Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Turkey -- Georgia -- Azerbaijan Confederation or Caucasus Contained

By Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis

Beyond the Fat Cats

The most important thing the Democrats and President-elect Obama can do with regard to the economy is bring back a sense of fairness and equity.

The fat cats who placed the entire economy at risk with their greed and manic irresponsibility are trying to lay claim to every last dime in the national Treasury. Meanwhile, we're nowhere close to an economic recovery program that will help the people who are hurting most.

Back in September, with the credit markets frozen and the stock markets panicking, the treasury secretary, Henry Paulson, was telling anyone who would listen that his $700 billion bailout package had to be passed with lightning speed — no time to look at it too closely, no time for dissent.

The package was modified, but hurriedly. Now we learn that while all eyes were focused on this enormous new burden for American taxpayers, Mr. Paulson's department was also engineering — separate and apart from the bailout — what The Washington Post described as “a quiet windfall for U.S. banks. ”

With virtually no public attention, and without the input of Congress, Treasury made a change in an obscure tax provision that benefited banks to the tune of well over $100 billion. Was this good policy? In the absence of proper scrutiny, how is it possible to know?

We've also learned that the government bailout of the giant insurer, the American International Group — already more than $100 billion — is apparently insufficient. Tens of billions more are needed.

When the Champagne and caviar crowd is in trouble, there is no conceivable limit to the amount of taxpayer money that can be found, and found quickly.

But when it comes to ordinary citizens in dire situations — those being thrown out of work or forced from their homes by foreclosure or driven into bankruptcy because of illness and a lack of adequate health insurance — well, then we have to start pinching pennies. That's when it's time to become fiscally conservative. President Bush even vetoed a bill that would have expanded health insurance coverage for children.

We can find trillions for a foolish war and for pompous, self-righteous high-rollers who wrecked their companies and the economy. But what about the working poor and the young people who are being clobbered in this downturn, battered so badly that they're all but destitute? Can we find any way to help them?

~ more... ~

"It's a chemical sledgehammer" - Children in foster care

The chemical abuse of U.S. children in foster care represent the collapse of civilized medicine.
The Associated Press report (below) provides but a glimpse into a world of wontonly prescribed psychotropic drugs for children.

Children are being chemically assaulted under the guise of "treatment." Psychiatrists under the influence of drug manufacturers are misusing their prescribing license all across the U.S when they prescribe toxic combinations of psychotropic drugs for helpless children.

''The picture is bleak, and rooted in profound human suffering.''

That was the stinging verdict of a report on psychiatric treatment of foster children, including the misuse of medication issued by outgoing Texas state comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn in December. The report recommended hiring a full-time medical director for foster children and requiring prior approval for certain prescriptions.  http://www.window.state.tx.us/specialrpt/hccfoster06

In New York--''Children who are having normal reactions to the trauma of being separated from their families are often misdiagnosed or overdiagnosed as suffering from psychiatric problems, and the system is too quick to medicate,'' said Mike Arsham of the Child Welfare Organizing Project. '
'It's a chemical sledgehammer that makes children easier to manage.''

~ more... ~


Foster children routinely drugged in Florida

APATHY, DRUGS A POTENT MIX FOR FOSTER KIDS

Fred Grimm, Miami Herald, September 18, 2003

Substitute the word ''my'' for ''foster.'' Then consider that
psychotropic drugs are being popped into these children like aspirin.
Some without ever seeing a psychiatric pediatrician. Some of them
infants and toddlers. Most of them unmonitored for side effects.
Would you acquiesce? Would you shrug it off, if they were your kids,
rather than some troublesome horde downgraded to the caste of foster
children?

Would you say, ''Yeah, OK, what the hell?,'' if the state of Florida
decided to medicate your toddler with buspirone or pentobarbital or
bupropion or amphetamines or lithium or sertraline?

Suppose the Florida Statewide Advocacy Council -- after learning
psychotropic drugs were being fed to your preschooler -- called this
a "disturbing discovery since most of these drugs have not been
approved for use in young children by the federal Food and Drug
Administration.''

SCARY SIDE EFFECTS

Imagine if the state were drugging your young child despite possible
side effects that included "decreased blood flow to the brain,
cardiac arrhythmias, disruption of growth hormone leading to
suppression of growth in the body and brain of a child, weight loss,
permanent neurological tics, dystonia, addiction and abuse, including
withdrawal reactions, psychosis, depression, insomnia, agitation and
social withdrawal, suicidal tendencies, possible atrophy in the
brain, worsening of the very symptom the drugs are suppose to
improve, and decreased ability to learn.''

Not to mention the risk of tardive dyskinesia, which, according to
the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, is
another potential effect of anti-psychotic drugs characterized by
"repetitive, involuntary, purposeless movements. Features of the
disorder may include grimacing, tongue protrusion, lip smacking,
puckering and pursing, and rapid eye blinking. Rapid movements of the
arms, legs, and trunk may also occur. Impaired movements of the
fingers may appear as though the patient is playing an invisible
guitar or piano.''

'INTERESTING' FINDINGS

I don't know you. Maybe the potential of a sleepless, depressed,
withdrawn, suicidal, undersized, addicted, lip-smacking child playing
perpetual air guitar doesn't trouble you. But if it does, if you
would find this an unacceptable risk for your own children, then why
do you assent, in your mute apathy, to the treatments described by
the advocacy council, which pulled the files of 1,180 foster kids
(out of some 15,000) and found that 652 were being medicated on
psychotropic drugs?

The Department of Children & Families complained that the sample was
too small and yielded misleading results. Florida Medicaid, which
funds this mass child drugging, called the report's finding
"interesting and of concern.''

Interesting? If the recipient of these drugs had been the child of
someone in the Florida Medicaid hierarchy, reaction would have a bit
stronger than ''interesting and of concern.'' It was as these foster
kids were no more than lab monkeys....

Google uses web searches to track flu's spread

There is a new common symptom of the flu, in addition to the usual aches, coughs, fevers and sore throats. Turns out a lot of ailing Americans enter phrases like “flu symptoms” into Google and other search engines before they call their doctors.

That simple act, multiplied across millions of keyboards in homes around the country, has given rise to a new early warning system for fast-spreading flu outbreaks, called Google Flu Trends.

Tests of the new Web tool from Google.org, the company's philanthropic unit, suggest that it may be able to detect regional outbreaks of the flu a week to 10 days before they are reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In early February, for example, the C.D.C. reported that the flu cases had recently spiked in the mid-Atlantic states. But Google says its search data show a spike in queries about flu symptoms two weeks before that report was released. Its new service at google.org/flutrends analyzes those searches as they come in, creating graphs and maps of the country that, ideally, will show where the flu is spreading.

The C.D.C. reports are slower because they rely on data collected and compiled from thousands of health care providers, labs and other sources. Some public health experts say the Google data could help accelerate the response of doctors, hospitals and public health officials to a nasty flu season, reducing the spread of the disease and, potentially, saving lives.

“The earlier the warning, the earlier prevention and control measures can be put in place, and this could prevent cases of influenza,” said Dr. Lyn Finelli, lead for surveillance at the influenza division of the C.D.C. From 5 to 20 percent of the nation's population contracts the flu each year, she said, leading to roughly 36,000 deaths on average.

The service covers only the United States, but Google is hoping to eventually use the same technique to help track influenza and other diseases worldwide.

~ more... ~

End the Federal Reserve Bank! National Rally for Sound Money, November 22nd

From Target: Freedom

On November 22nd, rallies in 39 cities will commence at Federal Bank locations throughout America. We have one message: END THE FED.

The official website is www.endthefed.us 

For a list of rally locations, click here

If you don't know why we should END THE FED, check out these videos:




Remembering the victims of those who profit from war

How unfortunate that we have a need for such a day, especially since “War is a racket It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.” So stated Major General Smedley D. Butler, USMC , the most decorated Marine in US history.

Today, and every day, we should remember why we have sent our children to die, and to kill. We should remember that war is meant to consolidate assets for the oligarchy. We should also remember that
the majority of casualties of every War have been civilians
. That not only soldiers, but countless innocents have been caught in the line of fire between warring corporations to increase the wealth of the privileged few.

~ more... ~


American shot dead in Peshawar: Pakistani police

Gunmen shot dead a U.S. aid official along with his driver in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar Wednesday, a senior police official said.
"He was working for U.S. aid projects for tribal areas," the official, who requested anonymity, told Reuters.

U.S. embassy officials in Islamabad were not immediately available for comment.

~ Reuters ~



Google
 

image from http://www.spitting-image.net

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