Opit's LinkFest!: 15 September

NEW YORK, NY - DECEMBER 06: A member of the Occupy Wall Street movement places tape over a window of a forclosed home during a march in the impoverished community of East New York in Brooklyn to draw attention to foreclosed homes in the community on December 6, 2011 in New York, United States. The group said they would occupy a home and would hand the property over to a homeless family. In what organizers are describing as a new frontier for the movement, thousands of other Occupy Wall street protesters around the country participated in similar actions. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

NEW YORK, NY - NOVEMBER 02: Members of the New York City chapter of Iraq Veterans Against the War and dozens of other uniformed veterans known as 'Veterans of the 99%' march from Vietnam Veterans Plaza to Zucotti Park where the Occupy Wall Street movement is centered on November 2, 2011 in New York City. The veterans groups, which feature current and former members of the United States military, marched in support of Occupy Wall Street and to pay homage to Scott Olsen, a former Marine and Iraq War vet who sustained a skull fracture after he was injured by police at an Occupy Oakland protest. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

English: A member of Anonymous at the Occupy Wall Street protest in New York. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

CHICAGO, IL - OCTOBER 05: Rules for demonstrators with Occupy Chicago to follow are posted on a cart at the protest site in the financial district October 5, 2011 in Chicago, Illinois. The protest is one of many around the country being held in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street protests currently taking place in New York City. The demonstrators are protesting what they believe is greed and corruption among banking and business leaders, claiming the majority of wealth in the United States is controlled by 1 percent of the population. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

English: Valerie Plame at an event at Moravian College in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

FOCUS: Valerie Plame Wilson | US Government Is Bullying an American Hero

Valerie Plame Wilson, Reader Supported News
Plame Wilson writes: "If you offer the public a true story that is at odds with what the government wants you to know, they will stop at nothing to destroy you, your reputation, and the reputations of the people around you."
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Live Coverage: Occupy Worldwide
Reader Supported News Special Coverage
The seed planted on September 17, 2011, in New York City has grown into a national and international movement. Occupy Wall Street has branched out with hundreds of groups organizing Occupy protests in their own communities. Reader Supported News highlights some of the more significant actions from around the country here. Share this page with your friends and associates and check back often for the latest developments.
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Why Are We Being Kept in the Dark Over GMOs?

Dr. Mercola, NaturalSociety
Mercola writes: "As it currently stands in the United States, you are actually being completely kept in the dark about what's in your food. And it may interest you to know that many pro-GMO corporations such as Monsanto intend to keep it that way."

I Told You I Was Sick shared Wellness Uncovered Health Forum's photo.

Occupy Monsanto

Apparently he had quite a bit to do with Monsanto coming to power, not surprising but still somewhat alarming.

How Mitt Romney Helped Monsanto Take Over the World

www.motherjones.com

How Romney helped Monsanto transform from teetering, scandal-plagued chemical firm to shiny new ag-biotech giant.

NaturalNews.com

What is actually going into your body with a flu shot? How dangerous is this to your health?

Flu Shots Are Made From WHAT??? - NaturalNews.tv

tv.naturalnews.com

You may not want to know how flu shots are produced. Even worse may be how some new production methods are ready to come to a syringe

Hamid Dabashi | Cairo, Benghazi and Beyond: Beware the False Fury
Hamid Dabashi, Al Jazeera English
Dabashi writes: "The principle problem with this absurdity, however, is not its origin - but its destination: the riots and demonstrations in front of the US embassies that began in Cairo and Benghazi and have now spread all over the Muslim world."
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Mass Protests Intensify Across Muslim World
Al Jazeera English
Excerpt: "Protesters have attacked Western embassies in Tunisia, Yemen and Sudan, as a wave of demonstrations against an anti-Islam film swelled and swept across much of the Muslim world after Friday prayers."
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Paul Krugman | The iPhone Stimulus
Paul Krugman, The New York Times
Krugman writes: "What I'm interested in, instead, are suggestions that the unveiling of the iPhone 5 might provide a significant boost to the U.S. economy, adding measurably to economic growth over the next quarter or two."
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Mitt Romney's Disastrous Energy Plan
Jeff Goodell, Rolling Stone
Goodell writes: "...what Romney and the Republicans are offering voters this November isn't a coherent energy plan. It's a suicide note."
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FOCUS: Michael Lewis | Obama's Way

Michael Lewis, Vanity Fair
Summary: "To understand how air-force navigator Tyler Stark ended up in a thornbush in the Libyan desert in March 2011, one must understand what it's like to be president of the United States - and this president in particular. Hanging around Barack Obama for six months, in the White House, aboard Air Force One, and on the basketball court, Michael Lewis learns the reality of the Nobel Peace Prize winner who sent Stark into combat."
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FOCUS | Judge Forrest v. Indefinite Detention and Congress

The New York Times | Editorial
Excerpt: "For 11 years, Americans have struggled to reach a sensible legal balance that protects both national security and civil liberties..."
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FOCUS: Bill Moyers, Bernie Sanders | Challenging Power, Changing Politics

Bill Moyers and Bernie Sanders, Moyers & Company
Excerpt: "Welcome - to some ideas you didn't hear at the Republican and Democratic conventions."
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Occupy Monsanto added a new photo.

Suzuki Elders

To eat or not to eat….organic foods

by Peggy Olive

A recent Stanford study has received a lot of attention because it finds that organic foods are no more nutritious than those grown “conventionally”. Apparently this comes as a surprise to many, although there have been similar reports in the scientific literature over the years. Leaving aside the fact that until the 20^th century all food was grown organically, does this mean that we’re wasting our money paying extra for organically grown foods?

It’s not obvious to me why crops grown organically should contain more vitamins and minerals. That’s determined genetically for the most part. Popeye eats spinach and not green beans because of the higher vitamin and mineral content of spinach. The level of vitamins is also closely tied to the time since harvest. Vitamin C levels drop precipitously in many vegetables held at room temperature or even some kept in our refrigerators for a few days. If concerned only about nutrition, eating freshly-picked vegetables from your local gardens makes more sense than buying organic foods from afar.

Food safety issues are no different for organic and non-organic foods, although many people think the higher price paid for organic foods should make them safer to eat. There’s also no reason to believe that organic meat comes from animals that have been treated more humanely than animals fed hormones or antibiotics.

So why should we choose to eat foods grown organically if they aren’t more nutritious, they aren’t safer to eat, and the animals haven’t led happier lives?

An excellent reason to eat organic foods is because they are grown without the use of pesticides, additives, and hormones that we should avoid for health reasons. Just as important, organic refers not only to the food itself, but how it was produced. Organic foods are grown using methods that recycle resources and promote biodiversity, considered key elements of environmentally sustainable agriculture. Monoculture and intensive farming methods using petroleum-based fertilizers depletes the soil of important organisms that supply nutrients to growing plants. Soil degradation has been of concern for a long time in Canada and elsewhere, and ultimately conventional farming practices result in reduced crop yields, now exacerbated by climate change.

The argument has made that organic farming methods cannot increase agricultural productivity because they are too inefficient. However, the UN Environmental Program reported in 2008 that organic farming practices in Africa outperformed industrial, chemical-intensive conventional farming, and improved soil fertility, retention of water, and resistance to drought. Scientific studies support the conclusion that organic farming methods are better at retaining soil productivity than conventional methods.

Ten benefits of organic farming/ organic food

Better for our environment, by definition: A production system that integrates cultural, biological, and mechanical practices that foster cycling of resources, promote ecological balance, and conserve biodiversity.
Not treated with pesticides, hormones, or potentially toxic additives
Safer for farm workers (limits exposure to toxins)
Safer for farm animals
Safer for crop pollinators
Better for soil (fosters biodiversity, water retention, productivity)
Animals not fed animal by-products
Not genetically modified (when labelled 100% organic)
Not treated with antibiotics so organic meat contains less antibiotic-resistant bacteria
More likely to be farmed locally (fresher)

The major disadvantage of organic food is the price you will pay at your supermarket checkout, typically 10-40% higher. Organic foods are more expensive because production costs are higher. Production costs are higher because farming methods are more labour intensive and there is potentially greater crop loss from pests. Because the price is higher, the choice to eat organic foods is not always available to those on limited incomes, and this could be viewed as a social equity issue. Certifying that the organic food you buy has actually been grown organically and is chemically free is an ongoing concern. To counter this problem, Canadian organic food now bears a logo but more oversight is required.

Fortunately, not all the foods we eat need to be grown organically if we want to significantly reduce our exposure to pesticides. The Environmental Working Group, a U.S. based non-profit organization specializing in research and advocacy to protect public health and the environment, has given us a list of the dirty dozen fruits and vegetables that are likely to present with the highest levels of pesticides, so it makes sense to use your “organic dollars” to buy these ones. Now, if only my aging mind could remember which ones are best to buy ‘organic’ when standing in front of the vegetable displays and fruit bins.

It is true that some of the benefits of organic food might be accomplished by no-till farming methods and by the use of genetically modified foods (GMFs) that are naturally pesticide-resistant or tolerant to environmental stresses. No-till methods will improve the soil, but many GMFs are grown to be resistant to the drugs used to kill the weeds or pests, and we, like honeybees, are not resistant. The potential of GMFs to add new toxins, allergens and genetic hazards to our food supply is a concern for many consumers and the paucity of studies on the long-term safety of GMFs has been reported in the scientific literature.

As demand for organic food grows, economies of scale will reduce cost to the consumer and cost to the farmer who implements organic farming practices. Before we complain about the price of organic foods, we need to be reminded of how little of our income we actually spend on food. In 1961, Canadians spent on average 19% of their income on food, but by 2005 this had dropped to 9.3%. In comparison, Europeans spend about 15% of their income on food, South Americans about 30%, and Africans more than 40%. Also, we shouldn’t forget how much food we waste. Total losses and wastage in the food chain can reach 50% in Western countries, so we would pay much less for our food if we simply reduced waste. With the benefits of organic foods listed above (which do not include nutrition per se) and the low relative cost for food in this country, price alone becomes a poor excuse for not choosing to eat organic foods.

Peggy Olive | 15 September, 2012 at 7:37 pm | Categories: ElderPlanet | URL: http://wp.me/pWGbk-lc

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I Told You I Was Sick shared Collective Evolution's photo.
Possibly the most toxic thing you can buy in a grocery store.

Carl Gibson | Standardized Testing for Elected Officials

Carl Gibson, Reader Supported News
Intro: "Rahm Emanuel wants to cheapen education to make it conform to a standardized testing model. So how about we come up with standardized testing models to see how our do-nothing politicians measure up?"
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Obama's Call Moves Egypt to Heal Rift From Protests
David Kirkpatrick, Helene Cooper and Mark Landler, The New York Times
Intro: "Following a blunt phone call from President Obama, Egyptian leaders scrambled Thursday to try to repair the country's alliance with Washington."
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Big Ag Allegedly Funded Stanford's "Spin" on Organics Study
The Cornucopia Institute
Excerpt: "Not surprisingly, the study's glaring errors, both in understanding the important and complex differences between organic and conventional foods and in the researchers' flawed choice of research methods, prompted organic advocates to look closely at financial ties between Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute, which supports the researchers, and the chemical and agribusiness industry."
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US Election System Criticized by UN Commission
Karen McVeigh, Guardian UK
Intro: "Commission led by Kofi Annan says the rise of Super Pacs and voter ID laws has 'shaken citizen confidence' in elections."
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After 18 Years, Violence Against Women Act Has Saved Countless Lives
Annie-Rose Strasser, ThinkProgress
Excerpt: "As the country celebrates the 18th anniversary of the legislation, here are some of the victories achieved through VAWA."