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Thomas Paine

To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

13 Dec - Articles of Note

Chelsea Waterworks, 1752. Two Newcomen beam en...Image via Wikipedia

Full Disclosure | Authentically Wired

CORPORATE PROPOGANDA … excuse me … “disinformation”






9 Unexpected Things in Drinking Water …By Dana Chivvis … 8 Dec 09 — Charles Duhigg of The New York Times today delivered the latest unsettling news about the nation’s water supply: It’s not as clean as you might think. An analysis of federal data from the last five years revealed that more than 20 percent of the nation’s water-treatment systems have broken provisions of the Safe Drinking Water Act, the standards enforced by the Environmental Protection Agency. The result? As many as 19 million Americans are sickened each year. Over the years, the EPA has identified many substances in water supplies far and wide. Here are nine unexpected things that they’ve spotted.
Arsenic A naturally occurring element found in soil and minerals, arsenic is used as a pesticide and wood sealant. Ingesting high levels of arsenic, Madame Bovary can tell you, is deadly. At lower levels, over longer periods of time, it can darken skin and spur corns and warts. A carcinogen, arsenic can increase the risk of skin, liver, bladder and lung cancers.
The EPA has said that more than 3 million Americans have been exposed to water with illegal concentrations of arsenic since 2005.
Uranium The element Iran insists on enriching despite howls from the U.S. and other Western nations, it is also used in helicopters, airplanes, armor, fertilizer and household items like certain microwaves. After it’s mined and processed, some of it is released back into the environment in waste material, called mill tailings. Large amounts of uranium can lead to kidney disease and cancer, though naturally occurring uranium is much less radioactive.
The EPA says levels of uranium in drinking water are usually low and safe, according to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. However, the 3 million Americans exposed to illegal amounts of arsenic were also exposed to illegal amounts of radioactive substances.
Radium This radioactive metal has been used to treat cancer, for scientific research and in instrument calibration. Everyone is exposed to low levels of the substance, but higher levels are found near uranium mines, coal-burning industries and sometimes in drinking water that comes from wells. Radium can cause anemia and cataracts. At high levels, it is a carcinogen, causing increased bone, liver and breast cancer.
The EPA has reported that levels of radium were 2,000 times the legal limit in water flowing in some areas.
Tetrachloroethylene Used in dry cleaning and for metal degreasing, this chemical usually evaporates when it meets water, soil or air, but high exposure can cause headaches, dizziness, confusion, nausea and unconsciousness. Women who are exposed to high levels of tetrachloroethylene may have menstrual problems and even spontaneous abortions. It is also believed to be a carcinogen. The New York Times found that the drinking water in Ramsey, N.J., located 35 miles outside of New York City, has had illegal concentrations of tetrachloroethylene since 2004.
Lead Houses built before 1986 are more likely to have lead pipes than newer ones. Because hot water dissolves lead more easily, people who live with older plumbing should never drink hot water from the tap. Kids who drink lead-tainted water above the legal limits are at risk for physical and mental development problems. In adults, lead can lead to high blood pressure and kidney trouble.
The EPA’s threshold for lead is 0.015 parts per million. If you are concerned about the levels of lead in your water, you can have it tested at a certified laboratory.
Prozac, Birth Control, Makeup, Shampoo Along with deceased goldfish and incriminating evidence, it turns out Americans like to flush their drugs and personal care products down the toilet, too. These substances leave the toilet (or bathtub and shower) and end up in our waterways. In fact, most of the waterways the EPA tested had pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) in them. While there is evidence that ecological harm can come from PPCPs in the water, scientists are not yet sure of the threat to humans.
You can find reports on the drinking water in your area at the EPA Web site.
DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE . . . Oh, but not to worry as over the last 30 years EPA in close cooperation with our nations water purveyors (public & private) have determine (naturally, behind closed doors and without any input from you or me) what the SAFE levels are for these ingredients in the water they choose to provide to you and me.
And given the level of DISCLOSURE & TRANSPARENCY existing in Arizona “we” can be assured whatever is disclosed to us by our Governor and her Directors of Water Resources (ADWR) and Environmental Quality (ADEQ) is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth … yea, ha, ha
… In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act…George Orwell







nationaldebt_42d6b.jpg





Leader of the Anglican Church Publicly Denounces Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Bill

n an interview* with the British Telegraph newspaper, the Head of the Anglican Church has publicly condemned Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Bill that would literally enable the Ugandan government to hound gay men and women to death if the penalty of "aggravated homosexuality" is not removed.

In the interview, Dr. Rowan Williams talks about the schism facing the Anglican Church, his relationship with the Vatican, and also comments on legislation tabled by Ugandan MP David Bahati that has been dubbed the "Kill the Gays Bill":



( It violates confidentiality of the Church : the oldest refuge available to fugitives of conscience )


Presiding Bishop of America's Episcopal Church, Katharine Jefferts Schori, also formally condemns the Bill, saying that all efforts to criminalize homosexual behavior are inconsistent with the tenets of the Church, while adding:






...We note that much of the current climate of fear, rejection, and antagonism toward gay and lesbian persons in African nations has been stirred by members and former members of our own Church.  We note further that attempts to export the culture wars of North America to another context represent the very worst of colonial behavior.  We deeply lament this reality, and repent of any way in which we have participated in this sin.
You can read the rest of the Bishop's statement here.







Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, talks to George Pitcher about schism, Rome, politics and conservation.




*Isn’t there something rather acquisitive and invasive about this Pope, who wants us to know that there is one universal voice of authority and it speaks from Rome? Dr Williams suddenly opens up: “Nothing entirely new about that of course. At the end of John Paul II’s pontificate you have that discussion of how papal authority is meant to be understood, how it might be received by others. I think that’s treading water at the moment. I’d like to see that revived and that’s part of what I was nudging at in Rome.





“Second thing is that in British Catholicism there’s a kind of resurgent – no – recurrent cycle of the 'second spring’, in Cardinal Newman’s imagery, and in the wave of distinguished converts in the interwar years, Evelyn Waugh and so on. There was just a hint of it when Cardinal Hume uncharacteristically talked about the reconversion of England – and I think he regretted that actually. And a few people in the last round. It’s a pattern, the sense that the Reformation wounds are going to be healed in favour of Rome. And it just keeps coming back – I think this has been the occasion for another little bit of that. It’s bits of the repertoire.”
The languid manner in which he delivers this leaves no doubt that he’s not holding his breath for a Roman second spring either. I wonder whether the Pope has, unwittingly and ironically, provided the kind of “third province” that Anglo-Catholics were demanding because they can’t accept women bishops, lesbian or otherwise. The Revision Committee for women bishops, after all, dropped proposals for legal protection for them in the wake of the Pope’s initiative.
“I would guess that the papal announcement had some impact on the way some people thought and voted on the committee,” concedes Dr Williams. “But actually I don’t think it is a solution. A great many Anglo-Catholics have good reason for not being Roman Catholics. They don’t believe the Pope is infallible. And that’s why they’re still pressing for a solution in Anglican terms, rather than what many of them see as a theologically rather eccentric option on the Roman side.”



Iranian scientist who vanished 'gave nuclear secrets' to UN inspectors sent to Qom site

An award-winning atomic physicist, Mr Amiri had worked at the heavily-guarded underground site at Qom. He was attached to a Tehran university named by the EU last year as part of the regime's nuclear-proliferation operations.But contrary to Iranian claims, Mr Amiri actually defected after an elaborate international cloak-and-dagger co-ordinated by the CIA, according to a well-connected French intelligence analysis website.





The vanishing act was reminiscent of Cold War days between the Soviet Union and the West when spies - often scientists and diplomats - were spirited away in plots just as outlandish as any John le Carré thriller.
Heads have rolled at Iran's nuclear counter-espionage agency since his loss, and the foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, raised his case in a private meeting with the UN secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon.
The Islamic republic has now linked the fate of three American hikers detained in Iran since July with a list of Iranian citizens, including Mr Amiri, who Tehran alleges are being held by the US. It appears to be proposing some form of trade in talks with Swiss intermediaries.
Officially, the US says it has no information on Mr Amiri's whereabouts, but the scientist is now believed to be in Europe, protected by a Western intelligence agency, in a CIA-led operation. He will be debriefed intensively by experts - who will also want to ensure that he is not an Iranian plant.
Four months after Mr Amiri disappeared, President Barack Obama, flanked by Gordon Brown and the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, disclosed that Iran had built the buried uranium enrichment plant near the holy city of Qom.
Western intelligence had developed information about the site over three years.
But Mr Amiri's intelligence about its inner workings - and especially security procedures - proved "extremely useful", a source close to France's overseas secret service, the DGSE (Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure), told The Sunday Telegraph.
"Amiri has first hand knowledge of the site and this would have been the main subject of discussion," the source said. "The meeting was so secret that the inspectors who met Amiri were unlikely to have even known his name, let alone his background. He was just presented as a bona fide contact in the know about how Qom works."
( Isn't it remarkable how these stories never touch upon the fact that these actions clearly violate treaty terms supporting Iran's agreement to transparency of their nuclear operations : and are continually posed as a threat by the holder of a phenomenally overdeveloped international weapons program for assault with Weapons of Mass Destruction anywhere on the Planet.
And of course, not only is the Third Pillar of the NPT violated, but I have been posting articles on how this is a planned disinformation program  from 1975 ... and even previous to that.
Deer Hunting with Jesus - Joe Bageant
Dispatches from America's Class War






The Devil and Mr. Obama

Barack promised change -- and sure enough, things changed for the worse
Obama's public approval ratings are taking a beating. Millions of his former cult members have awakened with a splitting hangover to find their pockets turned inside out and eviction notices on the doors of their 4,000 square foot subprime mortgaged cardboard fuck boxes.
This frustrating ping pong game in which the margin of first time, disenchanted and undecided voters are batted back and forth has become the whole of American elections. That makes both the Republican and Democratic parties very happy, since it keeps the game down to fighting the enemy they know, each other, as opposed to being forced to deal with the real issues, or worse yet, an independent or third party candidate who might have a solution or two.
Thus, the game is limited to two players between two corporate parties. One is the Republican Party, which believes we should hand over our lives and resources directly to the local Chamber of Commerce, so the chamber can deliver them to the big corporations. The other, the Democratic Party, believes we should hand our lives and resources to a Democratic administration -- so it alone can deliver our asses to the big dogs who own the country. In the big picture it's always about who gets to deliver the money to the Wall Street hyena pack.
Americans may be starting to get the big picture about politics, money and corporate power. But I doubt it. Given that most still believe the war on terrorism is real, and that terrorists always just happen to be found near gas and oil deposits, there is plenty of room left to blow more smoke up their asses. Especially considering how we are conditioned to go into blind fits of patriotism at the sight of the flag, an eagle, or the mention of "our heroes," even if the heroes happen to be killing and maiming Muslim babies at the moment. Patriotism is a cataract that blinds us to all national discrepancies.
 The Nobel Committee awarded the 2009 Peace Prize to the very person who dropped the most bombs and killed the most poor people on the planet during that year. 
The same guy who started a new war in Pakistan, beefed up the ongoing war in Afghanistan, and continues to threaten Iran with attack unless Iran cops to phony US-Israeli charges of secret nuclear weapons facilities. It's weapons of mass destruction all over again. Somewhere in the whole fracas has been forgotten that Iran has been calling for a nuclear free zone in the Middle East since 1974. Iran has also been consistent in its position that "petroleum is a noble material, much too valuable to burn for electricity," and that nuclear energy makes much more sense, given that our food supply, whether we like it or not, is fundamentally dependent upon petrochemicals and will remain so until the earth's population is reduced to at least half of what it is now. The Iranian attitude has been to use the shrinking petroleum deposits as judiciously as possible.
To which oilman George Bush replied that "There will be consequences for Iran's attitude."
Then there are Obama's noble efforts to fight terrorism by beefing up troop "deployment" in Afghanistan. Deployment may be construed to mean an American style armed gangbang, in which everybody piles on some wretched flea bitten hamlets for all they are worth, with periodic breaks for pizza and video games.












Now if you look at the deployment of US forces in Afghanistan, compared to NATO country forces there, you'll find them in a nice even line along what could easily be mistaken for an oil pipeline route. One that taps into the natural gas deposits in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan and, by the purest coincidence, just happens to bypass nearby Russia and Iran. But we all know that "It's about fighting terrorism over there so we won't have to fight it here!" That still plays in Peoria, so we're sticking with it.












"The Fed" is an offshore private banking cartel that decides just how much bogus currency can be printed and circulated profitably for bankers without wrecking their Ponzi schemes. And the chairman of that august body has announced that the recession is over. Well halleluja! We can quit rolling our own cigs and buy ready mades, and run recklessly through the Dollar Store scooping up dented canned goods and cheap Chinese tube socks.




















That makes us luckier than the three and a half million Americans, most of whom led normal lives a few of years ago, who are now homeless. That includes one million school children sleeping in tents, shelters and other makeshift arrangements, and trying to look presentable each morning at schools that have not even the mercy to let them use the school showers. By the administration's own calculation, the number of homeless and people out of work will continue to escalate at least into the next year. Home foreclosures, and therefore homelessness, "has not topped out yet," says Obama.





Economic systems are merely belief systems. I didn't say that. Keynes said that.







The U.S. Ministry of Truth has announced that our unemployment rate is at 10%. I've yet to meet an American who does not know the official unemployment rate is a complete fiction. 

Unemployment will in all likelihood go higher. And nobody on earth knows how to reduce it .





















The Federal Reserve has logically set a low interest rate policy. 





















Banks took the Fed's money, then raised the annual percentage rate (APR) on credit card purchases and cash advances and on balances that have a penalty rate because of late payment. Next they raised the late fee. What the hell? If Americans are on the ropes, struggling to make their payments on time, then the logical thing to do is to stick it to them. Bleed 'em for all they're worth. It's an American free market tradition. We the people do not complain. We expect no mercy. America is a business and the American concept of business is pure ruthlessness.









A Deutsche Bank analyst tells me a near term worst is yet to come. Bank failures and home foreclosures have not peaked. A commercial real estate bust is coming down the pike. He says that, while there will be some minor periodic upswings, the fraudulent value of the dollar is now evident as it falls against every other currency, even the Russian ruble (13%), except those unlucky enough to be pegged to the US dollar.

The saddest thing is that Americans are cultivated like mushrooms from birth to death, kept in the dark and fed horseshit. Consequently, they haven't the slightest idea that there is an alternative to the system in which they labor at the pleasure of corporate and financial elites who own both their government and their every waking hour. That alternative is democratic Socialism. Self governance for the broadest common good. Which the Ministry of Truth has defined for them as fascism.









Healthcare and environment? Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha










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