Opposing Digits

Washington - With power cleaner than coal and cheaper than natural gas, the nuclear industry, 20 years past its last meltdown, thinks it is ready for its second act: its first new reactor orders since the 1970's.

But there is a catch. The public's acceptance of new reactors depends in part on the performance of the old ones, and lately several of those have been discovered to be leaking radioactive water into the ground.

Near Braceville, Ill., the Braidwood Generating Station, owned by the Exelon Corporation, has leaked tritium into underground water that has shown up in the well of a family nearby. The company, which has bought out one property owner and is negotiating with others, has offered to help pay for a municipal water system for houses near the plant that have private wells.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:52 PM 0 comments

According to a recent Forbes piece, "a lot of people have their fingers crossed" that New River Pharmaceuticals Inc. will successfully launch its planned new treatment for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder with partner Shire Plc.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:33 PM 0 comments

More than a dozen scientists and doctors, several of them recipients of sizable federal grants, have been faking research, destroying data, plagiarizing or conducting experiments on people without necessary ethics approvals, the country's lead research agencies report.

One medical researcher, who was awarded $1,347,445 for various projects, fabricated and falsified data and was permanently barred last year from receiving more federal money, according to documents obtained by CanWest News Service.

Another researcher altered and destroyed data and cannot apply for funding for three years.

A third researcher, who engaged in "academic dishonesty in publication," has been barred from receiving more federal research money until next year.

Officials at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) say they cannot, under federal privacy laws, identity the researchers.

Officials at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) say they cannot, under federal privacy laws, identify the researchers.

But CIHR says it awarded more than $12-million to projects in which researchers have been found to be violating research ethics or integrity rules since 2003. They worked at Dalhousie University, McGill University, McMaster University, Sunnybrook & Women's College Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, the University of Alberta, the University of British Columbia, Universite de Montreal, and Universite de Sherbrooke.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:25 PM 0 comments

Drugs children take for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder should carry stronger warnings about the risk of side effects like hallucinations and paranoia, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said.

Since 2000, the agency has received more than 500 reports of psychosis in children 10 and younger who took ADHD drugs, including Shire Plc's Adderall, Eli Lilly and Co.'s Strattera and Novartis AG's Ritalin and Focalin, a staff review found.
"Signs and symptoms of psychosis or mania, particularly hallucinations, can occur in some patients with no identifiable risk factors," according to an agency review dated March 3. The documents were posted on the FDA Web site in advance of a panel meeting next week.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:23 PM 0 comments

MEXICO CITY - Water is worth fighting for — even to the death, activists holding an "alternate" forum outside the world water summit said Friday. That attitude might seem strange in developed countries, where water flows at the touch of a faucet. But it isn't nearly as accessible in the developing world.

And water wars aren't an apocalyptic vision of the future. They're already starting to happen, the protesters say.

"We've been beaten, we've been jailed, some of us have even been killed, but we're not going to give up," said Marco Suastegui, who marched alongside about 10,000 protesters Thursday outside a convention center where the international Fourth World Water Forum is being held.

Suastegui is leading the battle against a dam being built to supply water for the Pacific coastal resort of Acapulco. Opponents fear the dam will dry up the nearby Papagayo River.

"We will defend the water of the Papagayo River with our lives, if need be," Suastegui said.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:18 PM 0 comments

In five internal reports made public yesterday as part of a lawsuit, New York City police commanders candidly discuss how they had successfully used "proactive arrests," covert surveillance and psychological tactics at political demonstrations in 2002, and recommend that those approaches be employed at future gatherings.

Among the most effective strategies, one police captain wrote, was the seizure of demonstrators on Fifth Avenue who were described as "obviously potential rioters."

The reports provide a rare glimpse of internal police evaluations and strategies on security and free speech issues that have provoked sharp debate between city officials and political demonstrators since the Sept. 11 attack.

The reports also made clear what the police have yet to discuss publicly: that the department uses undercover officers to infiltrate political gatherings and monitor behavior.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:46 AM 0 comments

Even a quick glance at coal-producing states like West Virginia shows that the idea of an eco-friendly use for the fossil fuel is far more misnomer than reality.

On the West Virginia-Ohio border, the tread of the county's coal-burning power industry is expanding, digging into the Appalachian Mountains and kicking up clouds of pollution. While small towns choked by power plants hear the promise of new "clean coal" technologies, mining communities know there is no technological remedy for the destruction the industry is wreaking in their communities.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:19 AM 0 comments

John Peeler has "all the dirty goods" on the U.S. government's covert operations to kill New World Order foes, as well as the hidden details behind Waco, Oklahoma City and 9/11.
18 Mar 2006

John Peeler has been called a "jack boot thug" more than once in his life, even calling himself "the worst of the worst" for the downright "dirty assignments" he took on as a longtime FBI agent.

Peeler, who saw it all so to speak, worked behind the scenes or had inside information about Waco, Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma City and 9/11.

For years, the veteran undercover FBI agent worked underground basically as a hit man or infiltrator, trying to nip in the bud any patriot or militia movement threatening the New World Order agenda, being privy to exactly how the government staged terrorist events like Oklahoma City and 9/11 in order to further the Illuminati agenda leading to World War III and the destruction of the West.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:55 AM 0 comments

(AP) CHICAGO Soaring numbers of American children are being prescribed anti-psychotic drugs -- in many cases, for attention deficit disorder or other behavioral problems for which these medications have not been proven to work, a study found.

The annual number of children prescribed anti-psychotic drugs jumped fivefold between 1995 and 2002, to an estimated 2.5 million, the study said. That is an increase from 8.6 out of every 1,000 children in the mid-1990s to nearly 40 out of 1,000.

But more than half of the prescriptions were for attention deficit and other non-psychotic conditions, the researchers said.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:47 AM 0 comments

Before you cancel text messaging from your cell phone plan or quit your job, rest assured that you can continue to do the strenuous or repetitive activities that commonly cause bursitis while reducing your chances of developing it yourself. The best way to do this is by getting in shape. "The stronger your muscles, the lower your risk of injuring a tendon or bursa," writes Michael Castleman, author of Blended Medicine. Additionally, good nutrition, especially adequate amounts of healing nutrients like vitamin C, both prevents and treats bursitis.

# posted by madthumbs @ 4:57 PM 0 comments

March 17 (Bloomberg) -- The low-carbohydrate Atkins diet, which experienced a peak of popularity two years ago, isn't safe and shouldn't be recommended for weight loss, according to doctors writing in The Lancet.

Low-carbohydrate diets for weight management ``are far from healthy'' given their association with constipation or diarrhea, halitosis, headache and general fatigue, among other side effects, Dr. Lyn Steffen of the University of Minnesota School of Public Health wrote. They also increase the protein load to the kidneys and alter the acid balance of the body, which can result in loss of bone minerals, Steffen said.

# posted by madthumbs @ 3:14 PM 0 comments

This is a two-page summary of revealing accounts by 20 award-winning journalists from the book Into the Buzzsaw, compiled Kristina Borjesson. All of these courageous writers were prevented by corporate media ownership from reporting major news stories. Some were even fired or laid off. These journalists have won numerous awards, including several Emmys and a Pulitzer. Join in building a better world. Spread this news across the land.

# posted by madthumbs @ 3:07 PM 0 comments

Representative Henry Waxman (D-CA) has alleged in a letter to White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card that President Bush signed a version of the Budget Reconciliation Act that, in effect, did not pass the House of Representatives.

Further, Waxman says there is reason to believe that the Speaker of the House called President Bush before he signed the law, and alerted him that the version he was about to sign differed from the one that actually passed the House. If true, this would put the President in willful violation of the U.S. Constitution.

# posted by madthumbs @ 3:01 PM 0 comments

AN RAF medical officer who refused to return to Iraq for a third tour “honestly” believed that the British military campaign was illegal, a court martial hearing was told yesterday.

Flight Lieutenant Malcolm Kendall-Smith, 37, who is facing five charges of failing to comply with a lawful order, decided that it was his duty to disobey the order, his lawyer said during a pre-trial hearing at Aldershot, Hampshire.

# posted by madthumbs @ 3:00 PM 0 comments

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - Many electric utilities are collecting money from customers to pay income taxes, and then never paying those taxes, according to a report published Wednesday.

The New York Times reports that the practice is legal and defended by the companies as a smart business practice. But consumer advocates told the newspaper that the practice is wrong and that if the companies don't owe the taxes, then customers shouldn't be forced to pay for them as part of state-approved electric rates.

# posted by madthumbs @ 2:53 PM 0 comments

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The "secret society" of U.S. judges is about to be invaded by a Web site that lets people who have appeared before them rate judges in the first such public forum.

The tooth-comb scrutiny will come from lawdragon.com, run by Katrina Dewey, an attorney and former editor of the Los Angeles Daily Journal, the largest U.S. legal daily newspaper.

# posted by madthumbs @ 2:45 PM 0 comments

FORT MEADE, Md. — An Army dog handler charged with using his animal to terrify Abu Ghraib prisoners laughingly claimed he was competing with a comrade to frighten detainees into soiling themselves, according to testimony Tuesday at his court-martial.

The testimony on the second day of the trial was the most damaging evidence yet against Sgt. Michael J. Smith.

# posted by madthumbs @ 2:35 PM 0 comments

A US man who sent in a torn up, and taped back together, credit card application as an experiment to see whether he needed to shred his applications has received a credit card. Rob Cockerham used his father's address and his mobile (as opposed to land line number) when making an application for a JP Morgan Chase credit card.

# posted by madthumbs @ 2:27 PM 0 comments

Due to overwhelming interest, we're going to return to the G spot — a region of female anatomy associated with orgasm and occasionally ejaculation.

After my last column on the G spot ran last month, quite a few men wrote in or called. Several said they were older than 60 and they sounded as if they'd been with enough women to have put together statistically significant scientific studies on female sexual response. These guys for the most part wanted to express wonder at the great diversity nature bestows on the female body.

Those who reported they'd witnessed an ejaculatory event may have rubbed up against a woman's prostate. That's not a typo. In 2002, what was once an obscure female anatomical feature known as the paraurethral glands, or Skene's glands, was officially renamed the prostate by the Federative International Committee on Anatomical Terminology.

To understand why women would have prostate glands, it helps to go back to our embryonic beginnings, when everything was taking shape. Popular wisdom says we all start life as female embryos, but scientists say we really begin as blended male-female beings.

# posted by madthumbs @ 2:17 PM 0 comments

Banksters hope to profit off illegal immigration

The San Diego housing market is one of the most expensive in the country and many first-time home buyers are simply priced out of the market. Even if you can somehow scrape together enough money for a down payment, rising interest rates and mortgage insurance make it exceedingly difficult to become a homeowner. That is, unless you happen to be an illegal alien.

If you are in the country illegally, don’t have a valid social security number and use a taxpayer ID number instead, you’re in luck. The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) has persuaded Citibank, one of the nation’s largest banks, to help out. Illegal aliens in San Diego can purchase a home at below market interest rates, receive down payment assistance, and not have to take out mortgage insurance like other risky customers do.

# posted by madthumbs @ 1:58 PM 0 comments

Banksters hope to profit off illegal immigration

The San Diego housing market is one of the most expensive in the country and many first-time home buyers are simply priced out of the market. Even if you can somehow scrape together enough money for a down payment, rising interest rates and mortgage insurance make it exceedingly difficult to become a homeowner. That is, unless you happen to be an illegal alien.

If you are in the country illegally, don’t have a valid social security number and use a taxpayer ID number instead, you’re in luck. The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) has persuaded Citibank, one of the nation’s largest banks, to help out. Illegal aliens in San Diego can purchase a home at below market interest rates, receive down payment assistance, and not have to take out mortgage insurance like other risky customers do.

# posted by madthumbs @ 1:58 PM 0 comments

Former officer and veteran criminal lawyer turns in his wings and writes critical letter to Bush about his misguided policies destroying America.
17 Mar 2006

A former U.S. Navy officer has sent President Bush a sharp message, sending his military shoulder boards and aviator wings as a symbolic gesture of disgust in a recent letter addressed to the White House.

Former Navy pilot, lawyer and public defender for more than 20 years, Joseph DuRocher, 68, of Orlando, Florida, finally threw in the towel on the Bush administration, saying he was fed up "to the hilt," especially with torture and abuse policies condoned by the President related to the Iraq War, as well as an economic and environmental agenda destroying the country he loves.

# posted by madthumbs @ 8:09 AM 0 comments

Smoking appears to interfere with the brain's ability to recover from the effects of chronic alcohol abuse, according to a study conducted by researchers at the San Francisco VA Medical Center.

After one month of sobriety, recovering alcoholics who smoked showed significantly less improvement than those who did not smoke in both brain function and neurochemical markers of brain cell health.

"This study suggests that for better brain recovery, it may be beneficial for alcoholics in early abstinence to stop smoking as well," concludes Dieter Meyerhoff, Dr.rer.nat., a radiology researcher at SFVAMC and the senior author of the study. Meyerhoff is also a professor of radiology at the University of California, San Francisco.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:52 AM 0 comments

Gentlemen, eat your chili peppers. Habanero, jalapeno, Scotch bonnet -- those hot but tasty varieties of the capsicum frutescens have multiple health benefits -- including the ability to drive prostate cancer cells to kill themselves, researchers announced yesterday.

According to a team from the University of California at Los Angeles and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, the hot stuff in peppers -- capsaicin -- caused 80 percent of active prostate cancer cells growing in mice to "follow the molecular pathways leading to apoptosis," or cell death.

The cancer cells literally committed suicide. What's more, the cancer tumors of the mice treated with a hot pepper extract were one-fifth the size of untreated mice.

"Capsaicin had a profound anti-proliferative effect on human prostate cancer cells in culture," said Dr. Soren Lehmann. "It also dramatically slowed the development of prostate tumors formed by those human cell lines grown in mouse models."

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:47 PM 0 comments

MAR. 15 2:53 P.M. ET Shares of Cephalon Inc. dropped Wednesday on concerns an internal Food and Drug Administration memo about the drug maker's attention deficit treatment candidate Sparlon could spell problems for the company in an upcoming advisory panel meeting.

Cephalon shares were down $3.58, or 4.4 percent, to $77.76 in afternoon trading on the Nasdaq at nearly double their average volume, after being down as much as 7 percent earlier in the day. Shares reached a 52-week high of $82.92 Monday after climbing from a year low of $37.35 in June.

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Heavy-hitters from across the country are heading to Washington this month to debate representatives of the pharmaceutical industry during FDA hearings on the controversy surrounding the over-prescribing of attention deficit drugs to children.

The International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology (ICSPP) will be represented by five of the leading experts on attention deficit disorders at the FDA's Pediatric Advisory Committee's meeting on March 22, to include Dr Fred Baughman, Dr Peter Breggin, Dr S DuBose Ravenel, Dr Grace Jackson, MD, and Dr David Stein. These experts combined have authored hundreds of books, papers and reports on attention deficit disorders.*

And all five have one common goal; to put an end to the drugging for profit of the nation's most vulnerable citizens and pharma's most lucrative customer base - innocent children.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:22 AM 0 comments

MOSCOW. March 14 (Interfax) - Russian Communist party leader Gennady Zyuganov has blamed the United States for the spread of avian influenza, or bird flu, in a number of European countries, including Russia.

"The forms of warfare are changing. It's strange that not a single duck has yet died in America - they are all dying in Russia and European countries. This makes one seriously wonder why," Zyuganov said at a press conference at the Interfax main office on Tuesday.

Zyuganov said that he has good knowledge of war gases as he dealt with them during his army service.

"I tested all kinds of war gases at a range myself," he said.

Asked to be more precise as to whether he believes the bird flu outbreak could be a deliberate attack by the U.S., Zyuganov answered positively.

"I not only suggest this, I know very well how this can be arranged. There is nothing strange here," he said.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:08 AM 0 comments

The Evidence Points One Way

The more a government emphasizes its commitment to defense, the less it seems to care about the survival of its people. Perhaps it is because its attention may be focused on more distant prospects: the establishment and maintenance of empire, for example, or the dynastic succession of its leaders. Whatever the explanation for the neglect of their security may be, the people of America have discovered that casual is the precursor of casualty.

But while we should be asking what George Bush and his cabinet knew and failed to respond to before September 11, we should also be exploring another, related, question: what do they know now and yet still refuse to act upon? Another way of asking the question is this: whatever happened to the anthrax investigation?

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:04 AM 0 comments

TIKRIT, Iraq, March 15 (Reuters) - Eleven members of an Iraqi family were killed in a U.S. raid on Wednesday, police and witnesses said. The U.S. military said two women and a child died during the bid to seize an al Qaeda militant from a house.

A senior Iraqi police officer said autopsies on the bodies, which included five children, showed each had been shot in the head. Community leaders said they were outraged at the killings and demanded an explanation from the U.S. military.

Television footage showed the bodies in the Tikrit morgue -- five children, two men and four women. Their wounds were not clear though one infant had a gaping head wound.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:02 AM 0 comments

The United States has come to a decision point on nutritional supplements. Choice A is to continue participating in the Codex Alimentarius Commission (Codex), which could be hazardous to public health by setting limitations on supplements, and Choice B is to pass the Health Freedom Protection Act (HFPA), which could revolutionize the health supplement industry and greatly benefit public health, in part by no longer allowing the FDA to prohibit disease treatment claims for foods and supplements.

U.S. Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) said in his Nov. 10, 2005 speech before the U.S. House of Representatives, "Because of the FDA's censorship of truthful health claims, millions of Americans may suffer with diseases and other healthcare problems they may have avoided by using dietary supplements." Paul cited the FDA's four-year prohibition of telling consumers that folic acid reduces birth defects, which resulted in an estimated 10,000 cases of preventable birth defects, as evidence that the FDA's current policy obstructs good public health.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:15 AM 0 comments

According to researchers, Catholic Church infiltrated by Illuminists disguised as Jesuits with world domination as their goal and deception and war their main tools.

The Italian priest saying Mass in what looked like a gold plated church near the Spanish Steps in Rome was about to give his sermon when in stormed a street beggar screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Give me the money and give it to the starving people like me. All criminals at the altar, especially you Father with all those golden rings and chalices!" cried the street person in Italian, as several church ushers rushed to remove him from the premises.

While being pushed out of the Church like a piece of garbage, he made one last plea to those attending Holy Sunday Mass. "Don't give him the money, please don't give it him! I need to eat. So do many others. All they do here is steal your money while many die in the streets.!"

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:11 AM 0 comments

One show trial ends prematurely, another begins

After the murder of Slobo Milosevic prevented the true Butchers of Serbia, Wes Clark and Bill Clinton, from being brought to justice, on the very first day of Saddam Hussein's testimony the judge turned off his microphone and ordered all media to leave following Saddam's comments that the civil war in Iraq is being deliberately fueled by the US.

Over the past few weeks we have highlighted Israeli and US foreign policy documents that actually encourage not deter the break out of civil war in Iraq. Decades old blueprints document how inter-Arab conflict would be beneficial to the Neo-Cons, initiating ethnic cleansing in Iraq and drawing in Iran and Syria to provide a pretext to expand the war.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:26 AM 0 comments

Web site containing live 'molestation on demand' shut down

CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- An Internet chat room that streamed video of live child molestations has been shut down and 27 people have been charged with online child pornography offenses, federal authorities said Wednesday.

Justice Department and Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials still are looking for one suspect after an undercover sting operation shut down a Web site called "Kiddypics & Kiddyvids."

It was not clear exactly how many suspects had been arrested, but Randall Samborn, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Chicago, said, "Most have been [arrested]."

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:18 AM 0 comments

Professor Turley (rough transcript):

President Bush has for many years asserted authority that is both absolute and in my view, quite dangerous.

In August 2002, there was the infamous torture memo, put out by the justice department, that stated that the President could indeed order gov’t officials to violate federal law. In fact, that memo said that imposing a limitation on his ability to conduct exercises that constitute torture would be a constitutional infringement on his authority.

The President also claimed authority to unilaterally declare a citizen an enemy combatant, to strip him entirely of his constitutional rights, including the right of access to counsel.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:21 PM 0 comments

(CBS) MELVILLE “This has saved all our children's lives”, said a shaken Dorothy Mirro in Melville today.

She was among twenty emotional parents supporting controversial shock-therapy treatment.

“The school is a god-send. My wife and I suffer. You don't know what it's like to have a violent son who could kill you--but who you dearly love.”

The school that Jenkin Washington speaks of, The Rotenberg Center, is in Massachusetts but approved by New York State as a facility for extremely troubled youths. It uses modern-day electric shock therapy by way of back packs, belts--sometimes strapped to arms and legs. The shocks can last two to three seconds and are usually administered several times a week.

Ralph Antonelli of the Rotenberg Center was with the supportive parents explaining. He explaioned: ”We use supportive behavior modification fifty percent of the time. But it doesn't aleways work with the most severe cases. This is a last resort. We hate schizophrenic drugs. A judge must pre-approve each individual case”

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:16 PM 0 comments

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is taking steps to remove phenylpropanolamine (PPA) from all drug products and has requested that all drug companies discontinue marketing products containing PPA. In addition, FDA has issued a public health advisory concerning phenylpropanolamine. This drug is an ingredient that was used in many over-the-counter (OTC) and prescription cough and cold medications as a decongestant and in OTC weight loss products.

In response to the request made by FDA in November 2000, many companies have voluntarily reformulated and are continuing to reformulate their products to exclude PPA while FDA proceeds with the regulatory process necessary to remove PPA from the market.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:05 PM 0 comments

Popular Prescription Sleeping Pill May Be Behind Bizarre Sleep Behavior

March 15, 2006 — Janet Makinen took Ambien for six years and never understood why she was sleepwalking and eating bizarre things like raw eggs, uncooked yellow rice, and loaves of bread while she slept. Only her husband knew about her problem, but as soon as she told her doctor, he took her off the sleep medication and the sleepwalking ended.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:24 PM 1 comments

REAL doctors performed real procedures on real patients. The insurance claims were real; so were the surgery centers that filed them. And the money that insurers paid - a total of about $500 million, federal investigators estimate - was most assuredly real.

Hundreds of people, many of them recent immigrants unfamiliar with America's health care system, volunteered to undergo the medical tests and operations. They traveled to surgery centers in Southern California for what would be, in another context, routine procedures like endoscopies, colonoscopies and pap smears. Some traveled, on the clinics' dime, from as far away as Tennessee. Some of them, investigators say, received free or discounted plastic surgery, and others got cash.

Any such payment was and is illegal.

Insurers, meanwhile, were billed tens of thousands of dollars for each procedure, far more than they would have paid if the patients had gone to in-network providers.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:17 PM 0 comments

I suspect that this Dubai thing is a simple ploy. Almost no-one would agree with giving an Arab country our port security, including Bush. Now it appears that the contract is going to Haliburton which I believe was the intent in the 1st place. The people in control of our government can now say “We the people have spoken! They want Haliburton instead of the Arabs controlling port security”. This is typical of the Cheney/Bush Administration’s adolescent approach toward swaying public opinion. It’s almost laughable.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:03 PM 0 comments

Summary: Keith Olbermann, appearing on C-SPAN, said: "There are people I know in the hierarchy of NBC, the company, and GE, the company, who do not like to see the current presidential administration criticized at all. ... There are people who I work for who would prefer, who would sleep much easier at night if this never happened. On the other hand, if they look at my ratings and my ratings are improved and there is criticism of the president of the United States, they're happy."

During a March 12 interview with C-SPAN president and chief executive officer Brian Lamb, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann said: "There are people I know in the hierarchy of NBC, the company, and GE [General Electric Co., NBC's parent corporation], the company, who do not like to see the current presidential administration criticized at all. ... There are people who I work for who would prefer, who would sleep much easier at night if this never happened." He added, "On the other hand, if they look at my ratings and my ratings are improved and there is criticism of the president of the United States, they're happy."

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:33 AM 0 comments

As has been stated before, all medical and non-medical authorities on vaccination agree that vaccines are designed to cause a mild case of the diseases they are supposed to prevent. But they also know and admit that there is no way whatsoever to predict whether the case will be mild or severe - even deadly. With this much uncertainty in dealing with the very lives of people, it is very unscientific and extremely dangerous to use such a questionable procedure as vaccination.

Many vaccines also cause other diseases besides the one for which they are given. For instance, smallpox vaccine often causes syphilis, paralysis, leprosy, and cancer. (See the chapters on smallpox and plagues.) Polio shots, diphtheria toxin-antitoxin, typhoid vaccine, as well as measles, tetanus and all other shots often cause various other stages of disease such as post-vaccinal encephalitis (inflammation of the brain,) paralysis, spinal meningitis, blindness, cancer (sometimes within two years,) tuberculosis, (two to twenty years after the shot,) arthritis, kidney disease, heart disease (heart failure sometimes within minutes after the shot and sometimes several hours later.) Nerve damage and many other serious conditions also follow the injections.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:27 AM 0 comments

March 15, 2006

Despite the confirmation of a third case of mad cow disease, the government intends to scale back testing for the brain-wasting disorder blamed for the deaths of more than 150 people in Europe.

The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) boosted its surveillance after finding the first case of mad cow disease in the United States in 2003. About 1,000 tests are run daily, up from about 55 daily in 2003.

The testing program detected an infected cow in Alabama last week, and further analysis confirmed Monday that the animal had mad cow disease.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:20 AM 0 comments

The e-mails circulating in recent days offer customers of Chase Manhattan Bank a 20 dollar "reward" for filling out on online survey, according to security firms that monitor such schemes.

The schemes are the latest variety of frauds known as "phishing," or luring users to fake websites to divulge personal or financial account information that can be used by hackers or for simple theft.

Experts at the British security firm Netcraft said the users responding to the fake Chase e-mails first detected Saturday were "directed to sites hosted on IP addresses assigned to The China Construction Bank (CCB) Shanghai Branch."

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:14 AM 0 comments

If U.S. troops go to Africa, it won't be for a humanitarian intervention; it will be to protect American oil interests in the troubled Niger Delta.

Africa's humanitarian needs -- today the pillage in Darfur, yesterday the famine in Niger -- dominate the headlines. Human suffering, from hunger to rape, also dominates the limited attention that Americans have for hearing about problems in the most troubled part of the world. Now that may be changing as an armed insurgency in oil-rich Nigeria threatens oil exports to the U.S. and raises the possibility that U.S. troops will dig into African soil in order to protect a resource deemed vital to American interests.

In short, Nigeria might be the next Iraq.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:10 AM 0 comments

RALEIGH, N.C. - A former CIA contract employee accused of using a flashlight to beat an Afghan prisoner who died in custody in 2003 used to beat his 6-year-old stepson the same way, federal prosecutors said.

David Passaro, 39, of Lillington, is the first U.S. civilian to face prisoner abuse charges stemming from the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. The former Army special operations soldier was working under contract to the CIA helping the U.S. military hunt terrorists, gather intelligence and train Afghanistan's armed forces. He is charged with assault and could get 40 years in prison if convicted.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:08 AM 0 comments

A new theory to explain global warming was revealed at a meeting at the University of Leicester (UK) and is being considered for publication in the journal "Science First Hand". The controversial theory has nothing to do with burning fossil fuels and atmospheric carbon dioxide levels.

According to Vladimir Shaidurov of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the apparent rise in average global temperature recorded by scientists over the last hundred years or so could be due to atmospheric changes that are not connected to human emissions of carbon dioxide from the burning of natural gas and oil. Shaidurov explained how changes in the amount of ice crystals at high altitude could damage the layer of thin, high altitude clouds found in the mesosphere that reduce the amount of warming solar radiation reaching the earth's surface.

Shaidurov has used a detailed analysis of the mean temperature change by year for the last 140 years and explains that there was a slight decrease in temperature until the early twentieth century. This flies in the face of current global warming theories that blame a rise in temperature on rising carbon dioxide emissions since the start of the industrial revolution. Shaidurov, however, suggests that the rise, which began between 1906 and 1909, could have had a very different cause, which he believes was the massive Tunguska Event, which rocked a remote part of Siberia, northwest of Lake Baikal on the 30th June 1908.

The Tunguska Event, sometimes known as the Tungus Meteorite is thought to have resulted from an asteroid or comet entering the earth's atmosphere and exploding. The event released as much energy as fifteen one-megaton atomic bombs. As well as blasting an enormous amount of dust into the atmosphere, felling 60 million trees over an area of more than 2000 square kilometres. Shaidurov suggests that this explosion would have caused "considerable stirring of the high layers of atmosphere and change its structure." Such meteoric disruption was the trigger for the subsequent rise in global temperatures.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:03 AM 0 comments

Mar. 15 – Newly released government documents reveal not only that federal law enforcement agencies monitored nonviolent activists in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, but also that agents may have based their reporting and surveillance on ethnic prejudice.

Previously released documents showed the FBI was maintaining files on various anti-war groups across the country, but the American Civil Liberties Union, says the latest files represent the first concrete evidence that the Bureau is spying on activist groups solely based on their opposition to the war in Iraq.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:00 AM 0 comments

Elderly patients taking certain drugs to lower their blood pressure appear to have a markedly reduced risk of Alzheimer’s disease, researchers report. Results from their short-term study suggest that some of these medications could slash this risk by up to 70%.

Previous research has shown that high blood pressure, also known as hypertension, can increase a person’s chances of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:54 AM 0 comments

It could be nearing high noon for the soda industry. After years of repeated battering over the issues of childhood obesity and tooth decay, sugary beverages have suffered an unprecedented backlash. The New York Times reported last week that soft drink sales are down for the first time in 20 years, and sales of bottled water, juices and energy drinks are continuing to eat into the soda market.

Into this anti-carbonated climate comes a potentially bigger bombshell that could spell disaster for the industry. Last month, the FDA quietly revealed that some soft drinks were found to contain the human carcinogen benzene in levels up to 10-20 parts per billion (ppb) -- four times the acceptable limit found in drinking water. Benzene, a chemical linked to leukemia and other forms of cancer, forms in certain beverages under certain conditions, such as exposure to heat and light.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:07 AM 0 comments

This is an exclusive story about one of the most exciting new superfoods you've probably never heard of. It is a selectively-bred superfood seed derived from chia. Chia is a well-known ancient grain or seed used by the Aztecs as a superfood source, and by itself it is very nutritional. It's something I've used for years in my own diet. Chia is loaded with omega-3 oils, high-quality proteins, fibers and lots of minerals, but this new superfood (which I'll just call "super chia" for convenience) takes it to a higher level.

Super chia is a consistently produced crop with higher nutrient density than chia, and it is grown by a company in Canada. The company does its growing in Peru – which has the right climate and the right soils for plants like this – and it is now selling this super chia to food companies throughout the world that are starting to integrate it into their foods. As an individual consumer, you can buy this superfood by the pound and use it in your own cooking in lots of innovative ways, which I will describe for you. But first, let me tell you why I'm so excited about this and what this could mean for nutrition across this country and around the world.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:05 AM 0 comments

The drug industry is happily jumping up and down, shouting about what it considers to be a new, amazing, miracle-class breakthrough drug for breast cancer. The drug is called Herceptin, and the words being used to describe this drug include "amazing" and "unprecedented." It's even been called "a cure" for breast cancer. When it was presented at a medical conference last year, the attendees gave the presentation a standing ovation, and almost every breast cancer charity is now loudly screaming about how this drug needs to be prescribed to every woman who has breast cancer.

That's the level of hype surrounding Herceptin. These are the kinds of words that the medical industry always warns people against believing in the nutritional supplements industry. The medical industry says that when anybody says something is a "miracle" or a "cure," it's a red flag, and it should be avoided. And yet pushers of conventional medicine are now using these very same terms to describe their own drug.

But what's the truth about Herceptin? Is it really a miracle-class breast cancer drug? Is it the most amazing pharmaceutical breakthrough in a quarter century, as is being claimed by some people out there?

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:02 AM 0 comments

Steve Smith set out hitchhiking and ended up in a CIA controlled psychiatric hospital. Forty years later he is still trying to get justice along with 80 other victims in a class action suit going on for nine years and stalled by government lies and deceipt.
15 Mar 2006

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:00 AM 0 comments

Documents released today by the American Civil Liberties Union reveal that the Federal Bureau of Investigations has indeed monitored political groups solely on the basis that they opposed a U.S.-led war.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:47 AM 0 comments

Infants exposed to at least one course of antibiotics during their first year of life are twice as likely to develop asthma as children who do not take the medications, scientists report in a new analysis.

The study by researchers at the University of British Columbia is known as a meta-analysis, statistical research in which data from previous studies are pooled and re-analyzed. Some of the children in the studies had not been exposed to antibiotics while others had and those who had one course of the drug during their first year of life were more likely to develop the disorder.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:42 AM 0 comments

The latest spin on the poisoning of Slobodan Milosovic is that it was likely self-administered. Well, we're getting there.

Initial reports that Milosovic had recently expressed fear for his life and that his blood contained traces of Rifampicin, a drug used to treat leprosy and tuberculosis, were greeted with skepticism and even hostility on the part of the stubbornly incurious, who are inclined to type "Not everything is a conspiracy" when in fact they admit to none.

Rifampicin would have inhibited the effectiveness of Milosovic's blood pressure medication, possibly precipitating his fatal heart attack. Hague toxicologist Donald Uges says he is "sure he took the medicine himself because he wanted a one-way ticket to Moscow" for treatment. Earlier the UN's chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte said it could have been a suicide, just as Croatian Serb leader Milan Babic's death in the same prison was said to be only a week before. Milosovic had been under constant suicide watch, so perhaps now his passing will be rulled "death by misadventure."

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:29 AM 0 comments

LAGUNA NIGUEL, Calif. — Riley Brown is 12 years old and lives a life many of his peers might envy, or perhaps find incomprehensible.

On any given day Riley will probably sleep until he is ready to get out of bed and then spend his time doing whatever interests him. Maybe he'll play his guitar, or go to the park to meet with like-minded friends. Or, maybe he will boot up his computer and start "playing around" with HTML codes.

His younger brother, Casey, 10, and his sister, Maggie, 5, do more or less the same thing.

And their mother, Deanne, could not be happier.

"I love unschooling," she said. "It has been the best decision I could have made for me and my family."

The Browns are part of an approach to education that is called "unschooling" and allows children to pursue what interests them, rather than trying to make them interested in things that interest others.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:23 AM 0 comments

WASHINGTON -- Democrats distanced themselves Monday from Wisconsin Sen. Russell Feingold's effort to censure President Bush over domestic spying, maneuvering to prevent a vote that could alienate swing voters.

Republicans dared Democrats to vote for the proposal.

"Some Democrats in Congress have decided the president is the enemy," Vice President Dick Cheney told a Republican audience in Feingold's home state.

Feingold, a potential presidential candidate, said on the Senate floor, "The president has violated the law and Congress must respond."

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:03 AM 0 comments

The mainstream press is having a hearty chuckle about the capers and the chicanery witnessed at the annual Gridiron Club dinner, a get-together of media and government elites. The highlight was an "amusing" rendition of a torture song by a dragged-up Tim Russert.

I for one don't find it funny that a bunch of war criminals and their sycophantic collaborators are cackling and patting each other on the back about the 'hilarious shortcomings' of the administration.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:57 AM 0 comments

The FDA has now approved a patch for depression. Slap one of these patches on your skin, and a slow dose of mind-altering drugs is slowly absorbed into your blood. This approval, of course, comes from the same federal agency that claims skin care and cosmetic products containing toxic chemicals aren't dangerous because the skin doesn't actually absorb anything.

Like most drugs, the approval of this patch for depression is based on the absolutely loony (and scientifically dishonest) idea that depression is caused by a lack of synthetic chemicals circulating in the brain. All disease is just a matter of chemical deficiency, according to Big Pharma and the FDA. And if all Americans just had all the right chemicals pumped into their bodies (at several thousand dollars a month in prescription drug costs, by the way), we'd all be healthy and pain free!

Believe it or not, bottled water is now being sharply criticized in the U.S. by the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental group. While the group does some great work in many areas, it misses the point on bottled water: if people weren't buying bottled water in plastic bottles, they'd be buying soft drinks in aluminum cans anyway. There's a container garbage problem either way.

The group also says that tap water is just as good as bottled water, which makes me wonder what they're drinking. Sure, tap water is probably okay if you're a horse (although I would never let my dog drink it). But unless you enjoy consuming carcinogenic chemicals and fluorosilicic acid -- a chemical dripped into the water supplies in many U.S. cities -- then tap water just isn't a safe option.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:44 AM 0 comments

Cooper was killed on Nov. 5, 2001, in a pre-planned ambush originally planned on the morning of 9/11, according to his best friend and co-researcher, Doyel Shamley. Shamley has picked up where Cooper left off, continuing to spread the word about the evil plans of the New World Order.
14 Mar 2006

Doyel Shamley lost a good friend on a blackened night in November 2001, as activist William Cooper was brutally murdered in an ambush by minions of the New World Order.

Make no mistake about it, said Shamley, the author of the nation's best selling underground book, Behold A Pale Horse, was gunned down in cold blood at his rural home in the Arizona desert in a plot, Shamley vehemently contends, hatched by Illuminati higher-ups, wanting desperately to erase Cooper from the planet for getting to close to their demonic secrets.

Justice, of course, has never been served in Cooper's case since getting at the real culprits behind the Illuminati hit squads is like trying to plant a bed of roses in an asphalt parking lot.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:40 AM 0 comments

WASHINGTON - A cow in Alabama has tested positive for mad cow disease, the Agriculture Department said Monday, confirming the third U.S. case of the brain-wasting ailment. The cow did not enter the food supply for people or animals, officials said. The animal, unable to walk, was killed by a local veterinarian and buried on the farm.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:07 AM 0 comments

February Sunday 19th 2006 (05h00) : 10-year-old boy prisoner of Guantanamo Bay -- found innocent after two years of detainment 23 comment(s). From: Eric Smith> Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2004 02:10:46 +0900 To: http://www.thenation.com/outrage/in... (hyperlinks also follow story.)

You’re kidding, right? That’s it?

After holding Brits in our extralegal dungeons for two years, one day we just let ’em go?

We’ve still got more than 600 people imprisoned in our Halliburton-built prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where for more than two years we’ve been interrogating them, denying them lawyers, denying them any kind of judicial review, hinting quite bluntly that they could all remain in limbo like this forever, and trying to put a brave face on all of the suicide attempts.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:03 AM 0 comments

The latest UN tax scheme was revealed at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January. At this conference of the world’s financial elite, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) unveiled a UN plan to take $7 trillion from developed nations for use by the UN to save the rest of the world from all of its problems.

The United Nations remains determined to rob from wealthy countries and, after taking a big cut for itself, send what’s left to the poor countries. Of course, most of this money will go to the very dictators whose reckless policies have impoverished their citizens.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:00 AM 0 comments

Richard Taus wanted to go public in the 1980's about illegal government sponsored drug trafficking he documented while serving as an FBI agent. Refusing to backdown to inside pressure, it led to trumped up charges of child abuse he claims are "totally false," leading to a long prison term.

Richard Taus played it right and played it straight for 10 long years as an FBI agent. He swore to uphold the Constitution, obey the law and protect the American people from enemies both foreign and domestic.

What a shock, though, when he found out others in the department, including higher-ups in the Justice Department and the White House were playing a completely different game, playing a highly deceitful and illegal game of drug-running and money laundering.

And the tentacles of what came to be known as Iran Contra led to Taus being set up, arrested and sentenced to a 33-99 year federal prison term, a sentence that conveniently started just prior to "Daddy" Bush's 1988 election as President.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:55 PM 0 comments

Every few years one government entity or another pretends to be concerned about the fact that pharma is drugging the nation's children with stimulants. Whether it be the FDA, or a congressional committee, the sequence of events is always the same. They hold hearings and appear shocked as they listen attentively to the upset parents and advocates who show up to speak on behalf of innocent children. But as soon as the hearings are over, drug companies carry on business as usual.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:20 AM 0 comments

The Unanimous Vote Is but the Latest Controversial and Disappointing Action by an ‘Independent’ FDA Advisory Panel

When sales of Tysabri were suspended on February 28, 2005, many critics of the highly controversial MS drug, with potentially fatal side-effects, hoped that would end the saga of a medication that many experts believed should never have been approved in the first place. That, however, was only the beginning of the story.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:10 AM 0 comments

A Special Air Service (SAS) soldier has refused to fight in Iraq and has left the Army over the "illegal" tactics of United States troops and the policies of coalition forces.

After three months in Baghdad, Ben Griffin told his commander that he was no
longer prepared to fight alongside American forces.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:56 AM 0 comments

March 12, 2006 -- Gale Norton's sudden decision to resign as Interior Secretary is a sign that the Jack Abramoff investigation is closing in on higher-ranking Bush administration officials, according to informed Washington insiders. Norton is at the center of the scandal that has embroiled convicted GOP lobbyist Abramoff, her Interior Department deputy Steven Griles (accused by Interior's chief attorney of meddling in decisions involving the Coushatta tribe of Louisiana, which was an Abramoff client) and Italia Federici, the president of the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, a corporate-funded front co-founded by Norton and GOP policy adviser Grover Norquist that arranged for access to Norton and top Interior officials in exchange for tribal donations to the group.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:06 AM 0 comments

Phil Kronzer, nicknamed the "cult buster," has been trying to get to the bottom of corruption within religious groups. His research has turned up a trail of lies and deceipt, leading right to the doorstep of high ranking religious and government officials.
11 Mar 2006

And for years now, since his wife was ripped away from by an underground cult, he has dedicated his life to debunking "the religious cult" behind Medjugorje, who he claims has destroyed his business and personal life.

Kronzer has spent over four years of his life and more than $500,000 investigating the group that "took away my wife" and the authenticity of Medjugorje confident his now ex-wife and other family members continue to be manipulated by the "cult operating within the Church" primarily due to their wealth.

"Through my efforts which are nonstop since I have nothing else to lose," said Kronzer, "I will continue to uncover a trail of lies, deceit, and sensationalism that Medjugorje supporters use to perpetuate this hoax for personal profit and leaving countless victims behind." But what exactly is the significance of Medjugorje and why, according the Kronzer, are the satanists in firm control of the Vatican using it for their evil benefit?

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:01 AM 0 comments

Banned antidepressants are being handed out to thousands of children by doctors because they face waits of up to 10 months to see a psychiatrist.

Family doctors have revealed that they are forced to hand out "happy pills" to children as young as 13 suffering depression while they languish on waiting lists to see specialists, despite serious safety concerns of doing so.

Almost 7,000 under-18s are prescribed Seroxat

The antidepressant Seroxat and similar drugs, called SSRIs, were restricted for children's use by the Government's medicines' watchdog in 2003 after an investigation revealed that they could cause mood swings and increase the risk of suicide in under-18s.

# posted by madthumbs @ 8:09 AM 1 comments

The Soil Association has teamed up with organic food manufacturer Organix in a campaign targeting additives in children's food products.

The two groups have presented the Secretary of State for Health with a report suggesting that specific combinations of additives can have a neurotoxic effect.

The research, conducted at the University of Liverpool, examined the toxic effects on nerve cells of combinations of four common food additives: E133 Brilliant Blue with E621 monosodium glutamate and E104 Quinoline Yellow with E951 Aspartame.

The mixtures of the additives in question were found to have a much more potent effect on nerve cells than each additive on its own, with the effect on cells being up to four times greater when Brilliant Blue and MSG were combined and up to seven times greater when Quinoline Yellow and Aspartame were combined.

# posted by madthumbs @ 8:08 AM 0 comments

Recently Marines in Iraq wrote to Starbucks because they wanted to let them know how much they liked their coffees and to request that they send some of it to the troops there.

Starbucks replied, telling the Marines thank you for their support of their business, but that Starbucks does not support the war, nor anyone in it, and that they would not send the troops their brand of coffee.

So as not to offend Starbucks, maybe we should not support them by buying any of their products! As a war vet writing to fellow patriots, I feel we should get this out in the open. I know this war might not be very popular with some folks, but that doesn't mean we don't support the boys on the ground fighting street-to-street and house-to-house for what they and I believe is right.

If you feel the same as I do then pass this along, or you can discard it and no one will never know. Thanks very much for your support. I know you'll all be there again when I deploy once more.

# posted by madthumbs @ 6:12 PM 0 comments

William E. Pelham Jr., an expert on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, says he agrees with a recent Federal Drug Administration panel recommendation that Ritalin and other stimulant drugs used to treat ADHD should carry a warning about a possible link to an increased risk of death and injury.

William Pelham agrees with a recommendation by an FDA panel that Ritalin and other stimulant drugs used to treat ADHD carry a "black box warning."

The FDA's Drug Safety and Risk Management voted in favor of a "black box" warning—the FDA's strongest form of warning—for ADHD stimulant drugs after hearing testimony about the deaths of 25 people, including 19 children, who had taken the drugs.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:58 PM 0 comments

More good news for those of you who like a swift pint or two: beer doesn't just fight cancer and make you clever but also blocks "interferon-gamma-induced chemical processes".

This is a good thing, trust us, because what the Innsbruck Medical University team behind this revelation has shown - in layman's terms - is that beer offers a resultant anti-inflammatory effect which may have a "beneficial impact on coronary heart diseases".

More specifically, in vitro tests on peripheral mononuclear blood cells demonstrated that beer extracts blocked the effects of said interferon-gamma - "one of the most important messengers in inflammatory response and mainly produced as part of the cellular immune response".

To cut right to the chase: "Beer extracts inhibit, among other things, the production of neopterin and the degradation of tryptophan by suppressing T-cell response."

The team notes that "this suppression might be connected with the calming effect of beer since its normalising effect on the tryptophan balance improves the availability of the 'happiness hormone' serotonin".

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:54 PM 0 comments

SAN DIEGO ---- A Vista woman suing her former employer for allegedly firing her for having a bumper sticker on her car touting progressive talk radio made the rounds Friday on national and local radio shows.

During interviews Friday, Linda Laroca said her former employer later told her the comment about the firing was a joke, and asked her back to work.

Laroca, alongside her attorneys, made her first public comments about the suit during an appearance on the Stacy Taylor show on KLSD, 1360 AM, a local affiliate of the progressive talk-radio network, Air America.

Laroca also spoke later in the day on two syndicated programs: the nationwide Ed Schultz show (a part of the Jones network) and Air America's national Randi Rhodes show, with Sam Seder filling in as a substitute host Friday.

Laroca alleges in her suit that her former manager spotted the bumper sticker advertising Air America, told Laroca she could be a member of al-Qaida, and fired her on the spot.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:50 PM 0 comments

The UN war crimes court for the former Yugoslavia has found itself in the dock over the death of Slobodan Milosevic, coming under a barrage of criticism from his family and supporters.

But the Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) rejected responsiblity for the former Yugoslav President's death, the fourth detainee to die in custody and the key figure in all the Balkan's conflicts.

"The Hague tribunal has killed my husband," Milosevic's wife Mirjana Markovic was quoted as saying by CNN from Moscow.

The court's judges denied in February a request from the 64-year-old Milosevic, who was suffering from high blood pressure and heart problems, to undergo medical treatment in Moscow.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:44 PM 0 comments

A Pomona College professor of Latin American history said Friday that he was questioned about his Venezuela connections by two Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies working for a federal task force and called the quizzing an intrusion on his academic freedom.

The college's president weighed in as well, saying he feared the "chilling effect" such visits could have on academia.

Professor Miguel Tinker-Salas said the deputies entered his office without an appointment Tuesday during hours normally set aside for student conferences. He said the deputies were there for about 25 minutes and asked him about the Venezuelan community and his relationship with it. They also told him he was not the subject of an investigation.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:14 PM 0 comments

An Interview With Former Labour MP Tony Benn

We have an extended conversation with Tony Benn, one of Britain’s most distinguished politicians and the longest serving MP in the history of the Labour party. Benn discusses the new revelations the British government helped Israel build the atom bomb. Benn also speaks about U.S. and U.K. relations, extraordinary rendition, Guantanamo Bay, torture, religion, and the state of the media.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:50 AM 0 comments

Impotence is a major warning sign of potential heart failure, according to a new study by top Austrian scientists.

"The penis is the antenna of the heart," said Dr Stephan Madersbacher, head of Urology at the Danube Hospital in Vienna.

Dr Madersbacher found that men who experience moderate to serious erectile dysfunction had a 65% higher risk of a heart attack within 10 years.

And the risk of a stroke was found to be 43% higher in impotent men, in the study which was run in conjunction with the city council.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:49 AM 0 comments

Donald Rumsfeld has made a killing out of bird flu. The US Defence Secretary has made more than $5m (£2.9m) in capital gains from selling shares in the biotechnology firm that discovered and developed Tamiflu, the drug being bought in massive amounts by Governments to treat a possible human pandemic of the disease.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:43 AM 0 comments

States have steadily limited the public's access to government information since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a new Associated Press analysis of laws in all 50 states has found. Legislatures have passed more than 1,000 laws changing access to information, approving more than twice as many measures that restrict information as laws that open government books.

Some things your government doesn't have to tell you about:

- The safety plan at your child's school, if you live in Iowa.

- Medication errors at your grandparent's nursing home in North Carolina.

- Disciplinary actions against Indiana state employees.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:02 AM 0 comments

Faik Bakir, the director of the Baghdad morgue, has fled Iraq in fear of his life after reporting that more than 7000 people have been killed by Iraqi interior ministry death squads in recent months, John Pace, the outgoing head of the UN human rights office in Iraq, told the March 2 British Guardian.

Pace said the Baghdad morgue has been receiving 700 or more bodies a month. The figures peaked at 1100 last July — many showing signs of torture.

“The vast majority of bodies showed signs of summary execution — many with their hands tied behind their back. Some showed evidence of torture, with arms and leg joints broken by electric drills”, said Pace. The killings had been happening long before the recent spate of sectarian killings following the February 22 bombing of a Shiite mosque in Samarra.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:44 AM 0 comments