Opposing Digits

THE administration of US President George W. Bush is planning a massive bombing campaign against Iran, including use of bunker-buster nuclear bombs to destroy a key Iranian suspected nuclear weapons facility, The New Yorker magazine reported in its April 17 issue.
The article by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said that Mr Bush and others in the White House have come to view Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a potential Adolf Hitler.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:50 PM 0 comments

April 7, 2006 -- Debate over a possible tie between mercury-containing vaccines and autism flared up this week as activist groups launched a campaign accusing federal health agencies and prominent researchers of manipulating scientific findings on the link.

Some parents of autistic children have long blamed vaccines containing the preservative thimerosal for an alarming rise in the disorder. Thimerosal contains a type of mercury. A series of reports by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) ending in 2004 concluded no evidence could be found linking the vaccines to neurological diseases, including autism.

But groups this week mounted a campaign to publicize previously undisclosed transcripts and emails that they say point to efforts by the CDC to manipulate the IOM's scientific conclusions on the safety of vaccines containing thimerosal. The groups accuse the CDC of trying to defend a long-held policy promoting childhood vaccinations.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:20 PM 0 comments

Two new studies by a University of Pittsburgh research team suggest that omega-3 fatty acids--substances that are found in high concentrations in fish oils and certain seeds and nuts--significantly inhibit the growth of liver cancer cells. The studies, presented today at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), at the Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C., suggest that omega-3 fatty acids may be an effective therapy for both the treatment and prevention of human liver cancers.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:13 PM 0 comments

“‘I feel like despite your rhetoric, that compassion and common sense have been left far behind during your administration,’ Taylor said, standing in a balcony seat and looking down at Bush on stage. ‘And I would hope from time to time that you have the humility and grace to be ashamed of yourself.’”

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PHOENIX – Two young men charged with sodomizing 18 boys at a youth camp last year have been offered a plea agreement that may net them little jail time and no record of sexual assault.

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The Bush administration Wednesday unveiled a blueprint for rebuilding the nation's decrepit nuclear weapons complex, including restoration of a large-scale bomb manufacturing capacity.

The plan calls for the most sweeping realignment and modernization of the nation's massive system of laboratories and factories for nuclear bombs since the end of the Cold War.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:03 PM 0 comments

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal auditors on Thursday laid out a scenario of omissions, missteps and bureaucratic nightmares that caused a loss of money and other donations sent from abroad to help victims of Hurricane Katrina.

Lawmakers at a congressional hearing on the subject reacted harshly to a Government Accountability Office report that attributed the errors, which involved as many as eight government agencies, to the United States' lack of experience as a recipient of huge amounts of aid from others.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:02 PM 0 comments

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (CNN) -- When M. Smith learned she had AIDS in the early 1990's, she figured it was a death sentence. "It was mind-numbing," Smith says.

She was 35, healthy, and never suspected that an ex-boyfriend, who died years earlier of AIDS related complications, had infected her.

Smith, who also had cancer at the time, says her prognosis gave her less than two years to live. So, she started to get her affairs in order.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:58 AM 0 comments

A new Amnesty International report provides further evidence of the existence of secret CIA prisons in Eastern Europe. Three prisoners told the human rights group that they had been held at US "black sites" in the region.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:55 AM 0 comments

Summary: On his nationally syndicated radio program, Glenn Beck said of Native Americans who are considering circumventing a new South Dakota law banning nearly all abortions by opening an abortion clinic on an Indian reservation in the state: "Indians will have found something that can be more profitable than casinos, and that's abortion clinics. And then, look out, man -- exploiting everything illegal for profit."

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:53 AM 0 comments

GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba (Reuters) - U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his appointees set rules that violate President George W. Bush's order to hold fair trials for prisoners charged with terrorism in the Guantanamo tribunals, a military defence lawyer said on Friday.

"We can't help it that the secretary of defence and his delegees (sic) have messed this thing up, but they have," military lawyer Army Maj. Tom Fleener told the presiding officer at one of the hearings.

"If the rules don't provide for a full and fair trial, then they violate the president's order."

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:50 AM 0 comments

You didn’t see many Jews amid the sea of Mexican and American flags during the recent pro-immigrant rallies that filled city streets, but Jews and Jewish groups, in largely liberal Los Angeles, have been advocating on behalf of immigrants, mostly outside the view of television cameras.

Among local Jewish organizations, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has been leading the way: Its regional branch has been developing and disseminating a pro-immigrant resolution for roughly six months. The resulting declaration, recently approved by the Pacific Southwest Region of the ADL, calls for humane treatment of illegal immigrants, while also accepting the need for “security precautions ... necessary to protect the integrity of the United States border and the well-being of the American people.”

Sixteen local civil rights organizations and the Catholic church have signed on to the declaration, said Amanda Susskind, regional director of ADL. The declaration has been forwarded to L.A. City Council President Eric Garcetti, with the hope that the City Council, too, will endorse the nonbinding resolution. Signatories hope the declaration will work its way to other cities and to the state Legislature as well.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:45 AM 0 comments

Two stories scream out for national attention, both coming from small Illinois country towns and both demonstrating man's inhumanity to man.

The first involves Kim Stubblefield, a 48-year-old woman who worked all her life and who has been left to die in a ragged, rundown hotel room, turned away from hospitals because she can't afford health insurance.

The second involves Darrel Hanson, a 51-year-old man who is being left in jail to rot after recently being convicted for threatening public officials by email over an attempted city "land grab" of his property. For his email violation, he faces a 10 year prison term.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:14 AM 0 comments

GENETICALLY modified food will eventually be unavoidable, a top researcher said yesterday.

Dr Liz Dennis, from the CSIRO, said GM crops would become common in Australia, allowing producers to make food more nutritious and use fewer pesticides.

But the prediction comes as food companies are under pressure to ban genetically modified ingredients.

Companies including Cadbury Schweppes, Woolworths and Goodman Fielder are targeted in the True Food Guide, released yesterday by Greenpeace, for not guaranteeing their products are GM-free.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:59 AM 0 comments

Former Birmingham police officer Raymond Ketland, 66, of Nant y Coed, Glan Conwy, became involved with the girl after noticing sexual activity on Llanddulas beach.

He admitted two charges of sexual activity with a minor, taking indecent photographs of a child and facilitating a child sex offence, and was jailed for two and a half years.

Ketland had become involved partly through a fellow Mason.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:28 AM 0 comments

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Over the past three months, workers at the
Kennedy Space Center have tripped, dropped things, banged into sensitive equipment and started fires in a baffling string of accidents that have left one person dead.

NASA is investigating three of the accidents — the death of a worker who fell off a roof, the bumping of space shuttle Discovery's robotic arm by a platform, and damage last week to an instrument that supplies power to the orbiters.

But since the beginning of the year, there have been 20 other incidents in which a worker was injured or equipment was damaged in excess of $25,000. There were 14 incidents during the same period last year.

"There's enough going on that we're very, very concerned," said Bill Parsons, deputy director of the Kennedy Space Center.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:54 AM 0 comments

BIRMINGHAM, Ala., April 7 - Breathing other people's tobacco smoke significantly increases the risk of developing glucose intolerance, researchers here reported.

In fact, passive smokers are even more likely than ex-smokers to become glucose intolerant, reported Thomas K. Houston, M.D., of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, in a study published online today by the BMJ, formerly the British Medical Journal.

Previous research has suggested that smokers are at an increased risk for glucose intolerance and diabetes, but the current study is the first to link passive smoking with glucose intolerance, Dr. Houston and colleagues said.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:43 AM 0 comments

ORLANDO, Fla. - Alison Bregman-Rodriguez felt as if lightning had struck her right eye, or someone had pulled skin out of it. For almost a month she could not work, drive or watch television.

“I’d never felt so much pain,” the 30-year-old social worker said.

It was not until several doctor visits later that Bregman-Rodriguez was diagnosed with a fungal eye infection, a difficult-to-treat condition that can cause blindness.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:38 AM 0 comments

San Francisco – The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) on Wednesday filed the legal briefs and evidence supporting its motion for a preliminary injunction in its class-action lawsuit against AT&T. After asking EFF to hold back the documents so that it could review them, the Department of Justice consented to EFF's filing them under seal — a well-established procedure that prohibits public access and permits only the judge and the litigants to see the evidence. While not a party to the case, the government was concerned that even this procedure would not provide sufficient security and has represented to the Court that it is "presently considering whether and, if so, how it will participate in this case."

"The evidence that we are filing supports our claim that AT&T is diverting Internet traffic into the hands of the NSA wholesale, in violation of federal wiretapping laws and the Fourth Amendment," said EFF Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston. "More than just threatening individuals' privacy, AT&T's apparent choice to give the government secret, direct access to millions of ordinary Americans' Internet communications is a threat to the Constitution itself. We are asking the Court to put a stop to it now."

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Medical researchers are once again warning about the long-term memory effects of smoking marijuana. Toking on the herb for decades apparently makes your memory, well, dopey. That is, if you believe the study which was based on 40 people found in a drug rehabilitation program who said they only smoked marijuana about 20 times in their entire life.

Right. I've never heard of anyone checking into a rehab center after smoking pot only 20 times. And besides, if pot destroys a person's memory as researchers claim it does, how do they know these people haven't smoked pot a thousand times and just can't remember?

Let's face it: Basing research on the personal memories of people who scientists claim have had their memories destroyed is not exactly good science. It sounds more like an agenda that uses science to support the War on Drugs and the continued incarceration of thousands of Americans whose only crime is getting high in the basement of their parents' house.

# posted by madthumbs @ 3:26 PM 0 comments

The easy, relaxed lifestyle experienced by our ancestors no longer exists, and we're not even aware of how much stress we're under. The problem? "Our lifestyles have changed, but our bodies haven't," Dr. James Wilson said in his November lecture at the First Arizona Choices Exposition in Tucson, Ariz. A large portion of our population is feeling tired and stressed out, and we want to know why.

The adrenal glands sit over the kidneys, where they play a significant role in the body, secreting more than 50 hormones necessary for life, including epinephrine (adrenaline), cortisol, dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), progesterone and testosterone. Since they produce so many essential hormones, the adrenal glands are responsible for many of the functions we need to stay alive and healthy, including:

* Energy production -- carbohydrate, protein and fat conversion to blood glucose for energy
* Fluid and electrolyte balance

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ISLAMABAD: Researchers are rolling out the spice rack against cancer with studies showing that ginger and the hot element in red chili peppers could kill tumour cells.

The ginger and chilli-pepper studies were presented during the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research in Washington. Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh experimented on mice to show that capsaicin, the active ‘hot’ ingredient in the pepper, killed pancreatic cancer cells through the body’s normal process for clearing defective cells.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:13 AM 0 comments

[Britain lives in fear after one Swan dies. 100 confirmed deaths, a few to go for the predicted Feb 21, 2005: "Could kill up to 100 million, including hundred of thousands in Britain alone."]

[Daily Mail April6, 2006.] Bird Flu Kills British Swan.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:10 AM 0 comments

MERCK was ordered to pay $US4.5 million ($6.2 million) to a man who blamed the maker of Vioxx for his heart attack, but nothing to a second plaintiff who also sued the company, according to a decision reached by jurors late on Wednesday.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:05 AM 0 comments

A former Labour insider says a scenario is being devised allowing Tony Blair to step down as party leader but stay as Prime Minister. Political Editor Graham Dines looks at this very un-British solution

IF we are to believe former Labour strategist Derek Draper, the Prime Minister and his allies have come up with a cast iron plan for Tony Blair to cling to power, even while his domestic authority drains away.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:03 AM 0 comments

Public transit (RTD) workers in Colorado just went on strike for better wages and benefits, which they no doubt deserve. Unfortunately this leaves the working poor, who are most dependent on buses and light rail, with even fewer option to commute to their underpaid jobs. 275,000 riders per day are left without a ride.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:00 AM 0 comments

British TV journalist James Miller was murdered when he was shot by an Israeli soldier in Gaza, a jury ruled unanimously today at the inquest into his death.

Delivering a verdict of unlawful killing, the jury told St Pancras coroners court in London that Mr Miller had been killed deliberately.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:58 AM 0 comments

Stone age people in Pakistan were using dental drills made of flint 9,000 years ago, according to researchers.

Teeth from a Neolithic graveyard in Mehgarh in the country's Baluchistan province show clear signs of drilling.

Analysis of the teeth shows prehistoric dentists had a go at curing toothache with drills made from flint heads.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:52 AM 0 comments

US House Judiciary Committee [official website] chairman Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) [official website] accused US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales [official profile] of "stonewalling" his committee on the topic of the NSA warrantless surveillance program [JURIST news archive] during an oversight hearing [meeting materials] Thursday on US Justice Department operations. Sensenbrenner argued that because the committee is responsible for overseeing the Department of Justice, Gonzales cannot refuse to answer questions about how the Bush administration regulated the NSA program by saying the program is classified.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:48 AM 0 comments

Two retired New York policemen have been convicted of murder for participating in mafia killings.

Louis Eppolito, 57, and Stephen Caracappa, 64, were found guilty of working for the Luchese crime family while serving as detectives.

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You can count congressional lawmakers among those who want caller ID to mean something again.

Bipartisan legislation introduced Wednesday in the House of Representatives seeks to outlaw the use of caller ID spoofing techniques "with the intent to deceive the person to whom the call is made."

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WASHINGTON -- President Bush personally authorized leaking long-classified information to a reporter in the summer of 2003 to buttress administration claims, now discredited, that Saddam Hussein was attempting to acquire weapons of mass destruction for Iraq, according to a court filing by prosecutors in the case against former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:45 AM 0 comments

China has developed its own version of the Patriot anti-missile system, according to a Chinese-owned Hong Kong newspaper.

The ground-to-air guided missile system is part of China's air shield that is similar to U.S. Patriot missiles, the March 29 Wen Wei Po reported.

China covertly obtained Patriot anti-missile system technology from Israel during the 1990s, according to U.S. officials.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:41 AM 0 comments

Burglars will be allowed to escape without punishment under new instructions sent to all police forces. Police have been told they can let them off the threat of a court appearance and instead allow them to go with a caution.

The same leniency will be shown to criminals responsible for more than 60 other different offences, ranging from arson through vandalism to sex with underage girls.

New rules sent to police chiefs by the Home Office set out how seriously various crimes should be regarded, and when offenders who admit to them should be sent home with a caution.

A caution counts as a criminal record but means the offender does not face a court appearance which would be likely to end in a fine, a community punishment or jail.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:31 AM 0 comments

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney authorized Cheney's top aide to launch a counterattack of leaks against administration critics on Iraq by feeding intelligence information to reporters, according to court papers citing the aide's testimony in the CIA leak case.

In a court filing, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald stopped short of accusing Cheney of authorizing his chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby, to leak the CIA identity of Valerie Plame.

But the prosecutor, detailing the evidence he has gathered, raised the possibility that the vice president was trying to use Plame's CIA employment to discredit her husband, administration critic Joseph Wilson. Cheney, according to an indictment against Libby, knew that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA as early as June 12, 2003, more than a month before that fact turned up in a column by Robert Novak.

# posted by madthumbs @ 8:42 PM 0 comments

(ST. LOUIS) - More than a million people in the United States are legally blind. Many of them once had vision but tragically lost it. Now a breakthrough device could give them back some of their sight.

Some call her the bionic woman. Others call her a medical miracle. But Cheri Robertson has given herself another title:

"I just call myself the robo-chick."

Robertson is blind, but this device allows her to see, not with her eyes but with her brain! Fifteen years ago, she lost both of her eyes in a car accident. She was just 19 years old.

# posted by madthumbs @ 2:21 PM 0 comments

Over the years, countless studies have shown that when it comes to infant nutrition, breast milk is best. This fact remains true, as there is simply no infant formula product on the market that can match the superior nutrition of mother's milk. In fact, some infant formulas actually contain ingredients that can be harmful to your baby.

Although some formula recipes have improved over time for mothers who must rely on formula to feed their new baby, many products are still loaded with unhealthy and even dangerous ingredients, making breastfeeding the best way to go for new mothers who have the option.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:22 AM 0 comments

WASHINGTON - April 5 - Boys who drink water with levels of fluoride considered safe by federal guidelines are five times more likely to have a rare bone cancer than boys who drink unfluoridated water, according to a study by Harvard University scientists published in a peer-reviewed journal.

The study, led by Dr. Elise Bassin and published online today in Cancer Cases and Control, the official journal of the Harvard Center for Cancer Prevention, found a strong link between fluoridated drinking water and osteocarcoma, a rare and often fatal bone cancer, in boys. The study confirms studies by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the New Jersey health department that also found increased rates of bone cancer in boys who drank fluoridated tap water.

Bassin’s study comes on the heels of a National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report that found the federal “safe” limit for fluoride in tap water did not protect children from dental fluorosis or and increased bone fractures. The NAS recommended that the allowable limit for fluoride in tap water be lowered immediately.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:49 AM 0 comments

April 4, 2006 -- Iowa is experiencing an epidemic of mumps, a viral infection usually made rare by vaccination.

Iowa's public health department reports 300 confirmed, probable, or suspected cases of mumps through April 3.

That's a "dramatic increase," Iowa public health officials say in a letter to Iowa health care facilities. Since 2001, the U.S. has averaged 265 mumps cases per year, with five of those cases in Iowa, according to the CDC.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:48 AM 0 comments

WASHINGTON, April 5 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Generation Rescue, a national organization of parents of autistic children, today launched a Web site (http://www.PutChildrenFirst.org) and full- page ad detailing newly-released internal documents about the Centers for Disease Control's (CDC) efforts to minimize or cover up the connection between child vaccines and autism. Many parents and scientists believe that autism and other developmental disorders are caused by the toxic metal mercury, a key ingredient in a vaccine preservative called Thimerosal.

Other nonprofits that support the ad include the National Autism Association, Autism One, NoMercury, Moms Against Mercury and A-CHAMP. Tomorrow autism organizations and parents will participate in the Mercury Generation March, a rally in Washington, D.C., to demand answers. This controversy has been recently fueled by high-profile figures publicly calling for similar answers from the CDC, such as Senators Joe Lieberman (D- CT) and John Kerry (D-MA); Representatives Dave Weldon (R-FL), Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Dan Burton (R-IN); Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.; and radio and television host Don Imus of MSNBC.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:47 AM 0 comments

(AP) A state jury has found Merck & Co. liable for one of two former Vioxx users' heart attacks and ordered he receive $4.5 million in damages in a closely watched trial involving two New Jersey men.

The jury found the company failed to adequately warn both plaintiffs about the risk factors linking the now-withdrawn painkiller to heart attacks and strokes, but said the drug was only a factor in one of the men's illnesses.

The panel said the company concealed the risks of the drug for both men, but ruled that only John McDarby, 77, a retired insurance agent from Park Ridge, should receive compensation.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:39 AM 0 comments

According to Steve Esdale of Florida, 'Jeb's Taliban' is hard at work in his state covering-up murders, pushing drugs and spreading a general climate of fear and terror, claiming Gov. Jeb Bush is "real the kingpin of crime" and Florida's No. 1 "undercover crime boss."

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:32 AM 0 comments

It would seem the only case the Iraqis and the United States have against Saddam Hussein, or the man they claim is Saddam Hussein, is the alleged mass extermination of the Kurds in the 1980s. However, in the case of the Halabja massacre, as I wrote on September 20, 2003 (Colin Powell in Iraq: Exploiting the Dead of Halabja), it appears Saddam is innocent of gassing Kurds and his innocence was proclaimed by none other than the State Department. Stephen C. Pelletiere stated in early 2003: "We cannot say with any certainty that Iraqi chemical weapons killed the Kurds. I am in a position to know because, as the Central Intelligence Agency's senior political analyst on Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war, and as a professor at the Army War College from 1988 to 2000, I was privy to much of the classified material that flowed through Washington having to do with the Persian Gulf. In addition, I headed a 1991 Army investigation into how the Iraqis would fight a war against the United States; the classified version of the report went into great detail on the Halabja affair."

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:28 AM 0 comments

Police fought running battles with rioters in central Paris last night as youths attacked officers with bangers, bottles and concrete at the end of a mass demonstration against a youth employment law that has caused a political crisis for Jacques Chirac's ruling party.

Trade unionists and student leaders said up to three million people took to the streets across France yesterday - the second time in eight days that the country has seen its biggest street demonstrations in almost 40 years. The protests, including one by hundreds of thousands of students and scholars who marched through central Paris, were mainly peaceful.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:22 AM 0 comments

A further wave of police-state laws is currently being pushed through the Australian parliament without the Howard government even claiming any new terrorist threat. The measures—six bills so far—are in addition to the detention without trial, sedition and “advocating terrorism” legislation passed by the federal and state parliaments just before Christmas.

Virtually no media coverage has been given to the latest laws, even though they will authorise the government and its security agencies for the first time to intercept the telephone and email communications of completely innocent people. They will also extend the Australian Security and Intelligence Organisation’s (ASIO) secret detention and interrogation powers for a decade, effectively making them permanent.

The Telecommunications Interception (Amendment) Act 2006, which was pushed through both houses of parliament last week, permits the federal police and ASIO to covertly monitor or read anyone’s phone calls, emails, SMSs and other “stored communications”. This power extends to so-called “B-Parties”—innocent people who have, even if unwittingly, communicated with someone suspected of a crime or of being a threat to “national security”.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:15 AM 0 comments

A former employee of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration reveals how NASA covers up and erases UFOs from satelite photos. But first a little bit about this former employee: DONNA TIETZE HARE. Formerly of NASA, female slide technician, the recipient of numerous space awards including 1969 Apollo Achievement award from the National Aeronautics & Space Administration, 1973 Skylab award, a medallion for success on the Skylab-Suez Test project, numerous other awards for her skill as a technical Artist, honors, awards and a 1994 reccomdation by Texas Governor Ann Richards to the Advisory Committee of Psychology Associates.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:50 AM 0 comments

TONY EASTLEY: An investigation by AM has established that at least two of the 13 Melbourne men currently facing charges over terrorism-related offences suffer from severe mental illness.

A medical report given to Victorian police reveals that one of the accused suffers from, among other things, manic episodes, psychosis and auditory hallucinations.

Two of the men have suffered from schizophrenia for at least two years and one has been in and out of psychiatric institutions in Victoria.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:10 AM 0 comments

Recent FDA hearings have put the nation's attention on the drugs used to treat so-called ADHD. As these drugs have been linked to heart attack, sudden death and the appearance of psychotic symptoms in children, not generally at risk for such, this is definitely a positive move.

But going a step further, the validity of the diagnosis of "ADHD" should also be questioned. In 1998, a group of psychiatrists and doctors attended the U.S. National Institutes of Health consensus conference on "Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder," (ADHD) and attempted to establish the criteria for diagnosing this so-called psychiatric disorder.

They failed.

Not only did they fail, but the only "certainty" that resulted, by their own admission, was a total inability to even define the symptoms of the ADHD label, with one of the "experts" called upon literally fumbling with words for minutes on end.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:23 AM 0 comments

MADISON, Wis. April 4 - An apparent increase over the past decade in the prevalence of children labeled as autistic in special education programs may be a phantom conjured by diagnostic substitution, according to an investigator here.

"My research indicates that the increase in the number of kids with an autism label in special education is strongly associated with a declining usage of the mental retardation and learning disabilities labels in special education during the same period," said Paul T. Shattuck Ph.D., MSSW, a pediatrics researcher at the University of Wisconsin

"Many of the children now being counted in the autism category would probably have been counted in the mental retardation or learning disabilities categories if they were being labeled 10 years ago instead of today," Dr. Shattuck added. He outlined his case for the rise in autism being due largely to diagnostic substitution in the April issue of Pediatrics.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:02 AM 0 comments

ROME (Reuters) - Prosecutors hoping to put 22 CIA agents on trial in Italy for kidnapping a Muslim cleric there say they have gleaned new evidence from German phone records, a well-placed judicial source said.

The CIA agents are accused of grabbing Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr off a Milan street in 2003 and flying him for interrogation in Egypt, where he has said he was tortured.

One of the main arguments in the Italian prosecutors' case is that Nasr was flown from Italy to a U.S. military base in Ramstein, Germany, before changing planes and heading to Egypt.

Ramstein was first identified partly by Nasr's description of how long he spent in the air and from examination of outbound flights at the Aviano military base north of Venice, which is used by the U.S. Air Force.

New checks into German phone records -- including at the Ramstein air base and a hotel -- have produced more evidence of the stopover, the source at the Milan prosecutors' office said.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:53 AM 0 comments

Iran would respond to U.S. military strikes against its nuclear sites with global attacks by intelligence operatives and Hezbollah teams, The Washington Post reported in an article on its Web site on Saturday, citing unnamed "intelligence and terrorism experts."

Iran would attack U.S. targets in Iraq and there is "growing consensus that Iran's agents would target civilians in the United States, Europe and elsewhere," The Post said.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:50 AM 0 comments

EPA considers rolling back regulation on arsenic after small communities say enforcement is too costly

WASHINGTON - The Environmental Protection Agency is proposing to allow higher levels of contaminants such as arsenic in the drinking water used by small rural communities in response to complaints that they cannot afford to comply with recently imposed limits.

The proposal would roll back a rule that went into effect earlier this year and make it permissible for water systems serving 10,000 or fewer residents to have three times the level of contaminants allowed under that regulation.

About 50 million people live in communities that would be affected by the proposed change.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:47 AM 0 comments

Manfred Nowak, the United Nations special rapporteur on torture, travels the world to expose human rights violations in so-called "rogue states." Now he is directing his attention at the United States.

When asked where torture conditions are cruelest in the world, Manfred Nowak frowns. Perhaps in Mongolia, he replies, thoughtfully. There, death row prisoners are abandoned for weeks at a time with their hands and feet bound. "Someone who's waiting to be executed doesn't need to be made to suffer in that way," he says.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:44 AM 0 comments

The controversial Department of Justice inquiry that asked Google Inc. to turn over millions of Internet search queries is much broader than previously known, with subpoenas going to at least 34 companies, according to newly available public documents.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:42 AM 0 comments

The special counsel appointed in late December 2003 to investigate the leak of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson found out the identity of the Bush administration official who disclosed her undercover status to syndicated columnist Robert Novak just two months after the probe began.

But in early February 2004, a month after he started the investigation, Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald shifted gears and started to build a perjury and obstruction of justice case against White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove and Vice President Dick Cheney’s former Chief of Staff I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby according to several attorneys close to the investigation.

That month, Justice Department investigators working on the leak case approached a senior official in the Office of Vice President Dick Cheney who had been identified by witnesses as having played a major role in the Plame Wilson leak.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:35 AM 0 comments

It's true—you might die of loneliness, but not until you're older.

In a new University of Chicago study of men and women 50 to 68 years old, those who scored highest on measures of loneliness also had higher blood pressure. And high blood pressure is a major risk factor for heart disease, the number one killer in many industrialized nations and number two the United States.

Lonely people have blood pressure readings as much as 30 points higher than non-lonely people, said the study leaders Louise Hawkley and Christopher Masi. Blood pressure differences between lonely and non-lonely people were smallest at age 50 and greatest among the oldest people tested.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:32 AM 0 comments

Last week's attack by U.S.-led Iraqi paramilitary forces on a building that Shi'ite leaders claim was a mosque may have marked the beginning of a new stage of U.S. policy in which Iraqi forces are used to carry out military operations against Shi'ite militia forces – especially those loyal to Moqtada al-Sadr.

However, such a strategy risks uniting the Shi'ites against the U.S. military occupation and leading to a showdown that makes that presence politically untenable.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:29 AM 0 comments

The US Central Intelligence Agency [official website] hid its rendition of terrorism suspects to various foreign countries by using private air carriers and "front" companies, according to a new report [PDF text; AI summary] released by Amnesty International [advocacy website] late Tuesday. According to "Below the Radar: Secret Flights to Torture and 'Disappearance,'" the CIA has transported suspects to various CIA and military bases and has handed them over to the custody of other governments - including Egypt, Jordan and Syria - for interrogation and detention. The report says that the CIA has avoided detection by taking advantage of the terms of the Convention on International Civil Aviation, the so-called "Chicago Convention" under which private, non-commercial flights may fly over countries and make technical stops without notifying the country.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:25 AM 0 comments

Belligerent Until the Bitter End

The Bush regime currently has wars underway in Afghanistan and in Iraq and can bring neither to a conclusion. Undeterred by these failures, the Bush regime gives every indication that it intends to start a war with Iran, a country that is capable of responding to US aggression over a broader front than the Sunni resistance has mounted in Iraq.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:19 AM 0 comments

Intel agents using lead bags to prevent satellite spying via licenses & cell phones

Washington—April 4, 2006—According to a U.S. intelligence source who has spoken to other officials in the intelligence community with direct knowledge of the plan, Bush administration and certain congressional legislators are quietly developing plans to roll out national ID cards for all Americans and illegal aliens living within U.S. borders.

The source told us the government has termed the project the “Federal Registration Identification Program,” to be proposed as a substitute for fences or walls along the border which have been proven effective in stopping illegal aliens, drug smugglers and human traffickers in San Diego.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:14 AM 0 comments

How do I know we're in a disease economy today? You can see it for yourself. Just drive around any city or town in the United States and you can see what's happening. Take a look at the new construction. What's going to be there? If it's an office complex, chances are it's going to be a medical office building. If it's on a street corner, it's probably going to be a pharmacy -- maybe a new Walgreens or CVS Pharmacy or a new drive-through Wal-Mart pharmacy. You even see pharmacies in grocery stores now, because they are so profitable. When you go into grocery stores and look at what's being sold there, you're getting a good look at the economic activity in this country. You mostly see products that promote disease, thanks to their disease-causing ingredients.

Of course, the disease economy promotes Big Pharma companies. These are the pharmaceutical manufacturers in this country, and they are huge global corporations. The selling of pharmaceuticals is a $1 trillion industry. It's an amazing statistic. Here in the United States, some of our largest corporations are drug companies. In fact, as I've stated before, the top 10 pharmaceutical companies in the United States earn more money than the remaining 490 Fortune 500 companies. Just recently, I heard the Bush administration was very excited about the news that we are experiencing economic growth in this country. The economy is up, more money is changing hands, and that's all that economists really look at when calculating gross domestic product or gross national product. They're just looking at the total number of dollars that changed hands.

# posted by madthumbs @ 5:04 PM 0 comments

I think this antibacterial products sham has gone way too far. Yesterday I was shopping at Office Depot, and guess what I found? Antibacterial pencils. Yes, it's true. I found some mechanical pencils made by PaperMate that have an antibacterial coating. Isn't this fascinating?

We've seen antibacterial hand soaps and dish soaps, shampoos and all sorts of other personal care and cleaning products. And we've seen all the bad news about this, as well, including the fact that they are completely and utterly useless at actually protecting people from germs, viruses or contagious disease. These chemicals basically create superbugs in your own kitchen. They actually encourage the growth of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and they do nothing to make you healthier because we don't live in a sanitary environment in the first place.

We live with bacteria all around us. In fact, your immune system needs to be stimulated by some exposure to bacteria in order to be healthy enough to defend you against those really aggressive ones that might make you sick. You have to have bacteria in your environment if you want to be healthy. So, the whole concept of antibacterial products is actually quite ridiculous to begin with.

We also learned that many of these antibiotic products contain toxic chemicals. What do I mean by toxic? I mean chemicals that are molecularly similar to Agent Orange -- chemicals that cause brain cancer and impair the ability of your brain and nervous system to function adequately. I mean chemicals that have to be detoxified by your liver, which means that if you touch these chemicals -- if you even get them on your skin -- your liver has to do all the hard work to render them harmless. So, not only are you doing nothing to protect yourself against all those dangerous bacteria, you are actually harming your health by exposing yourself to these dangerous toxic chemicals.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:37 AM 0 comments

Former Ambassador Leo Wanta, jailed for years and framed by the Bush and Clinton crime families, said during a recent radio interview there is no doubt in his mind Vince Foster, chief White House counsel to President Clinton, was murdered only weeks after giving Foster $250 million dollars earmarked for the Childrens' Defense Fund.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:32 AM 0 comments

The Government should have listened to its members, write George Williams and David Hume.

Last week, Federal Parliament passed a law that allows the Government to read private emails, text messages and other stored communications without our knowledge. The power extends to innocent people, called B-parties, if they have been unlucky enough to communicate with someone suspected of a crime or of being a threat to national security.

The Government should sometimes be able to monitor the communications of innocent people. This may be necessary to protect the wider community where a suspect can only be tracked through another person. However, the law goes beyond what can be justified and undermines our privacy more than is needed.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:23 AM 0 comments

Children Who Have Tonsils Removed Could Be Cured

If a child is misbehaving, a new study suggests that removing his or her tonsils could help.

Researchers believe that enlarged tonsils can cause sleeping problems, which in turn can cause behavior problems, Local 4 reported.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:40 AM 0 comments

Pharmaceutical companies spend between $12 and $18 billion every year marketing to physicians and residents. This amount of money includes approximately 60 million annual visits by pharmaceutical representatives as well as most of the $1.5 billion spent annually on continuing medical education.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:35 AM 0 comments

No criminal charges will be filed against a school principal and other school staff who forced a disabled student to take medication, the Coconino County Attorney's Office has decided.

The county attorney decided that the actions of former Cromer Elementary School Principal Chris Fonoti and staffers were not criminal. Fonoti was reassigned three weeks after the incident.

"There is absolutely no evidence that any criminal conduct took place and it appears that all school policies and procedures were followed by Cromer school staff," County Attorney documents state.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:34 AM 0 comments

CHICAGO - A rise in autism cases is not evidence of a feared epidemic but reflects that schools are diagnosing autism more frequently, a study said Monday.

Children classified by school special education programs as mentally retarded or learning disabled have declined in tandem with the rise in autism cases between 1994 and 2003, the author of the study said, suggesting a switch of diagnoses.

Government health authorities have been trying to allay widely publicized concerns that vaccines containing the mercury-containing preservative thimerosal, which is no longer used, were behind an autism epidemic.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:33 AM 0 comments

WASHINGTON — In a disturbing turn of events for an administration already plagued by sagging poll numbers and waning support for the Iraq war, Friday's revelation that the Bush Administration issued direct guidelines for programming to media outlets is troubling even die-hard conservatives.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:25 AM 0 comments

Unmanned aerial vehicles have soared the skies of Afghanistan and Iraq for years, spotting enemy encampments, protecting military bases, and even launching missile attacks against suspected terrorists.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:24 AM 0 comments

America was stunned by massive rallies of half a million in support of illegal aliens in both Chicago and L.A.

But two reports in the latest issue of Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin suggest no one should be surprised because these movements are well-organized, well-funded and directed by the hidden hands of globalist foundations with a one-world agenda.

In fact, three of the four major Hispanic activist groups behind the recent rallies receive massive funding from the Ford Foundation as well as more limited support from Carnegie and Rockefeller.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:23 AM 0 comments

Washington -- Even as the United States and Russia are cooperating to resolve international crises and track militant Islamic groups, Moscow is working at least as hard at stealing U.S. military and industrial secrets as during the Soviet era, current and former intelligence officials say.

Moscow's spies operate under a larger variety of covers than in Soviet days, experts say, and their morale is the highest since the mid-1980s. The Russian diaspora has created a pool of emigres, some of whom can be bribed, cajoled or blackmailed into helping.

"The Russian target is still very much there, still doing the things they did years ago," said Michael Donner, chief of counterintelligence for the FBI, in an interview. "We are scrambling to keep up."

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:18 AM 0 comments

NASA's Washington headquarters was raided last week by investigators searching for evidence of child pornography.

James Robinson, a NASA manager, came to the Feds attention when he responded to online ads for child pornography last year, Smoking Gun reports.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:15 AM 0 comments

The former head of the Star Wars missile defense program under Presidents Ford and Carter has gone public to say that the official version of 9/11 is a conspiracy theory and his main suspect for the architect of the attack is Vice President Dick Cheney.

Dr. Robert M. Bowman, Lt. Col., USAF, ret. flew 101 combat missions in Vietnam. He is the recipient of the Eisenhower Medal, the George F. Kennan Peace Prize, the President’s Medal of Veterans for Peace, the Society of Military Engineers Gold Medal (twice), six Air Medals, and dozens of other awards and honors. His Ph.D. is in Aeronautics and Nuclear Engineering from Caltech. He chaired 8 major international conferences, and is one of the country’s foremost experts on National Security.

Bowman worked secretly for the US government on the Star Wars project and was the first to coin the very term in a 1977 secret memo. After Bowman realized that the program was only ever intended to be used as an aggressive and not defensive tool, as part of a plan to initiate a nuclear war with the Soviets, he left the program and campaigned against it.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:13 AM 0 comments

Fingerprints from a crime scene are useless if the perpetrator's prints are not on file. But new forensic techniques now mean they can be used to determine whether a person is a smoker, uses drugs, and even which aftershave they wear - information that could help narrow down suspects.

Fingerprints contain a mixture of skin cells, sweat secretions and substances picked up from elsewhere. Careful analysis can show whether a person may have handled drugs or explosives, but the new tools make it possible to determine a person's habits from the secretions in their prints as well.

"We have found you can detect cotinine, made when someone metabolises nicotine, in fingerprints," says Sue Jickells, an analytical chemist at Kings College London, UK. "This tells you if that person is a smoker, and this kind of additional information could be useful if you don't have a suspect."

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:12 AM 0 comments

Bladders engineered in the laboratory from patients' own cells and then implanted into the body have succeeded in their first clinical trial.

The feat was accomplished by Anthony Atala, at Wake Forest University Medical School in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and his colleagues. He says that while scientists have had success with skin transplants grown on scaffolds in the past, this is the first time they have grown and transplanted a discrete, complex organ.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:08 AM 0 comments

BERLIN -- United Nations atomic energy chief Mohamed ElBaradei urged the international community Thursday to steer away from threats of sanctions against Iran, saying the country's nuclear program was not "an imminent threat" and that the time had come to "lower the pitch" of debate.

# posted by madthumbs @ 7:04 AM 0 comments

While the US remains committed to hunting down al-Qaeda operatives, it is now taking the battle to new fronts. Deep within the Pentagon, technologies are being deployed to wage the war on terror on the internet, in newspapers and even through mobile phones. Investigations editor Neil Mackay reports

# posted by madthumbs @ 6:57 AM 0 comments

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A fiber-rich diet may help control levels of a blood protein linked to an increased risk of heart disease, new research suggests.

In a study of 524 healthy adults, investigators found that those with the highest fiber intake had lower blood levels of C-reactive protein (CRP) than those who ate the least fiber. CRP is a marker of ongoing inflammation in the body, and consistently high levels of this protein have been identified in previous studies as a risk factor for future heart disease.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:35 AM 0 comments

Vaccinating the UK's poultry is not currently needed as a precautionary measure against bird flu, many leading animal health experts say.

Only if an outbreak occurs and other preventative strategies fail should the government consider the option, they told the BBC News website.

Current bird flu vaccines do not offer complete protection from infection and could, in some circumstances, "hide" the virus in affected flocks, they believe.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:32 AM 0 comments

'That's Not What This Election Is About,' He Says

SUNNYVALE, CA–Telling reporters and critics to "stick to the issues that matter," Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush declined to answer questions Monday concerning his alleged involvement in a 1984 Brownsville, TX, mass murder, in which 17 people were ritualistically murdered and skinned.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:31 AM 0 comments

Contrary to what you may have heard or read, none of the immigration reform legislation now before Congress will significantly reduce the flow of illegal immigrants over the U.S.-Mexican border.

That, at least, is the opinion of Ben Marquez, a University of Wisconsin-Madison political science professor who specializes in U.S.-Mexican politics and who I contacted this week to try to make sense of the explosive, and confusing, debate now taking place.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:17 AM 0 comments

The fact that electronic voting machines don't work may finally be sinking into a segment of the mainstream media. The fact that e-voting machines can, have been, and will be used to steal elections, continues to go unreported.

At least the corporate media has moved from framing the allegations of e-voting fraud as ³conspiracy theory² into reporting epic errors in election results.

Both USA Today and the New York Times have run recent articles on the mechanical problems surrounding electronic voting that mirror much of what happened during the theft the presidential election in Ohio 2004.

On March 28, USA Today's front page reported, that "Primary voting-machine troubles raise concerns for general election." The story focused on primaries in Illinois and Texas, where all-too-familiar problems include more votes being counted than there were registered voters, and thousands of votes missing from a recount.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:16 AM 0 comments

The Bush and Clinton crime families used Wanta's Ameri-tech funds as a 'cash cow.' instead of returning the money to the American people for roads, education and health care. While Illuminati banksters already embezzled billions on top of billions, documented by Wanta, the crooked Washington power brokers even stopped him from using 5 billion in repatriation funds for Gulf Coast hurricane relief money in 1999.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:14 AM 0 comments

High protein, low carbohydrate diets should be avoided during pregnancy as they can lead to more stressed offspring, research suggests.

A UK team followed a group of 86 children born in 1967-8 to mothers who were told to eat a pound of red meat a day to avoid pregnancy complications.

The study found the more meat the mother ate, the higher the levels of stress hormone cortisol in the child.

# posted by madthumbs @ 10:05 AM 0 comments

The use of mobile phones over a long period of time can raise the risk for brain tumors, a new Swedish study said on Friday, contradicting the conclusions of other researchers.

The Dutch Health Council, in an overview of research from around the world, last year found no evidence radiation from mobile phones and TV towers was harmful. A four-year British survey released in January showed no link between regular, long-term use of cell phones and the most common type of tumor.

However, researchers at the Swedish National Institute for Working Life said they looked at the mobile phone use of 905 people between the age of 20 and 80 who had been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor and found a link.

"A total 85 of these 905 cases were so-called high users of mobile phones, that is they began early to use mobile and/or wireless telephones and used them a lot," the study said.

"The study also shows that the rise in risk is noticeable for tumors on the side of the head where the phone was said to be used," it added.

# posted by madthumbs @ 9:54 AM 0 comments

Tell your Senator to vote "No" on the "National Uniformity for Food Act"

The House of Representatives has passed a controversial "national food uniformity" labeling law that would take away local government and states' power to require food safety food labels such as those required in California and other states on foods or beverages that are likely to cause cancer, birth defects, allergic reactions, or mercury poisoning. This bill would also prevent citizens in local municipalities and states from passing laws requiring that genetically engineered foods and ingredients such as Monsanto's recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH) be labeled.

The Senate will son be voting on this bill which would gut state food safety and labeling laws. The "National Uniformity for Food Act," lowers the bar on food safety by overturning state food safety laws that are not "identical" to federal law. Hundreds of state laws and regulations are at risk, including those governing the safety of milk, fish, and shellfish. The bill is being pushed by large supermarket chains and food manufacturers, spearheaded by the powerful Grocery Manufacturers of America.

Big food corporations and the biotech industry understand that consumers are more and more concerned about food safety, genetic engineering, and chemical-intensive agriculture, and are reading labels more closely. They understand that pesticide and mercury residues and hazardous technologies such as genetic engineering and food irradiation will be rejected if there are truthful labels required on food products. This industry-sponsored bill is gaining momentum and must be stopped! Act now! Preserve local and regional democracy and protect yourself and your family from unsafe food by sending an email or calling your Senator.

# posted by madthumbs @ 12:10 AM 0 comments

"Anti-War" -- -- History repeats itself, but always with new twists. We are back to the good old days when a Declaration of War preceded the start of a war. Such declaration occurred on March 16th, 2006. Reversing the old order, we are now in the "Sitzkrieg", to be followed shortly by an aerial "Blitzkrieg" in the coming days.

In the old days, Congress declared war, and directed the Executive to take action. In the new millenium, the Executive declared war last March 16th, then Congress will pass H.R. 282, "To hold the current regime in Iran accountable for its threatening behavior and to support a transition to democracy in Iran." This bill and previous ones like it are in direct violation of the legally binding Algiers Accords[pdf] signed by the United States and Iran on January 19, 1981, that states "The United States pledges that it is and from now on will be the policy of the United States not to intervene, directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in Iran's internal affairs"; however, this is clearly of no interest to the 353 policymakers sponsoring the bill.

# posted by madthumbs @ 5:53 PM 0 comments

DiaperFreeBaby is a network of free support groups promoting a natural approach to responding to babies' elimination needs. This practice is followed worldwide and is known as Elimination Communication, Natural Infant Hygiene, and Infant Potty Training. The process involves observing one's baby's signs and signals, providing cue sounds and elimination-place associations, and can be done with or without any diaper use.

# posted by madthumbs @ 2:01 PM 0 comments

Thirty-five years after the US sprayed the jungles of Vietnam with toxic defoliant, thousands of babies are still being born with horrific defects. But unlike the American veterans, no one in the war-ravaged country has received any compensation. Jeremy Laurance reports from Ho Chi Minh City

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:44 AM 0 comments

AN Audit of doctors who are prescribing thousands of children with stimulant drugs to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder has been called for in the wake of evidence of the medication's potentially dire side effects.

The Health Consumers Council of Western Australia says the state Health Department should review a random sample of cases of a Perth pediatrician who had been found to have authorised prescriptions for stimulant drugs to more than 2000 children over a 17-month period.

"We know that doctors can be influenced by the involvement of pharmaceutical companies," senior advocate Maxine Drake said. "It can also be that children are being taken by their parents to this doctor because they are hearing about the prescriptions.

"The medical profession is very used to self-regulation."

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:36 AM 0 comments

You child can be labelled "ADHD" based on a certain list of behaviors. Yet, how can you be sure that your child really has a permanent, incurable brain disorder? Could the symptoms of ADHD indicate something else?

[More:]

"Doctor, my child doesn't sleep well. He stays busy all the time. One minute he's happy, the next he's crying. He still has some bed-wetting problems and complains about headaches and stomach pains. He's a finicky eater. His teacher says he's restless and doesn't concentrate well, particularly after lunch. When the other students are ready to take their nap, he's just buzzing all over the place and rather unruly."

According to some of the "experts" in the fields of child behavior and "mental illness", this child obviously has a brain chemical imbalance, which causes Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). As the parent of this child, you may be told that your child's only hope is to take mind-altering drugs to control this behavior. The diagnosis of ADHD can be made in a psychiatrist's or physician's office, without any laboratory tests or any objective testing at all. Even a school psychologist can diagnose ADHD. The list of symptoms is all that's required.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:31 AM 0 comments

About four-million American kids struggle every day with ADHD. The disorder makes it difficult for them to focus and learn. Now, some schools are trying a new, simple approach -- and it’s changing lives.

It's not the typical scene at an American middle school.

Kids -- all with ADHD -- are practicing transcendental meditation, or T-M.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:30 AM 0 comments

IS Ritalin the new corporal punishment? Are the types of children who were getting the strap when I was at school 25 years ago, now being given drugs instead?

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:29 AM 0 comments

A freedom of information request has revealed hundreds of reports of side-effects from ADHD drugs dexamphetamine and Ritalin, worrying Aussie parents.

Dexamphetamine and Ritalin were hailed as wonder drugs for an epidemic of hyperactivity sweeping Australia.

But some blame the chemical cures for ADHD for a host of chilling side effects, even death.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:28 AM 0 comments

Most people develop osteoporosis to some extent by the time they get to 65+.
Yet how often do doctors diagnose calcium deficiency and recommend
supplements?

One very noticeable calcium deficiency symptom I've noticed is teeth
sensitive to touch such as when being brushed.
Another calcium deficiency symptom is gum disease, receding gums, gum
pockets, bleeding gums.

Another calcium deficiency symptom is mental ill ease and anxiety.

Of course, correcting calcium deficiency is only part of the equation.
Calcium needs to be kept in balance with magnesium, phosphorus, and other
minerals which begin to show up if large doses of calcium are taken for a
prolonged period.

But the solution isn't to cut down on calcium but increase supporting
minerals.

Carole
http://www.cellsalts.net

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:21 AM 0 comments

The US Department of Justice (DoJ) and the office of the White House Counsel are preparing a draft document laying out the President's wartime authority to remain in office past 2008, The Register has learned.

The scheme is described as an emergency "continuity presidency," made necessary by the extraordinary circumstances and unique challenges of protecting the United States from the threat of international terrorism.

# posted by madthumbs @ 11:16 AM 0 comments