Obama "dramatically" increases allowable levels of radiation in drinking water

© Natural News

Natural News | Jan 17, 2015 | Jonathan Benson

As radioactive pollution continues to accumulate throughout the environment as a result of nuclear incidents like Fukushima, the U.S. government's response is not to try to mitigate this threat to public health but rather to increase the official maximum exposure levels and basically redefine how much radiation is considered safe.

The Obama Administration recently did this with regard to radiation in drinking water, dramatically increasing allowable levels in response to "radiological incidents" that make it impossible to keep radiation levels below the previously established thresholds. So, the new approach is to continually raise these thresholds so that water can be considered safe.

It isn't, of course, but that's the illusion that the American plutocracy would have us all accept as reality -- or what the nuclear industry describes as the "new normal," according to Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). The goal is to maintain the ruse for as long as possible, or until so many people are ill and dying of cancer that nothing can be done to stop this runaway train.

According to a press release from PEER, the White House's decision to allow the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to alter its official radiation guides, known as Protective Action Guides (PAGs), make radiation cleanup mandates more lax than they have ever been in the history of the agency's existence.

"In soil, the PAGs allow long-term public exposure to radiation in amounts as high as 2,000 millirems," explains the press release. "This would, in effect, increase a longstanding 1 in 10,000 person cancer rate to a rate of 1 in 23 persons exposed over a 30-year period."

Allowable levels of radiation in drinking water are basically undefined at this point 

For drinking water, the requirements are even more obscured. According to the same report, the EPA's new standard is undefined in this regard as the agency "continues to seek input." But the gist of it allows for indeterminable "flexibility" in discarding the previously established limits for drinking water and basically allowing whatever radiation is present in water to be considered "safe."

There's obviously nothing scientific about this "new normal" policy, but most of the "sheeple" probably won't even take a second look at it. PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch said it right when he told some in the media that the Obama Sdministration's new guidelines are something that "only Dr. Strangelove could embrace."

"If this typifies the environmental leadership we can expect from Ms. McCarthy," he stated, referring to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, "then [the] EPA is in for a long, dirty slog. No compelling justification is offered for increasing the cancer deaths of Americans innocently exposed to corporate miscalculations several hundred-fold."

Interestingly, the guidelines in the new PAGs for how to handle "radiological emergencies," which include evacuations, shelter-in-place orders, food restrictions and other actions, seem to fit the bill for what the world currently faces with Fukushima. Radiation releases from the shuttered plant are still so high that a Japanese government official recently reported that there is no other option but to continue dumping contaminated releases into the ocean.

This tainted ocean water will obviously continue circulating around the world, polluting ocean life, soils, and other ecosystems encountered by humans. And this will result in even higher levels of radiation for which the EPA will have to cover up the truth and pretend as though everything is just fine.

"We have to dispose of the water," stated Shunichi Tanaka, chairman of the Nuclear Regulation Authority in Japan, in a public comment after expressing that he was "overwhelmed" by the number of tanks holding radioactive water.

Sources:

http://www.globalresearch.ca

http://www.peer.org

http://enenews.com

http://science.naturalnews.com

What’s to Blame for Our Dying Planet?

Activist Post | Jan 18, 2015 | Catherine J. Frompovich

Anthony Freda Art

What a question even to ask! But – someone, something—perhaps conspiracies—as many are encouraged by the global media to believe – truly have brought the planet and humankind out of mediaeval misery, but equally into profoundly dangerous circumstances. However, not many who, apparently, are responsible for Planet Earth, aka Mother Earth—Gaia, being trashed before our very eyes, either are fessing up or getting their respective or collective recognition, and all while continuing to profit from poisoning our dying planet.

Every day, commonplace humans who live, work, and try to make ends meet are being blamed for ruining Planet Earth. Why?

We, the ‘seeming-low-life’ in the elite’s minds, are saddled with being responsible for all the ills that plague the planet, if you listen to the media. Yet, that deflection is nowhere near fact, in this writer’s opinion. My reasoning: Who really is it that, manufacturers, finances, operates, and mainstreams the money-making technologies that have been touted and allowed to run without checks and balances on how they negatively impact Planet Earth, the environment, and all living matter?

Who controls business and industry?

Aren’t moguls such as J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, Andrew W. Mellon, and John D. Rockefeller responsible for setting the corporate paradigm while creating industrial and economic dynasties that, in essence, have overtaken science, the environment, and created vested interest lobbying practices that make certain 99% of non-elites comply with their fascist-like quest for wealth through influencing government?

Read more..

Humans Have Brought World's Oceans to Brink of 'Major Extinction Event'

"Although defaunation has been less severe in the oceans
than on land, our effects on marine animals are
increasing in pace and impact," the researchers write.
(Photo: Phil's 1stPix/flickr/cc)

Common Dreams | Jan 16, 2015 | Deirdre Fulton

But 'proactive intervention' could still avert marine disaster, researchers find

Marine wildlife at all levels of the food chain has been badly damaged by human activity, says a new report that urges immediate and "meaningful rehabilitation" if we are to avert mass extinction in the world's oceans.

"We may be sitting on a precipice of a major extinction event," Douglas J. McCauley, an ecologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara and an author of the study, told the New York Times.

The report, published Thursday in the journal Science, finds that habitat loss, mismanagement of oceanic resources, climate change, and the overall "footprint of human ocean use" have resulted in a phenomenon known as "defaunation"—a decline in animal species diversity and abundance.

"Although defaunation has been less severe in the oceans than on land, our effects on marine animals are increasing in pace and impact," reads the study abstract. "Humans have caused few complete extinctions in the sea, but we are responsible for many ecological, commercial, and local extinctions. Despite our late start, humans have already powerfully changed virtually all major marine ecosystems."

"Humans have profoundly decreased the abundance of both large (e.g., whales) and small (e.g., anchovies) marine fauna," it continues. "Such declines can generate waves of ecological change that travel both up and down ma­rine food webs and can alter ocean ecosystem functioning."

Just as the Industrial Revolution during the 1800s decimated the huge tracts of forests, driving many terrestrial species to extinction, industrial use of the oceans threatens to destroy marine habitats and in turn damage the health of marine wildlife populations.

Report co-author Steve Palumbi of Stanford University listed several emerging threats to the oceans: "There are factory farms in the sea and cattle-ranch-style feed lots for tuna. Shrimp farms are eating up mangroves with an appetite akin to that of terrestrial farming, which consumed native prairies and forest. Stakes for seafloor mining claims are being pursued with gold-rush-like fervor, and 300-ton ocean mining machines and 750-foot fishing boats are now rolling off the assembly line to do this work."

Timeline (log scale) of marine and terrestrial defaunation. If left unmanaged, the authors predict that marine habitat alteration, along with climate change (colored bar: IPCC warming), will exacerbate marine defaunation. (Credit: Science)

"Human activities are negatively impacting the ocean at an ever increasing and unsustainable rate, and we must freeze the footprints of industrial activities and commercial fishing," Oceana marine scientist Amanda Keledjian told Common Dreams. "Oceana applauds these researchers for their work, because assessing the oceans from a holistic perspective is the only way to understand the scope at which we must act to reverse collapsing fisheries and continued habitat degradation."

According to the Times:

Scientific assessments of the oceans’ health are dogged by uncertainty: It’s much harder for researchers to judge the well-being of a species living underwater, over thousands of miles, than to track the health of a species on land. And changes that scientists observe in particular ocean ecosystems may not reflect trends across the planet.

Dr. [Malin L.] Pinsky, Dr. McCauley and their colleagues sought a clearer picture of the oceans’ health by pulling together data from an enormous range of sources, from discoveries in the fossil record to statistics on modern container shipping, fish catches and seabed mining. While many of the findings already existed, they had never been juxtaposed in such a way.

A number of experts said the result was a remarkable synthesis, along with a nuanced and encouraging prognosis.

"I see this as a call for action to close the gap between conservation on land and in the sea," said Loren McClenachan of Colby College, who was not involved in the study.

The report authors say the effects of human activity in the ocean are still reversible: "Proactive intervention can avert a marine defaunation disaster of the magnitude observed on land."

Oceana's Keledjian echoed that appeal. "This study reminds us that it is critical to do everything we can to protect vulnerable species and the ocean ecosystems on which they depend," she said. "While much remains unknown about the state of the oceans, we cannot wait to act until we know with 100 percent certainty that extinctions and devastation are upon us, because that will already be far too late.

Comment: The emphasis on humans leaves out the fact that humans are controlled by corporations and military interests, and these powers are the primary problem, not individuals.

Best Of: Wal Thornhill: An Electric Cosmology for the 21st Century | EU Workshop

Thunderbolts Project | Jan 17, 2015 | Wal Thornhill

This talk by Wal Thornhill at the EU Workshop Nov 14-16, 2014 offers a compendium of the things that scientifically curious people need to know in order to see the electric force in its dynamic role from microcosm to macrocosm.

Rosetta Mission Update | 67P—The Violent Birth of a Comet

Thunderbolts Project | Jan 17, 2015

The electric comet idea forces us to consult the astronomical testimony of our earlier forebears, where independent accounts, told with different words and different symbols in different parts of the world, convey a story of planetary catastrophe.


Watch Update #1: The Rocky Comet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-a_j...
Watch Update #2: Comets May Not Be What We Thought https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UliV...
Watch Update #3: Oops! No Water on Comet 67P? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqxF5...
Watch Update #4: Rubble on 67P Defies Current Comet Theory https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QMkj...
Watch Update #5: Jets of Comet 67P -- Failed "Explanations" Continue https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceZqI...
Watch Update #6: Comet 67P -- Electrical Sculpting of Surface Dust https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0smmB...

Sea Turtles Use Earth's Magnetic Field to Find Home

A loggerhead sea turtle nests at the Archie Carr
National Wildlife Refuge in Melbourne Beach, Florida.
Credit: J. Roger Brothers

Live Science | Jan 15, 2015 | Laura Geggel

Female sea turtles, known to swim thousands of miles before returning to their birthplace to lay eggs, find their way home by relying on unique magnetic signatures along the coast, a new study finds.

For more than 50 years, scientists have been mystified by how sea turtles do this, said the study's lead researcher, J. Roger Brothers, a graduate student of biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

"Our results provide evidence that turtles imprint on the unique magnetic field of their natal beach as hatchlings, and then use this information to return as adults," Brothers said in a statement.

Previous studies have shown that sea turtles use Earth's magnetic field to help guide them at sea, but it was unclear whether magnetic features also help steer them toward the nesting sites chosen by their mothers, the researchers said.

To investigate, the scientists examined a database of records covering 19 years of loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) nesting along the eastern coast of Florida, the largest sea turtle rookery in North America. Earth's magnetic field, which acts as a giant invisible shield that protects the planet from dangerous solar radiation, changes over time. Earth's iron core is surrounded by a layer of molten metal, and as this molten metal sloshes around, it causes fluctuations in the magnetic field, with some areas strengthening and others weakening.

The researchers wondered whether turtles had changed their nesting locations as magnetic signatures drifted across the coast

A loggerhead sea turtle heads toward
the water in Melbourne Beach, Florida.
Credit: J. Roger Brothers

"We reasoned that if turtles use the magnetic field to find their natal beaches, then naturally occurring changes in the Earth's field might influence where turtles nest," Brothers said.

A look at the data, from 1993 to 2011, confirmed this idea. At certain times in some places, Earth's magnetic field shifted so that magnetic signals from nearby beaches moved closer together. During these times, turtle nests densely covered these areas, they found.

Similarly, there were fewer turtle nests, and the nests were farther apart, in places where magnetic signatures diverged, just as the researchers predicted.

"Our results provide the strongest evidence to date that sea turtles find their nesting areas at least in part by navigating to unique magnetic signatures along the coast," the researchers wrote in the study.

Scientists are unsure how turtles detect the geomagnetic field, but it's possible that tiny magnetic particles in their brains help the turtles process unique signatures, Brothers said.

Whatever the mechanism, it clearly helps sea turtles find their birthplace so they can reproduce, usually on accessible beaches that have soft sand, the right temperature and few predators.

"The only way a female turtle can be sure that she is nesting in a place favorable for egg development is to nest on the same beach where she hatched," Brothers said. "The logic of sea turtles seems to be that 'If it worked for me, it should work for my offspring.'"

The study was published today (Jan. 15) in the journal Current Biology.

Follow Laura Geggel on Twitter @LauraGeggel. Follow Live Science @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on Live Science.

Over 1,200 seabirds mysteriously die on Pacific Coast

© Natural News

Natural News | Jan 15, 2015 | J.D. Heyes

Officials on the Pacific Coast are puzzled by the deaths of hundreds of small, white-bellied seabirds since October.

The birds, called Cassin's auklets, are mostly gray in color and have blue feet. Media reports say they have been steadily washing ashore all along the Pacific Coast, from Northern California to the coast of the state of Washington, and that, naturally, is concerning wildlife and other experts because thus far they have yet to determine an exact cause for the massive deaths.

"To be this lengthy and geographically widespread, I think is kind of unprecedented," Phillip Johnson, the executive director of the Oregon Shores Conservation Coalition, told the Pierce Pioneer, in its online edition. "It's an interesting and somewhat mysterious event."

At the time of publication, the Pierce Pioneer (PP) noted that the University of Washington's Coastal Observation and Seabird Survey Team (COSST) had gathered as many as 1,200 birds that have washed ashore over the past few months.

COSST volunteer Diane Bilderback commented that she had not found any dead auklets until the beginning of this past fall, pointing to a very recent phenomenon.

Wasting away - but why?

Other residents along the Pacific Coast have also said they have encountered scores of dead auklets in recent months, including Ken and Cathy Denton.

"We've seen a lot of common murres, but those are common," Ken Denton told the PP. "This is the most we've seen of something else."

Julie Parrish, the COSST executive director, said the large number of deaths, which appear to be continuing to rise, is definitely a cause for concern. She told the PP that the bulk of the birds appear to have starved to death, which she said could be caused by an unusually prolific mating season.

"Almost every breeding pair laid an egg, and as the young birds fly south for the winter they may not all be finding the small fish and shrimp they normally feed on," she said.

That claim was backed up by Julia Burco, a veterinarian for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife; she, along with other experts, believes that the birds are starving and that no toxin is responsible for their deaths.

Bird deaths follow a pattern of other mass deaths of sea life

The deaths of so many auklets comes on the heels of other mass deaths of sea-faring animals, as Natural News has documented:

-- In September, we reported that millions of sea stars were dying -- again, along the Pacific Coast -- stretching from Alaska to Mexico. The creatures, which belong to the class of animals known as Asteroidea, have been on Earth for some 450 million years, and more than 20 species of them have been affected. Experts say dead sea stars are exhibiting signs of "wasting syndrome," a condition which causes their limbs to disintegrate.

-- The BBC reported in December that 500 dead sea lions had been discovered along the northern coastline of Peru, for no inherently obvious reason. As we reported:

The latest of several mass die-offs in recent years, the rotting corpses were found on Anconcillo Beach, located in Peru's Ancash region. Both young and old sea lions were found at the site, which the local governor blamed on fishermen who may have poisoned them while they searched for food at the shoreline. Others like the environmental group Orca, however, say oil exploration is probably the cause.

However, a more likely cause for these deaths and others is rising levels of radiation from the disabled nuclear plant in Fukushima, Japan. As The Christian Science Monitor reported, the levels of radiation in seawater from the damaged plant should peak along the U.S. Pacific Coast some time this year. That report is here.

Sources:

http://www.piercepioneer.com

http://www.spokesman.com

http://www.naturalnews.com

http://www.csmonitor.com

http://www.naturalnews.com

http://science.naturalnews.com

Gluten, leaky brain, & the connection to depression

SOTT | Jan 13, 2015 | Peter Osborne

© Front Neurol. 2014 Nov 21;5:241.

Over the weekend, I had the pleasure of getting to hang out with New York Times best selling author, and world renowned neurologist, Dr. David Perlmutter. If you aren't familiar with Dr. Perlmutter's work, check out Grain Brain. Some of the concepts in this book are revolutionary, and that brings me to the point of today's post.

Leaky barriers

Most people have heard of Leaky Gut, but it is rare to hear anyone talk about the concept of Leaky Brain Syndrome. I have discussed this concept before with Harvard researcher, Dr. Fasano, but only briefly Today I want to talk about one of the most debilitating diseases linked to a break down in the gastrointestinal barrier, but also potentially a break down in the blood brain barrier.

Depression. Unfortunately, many are unaware of the connection between gluten and depression. Part of this connection has to do with the role gluten plays in causing intestinal permeability (Leaky Gut). This process was discovered originally by Dr. Fasano. You can read a review of it here. The part less talked about has to do with gluten's impact on the microbiome (good bacteria in the gut). Studies have shown that gluten can alter the normal bacterial flora, and in doing so set the stage for decreased levels of regulatory gut bacteria, and increased levels of bacteria that contribute to inflammation. When you combine leaky gut with altered bacteria, you get an increased presence of bacteria and their by products in the blood. One type of bacterial byproduct is LPS (lipopolysaccharide). Studies have shown that when this happens, the immune system will produce inflammation trying to combat the presence of these translocated bacteria. This increase inflammation has been shown to alter the function of the brain, and a side effect of this is DEPRESSION.

Read more..

Sprayed on our Food, Round Up Deemed ‘Toxic Household Waste’ by Trash Collectors

© Natural Society

Natural Society | Jan 14, 2015 | Christina Sarich

In the same category as paint thinner, mercury, and antifreeze

Did you know that you should not put a bottle of Round Up in your municipal trashcan for pick up? If that is the case, then why on Earth would we put that same chemical trash into our bodies?

Yep – Round Up, Monsanto’s favorite herbicide and one of their best-selling products, is considered a Hazmat issue for local cities and towns. It isn’t supposed to be disposed of in your regular trash pick-up. According to the Department of Public Works, “Employees can be harmed by their toxic fumes.”

Monsanto’s Round Up is in the same category for trash removal as paint, paint thinner, furniture polish, mercury, swimming pool chemicals, CFL and fluorescent light bulbs, and antifreeze.

I certainly wouldn’t eat antifreeze, would you? I know that question may sound a bit insulting, but how is it then that we allow (through the voting process and complicit agreement) the EPA to hike up allowable glyphosate (the main ingredient in Round Up) levels? They’ve done it not once, but multiple times.

Now – the allowed level in teff animal feed is 100 parts per million (ppm); and in [GM] oilseed crops, 40 ppm. Allowed levels in some fruits and vegetables eaten by humans have also risen.

As a comparison, malformations in frog and chicken embryos were documented by Prof Andres Carrasco’s team at 2.03 ppm glyphosate (when injected into the embryos).

We also know that glyphosate exposure boosts harmful bacterial growth in the gut and eliminates healthful bacteria – making our body’s own trash eliminator – the GI tract – highly compromised.

Read: Chronically Sick People Found to Have High Levels of Glyphosate

Dr. Krüger explains in the study’s abstract:

“During the last 10-15 years, an increase of Clostridium botulinum associated diseases in cattle has been observed in Germany. . . The normal intestinal microflora is a critical factor in preventing intestinal colonisation by C. botulinum as shown in the mouse model of infant botulism. . . . A reduction of LAB in the GIT microbiota by ingestion of strong biocides like glyphosate could be an explanation for the observed increase in levels of C. botulinum associated diseases.

In the present paper, we report on the toxicity of glyphosate to the most prevalent Enterococcus spp. in the GIT. Ingestion of this herbicide could be a significant predisposing factor that is associated with the increase in C. botulinum mediated diseases in cattle.”

Remember – you should contact your local authorities when you are going to dispose of Round Up, even an empty bottle. But we keep spraying it on our food – no worries there.

Hubble takes the biggest image ever of Andromeda at 1.5 billion pixels

Cosmos Magazine | Jan 6, 2015

The Hubble Space Telescope's image of the Andromeda Galaxy is the sharpest and biggest image ever taken of it. Click to expand but for an even closer view go to the Hubble website and use the zoom tool.

NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) have released the sharpest and biggest image ever taken of the Andromeda galaxy. The image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope has an amazing 1.5 billion pixels that would require 600 HD television screens to display in full.

This panorama is the product of the Panchromatic Hubble Andromeda Treasury (PHAT) program. Images were obtained from viewing the galaxy in near-ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared wavelengths, using the Advanced Camera for Surveys aboard Hubble.

The view shows the galaxy in its natural visible-light color as photographed in red and blue filters.

This image is too large to display at full resolution and is best viewed here, using the zoom tool.

Andromeda Galaxy, otherwise known as Messier 31, is a large spiral galaxy that lies "just" 2.5 million light years from Earth. Hubble's detailed view  captures more than 100 million stars and thousands of star clusters embedded in a section of the galaxy’s pancake-shaped disc stretching across over 40,000 light-years.

The whole galaxy contains over one thousand billion stars.

But the image represents just a third of the giant galaxy. It traces the galaxy from its central galactic bulge on the left of the image, where stars are densely packed together, across lanes of stars and dust to the sparser outskirts of its outer disc on the right.

Imagery of this sophistication has more than a "wow" factor. It will help astronomers interpret the light from the many galaxies that have a similar structure but lie much further away from us than Andromeda.