamates
- Monosodium Glutamate (MSG)
- Maltodextrin
- Autolyzed Yeast Extract
- Disodium Guanylate
- Disodium Inosinate
- Blue 1, Blue 2
- Yellow 5, Yellow 6
- Red 3, Red 40

Genetically Modified Foods

GM Foods causes allergies, organ damage, cancer, immunotoxicty, and damaging transgenes which affect future generations. Many fruits and vegetables for sale in the U.S. are already genetically modified. The most commercialized GM fruit is papaya from Hawaii. About half of Hawaii's papayas are GM.

* Examples
- Corn flour, meal, oil, starch, gluten, and syrup
- Corn Sweeteners such as fructose, dextrose, and glucose
- Modified food starch
- Soy flour, lecithin, protein, isolate, and isoflavone
- Most vegetable oils and vegetable proteins
- Canola oil (also called rapeseed oil)
- Cottonseed oil
- Anything not listed as 100% cane sugar

Toxic Preservatives

Artificial preservatives are responsible for causing a host of health problems pertaining to respiratory tract, heart, blood and other. Some are very neurotoxic especially when combined with specific nutrients.

* Examples
- Antimicrobials
- Nitrites (i.e. Sodium Nitrite)
- Nitrates (i.e. Sodium Nitrate)
- Butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA)
- Butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT)
- Sulfites (i.e. Sodium Sulfite)
- Potassium Sorbate
- Benzoic Acid
- Propyl Gallate
- Sodium Benzoate

Toxic Emulsifiers

An emulsifier replaces surface proteins and aids in forming the network in specific food recipes. There are no healthy non-organic emulsifiers. They are all toxic causing everything from infertility, digestive disorders and migraines.

* Examples
- Polysorbate 80
- Mono-diglycerides
- Carrageenan
- Xanthan Gum (non-organic)
- Guar Gum
- Soy Lecithin or Soya Lecithin

Toxic Sweeteners

Sweeteners such as Neotame are thousands of times sweeter than sugar. They are all very potent, neurotoxic, immunotoxic and excitotoxic.

* Examples
- Aspartame
- High Fructose Corn Syrup
- Neotame
- Sucralose
- Sodium cyclamate
- Acesulfame-K

Toxic Adulterants

Food fraud and economically motivated food adulteration is highlighted by some very toxic substances which cause cancer, glaucoma, digestive and liver disorders. These are added to foods to increase their color, volume or weight.

* Examples
- Metanil Yellow
- Potassium bromate
- Malachite Green
- Tamarind seeds
- Washing powder
- Argemone seeds

This list is by no means extensive. There are now hundreds of toxic additives in our food supply. Chemical terrorism in our food supply must end and it starts with you.

Please look at the ingredient lists before you purchase any processed foods. If you see any of these, don't buy the product. Continue to educate yourself on the influx of new toxins introduced every year. Eventually, if we investigate enough the answers come. Rule of thumb, if the ingredient list has one chemical or more...it's one too many.

Marco Torres is a research specialist, writer and consumer advocate for healthy lifestyles. He holds degrees in Public Health and Environmental Science and is a professional speaker on topics such as disease prevention, environmental toxins and health policy.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

US: Domestic Fuels Protection Act Will Shift Cost to Consumers, Taxpayers

© naturalnews.com
Domestic Fuels Protection Act Will Shift Cost to Consumers, Taxpayers - EWG

Washington, DC - The Domestic Fuels Protection Act of 2012 (H.R. 4345) and its companion bill, the Domestic Fuels Act of 2012 (S.2264) would create a broad exemption from liability for a number of favored interests: fuel producers, engine manufacturers and retailers of virtually all transportation fuels and fuel additives such as gasoline blended with 15 percent ethanol, or E15.

“The ethanol industry’s push for these bills is a glaring admission that E15 is a faulty product,” said Sheila Karpf, a legislative and policy analyst at the Environmental Working Group. “Rather than creating a better fuel, the ethanol industry wants consumers and taxpayers to foot the bill for any harms caused by E15.”

These bills, the subject of today’s House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing, would undermine state consumer protection laws, immunize makers of defective fuel products and shield owners and operators of leaking underground storage tanks from legal action.

The Environmental Protection Agency agreed last year to increase gasoline’s ethanol content by 50 percent. That decision will result in numerous problems that jeopardize public health and the environment, including damage to older vehicles and engines, leaks from underground storage tanks, and drinking water contamination.

As a cautionary tale, consider the U.S. experience with methyl tertiary-butyl ether (MTBE), a fuel additive that caused leaks in underground storage tanks across the country, resulting in serious water pollution. After this hazard was exposed, 25 states banned MTBE as a fuel additive.

As drafted, the bills to be discussed today would extend liability protection for damages caused not only by ethanol, but also by other transportation fuels and fuel additives such as MTBE.

EWG, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, Our Children’s Earth Foundation, and Natural Resources Defense Council have sent a letter to congressional lawmakers opposing this legislation.

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Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Local: 2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing?

© AlJazeeraEnglish
2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing? - Washington Blog

The Gulf Ecosystem Is Being Decimated


The BP oil spill started on April 20, 2010. We’ve previously warned that the BP oil spill could severely damage the Gulf ecosystem.

Since then, there are numerous signs that the worst-case scenario may be playing out:
  • A recent report also notes that there are flesh-eating bacteria in tar balls of BP oil washing up on Gulf beaches
If you still don’t have a sense of the devastation to the Gulf, American reporter Dahr Jamail lays it out pretty clearly:




“The fishermen have never seen anything like this,” Dr Jim Cowan told Al Jazeera. “And in my 20 years working on red snapper, looking at somewhere between 20 and 30,000 fish, I’ve never seen anything like this either.”

Dr Cowan, with Louisiana State University’s Department of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences started hearing about fish with sores and lesions from fishermen in November 2010.

Cowan’s findings replicate those of others living along vast areas of the Gulf Coast that have been impacted by BP’s oil and dispersants.

Gulf of Mexico fishermen, scientists and seafood processors have told Al Jazeera they are finding disturbing numbers of mutated shrimp, crab and fish that they believe are deformed by chemicals released during BP’s 2010 oil disaster.

Along with collapsing fisheries, signs of malignant impact on the regional ecosystem are ominous: horribly mutated shrimp, fish with oozing sores, underdeveloped blue crabs lacking claws, eyeless crabs and shrimp – and interviewees’ fingers point towards BP’s oil pollution disaster as being the cause.

Read complete report..

Human-Made Earthquakes Reported in Central U.S.

© planetsave.com
Earthquakes in Oklahoma
Human-Made Earthquakes Reported in Central U.S. - Cryptogon.com

The number of earthquakes in the central United States rose “spectacularly” near where oil and gas drillers disposed of wastewater underground, a process that may have caused geologic faults to slip, U.S. government geologists report.

The average number of earthquakes of magnitude 3 or greater in the U.S. midcontinent – an area that includes Arkansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Texas – increased to six times the 20th century average last year, scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey said in an abstract of their research.

The abstract does not explicitly link rising earthquake activity to fracking – known formally as hydraulic fracturing – that involves pumping water and chemicals into underground rock formations to extract natural gas and oil.

But the wastewater generated by fracking and other extraction processes may play a role in causing geologic faults to slip, causing earthquakes, the report suggests.

“A remarkable increase in the rate of (magnitude 3) and greater earthquakes is currently in progress,” the authors wrote in a brief work summary to be discussed Wednesday at a San Diego meeting of the Seismological Society of America.

“While the seismicity rate changes described here are almost certainly manmade, it remains to be determined how they are related to either changes in extraction methodologies or the rate of oil and gas production,” the abstract said.


Sunday, April 15, 2012

Deadly tornadoes strike US Midwest

Deadly tornadoes strike US Midwest - AlJazeeraEnglish

 Dozens of tornadoes have swept across the central United States, leaving a trail of destruction and at least five people dead. Al Jazeera's Tom Ackerman reports.




World: THE CRIMINALIZATION OF "GLOBAL JUSTICE": Freedom Rider: The ICC is Criminal

THE CRIMINALIZATION OF "GLOBAL JUSTICE": Freedom Rider: The ICC is Criminal by Margaret Kimberley

The New World Order under U.S. dominion turns international law on its head and puts criminal-bought flunkies on the judicial bench. America, which is not even a signatory to the treaty that created the International Criminal Court, calls all the shots like a Mafia don. Africans and a few Serbs are the only ones that get arrested, while great crimes against peace masquerade as humanitarian intervention.
“Only the powerless are ever punished.”
The International Criminal Court (ICC) is despite its name, a court that advances the cause of criminality. It acts in concert with the most powerful nations on Earth, and allows them to engage in crimes of aggression against millions of people all over the world. Only the powerless are ever punished and the aggressors use the court to behave as if they were the injured parties. 

The world sees this institution in a benevolent light, assuming that it is a means of protecting humanity from the whims of evil doers in high places. Yet after nine years of existence, the ICC has managed to prosecute mostly little known African dictators and a few Serbians thrown in for good measure. 

Ironically, after having opposed the establishment of the ICC and after failing to ratify the treaty that brought it into existence, the United States is now its biggest cheerleader. The Bush administration was terrified that Americans, including Bush, Cheney and the rest of their henchmen and women, might be punished for their transgressions around the world. 

It is strange that after instigating the killings of thousands of people in Iraq, that neither Georg W. Bush nor Tony Blair have any reason to fear being brought to justice. They travel around the world, unafraid of punishment, giving speeches, writing books, making money, and having no worries whatever about getting their just deserts.
“After instigating the killings of thousands of people in Iraq, neither Georg W. Bush nor Tony Blair have any reason to fear being brought to justice.”
They had even less reason to worry after Barack Obama succeeded them. As the more effective evil, Obama knew that he needed to eschew Bush regime ham handedness in international relations. While simultaneously refraining from ratifying the treaty which brought the ICC into existence, Obama and company constantly offer up others to put in the dock in the Hague. 

Last year Barack Obama, David Cameron and Nicholas Sarkozy decided to carve up Libya, using NATO to do their dirty work, killing an untold number of civilians in the process, and they too have no fear of prosecution. Lead ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said as much while the crime was being committed, openly taking the side of the West. Moreno-Ocampo lied to the world, claiming that the Libyan government distributed Viagra to soldiers in order to use rape as a “weapon of war.“ 

The charge was a lie, made up out of whole cloth. If there was any pretense of ICC impartiality, Moreno-Ocampo himself dispelled any such notion. The anything but disinterested prosecutor is now featured in the latest Kony 2012 video, ending any debate about whether or not the phony, web driven, ginned up outrage has any standing in reality or truthfulness.
“When Palestinians petitioned the ICC to investigate war crimes committed by Israel in Gaza, they were turned away.”
While Obama and Clinton try to scuttle Kofi Annn’s Syrian peace plan and hint at President Assad’s prosecution before the ICC, the ICC shows its true colors. When Palestinians petitioned the ICC to investigate war crimes committed by Israel in Gaza, they were turned away. Moreno-Ocampo determined that because Palestine has not been recognized by U.N. General Assembly it has no standing to seek justice for the 2,000 people massacred by Israel in 2008 and 2009. The hypocrisy is blatant, and proves that the United States and its allies present the greatest threats to peace in the world. 

At the United National Antiwar Coalition conference last month, this columnist asked professor and author Vijay Prashad why the ICC prosecutes Africans and token Serbs, but never threatens anyone in Washington, London, Paris or Jerusalem. His answer was simple. “It is just international racism. I think there is no (other) way to explain it.” 

George Orwell said, “Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable.” Those words are still true, humanitarian missions and “responsibility to protect” are in fact euphemisms meant to promote good old fashioned imperialism. 

The fact is that the United States, Israel and their European allies never protect anybody. They continue doing what they have done for decades, deciding who is inconvenient and therefore disposal. The human toll is “collateral damage” and quickly forgotten.
“The United States and its allies present the greatest threats to peace in the world.”
There are of course people and nations who cause other human beings great suffering in the world. They should be stopped, but they should all be stopped. Joseph Kony has actually killed fewer people than the president of Uganda, Yoweri Museveni, but Museveni is a friend of the United States, so no social media campaign to will be directed at getting him before the ICC. 

Until there is greater justice in the world, that is to say when the rich capitalist nations have rivals for power, perhaps a court dedicated to punishing human rights violations would be a viable option. Right now it is fairly useless, because it was not created by people with honest intent. 

Perhaps a simple name change is in order. Is Court for International Criminals a better name? How about Criminal Court International? For once, political language would be honest and George Orwell would be proven wrong. 

Margaret Kimberley's Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well as at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com. Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgendaReport.com.