Here is my commentary on today’s offering from CommonDreams.org. If you use only one other source of news and commentary it should be CommonDreams.org. It’s free; from time to time they will ask you for a small donation. I have highlighted the commentary provided by Glenn Greenwald. In my opinion, the best writer on the web. Read it all – it makes a grand synthesis of the thinking brought forth by the assassination of Osama bin Laden. Read, assimilate, and learn. tfk

Wanted Dead or Alive
Published on Thursday, May 12, 2011 by CommonDreams.org
by Robert C. Koehler

When President Obama, summing up the killing of Osama bin Laden, said, “Justice has been done,” the problem wasn’t simply that he misspoke — justice, after all, can only emerge at the end of an impartial judicial proceeding — but that, in so misspeaking, he hit the emotional bull’s-eye.

“Justice has been done.”

We got him, America! Oh yeah, sweet! Who can’t feel the pop of satisfaction in those words? “He should have said, ‘Retaliation has been accomplished,’” Marjorie Cohn pointed out recently at Common Dreams, and that’s true, of course, but the president wasn’t summoning the dry, sober rule of law. He was evoking, just as George W. Bush did before him, the Wild West, America’s deepest font of mythology, where justice, you know, comes from the muzzle of a revolver. As with Geronimo, so with Osama: Wanted Dead or Alive.

“. . . it was the Indians who, by the ambush, the atrocity, and the capture of the white women . . . became the aggressors and so sealed their own fate,” writes Tom Engelhardt in The End of Victory Culture, describing the first mythological enemy we created as we carved a nation out of a continent.

“From the seventeenth century on,” Engelhardt continues, “Americans were repeatedly shown the slaughter of Indians as a form of reassurance and entertainment, and audiences almost invariably cheered.”

In the post-9/11 decade, myth and politics — myth and all phases of American culture — have converged with a certain ferocity that seems unprecedented in my lifetime, and coincides with our transition to a state of perpetual war and economic freefall. As real security for most people nosedives, appeal to myth, especially the myth of the Wild West, becomes the prime tool of governance.

“. . . from this day on,” said Mara Liasson a week ago on NPR, “his Republican opponents will always have to deal with the new and enduring fact that Barack Obama is the president who got Osama bin Laden.”

This says nothing and everything in one fell swoop. The “everything” is mythological: This is a big, big victory for the prez and for America. The “nothing” is . . . everything else. Bin Laden’s death doesn’t end our wars or make us safer. Indeed, anything but. Talk of terrorist retaliation immediately began cycling through the 24/7 media. If Sen. Charles Schumer has his way, the security bureaucracy will create a “no ride” list for Amtrak passengers because some evil, though sketchy, plans were found at bin Laden’s compound targeting the U.S. rail system.

“Even in death,” writes Glenn Greenwald, “bin Laden continues to serve the valuable role of justifying always-increasing curtailments of liberty and expansions of government power.”

The raid and assassination have also led to a resurgence of torture justifications in the media, particularly from Bush-era officials neck deep in war-crime complicity, despite zero evidence that testimony obtained via “enhanced interrogation” or “Rumsfeld interview” yielded any useful intelligence. Could it be, Carla Seaquist wondered in a piece on Huffington Post, that they’re just trying to establish a protective buffer against eventual prosecution for war crimes?

The myth of the Wild West is the myth of necessary violence. It has no limits. It justifies the carpet bombing of civilians. It justifies political assassination, including assassination by drone aircraft (with unlimited civilian casualties allowed, especially if they can be labeled “suspected insurgents”). It justifies the spread of toxic pollutants. It justifies the use of nuclear weapons.

And all it asks of us is a state of endless fear.

“There’s a way in which terrorism is incredibly smart and savvy,” said Suzanne Ross of the Raven Foundation. “If you make someone afraid, they will destroy themselves eventually.”

In several video presentations, Ross and her colleague, Adam Ericksen, examined President Obama’s attempts this past week to call forth a heightened sense of national unity around Osama bin Laden’s assassination. It’s a devil’s bargain, they maintain, because the need for more violence will never end. However, this need — for the next war, the next political assassination — always seems so reasonable. And as part of the bargain, “The meaning you’re making around violence is your own goodness,” Ross said.

The Raven Foundation, along with innumerable organizations and, in all likelihood, a majority of the American populace, wants this country to reorganize not around violence and exclusion — good guys vs. bad guys — but around a higher human standard: compassion, inclusion, real justice.

The only way this has any chance of happening is if enough people free themselves of the myth of the Wild West, which reduces these values to the status of the fair maiden rescued at gunpoint.

Posted by:
T.F. Kelley, Ph.D.
1500 Providence Hwy., #38
Norwood, MA 02062

On May 1st there will be three anniversaries to mark. First, the International Worker’s Day (also known as May Day) originated in 1886 in Chicago and is a national holiday in more than 80 countries. The second marks the publication eight years ago of the Downing Street Memo in The London Times which provided the first solid evidence of Bush’s decision to invade Iraq regardless of any U.N. action. The last is the anniversary of President Bush’s arrival as the copilot in a Navy S-3B jet on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln to announce we had won his war.

The selection of an aircraft carrier for Bush’s speech was brilliant. There was live TV coverage from the flight deck of the perfect tail-hook landing. The plane was labeled ‘Navy 1’ and ‘George W. Bush, Commander in Chief’ was printed under the cockpit window. At first hearing it seemed to be an important speech for the American people, indeed the world, for Bush announced, “In the battle of Iraq, the US and its allies have prevailed.” and “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended.” A massive banner proclaimed “Mission Accomplished.”

Until then, day 42 of the war, 138 American military personnel had been killed. One year later that number reached 734. Appearances gave way to reality as the killing continued. Baghdad, once called the Paris of the Middle East and the 5000 year old civilization it represented has been nearly obliterated.

As the situation in Iraq continued to degrade the “Mission Accomplished” banner became an embarrassment. The administration tried to blame the carrier crew for creating and raising the banner. But the banner and the live televised photo op were not the products of enthusiastic crew members. Professionals, a former ABC producer, a former Fox news producer and an NBC cameraman and lighting specialist had been on board for days creating the spectacle. Everything was accounted for: the lighting, the crew arranged in coordinated shirt colors, the now infamous “Mission Accomplished” banner positioned so it was captured by the camera focused on the president.

Bush’s strutting on the carrier deck was a theatrical promenade that served only to mark the start of his re-election campaign. There was nothing else of significance; everything since continues downhill. Within two weeks of the fall of Baghdad, April 14, the administration admitted there were no WMD, confirming years of negative reports from the U.N inspectors.

Afghanistan was lost in the spring of 2002, almost one year before the Iraq invasion, when key personnel and material were being transferred to the Iraq theatre in preparation for war. This void allowed Osama bin Laden to escape. The Taliban had not been defeated, only beaten back but allowed to regroup. Afghanistan had been effectively abandoned and we are now paying for those poor decisions.

Our new strategy, the “Surge,” was supposed to turn around our expensive, bloody and failing efforts. Realistically it was a cover for genocide and the ethnic cleansing of Sunni and Shia. Now there are 2.3 million Iraqis living in strange houses and neighborhoods. And about 2.2 million Iraqi refugees in Syria and Jordan.

Mayday, the international code word for distress, is appropriate for this anniversary. It will remind us of the perfidy of the Bush Administration and the needless deaths of more than 4,450 of our children and grandchildren, the crippling, maiming, blinding of over 32,000 others, the untimely deaths and wounding of over 100,000 Iraqis and the creation of thousands of orphans and widows.

T. F. Kelley
1500 Providence Hwy
Norwood 02062

A new survey of American voters shows that Fox News viewers are significantly more misinformed than consumers of news from other sources.

Yet another study has been released proving that watching Fox News is detrimental to your intelligence. World Public Opinion, a project managed by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, conducted a survey of American voters that shows that Fox News viewers are significantly more misinformed than consumers of news from other sources. What’s more, the study shows that greater exposure to Fox News increases misinformation.

So the more you watch, the less you know. Or to be precise, the more you think you know that is actually false. This study corroborates a previous PIPA study that focused on the Iraq war with similar results. And there was an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll that demonstrated the break with reality on the part of Fox viewers with regard to health care. The body of evidence that Fox News is nothing but a propaganda machine dedicated to lies is growing by the day.

In eight of the nine questions below, Fox News placed first in the percentage of those who were misinformed (they placed second in the question on TARP). That’s a pretty high batting average for journalistic fraud. Here is a list of what Fox News viewers believe that just ain’t so:

• 91 percent believe the stimulus legislation lost jobs
• 72 percent believe the health reform law will increase the deficit
• 72 percent believe the economy is getting worse
• 60 percent believe climate change is not occurring
• 49 percent believe income taxes have gone up
• 63 percent believe the stimulus legislation did not include any tax cuts
• 56 percent believe Obama initiated the GM/Chrysler bailout
• 38 percent believe that most Republicans opposed TARP
• 63 percent believe Obama was not born in the U.S. (or that it is unclear)

The conclusion is inescapable. Fox News is deliberately misinforming its viewers and it is doing so for a reason. Every issue above is one in which the Republican Party had a vested interest. The GOP benefited from the ignorance that Fox News helped to proliferate. The results were apparent in the election last month as voters based their decisions on demonstrably false information fed to them by Fox News.

By the way, the rest of the media was not blameless. CNN and the broadcast network news operations fared only slightly better in many cases. Even MSNBC, which had the best record of accurately informing viewers, has a ways to go before it can brag about it.

The conclusions in this study need to be disseminated as broadly as possible. Fox’s competitors need to report these results and produce ad campaigns featuring them. Newspapers and magazines need to publish the study across the country. This is big news and it is critical that the nation be advised that a major news enterprise is poisoning their minds.

This is not an isolated review of Fox’s performance. It has been corroborated time and time again. The fact that Fox News is so blatantly dishonest, and the effects of that dishonesty have become ingrained in an electorate that has been purposefully deceived, needs to be made known to every American. Our democracy cannot function if voters are making choices based on lies. We have the evidence that Fox is tilting the scales and we must now make certain its corporate owners do not get away with it.

Originally published by News Corpse | Written by Mark Howard
December 15, 2010  |

Today, March 19, 2011 marks the eighth anniversary of our invasion of Iraq.  Please read my Editorial that was published in the local regional newspaper on February 24, 2003, four weeks before the invasion.  I pointed out all the reasons that should have kept us from this criminal venture which has cost us at least three trillion dollars, so far.  That’s $3,000,000,000.00!!!

There were a number of reasons the administration and other interested parties put forward (all of whom stood to make money from this war they so lusted after). 

How many of you remember?   How many of you believed?  Anybody remember what Bush’s motivation was?  As the announcement he made one Sunday morning on of a “talk” shows (they don’t call them “think” shows”) Bush was going to be a “war president.”  He said that all of the successful presidents were war presidents and he was going to be a successful president because he was going to be a war president.  He first announced his “interest” in Iraq at an election rally somewhere in Maine before he had been nominated.

First, it was going to be a quick war.  One of his warmongering friends remarked that the Iraqi army would surrender when they got the first sniff of gunpowder.

And it was going to be an inexpensive war as well (maybe like our invasion of Panama).  We were going to be establishing a democracy which would spread across the Middle East, apparently on autopilot.  Another of the reasons was to strike at terrorism and enhance our safety, indeed the safety of the world.

Readers should remember also that the geniuses in the Bush administration determined that an invasion of Iraq was much more important than keeping track of Korea.  Indeed our representative to those meetings had to be replaced because he did not “play well with others.”  Only after the Koreans detonated their little bomb (a reminder, it was more difficult to make a small bomb than a larger one) did we take them seriously.  Indeed the administration had classified them as part of their historically nonsensical “axis of evil.”

Does everybody remember when Condoleezza Rice said those 3″ x 36″ aluminum tubes were “only suitable for use in enriching uranium” without asking anybody at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.  She failed to read the material transferred by the Clinton administration which mentioned that there was talk among the bad guys about using airplanes as weapons.  The tubes were identical to rocket casings in Iraq’s inventory.

The final death blow (to millions of people) was Colin Powell’s presentation to the United Nations.  He made 36 different claims all of which turned out to be nonsense.  Indeed, the European press had shown that over 28 of them were fraudulent in their next day’s newspapers. 

I’ll insert here the last sentence of my editorial: If Iraq poses no threat to our safety and security how many American lives are a “regime change” and an exercise in “nationbuilding” worth?”

Here is an evaluation by experts of the latest WikiLeak releases.

This report is republished with permission of  “STRATFOR”

Some emphasis has been added at my discretion.

In the end this whole episode will be a positive for this country – tfk

There were other embarrassments also known by the informed observer. Almost anyone who worries about such things is aware that Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is close to the Russians and likes to party with young women. The latest batch of leaks revealed that the American diplomatic service was also aware of this. And now Berlusconi is aware that they know of these things, which will make it hard for diplomats to pretend that they don’t know of these things. Of course, Berlusconi was aware that everyone knew of these things and clearly didn’t care, since the charges were all over Italian media.

The consistent reality of the leaks is that they do not reveal anything new to the informed but do provide some amusement over certain comments, such as Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitri Medvedev being called “Batman and Robin.” That’s amusing, but it isn’t significant. Amusing and interesting but almost never significant is what I come away with having read through all three waves of leaks.

Obviously, the leaks are being used by foreign politicians to their own advantage. For example, the Russians feigned shock that NATO would be reassuring the Balts about defense against a potential Russian invasion or the Poles using the leaks to claim that solid U.S.-Polish relations are an illusion. The Russians know well of NATO plans for defending the Baltic states against a hypothetical Russian invasion, and the Poles know equally well that U.S.-Polish relations are complex but far from illusory. The leaks provide an opportunity for feigning shock and anger and extracting possible minor concessions or controlling atmospherics. They do not, however, change the structure of geopolitics.

Indeed, U.S. diplomats come away looking sharp, insightful and decent. While their public statements after a conference may be vacuous, it is encouraging to see that their read of the situation and of foreign leaders is unsentimental and astute. Everything from memos on senior leaders to anonymous snippets from apparently junior diplomats not only are on target but are also well-written and clear. I would argue that the leaks paint a flattering picture overall of the intellect of U.S. officials without revealing, for the most part, anything particularly embarrassing.

At the same time, there were snarky and foolish remarks in some of the leaks, particularly personal comments about leaders and sometimes their families that were unnecessarily offensive. Some of these will damage diplomatic careers, most generated a good deal of personal tension and none of their authors will likely return to the countries in which they served. Much was indeed unprofessional, but the task of a diplomat is to provide a sense of place in its smallest details, and none expect their observations ever to be seen by the wrong people. Nor do nations ever shift geopolitical course over such insults, not in the long run. These personal insults were by far the most significant embarrassments to be found in the latest release. Personal tension is not, however, international tension.

This is the simplest of human rules. Not admitting what you know about others is the foundation of civilization. The same is true among diplomats and nations.

And in the end, this is all I found in the latest WikiLeaks release: a great deal of information about people who aren’t American that others certainly knew and were aware that the Americans knew, and now they have all seen it in writing. It would take someone who truly doesn’t understand how geopolitics really works (e.g., Joe Lieberman, Sarah Palin) to think that this would make a difference. Some diplomats may wind up in other postings, and perhaps some careers will be ended. But the idea that this would somehow change the geopolitics of our time is really hard to fathom. I have yet to see Assange point to something so significant that that it would justify his claim. It may well be that the United States is hiding secrets that would reveal it to be monstrous. If so, it is not to be found in what has been released so far.

Why does a billionaire want to take away your Social Security benefits?

Peter Peterson is 84 years old. He’s old enough to relax and enjoy the fruits of the years he was well paid for managing other rich people’s money. Why is he spending his fortune to convince politicians they should ruin the average guy’s retirement?

Today Peterson announced the next facet in his long campaign to hack Social Security, including a joke Presidential candidate named Hugh Jidette (“huge debt”) and a website called Owe No. His aim is to convince Congress to raise the retirement age, cut Social Security’s cost-of-living increases—and raise the payroll taxes we pay for Social Security and Medicare.

It wouldn’t matter what one cranky octogenarian billionaire had to say if he weren’t putting $6 million into ads, funding “expert” commissions, and spreading lies designed to panic the populace.

Maybe Peterson figures offense is better than defense—he’s got a lot to defend. He made his fortune as a hedge fund manager—that is, moving money around—so he ought to be living in fear. Someone might get the idea he and his buddies would be good folks to tax. It’s like Willie Sutton, the famous bank robber, once said. Asked why he robbed banks, Sutton replied, “Because that’s where the money is.”

Peterson and pals are the ones George Bush gifted with big tax breaks that are set to expire December 31. Although he says his top priority is reducing the deficit, Peterson doesn’t want to cut that deficit by putting his own taxes back where they were in the 1990s.

It’s hard to get your head around how rich Peterson is, and how many rich people there are in this country. But here’s how to put their money in perspective, in relation to Social Security. If Congress decides to extend those tax cuts, for households making $250,000 or more (the top 2 percent of earners), the money the Treasury will lose would be enough to put Social Security in the black for 75 years–and raise benefits by 2 percent.

First They Took Your House
Meanwhile, we have a big chunk of near-retirees today who have barely seen their wages rise at all during their working lifetimes, the last 30 years. They couldn’t save a huge amount; what they saved they had in home equity. And that was wiped away by the financial shenanigans of Peter Peterson and his ilk. There are millions of potential retirees who will have next to nothing except Social Security if they’re ever able to retire. It wasn’t enough for Wall Street to rob us of our houses’ worth and what we had in 401(k)s. Now they want to take Social Security too.

Like I said, I don’t understand it. Is there no shuffleboard court where this man could spend his golden years?

By Dr. Mercola  |  November 04 2010 | Mercola.com

In the early 1950s, the United States administered four vaccines — diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis and smallpox. Children received 13 doses of four vaccines by the time they were two years old and not more than three vaccines in a single visit.   By the mid-1980s, there were seven vaccines — diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, measles, mumps, rubella and polio.  Children received 15 doses of seven vaccines by the time they were two years old and not more than four vaccines in a single visit.  Since the mid-1980s, many vaccines have been added to the schedule.  Today, children may receive as many as 37 doses of 14 vaccines by the age of two, and as many as eight vaccines in a single visit!  The United States recommends more vaccines than any country in world. The CDC recommends 48 doses of 14 vaccines by age six, and 69 doses of 16 vaccines by age 18.  The CDC also recommends an annual flu shot for all Americans from six months of age through year of death.  What exactly is fueling this dramatic rise in the number of shots recommended to our children and adults?

Are Infectious Diseases on the Rise?

Outside of an occasional local outbreak, like the recent whooping cough epidemic in California that the media blew completely out of proportion, the diseases included on the vaccination schedule are actually stable in the 21^st century United States. According to Dr. Robert Sears, author of The Vaccine Book, the number of childhood cases of diseases included on the vaccine schedule, in the U.S. in 2007, was:

• Pneumococus — approx. 10,000 cases a year
• Diphtheria – 5 cases per year, 0 cases some years
• Tetanus – 1 case per year in children under 5
• Pertussis – approx. 10,000 cases a year
• Hepatitus B – 30 cases in 1 year olds, 30 cases in 1-5 year olds
• Rotavirus – 500,000 cases, 50,000 hospitalizations, 20-70 deaths
• Polio – 0 cases since 1985
• Measles – 50-100 cases a year
• Mumps – 250 cases a year
• Rubella – 250 cases a year
• Chickenpox – 50,000 cases a year
• Hepatitis A – 10,000 cases a year, most in children aged 5-14
• Flu – Millions of cases
• Meningococcal Disease – approx. 3000 cases a year

Media stories about an occasional local outbreak of a disease, usually designed to promote as much fear as possible, never seem to balance their accounts with readily available statistics supporting the facts about childhood diseases in the U.S. Has the incidence of serious infectious childhood disease in the U.S been reduced solely due to widespread use of vaccines (as vaccine proponents always claim), or has improved sanitation, health care and living conditions played a big role both before and after vaccines came on the scene? Are other first-world nations, which are currently giving fewer vaccines to their children than the U.S., experiencing a similar drop in infectious diseases thanks to improved living conditions? With some of the highest vaccine rates on earth, does the United States have the world’s healthiest children? To better answer these questions, we have to look at the overall picture of the health of our children in the United States.

Has More Vaccination Led to More Health?

Unfortunately in the United States, especially when it comes to anything that has to do with your health, there is a misguided notion that more is always better. You see this time and time again in products on pharmacy shelves marketed as “maximum strength”. You could say the U.S has a fascination with believing that if a little is good, a lot must be better. This is not always the case. Take for instance aspirin, considered by many to be one of the safest drugs. If you take two aspirin, your headache may disappear. If you take ten, you may experience some serious problems. If you take 50, you better hope there’s a hospital nearby! The question must be asked — has dramatically increasing the number of vaccines given to our children during the past 30 years actually led to healthier or sicker children? There is accumulating evidence that dramatically increasing the numbers of vaccinations our children get has made vaccine makers richer, while America’s children are moving in the opposite direction of health — statistics show they are actually getting sicker…

During the past 30 years, the number of vaccinations our children receive has tripled, and during that same period of time, the number of children with learning disabilities, ADHD, asthma and diabetes has also more than tripled! Vaccine makers and proponents will tell you that these statistics are unrelated. But no good scientific evidence currently exists that demonstrates vaccines are not contributing to the increasing incidence of chronic illness and disability in our children. More than twice as many children have chronic brain and immune system dysfunction today than they did in the 1970s when half as many vaccines were given to children.

Sadly, today in America:

• 1 in 6 children is diagnosed with a learning disability
• 1 in 9 children suffer from asthma
• 1 in 110 develop autism
• 1 in 450 become diabetic

As the National Vaccine Information Center asks in a bulletin entitled “48 Doses of Vaccines Before Age 6” : “Is the atypical manipulation of the immune system with more and more vaccines in early life setting some children up for chronic disease and disability? IS LESS BETTER?” Clearly, more and more vaccines are not solving the widespread health problems currently affecting our children. The fact is, vaccines could be a major part of the problem.

Flu Shots for ALL Americans

Today, the most common childhood infection is influenza, and in the past few years federal health officials have directed doctors to give all Americans an annual flu shot, from six months of age onward, until the year of death. New Jersey has also passed a law requiring all children attending daycare or pre-school to get an annual flu shot, and some health care workers are being fired if they refuse to get an annual flu shot. This can only be viewed as the prelude to a much larger campaign that, in the future, may end up dictating whether you will be allowed to enter higher education, get a job, or even travel… Simply put, this trend of mandating annual influenza vaccinations must be resisted and stopped.

Is There Evidence the Flu Shot is Necessary, Safe or Effective?

Many studies funded by pharmaceutical companies selling vaccines have “proved” that influenza vaccine is safe and effective. But independent reviews of those studies have found the opposite is true. Studies are now showing what people who refuse to take flu shots have known for a long time: that flu shots simply do not work as advertised.
For example:

• Giving young children flu shots appeared to have no impact on flu-related doctor visits or hospitalizations during two recent flu seasons, according to a study published in the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine.
• The flu vaccine is no more effective for children than a placebo, according to a large-scale, systematic review of 51 studies, published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.
• NO studies have conclusively proven that flu shots prevent flu-related deaths among the elderly.
• A study published in the Lancet found that influenza vaccination was NOT associated with a reduced risk of pneumonia in older people.
• Research published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine also confirms that there has been no decrease in deaths from influenza and pneumonia, despite the fact that vaccination coverage among the elderly has increased from 15 percent in 1980 to 65 percent today.

For even more information, studies, and statistics about the flu shot, please review this previous article. In 2009, public health doctors at the World Health Organization (WHO) and in the U.S. declared a H1N1 “swine flu” pandemic when a new bird-swine-human strain of H1N1 influenza was identified in Mexico. However, the 2009 “swine flu” pandemic turned out to be very mild – one of the mildest influenza seasons in recent years, in fact! — while the pandemic H1N1 swine flu vaccine turned out to be HIGHLY reactive. It has been alleged that the 2009 pandemic H1N1 swine flu vaccine is much more deadly than the swine flu itself. In fact, in 2010 Australia temporarily banned use of seasonal influenza vaccine containing the pandemic H1N1 strain for children under the age of five after 99 children were admitted to the hospital with convulsions after receiving the shot!

The U.S. 2010/2011 seasonal influenza vaccine contains the pandemic H1N1 vaccine strain that caused so many convulsions in Australian children. A federal oversight committee reviewing the 2009 pandemic H1N1 vaccine used in the U.S. found a possible link between the swine flu vaccine with Guillain-Barrre Syndrome (GBS), idiopathic thrombocytopenia purpura (ITP), a blood clotting disorder, and Bell’s Palsy, which causes facial paralysis. It’s astounding how effective drug companies are at manipulating national health policy. They have been able to manipulate and pervert the public health system so they now can sell toxic, ineffective flu shots in pharmacies, airports, college campuses, grocery stores, and countless other outlets, without ANY solid evidence that the flu shots even work, and despite the many questionable ingredients found in the shots, such as:

• Thimerosal, which is known to be very toxic by inhalation, ingestion, and in contact with skin, (still included in multi-dose flu vaccine despite a legitimate public outcry about the known dangers of mercury!)
• Formaldehyde or Formalin
• Chicken kidney cells, aka Chicken DNA
• Monosodium glutamate
• Octoxinol-9 (Triton X-100), also used in spermicidal applications!
• Polysorbate 80 (Tween 80)

Since we don’t know whether many of our sick and disabled children are chronically ill because they’ve already been over-vaccinated, why are we trying to force more vaccines, like the ineffective and risky flu vaccine, on them? And why are governments constantly trying to mandate even more shots for children?

Follow the Money

The vaccine industry seems to view the 308 million people living in the United States as little more than pin cushions for their profitable vaccine products. Pharmaceutical profits from swine-flu-related drugs alone have soared – with earnings between $10 billion and $15 billion in 2009, according to estimates from investment bank JPMorgan. A report from 2007 entitled “Pipeline and Commercial Insight: Pediatric and Adolescent Vaccines,” written by vaccine analyst Hedwig Kresse, makes some interesting points about the future of vaccine profits. The report includes an assessment of products and forecast of market size and coverage rates to the year 2016, predicting that due to the “promising commercial potential” of new, high-price vaccines, the pediatric and adolescent vaccine market will quadruple from approximately $4.3 billion in 2006, to over $16 billion by 2016, across the US, the EU-five including France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the UK, and Japan.

The crucial factor for success in the pediatric market, the report notes, is the introduction of products into the national vaccination schedules. As an example, Dr. Kresse cites Wyeth’s Prevnar, as the first premium price vaccine launched in the US in 2000 for vaccinating infants against pneumonia and meningitis. Since then, Prevnar has been added to the childhood vaccination schedules in the US and EU-five despite its high price of nearly $320 for the four-dose regimen. The sad reality could be that the motivation for continually increasing both the number of shots given and the price of the vaccines is nothing more than a desire by big Pharma to improve “market share” and profits.

The Alliance Between the Vaccine Industry and the Government

In the first quarter of 2010 alone, the US federal government representatives received $19 million per day from lobbyists, and over $1 billion in total lobbyist spending, a large chunk of the money coming from the health care sector. Keep in mind, this is only federal lobbying efforts. This figure doesn’t take into account the millions more spent lobbying at the state level, not to mention the cozy lobbying arrangements between the drug reps and individual doctors. Why this massive lobbying push by the vaccine industry?

One of the reasons (certainly not the only one), is to influence vaccine mandates. The vaccine industry has a vested interest in (and continually spends big money on) trying to make sure that more vaccines and more doses are mandated by the government. For every mandate they have successfully pushed through, there are some recent ones that have failed due to action taken by parents of vaccine injured children and others to defeat them. Currently in California, there is a bill under consideration to make pertussis vaccine booster doses mandatory for all children between 7^th and 12^th grade.

And in New York there has been a battle over a bill to make flu shots mandatory for all health care workers, and those who refuse an annual flu shot stand to lose their job. There are also a whopping 145 additional vaccines in the pipeline being developed and tested in clinical trials. Since drug companies are going to want a stable, predictable market in the U.S. for these new vaccines, they’re likely to press for mandated use of many of them, both by children and adults.

Prejudice Against the Unvaccinated?

One of your basic freedoms as a human being is your right to decide what you put into your own body. Especially when it comes to medical risk-taking, there is a basic human right to be fully informed about all risks and have the ability to refuse to allow substances you consider to be harmful, toxic or poisonous to be forced upon you. But are those of us who are trying to exercise our right to informed consent to medical risk-taking facing prejudice and discrimination? When it comes to getting an education, keeping your job, or being allowed to obtain health insurance and medical care, the answer could soon be “yes.” Besides the potential looming threat of job loss for unvaccinated health care workers in New York, students in all 50 US states are required to get dozens of doses of vaccines to enroll in school (exemptions to this requirement do exist however. More about that in a minute).

Furthermore, according to WebMD, the new government healthcare reform may include trying to make vaccines mandatory, meaning a real possibility now exists that you will be required to receive mandated vaccines to qualify for health insurance:
“The CDC almost certainly will make universal flu vaccination official U.S. policy for this fall’s 2010-2011 flu season, as it consistently follows the advice of the panel of outside experts, called the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).”
The partnership between government health agencies and big Pharma, based on ideology, profit-making and bad science, is moving closer and closer to discriminating against those who want to exercise their informed consent rights when it comes to making voluntary vaccination decisions.

The Vaccine Industry’s Fight Against Exemptions

Not only do the vaccine manufacturers want to take away your freedom of choice, there is also a new push coming from the vaccine industry to remove the existing non-medical legal exemptions to vaccination, which include:

• Religious Exemption– All states allow a religious exemption to vaccination except Mississippi and West Virginia.
• Philosophical, Personal or Conscientious Belief Exemption– The following 18 states allow exemption to vaccination based on philosophical, personal or conscientiously held beliefs: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Idaho, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin.

These exemptions are apparently viewed by the vaccine industry as unfair market practices that interfere with their ability to maximize profits. There is nothing the drug companies would like more than to make all their vaccines mandatory, without exception. And unfortunately, through extremely powerfully lobbying, they’ve managed to manipulate our politicians and public health officials to help them push their wares. Do you want your right to make informed health and vaccine choices for yourself and your family taken out of your hands? They do. They are fighting to do just that. Will you let them?

Dr. Paul “For Profit” Offit

One of the names you see again and again as a proponent for the safety and efficacy of vaccines is Dr. Paul Offit.
Who is Paul Offit?
Dr. Paul Offit, also known as “For Profit” Offit, is a fairly well-known and frequent proponent of forced vaccination. He regularly dismisses many of the potential vaccine risks and promotes vaccine mandates. But he is not just a doctor who believes that vaccinations save lives. Far from it. If you want to read a fascinating expose of this doctor, read the recent Philadelphia Magazine expose on him. Offit is a listed inventor on a cluster of patents that protect Merck’s RotaTeq vaccine and share the title “Rotavirus Reassortant Vaccine.” They include four granted U.S. patents — US5626851, US5750109, US6113910 and US6290968 — and two granted European patents — EP323708 and EP493575. He is also the recipient of a $350,000 grant from Merck for the vaccine’s development, a consultant to Merck Pharmaceuticals and, the icing on the cake, previously served as a member of The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). ACIP is a 15-member panel of immunization experts, selected by the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. They provide advice and guidelines to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on vaccine-preventable diseases. As a member of the ACIP from 1998 to 2003, Offit was involved in CDC recommendations about giving rotavirus vaccine to all babies. He voted “yes” three times out of four on issues pertaining to the ACIP’s rotavirus use recommendation.

To clarify, Offit voted for the FIRST Rotashield vaccine manufactured by Wyeth (monkey-human hybrid virus) approved by ACIP in 1998 to be given to all babies. He abstained from the vote in 1999 to recommend that Rotashield be removed from the market. He did not vote for the Merck RotaTeq vaccine (cow-human hybrid virus) to be recommended for use in all babies because he was prevented under ACIP/government rules from voting to recommend a product he had a personal financial stake in. As a result of the rotavirus vaccine being added to the CDC’s childhood vaccination schedule, the value of Offit’s stake in the Merck RotaTeq vaccine he helped to create skyrocketed. In 2008 CHOP sold its royalty stake in RotaTeq for $182 million, and Offit received an unspecified chunk: his share of the intellectual property, according to him was “in the millions”.

Why Isn’t This ILLEGAL?

Though Offit declines to say exactly how much he has gained personally, Age of Autism reported that Offit earned at least $29 million, and perhaps as much as $55 million from being a co-inventor of a rotavirus vaccine that was recommended by US public health agencies for universal use by all American babies. Of course, all of this begs the question — can someone’s vote on an “independent” government vaccine policymaking committee be trusted as being “unbiased” when that person could eventually profit from the committee’s vaccine policy recommendation? Would Offit, or anyone for that matter, truly be an unbiased judge of a vaccine’s safety and effectiveness when there is that big of a personal financial stake in the outcome?

It’s a rhetorical question, but I think the answer speaks for itself. Especially when you consider that Offit is also the doctor who made the infamous and scientifically irresponsible assertion that “an infant can safely receive up to 10,000 vaccines at once and 100,000 in a lifetime.”

The Vaccine Industry’s Ethical Questions

Besides the questions of whether vaccines are safe or effective, or whether supposedly independent vaccine advisory panels have been hijacked by doctors with financial conflicts of interest, or whether the questionable ingredients in vaccines have been properly tested for toxicity, there are other questions to consider as well. No discussion of the business practices of the vaccine industry would be complete without addressing the questionable ethical practices long associated with the pharmaceutical industry. Numerous times in the past 50 years they have been accused of falsifying drug study results, paying bribes, covering up or omitting side effects and deaths, and denying responsibility when drugs are pulled off the market for killing people.

For an eye-opening introduction to the criminal side of the vaccine industry please review this recent article.

According to an ABC News story from 2010, drug company reps from Eli Lily were instructed by the company to regularly give lavish gifts to doctors, and push more profitable drugs at higher doses in order to maximize profits, regardless of safety concerns. According to the story:
“To sell their drugs, pharmaceutical companies hire former cheerleaders and ex-models to wine and dine doctors, exaggerate the drug’s benefits and underplay their side-effects, a former sales rep told a Congressional committee this morning.”
With an ethical track record like this, full of outright lies, cover-ups, denials and bribery, how can you trust anything they say?

Always Look for Hidden Motivations

It is understandable that most people would like to believe the words of respected leaders in the health field, and companies claiming they are producing products that save lives. Unfortunately, it is often naïve to trust blindly. It’s not enough to look at the obvious credentials of people who give you advice and tell you to trust them, whether they are pro- or anti- an issue or hold a prestigious degree and title. Today, you also have to consider the hidden motivations behind their recommendations.

• What do they believe in?
• Where is their loyalty?
• Where is their money coming from?
• What does a company stand to gain financially from a government mandate?

It’s very sad to say, but some of the most trusted voices in defense of vaccine safety and forced vaccination policies are closely tied to paid shills for the pharmaceutical industry. As CBS News reported in 2008, these include:

• The American Academy of Pediatrics, to whom the vaccine industry gives millions for conferences, grants, medical education classes and even to help build their headquarters.
• Every Child By Two, a group that promotes early immunization for all children and admits they receive money from the vaccine industry — but won’t say how much.
• Paul Offit, who in addition to the monies described above holds in a $1.5-million research chair at Children’s Hospital, funded by Merck.

So the next time you come across someone arguing in favor of the safety and effectiveness of vaccines, and the need for more vaccines and vaccine mandates, take a moment to investigate the source.

Take the time to research the information they are leaving out of the discussion.

I think if you approach the subject of vaccines in this way, most of the time you will be very surprised by the information you will find.

I remember watching the Congressional hearings where Clarence Thomas was a candidate for the Supreme Court.  I remember particularly the unnecessarily abusive way in which Arlen Specter questioned Anita Hill.  I remember hearing Thomas’ life story, his accomplishments and the help he got from institutions and people along the way.  I remember the meanness of the “ABC” taunt he heard as a child.  It was clear that given his education and experience he was clearly not a viable candidate for the Supreme Court.  And sadly that has been clearly proven in the past 19 years.  The color of his skin was why he was there.  Sadly the inappropriate telephone message left on Anita Hill’s telephone by his wife Ginni has helped no one.  We know there was another potential witness at the time of the hearing, Lillian McEwen, who, because of that phone call decided to “end her 19-year silence about Justice Clarence Thomas.” Now there is talk demanding that Thomas be impeached for perjuring himself before the committee. ( More from the Washington Post )

Sadly Thomas’s best move 20 years ago would have been to thank his “champion” whoever that was and decline the offer.  For the seeds of deceit finally germinated leaving no path forward and no possible retreat. A book, “Strange Justice: The Selling of Clarence Thomas” by Jill Abramson and  will fill in all gaps you need.

[Finally this little aside, something I heard  at a technical meeting around that time.  George Bush had received some kind of award and to the surprise of his audience he used his thank you speech trying to justify why he (Bush) had nominated Clarence Thomas.]

For readers wanting to stimulate their memory here is one of many links to detailed explanations:  ( Consortiumnews )

Admirers of George W. Bush will soon have an opportunity to get inside the head of their dearly beloved neo-conservative icon.  His much-hyped memoir, ‘Decision Points’ is due out in bookstores on November 9^th.

We’re told that ‘The Decider’ has, “spent almost every day” writing what his publishing house calls, “a strikingly personal and candid account revealing how and why he made the defining decisions in his consequential presidency and personal life.”

Oh—the romantic visions this must conjure up in the minds of so many adoring fans.  Can’t you just imagine all of those sleepless nights Ol’Dubyah must have spent burning the midnight oil?  I can just see him now…instructing his house staff that, “I must not be disturbed” before locking the doors to his study and sinking into a big leather chair.  There he sits, alone and reflective, preferring to log his thoughts on paper instead of using a computer because—after all—he’s an old fashioned kind of guy.  Occasionally he will rise from his desk to step out onto the terrace.  There…he breathes in the cool night air and gazes up at the stars. He asks the good Lord to help him find the strength to confront his demons, and the courage to share with his fellow countrymen just how often he struggled with doubts before being forced to make tough and painful decisions.

Blah…blah…blah…

via The George W. Bush Memoir: Now Here’s a Book I Might Consider Burning « Revolt of the Plebs.

Two weeks into the war…

By T. F. Kelley
The Daily News Transcript
Published on April 4, 2003

In 1981 Richard Helms, Director of the CIA for most of the Vietnam War admitted it was our ignorance of a “complex cultural and ethnic problem” that led to the massive misassessments and their horrific consequences.  We already know, only two weeks into this war, that the wrong questions were asked.  The Administration not only failed to ask the right questions but also seemed to be were unaware of the questions for which answers were needed.

In selling the war in Iraq to the American people the Administration made several predictions based wholly on information-free assumptions.   These predictions/assumptions are being tested during the progress of the war and they are failing.  Among the predictions were: the war will be quick, we will be welcomed as liberators and the war will enhance our safety.

These predictions came from the highest level of the Administration.  Examples Dick Cheney (Mar 16), “Even significant elements of the Republican Guard are likely to step aside.”  On March 28, from Richard Perle (recently Chairman of the Defense Policy Board), “(Their) military organization will collapse at the first whiff of gunpowder.”  From Ken Adelman (Feb 13), “I believe liberating Iraq would be a cakewalk.”  From Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz (Mar 11), “They view us as their hoped-for liberators.”  It is obvious that the Administration’s predictions were, as best, wishful thinking, at worst massive institutional self-delusion.

It is apparent that we are not welcomed everywhere as liberators.  A large camp built in Jordan to accommodate thousands of fleeing Iraqis remains empty.  Instead, the traffic goes in the other direction with people reported to be returning to Iraq and Baghdad to protect and defend their homeland.  The question of Iraqi nationalism was apparently not considered.

There are few observers who still believe that this war will enhance our safety.  The longer it lasts, the bloodier it will get; more anti-American demonstrations will be held and more potential terrorists will be motivated.  Saddam, once reviled throughout the Arab world, is assuming the mantle of a folk hero.  The question of untoward consequences was not adequately addressed.

Nearly all Americans agreed that a “war on terrorism” was justified.  This change in focus from a “war on terror” to a “regime change” to “freeing the Iraqi people” is what the military calls “mission creep.”  To justify this unilateral invasion of a foreign country the Administration desperately tried to prove a connection between Iraq and Al-Qaida.  Failing that they focused on Iraq’s supposed possession of “weapons of mass destruction.”  The Administration concluded that the U.N. inspections were inadequate.  As proof of the existence of such weapons we were offered: the aluminum tubes, the poison factory, the drone and the purchase order for uranium.  The latter was shown to be an obvious forgery, the others proved insignificant.  The danger now is that if no “weapons of mass destruction” are found there may be a temptation, considering the enormous embarrassment to the Administration, to “find” some.

There is only one weapon of mass distraction, the nuclear bomb.  The inclusion of chemical and biological weapons in the same category as nuclear weapons is inaccurate.  Even our new 22,000-pound bomb could not be considered a weapon of mass destruction.  The inclusion of chemical and biological weapons makes people susceptible to panic and keep them fearful.   It is unfortunate that no one in the print or electronic media has seen fit to question the accuracy of this grouping of weapons and the motivation behind it.

There are only two predictions/assumptions that remain to be tested.  The first is that it will be possible to establish a democracy in Iraq.  The Administration has put Paul Wolfowitz, quoted above, in charge of installing democracy in Iraq.  Available reports seem to indicate that the Defense and State departments have two disparate plans in mind.  One plan anticipates some kind of military rule, the other, the employment of expatriates and existing politicians and administrators.  If the war continues to drag on many observers see the difficulties in creating democracy directly proportional to the magnitude of the destruction.

The final assumption was that the Iraq situation required immediate action while the situation in North Korea could be set aside.  That problem was largely created by the rhetoric of the administration.  It was unwise to call North Korea’s leader “evil” and “a dwarf.”  Name-calling seems to be a hallmark of this Administration and is proving to be self-destructive.  Their testing of a nuclear weapon will answer the question of which country got the proper attention.  Additionally, it may trigger an arms race and evolving China, Japan and Iran.

Our troops, the country’s children and grandchildren, are now poised to enter Iraq’s capital city.  Once was called the Paris of the Middle East Baghdad, as big as Los Angeles, is home to 4 million people, nearly all innocent, helpless victims.  While we support the efforts of our troops we should remember the arrogance and ignorance of the Administration that brought them there.