A Political Alarm Clock Is ringing
Category: News and Politics

A Political  Alarm Clock Is Ringing

Yesterday I received the following bulletin from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

The idea is this.

If the Obama-Biden ticket is victorious in November,           
Hillary Clinton can resign her NY Senate seat.

The Governor of Illinois, who is a Democrat,
then appoints Hillary Clinton to the Senate seat
just vacated by Barack Obama.
After all,
Hillary Clinton grew up in Illinois.

Then, Governor Paterson of NY appoints RFK Jr.

to the Senate seat just vacated by Hillary Clinton.

Biden will be replaced by a Delaware Democrat.

The Governor of Delaware is Democrat.

Rumor has it, that regardless of the outcome of the Senate race in Maine,
either Senator Collins will be replaced by a Democrat, or she will change her party affiliation to The Democratic Party before the new Congress convenes. The same holds true for Senator Snowe of Maine. I expect her to become a Democrat as well. There are a few other Republicans who may switch party affiliations after a Democratic victory across the boards in November.

My response was:

Why would we want more Dumbcrats? The Dumbcrats are  complicit in the crimes of the Bush Regime. The problem is the two party system, not a lack of Dumbcrats or Repugnacans!

There response to me was: Have you ever been accused of idiocy?

I tried to respond to the rude response from the  Kennedy staffer (I can’t believe Robert Kennedy would write something like that), but discovered I had been removed from their “friends,” and could not answer because they only accepted messages from “friends.”

No!   I have never been accused of idiocy, though I used to be idiotic enough to have some faith in the American political system.   Fortunately my eyes have become opened in that regard.  I resent the question.

As for the proposal, why should the governor or New York want to appoint Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Senator assuming all the other events transpired?  He has no political experience, and aside from the fact that his father was Attorney General, his uncle President, and his grandfather a bootlegger who happened to corner the market on Scot whiskey imported into the US even to this day, and he was a heroin addict as a young man, is  and shares nothing with the common man, he is unqualified.

Appointing Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as Senator would be appointing another millionaire to the Senate.

Barack Obama is a millionaire first term Senator with an acute lack of experience.   He allegedly came out against the war in Iraq while he was a Illinois state senator; however, as a US Senator he has never once voted against funding for the war.

His idea of getting out of Iraq is to switch the troops to Afghanistan and possibly into Pakistan.

He has chosen the hawkish millionaire senator from Delaware, Joseph Biden, to be his running mate.    What do Barack Obama and Joseph Biden have in common with the working men and women of the United States of America?    The answer is a resounding nothing!

John McCain, the Senator from Arizona, is probably worth more than Barack Obama and Joseph Biden combined.  The money comes through his second wife.

McCain’s claim to fame comes from being a POW during the Vietnam War.   How does that qualify one to become president?   The McCain’s spend $273,000 a year for butlers and maids in the various houses.   He will undoubtedly chose another millionaire as his running mate,

John McCain is notorious for losing his temper and generally throwing temper tantrums in the Senate.   And this mentally unstable millionaire is who the Republicans are nominating for presidential candidate!

John McCain has absolutely nothing in common with the every day working man and woman

Dennis Kucinich recently delivered a very inspiring speech to the Democratic convention called Wake Up America.

Yes.  Wake Up  America.  Realize that difference between the Democrats and the Republicans is about as much as the difference between Pepsi and Coke.   Both Pepsi and Coke are bad for the health.  They contribute to the epidemics of diabetes, heart disease and cancer.   The Democrats and Republicans are both equally as bad for the health of the nation.  They routinely overspend, sanction foreign wars that should be no concern of ours, they work together to ship American jobs overseas among many other detrimental items and they continually accept corporate money and provide corporate welfare while 50 million citizen don’t have health care coverage, and are losing their homes (Congress has bailed out the bankers, but can’t seem to bail out the homeowners)

Wake up supporters of Obama!  What has he done to end the war he allegedly opposes in Iraq?  Why has he continually voted to fund the war?  Why is he a member of the trilateral commission?  Why does he except corporate money and claim that he does not?

Wake up supporters of Obama!   You want to believe Obama says what he has to say to get elected so that he can institute a policy that is good for the country.   This has never happened in the history of the Republic, and if it actually should happen with Obama, the wealthy elite would surely have him assassinated promptly.

Wake up supporters of John McCain!   Unless you are part of the wealthiest 5% of the population John McCain does not represent your interest.  McCain will keep this great nation at war indefinitely while bleeding the people of the country until there is nothing left to give to the corporations.  Wake up supporters of John McCain unless you want to send your sons and daughters to die in foreign wars.   Wake Up John McCain supporters unless you want $10.00 a gallon gasoline!

Wake up Dennis Kucinich if you feel that you can affect change within the Democratic party.  It hasn’t happened in over two hundred years, and is not going to start now!

Wake up Robert F. Kennedy, Jr if you foolishly believe that a large Democratic majority in Congress will change anything.  The Democratic are as complicit in Corporate Fascism as the Republicans.

And wake up, please, all you people who say you are throwing your vote away by voting for a third party candidate.  By voting either Democrat or Republican you are voting for the continuation of corporate power, corporate lobbyists, fixed elections, a revolving door between the halls of Congress and Corporate Boardrooms among other wonderful things.

Yes.   Please Wake Up America to the corrupt and anti-democratic and anti-republican principles enshrined in the “two” party system.   The two sides of the same bought and paid for coin.

Wake Up America unless you want to have the best politicians money can buy and that corporations can influence all they want to lead you and your children and grandchildren down the road to bankruptcy and ruin while providing almost unlimited corporate welfare.

Listen to the Alarm Clock.  It’s Ringing Loud!

7:02 AM - 16 Comments - 14 Kudos - Add Comment

For Joanie (a poem)
Category: Writing and Poetry

FOR JOANIE
                              For Joanie Bruschi

I wrap you in my arms
you snuggle your blonde head
under my shoulder
as we start to slow dance

Soon we twirl pirouettes
swing and turn cartwheels
in a star drunk summer sky

We jitterbug into the bedroom
and swing into each other
finally resting in a waltz

A loud car passing by
brutally awakes me
and I realize you died
all those tumorous
years ago
before our love could send
roots deep into
the soul of one another
to support the gradually
growing hardwood
tree of our relationship

6:48 AM - 18 Comments - 20 Kudos - Add Comment

Chocolate Is Good For You
Category: Life

CHOCOLATE IS GOOD FOR YOU
           
Chocolate has been connected with romance since ancient Mayans consumed it as a beverage at weddings.

There is growing evidence that chocolate is good for that symbol of love, the heart.

Dark chocolate is usually richer than milk chocolate in a subgroup of antioxidant flavonoids called flavanols that are powerful protectors of cardiovascular health.   (It also has lower fat content).

In the past year, studies have shown chocolate’s beneficial effects on:

Circulation.   Eating 1.5 ounces of dark chocolate a day may improve blood flow to the heart, which lessens the risk of angina (chest pain) and heart attacks.

Blood Pressure.  Enjoying just a quarter ounce of dark chocolate per day lowers both systolic and diastolic blood pressure without increasing weight.   This is healthier and just as effective as taking blood pressure “medicine.”   It is also much cheaper and a lost tastier.

Cholesterol.   Sipping natural cocoa daily boosted HDL (“good”) cholesterol in Japanese men.   Also, their LDL (“bad”) cholesterol was more resistant to oxidation, making it less likely to clog arteries.   This is better, cheaper, safer and tastier than statins.

Cardiovascular mortality.   One recent population-based study found that post-menopausal women who consumed more chocolate were less likely to dies of cardiovascular disease over a 16 year period.

Whether one is a chocoholic may be programmed into their metabolism.   In a Swiss study, “chocolate-desiring” men and other men indifferent to the sweet were put on the same diet for 5 days.    

Blood and urine profiles of chocolate fans were different from those on non-fans. For example, chocolate lovers had lower LDL cholesterol and higher levels of the beneficial protein albumin.

The activity of “good” bacteria in the gut also varied between the two groups.   Roberta Lee, MD, of New York’s Continuum Center for Health and Healing says this study, “Represents clinical medicine of the future, in terms of relating intestinal metabolism to food preferences and identifying it as an integral aspect of health.”

A daily ounce of high-quality chocolate is healthy addition to the diet.

Look for chocolate that’s at least 70 percent cocoa.

Some of the better brands are Maglio (Italy), Valrhona (France, and Green & Black’s (England).  To order online visit worldwidechocolate.com.

For drinks reminiscent of traditional Mayan and Aztec beverages, go to kakawachcolates.com.

6:40 AM - 12 Comments - 10 Kudos - Add Comment

Bicycle 55 (travelogue/story
Category: Writing and Poetry

Bicycle 55

The bike and I head south towards Arizona, the wrinkle-faced parched deserts of Tucson beckon.   I pedal with a sense of contentment and well-being, knowing that there are good things and wonderful people in the world.

I no longer have a tailwind and the mountains seem to rise at least as high as the moon, but I am young, strong healthy, my legs are rested, and my dick starts swelling with just the thought of Sherry.   What will I do if she writes and tells me she is pregnant?   Will it change my whole life?   Change it as I always thought having children would do?  Will I want to come back and steal her away from Norman?  Norman a man I’ve never met and man whose wife I’ve cockled.  How the hell did that ever happen?

I stand up and push hard and drive the bike up a never ending mountain.   All I really need is to have th sun in my eyes and not be able to see a thing, literally and not metaphorically.

I push harder and harder, trying to drive the thoughts out of my head.  What’s the meaning of life?   Why do we, why do I do such dumb fucking things?

I know Fritters still rides with me, there’s a little of her guilt that will always travel with me.


The higher I climb up into the mountains the clear and more purified the air becomes.   I pedal through a cedar chest with the added perfume of spruce and juniper.   I become lightheaded on the mountain cologne.

I check my watch.   It’s two-thirty-seven when I reach the summit.   I stop and eat the lunch Sweet, Sweet Sherry, that wonderful, wonderful fuck packed for me.   An apple, a banana, a pear, homemade gingerbread cookies, and a burrito filled with a spicy cheese omelet, remembering what I ate that first morning when we we’re fucking on the kitchen floor.  The lunch brings a smile to my face.

I head down hill and get to coast most of the afternoon.   My thoughts quit worrying me and I listen to the birds singing in the trees, the squirrels scolding me as I pedal by.

It seems I have the road to myself, and I love it.  “Life is good,” I say out loud, almost wanting to shout it, really wishing that I could believe it.

6:32 AM - 2 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Another World (a prose poem)
Category: Writing and Poetry

ANOTHER WORLD


The motes pf dust hang suspended in illuminated air, seemingly tethered to nothing.

So small, they mostly go unnoticed.  To see them one almost needs a magnifying glass.

Yet these motes exist as individual planets in an infinitely larger universe.

Each planet gathers  its atmosphere around it  as if  a cloak.

These planets  populated by  animals–-large and small, fish swim in the oceans,
 tigers prowl the jungles.

The intelligent beings here call themselves, with great irony, human beings.

They search the galaxies and the night sky for signs of   other intelligent life   in the universe while they remain  blind to all the life that steams around them.

They’ve finally    Given up war and abandoned nuclear weapons and   power,  realizing the futility.

Now they  concern themselves with the intense heat which  causes the ice bound emotional   poles to melt, disturbing the historically and factually accurate ocean thought currents  to drift.

The long history of the planet  written in geological records, etched in rock, and scattered in archeological and palenotology artifacts,  before they learned to speak or write.

The planet they know and walk on, travel over, has been around since the   big bang when they were expelled from the vacuum cleaner yesterday.

The life giving light illuminating  this planet seems to travel forever from the lamp in the hallway, but that doesn’t bother them because they are coming to understand everything.

Sure in their infinite knowledge
believing they known the universe, they imagine that they can exist forever.

6:03 AM - 8 Comments - 10 Kudos - Add Comment

Worthy of Killing II, Chapter 10, Part 3
Category: Writing and Poetry

Chapter 10, Part 3
                   
In the morning the sky is as overcast as our hangovers; nevertheless, the fish are sold and will sail back to the mainland on another boat.

We fill the boat up with more ice.

The young captain and boat’s owner confesses.  “We’ve never filled up the boat’s hold so fast.  Especially in that stretch of water.  By the time we get to Napoli we are usually only three quarters full. “   He smiles impishly, grabs my hand, “You and that little devil have brought us luck.”

I’m not a great believer in luck.  I smile and say, “May it hold.”  I look at the sky and doubt it.

Only a slight breeze stirs and we bob more on the water than sail over it.  Wilbur flies off, and comes back silent.  This is a rare occurrence for him, and I’m not sure what to make of it.

It’s amazing how the lack of sunshine and a hangover can color the view of the world.   Wilbur wasn’t drinking last night but he seems as down as the rest of us.


The boat bobs through the day and night, and I feel a little queasy, though I don’t become nauseous and seasick.   I knock on the boat’s wooden haul for luck, and Wilbur looks at me suspiciously.  I am not, in his eyes, allowed to do anything out of the ordinary.

In the morning the sun can barely pierce through the thick gloom.  It forms a dull glow on the horizon

We feel better with the wine out of our system, but the think blanket of clouds drive us into ourselves, and causes a morose introspection.    The crew is silent and un-joking, totally unlike their normal selves.   I whistle at Wilbur, trying to cheer him up, but he looks at me forlornly, and will have nothing to do with it and refuses to whistle back.  He does not fly off from the boat, but sits gloomily up atop the sail, feasting in misery along with the rest of us.

This worries me.   What does he know that we don’t?”

I and all the men are bored.  I offer up a suggestion, more for reasons of psychology than for reasons of fishing which I know next to nothing about, “Why don’t we throw the nets in, see if we can pull anything out, mend the worn spots on the nets.”

The young captain glares at me as if to say, Are you the one running this boat.   He mutters, “Might as well.  Give us something to do.”

We throw the nets in twice and pull up about fifty fish each time.  I can see this cheers everyone up.

This cheerfulness is amplified when the wind picks up the cloud cover starts breaking up.  By late afternoon, everyone is in good spirits and talking up a storm as if making up for the previous day’s silence.

5:41 AM - 2 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

An Effective Way To Keep Religios Zealots Away
Category: Writing and Poetry

  An Effective Way To Keep Religious Zealots From                  Knocking On Your Door

     Gayle and I lie in bed in my house catty-cornered      from the Lucky Market at the corner of Kennedy      and South Meyer in the Barrio Viejo in Tucson in      1980.

     The Lucky Market has existed since before the      time of Christ and has been open all this time      by the same old crone who still runs the show.

     It's  Spring and still early in the      morning.
 
   Every since I've been living with Gayle I wake      with an erection in the morning.   Gayle also      wakes early and is always happy to indulge in a      morning fuck.

     This is Saturday and what a wonderful fuck we've      had.  We lie there in bed, spent, content and      happy.

     Someone knocks on the front door.  Gayle peaks      out the window.  "It's the fucking Jehovah's      Witnesses.  Let me handle this."

     She gets up, doesn't put anything on and goes to      the door.

     "Oh how wonderful!  Won't you come in and      explain about Christ to me?  Would you care for      some coffee?"

     It's obvious that they haven't been trained to deal      with a situation like this.  They beat a hasty      retreat.

     All the time that Gayle and I lived there, we were      never again bothered by a Jehovah's Witness,      Mormons or any other religious idiot again.

     I don't know what they marked the house with,      but it seemed to work.

     I wouldn't doubt if they still skipped this house in      their rounds of the barrio.

5:20 AM - 16 Comments - 16 Kudos - Add Comment

A Turning Point In The Fight Against Cancer
Category: Life

A turning point in the fight against cancer?

This is a re-post of a blog posted by my friend Charity Watch. Please add her as a friend.

For almost half a century, Prof. zur Hausen has been a prominent voice in the pharmaceutically-oriented cancer research community. His invitation to Dr. Rath, a prominent critic of conventional cancer therapies and a pioneer of natural cancer research, is no coincidence. It reflects the beginning of the re-orientation of international cancer research to specifically include vitamins and other micronutrients in the fight against this epidemic.

This re-orientation was brought about by significant advances in micronutrient research in cancer, a new field of medicine led by Dr. Rath and his research team (www.dr-rath-research.org).

Realizing the significance of this historic moment, Dr. Rath invited the International Journal of Cancer and the German Cancer Research Center to join him – based on the widely available scientific evidence – in a global effort to largely eliminate cancer as a cause of death in future generations.

Following is the full text of Dr. Rath's letter to the Editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Cancer:

 
 
Professor Harald zur Hausen
Editor in Chief
International Journal of Cancer
Deutsches Krebsforschungs-Zentrum (DKFZ)
 

August 13, 2008
 

Dear Professor zur Hausen,

On August 5, 2008 I received a letter signed by you inviting me to become a reviewer for the International Journal of Cancer (IJC) one of the most influential journals in cancer research. Beside your position as the Editor in Chief of the IJC, you have been chairman of the board of the German Cancer Research Centre (DKFZ) in Heidelberg for two decades, one of the world's leading cancer research institutions.

In your letter you invite me to review a paper submitted to your journal for publication, documenting the value of ascorbic acid (vitamin C) in the fight against cancer. As the primary reason for this invitation to become a reviewer for your journal you state: "Because of your expertise and experience" in the field of cancer research. I can only interpret this statement as the official recognition of the key role of micronutrients in the control of cancers for which my research team and I have been fighting for more than a decade.

For your entire life you have been a prominent representative of conventional cancer approaches including toxic chemotherapy, radiotherapy and other approaches that primarily served one goal: to use the cancer epidemic as a global market for the pharmaceutical investment business with patented drugs.

For you to contact me – an outspoken critic of these conventional approaches to cancer and a scientific pioneer for new and natural approaches to cancer – was no coincidence. Your decision recognizes two important facts: 1. The deadlocks of pharmaceutically driven approaches to cancer and 2. The compelling perspectives of micronutrients as powerful preventive and therapeutic agents in the control of, essentially, all forms of human cancer.
                                   
With your letter you recognize the urgent need for a reorientation of cancer research to specifically include micronutrients in the world-wide fight against cancer. For that decision you should be commended. At the same time, I am fully aware that this step was not voluntary but was compelled by the simple fact that the breathtaking perspective of the natural control of cancer can no longer be ignored. With the world's media regularly reporting the potential of vitamins and other micronutrients in reversing cancer, the dam is broken.

Considering the magnitude of negligence and obstruction towards micronutrients from the side of pharmaceutical medicine and considering the deadly consequences of this opposition for millions of cancer patients, your letter marks a turning point. It is obvious, however, that such a turning point in history cannot be guided by those who share responsibility for – or have at least tolerated – one of the darkest chapters in the history of mankind: the medical genocide in cancer.

In this situation, I have decided to respond to your letter in the form of an Open Letter to be shared with those most concerned about the way forward: The millions of cancer patients around the world. I am addressing you:

    * with the authority of the scientists whose discoveries now pave the way for the natural control of cancer;
      
    * with the confidence of one of the world's leading research teams having paved the way for the natural control of cancer (www.dr-rath-research.org);
      
    * and in full recognition of the historic opportunity that now presents itself to all mankind: to largely eliminate cancer as a scourge for our children, grandchildren and all future generations.
      

Before outlining the way forward, I consider it my duty to raise some of the questions from a consternated and outraged public you and your colleagues will have to answer in the months to come:

    * The first studies that documented the potential value of vitamins in the fight against cancer were published more than half a century ago, when you were still a student. Why was this research neglected for decades by pharmaceutical cancer research? Because vitamins were not patentable?
      
    * In the intervening 50 years since the answer of pharmaceutical-oriented cancer research has been chemotherapy and radiology - therapeutic options of which the most frequent side-effects are to cause even more cancer. Why did pharmaceutical-oriented cancer researchers not promote effective and safe natural alternatives? Because keeping the cancer epidemic alive for 5 decades brought the drug companies more than a trillion dollars in sales?
      
    * For two decades you were the head of the German Cancer Research Centre in Heidelberg with a total research budget of more than a billion Euros. Much of this money was public and taxpayer money provided for research in the public interest, namely to eliminate cancer. However, under your leadership much of this money was wasted for the development of ever more toxic chemotherapies, or for questionable vaccines with yet unpredictable side-effects. Why was this money not used for research with vitamins and other effective and safe cancer therapies? Who will pay back these hundreds of millions of wasted Euros?
      
    * In 1992 you published a research paper in the June 11 edition of the Journal of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO). The results of your studies showed that retinoic acid, a form of vitamin A, can inhibit the development of cervical cancer cells infected with the so-called papillomavirus. Did you ever inform the public about these important results? Did you conduct clinical studies to save the lives of cancer patients, many of them young women? Did you ever stand up when vitamin A was publicly discredited over many years in the interest of the pharmaceutical industry?
      
    * On March 8, 2002, our research institute published the breakthrough in the field of cancer research showing the potentiating effect of a micronutrient combination in controlling cancer: "Our research proves that vitamin C, lysine, proline and specific extracts from green tea (polyphenols) can inhibit the spread of cancer cells." To reach not only the scientific and medical community but also those millions of people directly affected by this disease, we published these findings on a full page in the world's largest newspaper, USA Today. Why didn't you take this life-saving information and make every effort to confirm it at your center?
      
    * In March 2003, together with researchers from our institute, we organized a lecture tour through Germany . We selected the five university cities, which are known to have a special focus in cancer research, among them Heidelberg , where the DKFZ is located. While the lecture halls were packed with patients, none of your researchers contacted us to initiate a scientific collaboration. Why?
      
    * In 2004, when the pharmaceutical industry and its stakeholders in medicine and the media launched an unprecedented attack against our natural cancer research, did you stand up for the scientific facts? What will you tell those millions of cancer patients who over decades were deliberately misled about the health benefits of micronutrients? What will you tell the relatives of those cancer patients who discontinued taking micronutrients as a result of this misinformation and who paid the ultimate price?
      
    * In 2005 our research team sent research results for publication to your International Journal of Cancer about the strong effects of micronutrients in skin cancer (melanoma) – a particularly aggressive form of cancer. Instead of publishing it and sharing this important research with scientists and doctors around the world, publication was declined without your journal even having reviewed the data. Why has the International Journal of Cancer for decades almost exclusively published cancer research directly or indirectly serving the pharmaceutical investment interests? As the editor in chief of this journal, how could you let that happen?
      
    * In October 2006, I had to stand trial in a Hamburg court for publicly stating that vitamins and micronutrients help in the fight against cancer and for defending our research in this field. Because of the strength of our research, I did not have to go to jail. To the contrary, the judge described us as "pioneers" for a new era in cancer research. Where were you and your colleagues from the DKFZ? Did you take positions on the side of science and on behalf of millions of cancer patients?
      
    * That same year, the British Medical Journal (BMJ) a scientific journal similar in influence to your own, embarked on a global defamation campaign against vitamin and micronutrient research in cancer. A London court approved a record fine against the BMJ of GBP 100,000. Did you, as the Editor in Chief of the International Journal of Cancer, take public positions in this important debate?
      

While the truth about the life-saving role of micronutrients in the fight against cancer was obstructed over decades, more than six million cancer patients worldwide died each year. They paid the ultimate price for the obstruction of the truth in the interests of the pharmaceutical investment business with the cancer epidemic. In light of this historic failure it would be naïve to think that a solution can come from those researchers that were largely responsible for this tragedy – or at least tolerated it.

 

In the interest of millions of cancer patients I therefore consider it incumbent upon me to direct the way forward. Here is what needs to be done immediately:

    * Dedicate 50% of each future edition of the International Journal of Cancer to scientific and medical reports in the field of micronutrient research and other science-based natural health approaches to cancer.
      
    * Assure that science-based natural health research is adequately represented in the International Journal of Cancer by appointing new members to the editorial board, making sure that they are experts in the field of vitamin and micronutrient research and that they represent 50% of the members of the new board.
      
    * Appoint researchers from the field of micronutrient research to the governing bodies of the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and allocate 50% of all future DKFZ budgets to micronutrient research in cancer.
      
    * Help make sure that micronutrient therapies are reimbursed by the health insurance providers as scientifically proven therapies in the fight against cancer.
      

In the interest of millions of people, these tasks need to be tackled immediately. Considering the immense task to redirect cancer research on a global level, your invitation for me to join your journal as a reviewer is a drop in the ocean.

I am inviting you and your research colleagues to join us in a vigorous international effort with the defined goal to end the cancer epidemic forever. The scientific rationale to reach this goal is available. What needs to be done now is to organize a global effort to end cancer, involving science, medicine, politics and all other sectors of society.

With millions of lives at stake, if you stay indifferent now, history will judge you. If you decide to act, we will join our forces towards this great goal all mankind has been waiting for. If this is the goal, my research team and I are ready to cooperate with your journal and your research colleagues at every level.

As a first step we propose to jointly organize a public symposium between your journal, the DKFZ and our research institute. At this symposium the best researchers from the DKFZ and from our research team would present their research to an audience of patients, doctors and the public at large. Such a symposium could serve as the beginning of an international campaign carried by our research institutes and others who will join us towards the eradication of cancer.

I am looking forward to your response.

Sincerely yours,

 
Matthias Rath, M.D.

5:13 AM - 6 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Powerful Tool To Avoid Drug Complications
Category: Life

POWERFUL TOOL TO AVOID DRUG COMPLICATIONS


Everyone has surely heard about drug interactions.  These occur when you take two or more drugs and they can work together to cause dangerous, even lethal problems.

Anyone who takes over three prescriptions medicines at the same time has no way of knowing what type of interactions are taking place.

This is true of the very best pharmacists and doctors.

Any time there are more than three prescriptions in the mix, it is impossible to determine.

Never let a doctor prescribe more than three medicines for you at one time, and don’t see different doctors to get different prescriptions.

 The fewer drugs one is taking, the better off they are.

Many drugs are prescribed to combat symptoms produced by other drugs.   IS THIS CRAZY, OR WHAT!

In the  past 10 years or so, it has been determined that nutritional supplements and even natural foods can interact with prescription drugs.   Some of the interactions are good, but some are very dangerous.

Unfortunately, most pharmacists are just now slowly getting up to speed on drug/nutrient interactions.  Your pharmacist most likely will not be able to help determine if the combinations of prescriptions and nutrients you are taking pose potential problems.

Leo Galland, MD, one of the most respected physicians in the alternative medicine community, has developed a unique software program that everyone and their physician should know about.

Galland calls it the Drug-Nutrient Reference System.

The information on drugs and supplements is too voluminous to keep on any doctor’s desk.  There is no way anyone could remember all that is published.

Galland’s program is quite simple and avoids mountains of books and paperwork.  Anyone can use it.

Dr. Galland loaded all of the known nutrient-drug interactions into the program.  When its booted up, a screen appears for a specific name.  After that, it give one a list of hundreds of drugs and prompts one to click on the medications used.

Next, one does the same with the extensive list of supplements provided.

Then one presses the interactions button and the software does its magic.  It automatically goes through its database to compare the listed supplements to the drugs.

Along the way, it notes favorable and/or unfavorable interactions.

It also looks at the dietary influences on the drug, and/or interactions [BOTH GOOD AND BAD] with supplements.

For example, if you’re taking iron for iron deficiency anemia, it will tell you that phytic acid [found in grains] and flavonoids [found in teas] may inhibit the absorption of this mineral.

It will also tell the known effects of any drug one is taking on their nutritional status.  For instance, a particular drug may deplete certain nutrients.  Once one knows this, one can prevent depletion by taking supplements which may prevent drug toxicity.

The software also lists drug-food interactions.  That shows the effects of certain foods on the drug.

There are recommendation to insure a positive effect. 

The adverse effects of supplements on drugs are in red boxes.

In clearly marked blue boxes, it lists the beneficial effects.   One box will say that CoQ10 is beneficial when taken with a statin.

Another box, in black, lists synergism [where affects are multiplied] of drugs and nutrients.—aspirin, a known platelet inhibitor [reduces clotting], has synergism with essential fatty acids.

Synergism can be a positive or a negative.   This is where a doctor’s advice comes into play.

Another blue box lists supplements that might enhance the present treatment.  
Supplements are also listed that might protect one from the toxicity of their drugs.

One might find that many controlled clinical trials have demonstrated that fish oil supplements can enhance the response of many drugs.  These include anti-inflammatories, heart rhythm drugs, antidepressants, psychiatric drugs, beta-blockers, cholesterol and lipid drugs, insulin and lithium.

LET’S SAY ONE TAKES THE STATIN DRUG Zocor.  The software will warn not to eat grapefruit or its juice.   These can elevate the drug’s concentration.  That, of course, could lead to further toxicity.

It would also show that selenium enhances the drug’s effectiveness.   Further, it would suggest fish oils as an outright and possibly superior alternative.

The program works for over-the-counter drugs as well.  If one is taking aspirin, it tells that nutrients like cayenne pepper and vitamin C can protect the stomach from aspirin-induced bleeding.

The software lists references for all the information.  The program generates a voluminous summary of all the available data.  The summary prints everything known to the program about what one is taking and that one [and their doctor] needs to know.

The program raises the bar for both alternative and orthodox doctors.

Orthodox doctors can make outstanding use of this program to make their therapies safer and more effective.

Onocologists ignorantly scare cancer patients over simultaneous use of vitamins and chemo.  They would quickly see the many articles showing that antioxidants not only protect one from the potential ravages, but they also make chemo more effective.

The program is available for $250 and anyone can purchase it at Dr. Galland’s website [www.nutritionworkshop.com].

One can change the model of chemical-based medicine by demanding their doctor acquire the program for their benefit.

Before one takes anything a doctor recommends, make sure one knows everything that is published about the drug.

Demand to know what might unknowingly make a doctor’s recommendations more risky.

There are millions of drug-related injuries each year.   With those sort of numbers, it is likely that every doctor in the country will see several mistakes.  

Make sure that you are not one of your doctor’s mistakes.

The program will hopefully open the doctor’s eyes to proof he or she as long demanded for published data regarding nutrition.

6:19 AM - 16 Comments - 14 Kudos - Add Comment

Bicycle 54 (travelogue/story)
Category: Writing and Poetry

Bicycle 54
           

The third morning I’m there, sleeping with my arm comfortably around Sherry, basking in the glow of good sex, good food and unadulterated love, the phone rings. 

Sherry is instantly wide awake.  “Oh Norman.  It’s so good to hear from you.”   She looks at me and grins.   “Can you bring?” and she reads from a list that she has on the night stand.  “I’ll expect you around six.  I love you too.”

When she hangs up she starts playing with me.  Then takes me in her mouth.   “She grins lewdly.  “Can you take me doggy style?”

I grin back.  “With pleasure.”

After we’ve finished, lying in bed together, spent, Sherry says, “Do you think I’m a nymphomaniac?”

I almost choke when she asks this.  “I think you’re a beautiful sexy woman who has discovered sex.”

Sherry gets a little pout on her pretty face, “Do you think if I worked at it I could become a nymphomaniac?”

I laugh.  “Why would you want to do that?   If you become an nympho, sex becomes a necessity and really ceases being a pleasure.”

Sherry grins.  “You mean I can’t be a nympho and enjoy it.  Shit.”

“Anyone every tell you that you are absolutely wonderful?”

“You’re the one that’s been wonderful.  God this is great.  I love wandering around naked, knowing you are watching.  I never believed fucking could be so. . . so. .. .fucking wonderful.”

I get the bike out and loaded, though it will never seem full again without Fritters.  Sherry comes out and kisses me.

I haven’t been using a condom and I ask Sherry.  “You have taken precautions, haven’t you.”

“Hell no,” she grins.  “I hope to hell you knocked me up.  It would be the most wonderful child in the world.”

I frown. Sherry wets her lips.   I’ll seduce Norman when he gets back so if I am knocked up, please God let me be, so he’ll think it’s his kid.”

I clear my throat and write out an address on the back of a card.   “Write and let me know if I fathered a child.”

I mount the bike feeling content, but don’t pedal a hundred yards before I feel the weight of the absence of Fritters.   I feel blessed by having met Sherry while at the same time feeling that I’m the dumbest fuck in the world.

6:05 AM - 4 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

White Noise (a poem)
Category: Writing and Poetry

WHITE NOISE

                       
white noise
white noise
something buzzing behind my eyes
behind your eyes
white noise
white water

a cigarette so white
white noise
I can’t hear the guitar
can’t hear the white
notes playing

I know someone is singing
someone has to be singing
the tambourine is jingling

but the white noise
and the storm
the white
white storm
the clouds they swarm

will we be hit
the trees bend
time suspend
will the storm pass over
will it leave only
white noise
white   
White hollow noise

I light the cylinder
suck on
white noise
The singing
ringing
white
white smoke
curling up
in a buzzing
behind my eyes

5:57 AM - 24 Comments - 20 Kudos - Add Comment

The CIA & Its Negetative Shadow Foreign Policy
Category: News and Politics

THE CIA & ITS NEGATIVE SHADOW FOREIGN POLICY

Note:   The author has worked as a war correspondent in Vietnam and in Central America and Colombia and has seen first hand the long term negative impacts of illegal (both in terms of International and US law) CIA interventions in the affairs of foreign governments.  

This is self-evident when one considers the fact that the term blow-back had to be coined to describe the repercussions of CIA operations

 That does not mean that the author does not believe that the CIA does have a legitimate roll.   However, he does believes that the roll  is valid only as long as it strictly limits itself to collecting information. 

 The author  further believes that the name, The Central Intelligence Agency, is a misnomer.  There is nothing “intelligent” about the agency.   Calling the information gathered,  intelligence, is a corruption of the word. 




The CIA has a long history of accepting bad information and believing it, because it conforms to how they view the world.   This was true of Vietnam, Guatemala, Iran (in the 1950s), Cuba, Santo Domingo and Iraq.   The list goes on and on.  It seems that they couldn’t believe anything that wasn’t evil about the Soviet Union.

What led the author to thinking about this was the election this last Sunday in Venezuela, and Sean Penn mentioning Venezuela in a recent well written and well thought out essay.

In that election Hugo Chavez, the duly elected President of that country, sought to expand his powers via the voting booth.

What Chavez wanted did not pass, though it was defeated by a very narrow margin, and he accepted his defeat with grace, as any truly democratically elected president would.

What disturbed this writer was the fact  it was reported that the CIA was actively supporting opposition to Chavez and his purposed changes.

Venezuela is a major exporter of petroleum to the USA.   Under Chavez the foreign and mostly US owned oil companies operating in Venezuela have not been nationalized; however, he has demanded and obtained a much larger percentage of the profits for the Venezuelan people.

This has not gone over well with the US, the oil companies and the oligarchy in Venezuela who have lived like royalty off the profits of the country’s natural resources.

The Monroe doctrine is the usual excuse for the USA’s meddling in Latin American affairs.

James Monroe was the fifth President of the US and lived from 1758 to 1831.   He was a Virginian, attended William and Mary College, and practiced law in Fredericksburg, Virginia.  He was elected President in 1816 and 1820 and served from 1817to 1825.

With the help of his Secretary of State, John Quincey Adams, he brought it to public light on December 02, 1823.    The irony of the Chavez defeat is that it was 184 years to the day after the declaration of the Monroe Doctrine.

In the address, that would twenty years later become known as the Monroe Doctrine, the President proclaimed that no European power could any longer colonize or interfere with the newly independent nations of the America, and that the US planned to stay neutral in wars between European powers and their colonies.   However, if these later types of wars were to occur in the Americas, the US would view such actions as hostile. 

In 1904 US President Theodore Roosevelt (without consultation with the rest of the countries in the Americas) asserted that the US had the right to intervene in Latin America.

This is the most significant change in the Monroe Doctrine and changes the doctrine from one of being an ally of Latin America when faced with an external threat to being one of hegemony.   This is known as the Roosevelt Corollary.

This was changed 26 years later in what is known as the Clark Memorandum.   In 1930, the Clark Memorandum was released, concluding that the Doctrine did not give the United States any right to intervene in Latin American affairs when the region was not threatened by Old World powers, thereby reversing the Roosevelt Corollary.

John F. Kennedy invoked the Monroe Doctrine when Soviet missiles were placed in Cuba in the 1960's.  He said:

“The Monroe Doctrine means what  it has meant since President Monroe and John Quincy Adams enunciated it, and that is that we would oppose a foreign power extending its power to the Western Hemisphere, and that is why we oppose what is happening in Cuba today. That is why we have cut off our trade. That is why we worked in the Organization of American States and in other ways to isolate the Communist menace in Cuba. That is why we will continue to give a good deal of our effort and attention to it.”

If one accepts the Monroe Doctrine as a duly stated enunciation of US foreign policy, then President Kennedy’s action were warranted.

However, the USA’s continued embargo of Cuba long after the Soviets have left Cuba and long after the Soviet Union’s existence, flies in the face of the Monroe Doctrine.

According to the Clark memorandum, which is still the applicable interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine, the USA under the auspices of the CIA has no business trying to influence the Venezuelan election one way or another.

Sure.   US corporations have not made as much money under the Chavez Presidency of Venezuela as previous, but in no way does that give the US the right to intervene in Venezuelan politics.

It is interesting to note what Chavez is doing with some of his oil windfall.  

He has helped set up an international bank for Latin America so that the countries can free themselves from the predatory practices of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund which are controlled by US and European bankers, and which have continually sucked the natural resources and lifeblood out of Latin America.

Chavez is investing in the education and health care of the Venezuelan people, and he is redistributing land owned but not used by the oligarchy, to the poor and homeless, in an effort to make the nation more independent in its food supply.

While FEMA languished in a hopeless state after the devastation of Katrina, Chavez offered to send materials to New Orleans free of charge.   As might be expected from the current regime in Washington, the offered was refused.

One of the changes that Chavez wanted to make that was strenuously objected to by Washington was that he could be elected continuously until he was rejected by the people of Venezuela.

Why Washington should object to this is highly suspect.   After all, this is the way governments are set up in Britain, France, Australia, Canada and a number of other countries.

What will be the “blow back”for the CIA’s meddling in Venezuela?   Will Venezuela stop selling oil to the US and only sell it to China, India or  any one of a number of countries who are clamoring and desperate for the petroleum?

If the US does not receive some sort of negative blow back from te CIA’s meddling it will be a miracle.

The CIA’s charter does not authorize it to meddle in the internal affairs of other countries.    It authorizes it to collect “Intelligence.”

Unfortunately, Congress has effectively abandoned its oversight of the CIA and isn’t fully informed of its various illegal operations.

The CIA has become a defacto foreign policy apparatus of the US.   One that operates without  transparency and the guidance of Congress.   This is to the detriment of US foreign policy, of Congress, of the constitution and of the America public.

The CIA’s actions are totally alien to what the United States of America has historically stood.  

The CIA, as it has become in this day and age, needs to be totally restructured.   No covert actions should be condoned or allowed.    It needs to be turned into an agency that strictly gathers information, and information that is based on fact and not what the CIA wants and projects the information to be.

Unfortunately, with either an Obama or a McCain presidency, the possibility of actually reforming the CIA are slim to non-existent.

Most recently the CIA has been meddling in the affairs of Bolivia, supporting the former ruling oligarchy in seeking control of Bolivia’s rich resources.   The former oligarchy as soundly defeated.

It seems that the world is waking up to the meddling shadow foreign policy of the US.   It is time its own citizens woke up and reformed this corrupt and out-of-control institution.

5:43 AM - 10 Comments - 8 Kudos - Add Comment

Update On Woman Exiting Car Window On Interstate
Category: Life

Update On Incident Concerning The Young Woman Exiting From A Passenger’s Window While Traveling Down The Interstate
                                       

I recently re-posted a blog that I wrote in 2007about an incident I witnessed and became involved in, in  1998 where I watched a woman coming out the passenger side of a car window at approximately seventy-five miles an hour.   Until about six weeks ago no one had ever contacted me about this event.

A group called the Web Sleuths contacted me, letting me know that the young woman had never been identified.   I gave them all the information I could recall, and directed them to the blog I wrote about the occurrence.   The group kept coming back with more questions which I answered to the best of my ability.

Things died down again, then I was contacted by the ABC new affiliate in Phoenix.  They wanted to interview me.  I was none to thrilled with that idea, but agreed to talk with them.

Everything started happening.    The young woman was identified as Tawni Mazzone who was originally from Massachusetts .   She had been living in Gilbert, a suburb of Phoenix for a short while, and was missing for only five days. She was seventeen years old, and by all accounts was a bright personable beautiful young woman with a friendly personality.

The Mazzone family is heart broken over this discover.

The  pimp charged with driving the vehicle was originally charged with manslaughter, but pled down to failure to assist.   He was given four years supervised probation.   He fled to California.   The prostitute that was in the car with him has given authorites his location and he is now in custody. 

Recent evidence has come to light where witnesses testified that they saw Tawni being forced into the vehicle.  If this is ture, there is a good possiblity that the man will be charged with second degree murder.

I would ask that if you and children, give them an extra hug, and tell them that you love them so they will never have to experience what Tawni went through in exiting this world.

11:11 AM - 20 Comments - 14 Kudos - Add Comment

10 Obscure Facts About Me (as if anyone. . .)
Category: Life

10 OBSCURE FACTS ABOUT ME
                   
1.I’m totally deaf in my right ear and blind in the other.

2.  I’m 5,897 years-old in spite of the fact that I was born April 31, 1604 in Rotterdam.

3.  While in the process of saving my life a neurosurgeon removed part of my skull to shed some light on a dark and twisted mind.  He did not put a plate in.

4.  I  literally and figuratively have a whole in my head.

5.  I’ve been diagnosed and certified as a psycho-ceramic.

6.  I’ve recently returned from an archeological expedition using the very latest in technology in search of the first word ever spoken. I regret to report that the results were inconclusive.  Another expedition is being organized.

7. I’ve had my entire head overhauled more than once.

8.  I got lost in the printed word when I was a child and haven’t been found since.

9.   I make my living selling snake oil.

10.  My favorite response when told “fuck you” by a member of the opposite sex is to say, “Okay.”

7:16 AM - 32 Comments - 30 Kudos - Add Comment